In Brobdingnag (Book II), Gulliver is still an ordinary moral man, but the Brobdingnagians are moral giant men. Certainly they are not perfect, but their moral superiority is as great to Gulliver as is their physical size. In his loyalty to England, we see that Gulliver is, in deed, a very proud man and one who accepts the madness and malice of British politics and society as the natural and normal standard. For the first time, we see Gulliver as the hypocrite — he lies to the Brobdingnagian king in order to conceal what is despicable about his native England. Gulliver's moral height can never reach that of the Brobdingnagians. Swift reinforces the idea of the giant's moral superiority by having Gulliver identify the English with the Lilliputians. This association also makes Gulliver ridiculous. It demonstrates the folly and self-deception that Gulliver practices in identifying himself with the moral giants. Gulliver's pride is at the root of his trouble. Swift dramatizes this with the mirror Gulliver cannot bear to look into.
In Book IV, Gulliver represents the middle ground between pure reason (as embodied by the Houyhnhnms) and pure animalism (as embodied by the depraved Yahoos), yet Gulliver's pride refuses to allow him to recognize the Yahoo aspects in himself. Therefore, he identifies himself with the Houyhnhnms and, in fact, tries to become one. But the horses are alien to Gulliver; yet Gulliver thinks of the Yahoos as alien and animal. Separating himself from his naturally depraved cousins, the Yahoos, Gulliver also separates himself from the European Yahoos. He is near to madness — because of pride. Gulliver has "reasoned" himself into rejecting his species and his nature: Gulliver is virtually a madman. His attitudes when he arrives in London make him a source of derision, for Gulliver seeks to change his basic nature by thinking; reason becomes the sole guide of his life.
In the end, Gulliver is still trying to acclimate himself to life as — and among — the Yahoos. Concluding, he confesses that he could be reconciled to the English Yahoos "if they would be content with those Vices and Follies only which Nature hath entitled them to. I am not in the least provoked at the sight of a Lawyer, a Pick-pocket, a Colonel, a Fool, a Lord, a Gamster, a Politician, a Whoremunger, a Physician, . . . or the like: This is all according to the due Course of Things: but, when I behold a Lump of Deformity, and Diseases both in Body and Mind, smitten with Pride, it immediately breaks all the Measures of my patience."
