Swift repeats this distinction between what he considers to be the chief and the secondary elements in literary excellence, almost in the same words, on p. 211, 1. 22. At first sight it would seem scarcely to agree with the position he takes up in the dispute between Ancients and Moderns. It might appear that 'method and art' (or 'skill' as he puts it on p. 211) were the qualities which, in the opinion of those whose sympathies would naturally lie with the Ancients, were the prime sources of 'duration,' instead of being sharply distinguished from it. But so to interpret Swift's words would be to import the terms of more recent criticism into the discussions of Swift's day. By 'method and art' Swift means pedantic rules and artificiality; and by 'duration' he means rather the breadth of treatment which gives to literary work an enduring interest as distinguished from topics of the day, than merely the continued respect and admiration which may be secured by artistic excellence.
Swift was really fighting the battle of literary art against the whims and caprices of a spurious originality which despises rule, and claims admiration for its laboured ingenuity and its obscurity. But no man was ever less prone to allow rules of art to become a burden or to fetter his liberty.
The commonplace description of the Tale of a Tub and the Battle of the Books as incidents in a forgotten controversy, might lead us to suppose that Swift had erred against his own rule. But we can never understand either book until we have learned fully that they deal with subjects as fresh in their interest for us to-day as when the books were written. The accidental contemporary phases of the struggle may have passed; but it is as much with us as ever, and must remain with us as long as the fundamental differences of taste, education, and temperament endure amongst men.