Only in this island of Luggnagg the
appetite for living was not so eager, from the continual example of
the struldbrugs before their eyes.
"That the system of living contrived by me, was unreasonable and
unjust; because it supposed a perpetuity of youth, health, and
vigour, which no man could be so foolish to hope, however
extravagant he may be in his wishes. That the question therefore
was not, whether a man would choose to be always in the prime of
youth, attended with prosperity and health; but how he would pass a
perpetual life under all the usual disadvantages which old age
brings along with it. For although few men will avow their desires
of being immortal, upon such hard conditions, yet in the two
kingdoms before mentioned, of Balnibarbi and Japan, he observed
that every man desired to put off death some time longer, let it
approach ever so late: and he rarely heard of any man who died
willingly, except he were incited by the extremity of grief or
torture. And he appealed to me, whether in those countries I had
travelled, as well as my own, I had not observed the same general
disposition.
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