Life & Wisdom Quote by Jonathan Swift

Power, for Swift, is a moral trap disguised as a prize. The line slices through the old fantasy that authority automatically ennobles its owner; he treats power as ethically inert at best, corrosive at worst. Calling it "no blessing in itself" is a cold bath for the ego. It denies rulers, bishops, and petty officials the comforting story that their status is proof of virtue. Swift, a cleric and a master satirist, knew how often power cloaks appetite in the language of duty.

The phrase "except when" is the hinge: power gets its only moral alibi through a specific, limited function. Not to enrich a nation, not to impose order, not to win glory, but to "protect the innocent". That word "innocent" is doing heavy work. It implies vulnerability, asymmetry, and a standard of care that indicts most real governance, which tends to protect the connected and punish the exposed. Swift's subtext is a dare: if you insist on wielding power, justify it by whom it shelters, not whom it elevates.

Context matters: Swift wrote amid the blunt machinery of British and Irish politics, where patronage, punitive laws, and colonial management were everyday realities. His satire ("A Modest Proposal" especially) thrives on showing how institutions can speak in civilized tones while committing barbarism. This sentence is the serious moral core beneath the jokes: power is only as legitimate as its restraint, and its only credible halo is the harm it prevents.