Summary of Gulliver’s Travels Part 4 Chapter 7

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Summary of Gulliver’s Travels Part 4 Chapter 7

Summary of Gulliver’s Travels Part 4 Chapter 7

The narrator’s great love of his native country is expressed. His master’s observations upon the constitution and administration of England, as described by the narrator, with parallel cases and comparisons. His master’s observations upon human nature are chronicled.

Impressed by the virtues of the Houyhnhnms, Gulliver decided to tell, freely and truthfully, as much as he could, about human beings. Gulliver had started to hate the Yahoos and had come to venerate the Houyhnhnms. He hoped to be able to stay among them for the rest of his life. Convinced by ‘a person of so acute a judgment’ as his master, who daily convinced Gulliver of a thousand faults in him that he had not perceived earlier, Gulliver sees in himself flaws that he had never considered infirmities. His master told him that he had considered all of Gulliver’s claims about his home country and had come to the conclusion that Gulliver’s people were not as different from the Yahoos as they might at first have seemed.

Gulliver’s Master reached the conclusion that the European Yahoos had only enough intelligence to make their natural corruption worse and to acquire new ones, which nature had not given them. By clipping their nails, cutting their hair, and generally growing soft, they had also deprived themselves of the natural protection the Yahoos of the Houyhnhnm Land had. Even though there were outward differences between Gulliver and the Yahoos in the land of the Houyhnhnms, their essential natures were the same: they hated each other more than other animals did and fought without a cause. The Yahoos of the land of the Houyhnhnms also loved shiny rocks, which none of the Houyhnhnms understood, but which seemed to be a trait common to the whole human species.

Yahoos were the only animals in Houyhnhnm land who fell sick. Gulliver’s Master did admit that European Yahoos had a lot more art than their local Yahoos. Still, their natures seemed essentially identical: for example, Yahoos of the land of the Houyhnhnm also liked to choose a leader, usually the weakest and the ugliest of the group. He also noted that Yahoos were unique in having both males and females fighting equally violently with one another. Gulliver’s Master continued that Yahoos loved filth more than most animals. Also, Yahoos sometimes fell into bad moods or thought they were sick for no reason; the only cure for this hypochondria was hard work.

He described all the flaws of the Yahoos, principally detailing their greed and selfishness. He admitted that Gulliver’s humans had different systems of learning, law, government and art but said that their natures were not different from those of the Yahoos.