“Underneath is interred the mortal remains of Mrs. Hester Johnson, better known to the world by the name of Stella, under which she was celebrated in the writings of Dr. Jonathan Swift, dean of this cathedral.
“She was a person of extraordinary endowments and accomplishments in body, mind, and behavior; justly admired and respected by all who knew her on account of her many eminent virtues, as well as for her great natural and acquired perfections.
“She died Jan. 27, 1727, in the forty-sixth year of her age, and by her will bequeathed £1,000 toward the support of the hospital founded in this city by Dr. Steevens.”
Although Swift did his best work after Stella’s death, he was never himself again. He became sour, morose, and misanthropic. His soul burned itself out with remorse. The last four years of his life were inexpressibly sad, and the retribution he deserved came from inward rather than outward causes. He was harassed by periodical attacks of acute dementia, to which his wonderful brain gradually yielded, and before his death he became an utter imbecile. He seemed to anticipate and prepare himself for such a fate, because among his papers was found his will, in which he bequeathed his entire estate to found an asylum for just such creatures as he himself became. He prepared his own epitaph, which reads as follows:
“Hic Depositum est Corpus.
Jonathan Swift, S.T.P.
Hujus, ecclesiae cathedrae decani ubi saeva
Indignatio ulterius cor lacerare nequit.
Abi viator, et imitare, si poteris,
Strenuum pro virili libertatis vindiceim.”