SECTION I.

A PHILOSOPHICAL DICTIONARY

VOLUME IX

By

VOLTAIRE

EDITION DE LA PACIFICATION

THE WORKS OF VOLTAIRE

A CONTEMPORARY VERSION

With Notes by Tobias Smollett, Revised and Modernized

New Translations by William F. Fleming, and an

Introduction by Oliver H.G. Leigh

A CRITIQUE AND BIOGRAPHY

BY

THE RT. HON. JOHN MORLEY

FORTY-THREE VOLUMES

One hundred and sixty-eight designs, comprising reproductions

of rare old engravings, steel plates, photogravures,

and curious fac-similes

VOLUME XIII

E.R. DuMONT

PARIS : LONDON : NEW YORK : CHICAGO

1901

_The WORKS of VOLTAIRE_

_"Between two servants of Humanity, who appeared eighteen hundred

years apart, there is a mysterious relation. * * * * Let us say it

with a sentiment of profound respect: JESUS WEPT: VOLTAIRE SMILED.

Of that divine tear and of that human smile is composed the

sweetness of the present civilization."_

_VICTOR HUGO._

LIST OF PLATES--VOL. IX

THE HOUDON BUST--_Frontispiece_

GENIUS INSPIRING THE MUSES

SAMSON DESTROYING THE TEMPLE

JOHN LOCKE

[Illustration: Voltaire.]

* * * * *

VOLTAIRE

A PHILOSOPHICAL DICTIONARY

IN TEN VOLUMES

VOL. IX.

PROPERTY--STATES-GENERAL

* * * * *

PROPERTY.

"Liberty and property" is the great national cry of the English. It is

certainly better than "St. George and my right," or "St. Denis and

Montjoie"; it is the cry of nature. From Switzerland to China the

peasants are the real occupiers of the land. The right of conquest alone

has, in some countries, deprived men of a right so natural.

The general advantage or good of a nation is that of the sovereign, of

the magistrate, and of the people, both in peace and war. Is this

possession of lands by the peasantry equally conducive to the prosperity

of the throne and the people in all periods and circumstances? In order

to its being the most beneficial system for the throne, it must be that

which produces the most considerable revenue, and the most numerous and

powerful army.

We must inquire, therefore, whether this principle or plan tends clearly

to increase commerce and population. It is certain that the possessor of

an estate will cultivate his own inheritance better than that of

another. The spirit of property doubles a man's strength. He labors for

himself and his family both with more vigor and pleasure than he would

for a master. The slave, who is in the power of another, has but little

inclination for marriage; he often shudders even at the thought of

producing slaves like himself. His industry is damped; his soul is

brutalized; and his strength is never exercised in its full energy and

elasticity. The possessor of property, on the contrary, desires a wife

to share his happiness, and children to assist in his labors. His wife

and children constitute his wealth. The estate of such a cultivator,

under the hands of an active and willing family, may become ten times

more productive than it was before. The general commerce will be

increased. The treasure of the prince will accumulate. The country will

supply more soldiers. It is clear, therefore, that the system is

beneficial to the prince. Poland would be thrice as populous and wealthy

as it is at present if the peasants were not slaves.

Nor is the system less beneficial to the great landlords. If we suppose

one of these to possess ten thousand acres of land cultivated by serfs,

these ten thousand acres will produce him but a very scanty revenue,

which will be frequently absorbed in repairs, and reduced to nothing by

the irregularity and severity of the seasons. What will he in fact be,

although his estates may be vastly more extensive than we have

mentioned, if at the same time they are unproductive? He will be merely

the possessor of an immense solitude. He will never be really rich but

in proportion as his vassals are so; his prosperity depends on theirs.

If this prosperity advances so far as to render the land too populous;

if land is wanting to employ the labor of so many industrious hands--as

hands in the first instance were wanting to cultivate the land--then the

superfluity of necessary laborers will flow off into cities and

seaports, into manufactories and armies. Population will have produced

this decided benefit, and the possession of the lands by the real

cultivators, under payment of a rent which enriches the landlords, will

have been the cause of this increase of population.

There is another species of property not less beneficial; it is that

which is freed from payment of rent altogether, and which is liable only

to those general imposts which are levied by the sovereign for the

support and benefit of the state. It is this property which has

contributed in a particular manner to the wealth of England, of France,

and the free cities of Germany. The sovereigns who thus enfranchised the

lands which constituted their domains, derived, in the first instance,

vast advantage from so doing by the franchises which they disposed of

being eagerly purchased at high prices; and they derive from it, even at

the present day, a greater advantage still, especially in France and

England, by the progress of industry and commerce.

England furnished a grand example to the sixteenth century by

enfranchising the lands possessed by the church and the monks. Nothing

could be more odious and nothing more pernicious than the before

prevailing practice of men, who had voluntarily bound themselves, by the

rules of their order, to a life of humility and poverty, becoming

complete masters of the very finest estates in the kingdom, and treating

their brethren of mankind as mere useful animals, as no better than

beasts to bear their burdens. The state and opulence of this small

number of priests degraded human nature; their appropriated and

accumulated wealth impoverished the rest of the kingdom. The abuse was

destroyed, and England became rich.

In all the rest of Europe commerce has never flourished; the arts have

never attained estimation and honor, and cities have never advanced both

in extent and embellishment, except when the serfs of the Crown and the

Church held their lands in property. And it is deserving of attentive

remark that if the Church thus lost rights, which in fact never truly

belonged to it, the Crown gained an extension of its legitimate rights;

for the Church, whose first obligation and professed principle it is to

imitate its great legislator in humility and poverty, was not originally

instituted to fatten and aggrandize itself upon the fruit of the labors

of mankind; and the sovereign, who is the representative of the State,

is bound to manage with economy, the produce of that same labor for the

good of the State itself, and for the splendor of the throne. In every

country where the people labor for the Church, the State is poor; but

wherever they labor for themselves and the sovereign, the State is rich.

It is in these circumstances that commerce everywhere extends its

branches. The mercantile navy becomes a school for the warlike navy.

Great commercial companies are formed. The sovereign finds in periods of

difficulty and danger resources before unknown. Accordingly, in the

Austrian states, in England, and in France, we see the prince easily

borrowing from his subjects a hundred times more than he could obtain by

force while the people were bent down to the earth in slavery.

All the peasants will not be rich, nor is it necessary that they should

be so. The State requires men who possess nothing but strength and good

will. Even such, however, who appear to many as the very outcasts of

fortune, will participate in the prosperity of the rest. They will be

free to dispose of their labor at the best market, and this freedom will

be an effective substitute for property. The assured hope of adequate

wages will support their spirits, and they will bring up their families

in their own laborious and serviceable occupations with success, and

even with gayety. It is this class, so despised by the great and

opulent, that constitutes, be it remembered, the nursery for soldiers.

Thus, from kings to shepherds, from the sceptre to the scythe, all is

animation and prosperity, and the principle in question gives new force

to every exertion.

After having ascertained whether it is beneficial to a State that the

cultivators should be proprietors, it remains to be shown how far this

principle may be properly carried. It has happened, in more kingdoms

than one, that the emancipated serf has attained such wealth by his

skill and industry as has enabled him to occupy the station of his

former masters, who have become reduced and impoverished by their

luxury. He has purchased their lands and assumed their titles; the old

noblesse have been degraded, and the new have been only envied and

despised. Everything has been thrown into confusion. Those nations which

have permitted such usurpations, have been the sport and scorn of such

as have secured themselves against an evil so baneful. The errors of one

government may become a lesson for others. They profit by its wise and

salutary institutions; they may avoid the evil it has incurred through

those of an opposite tendency.

It is so easy to oppose the restrictions of law to the cupidity and

arrogance of upstart proprietors, to fix the extent of lands which

wealthy plebeians may be allowed to purchase, to prevent their

acquisition of large seigniorial property and privileges, that a firm

and wise government can never have cause to repent of having

enfranchised servitude and enriched indigence. A good is never

productive of evil but when it is carried to a culpable excess, in which

case it completely ceases to be a good. The examples of other nations

supply a warning; and on this principle it is easy to explain why those

communities, which have most recently attained civilization and regular

government, frequently surpass the masters from whom they drew their

lessons.

PROPHECIES.

SECTION I.

This word, in its ordinary acceptation, signifies prediction of the

future. It is in this sense that Jesus declared to His disciples: "All

things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses, and in

the Prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning Me. Then opened He their

understanding that they might understand the Scriptures."

We shall feel the indispensable necessity of having our minds opened to

comprehend the prophecies, if we reflect that the Jews, who were the

depositories of them, could never recognize Jesus for the Messiah, and

that for eighteen centuries our theologians have disputed with them to

fix the sense of some which they endeavor to apply to Jesus. Such is

that of Jacob--"The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver

from between his feet, until Shiloh come." That of Moses--"The Lord thy

God will raise up unto thee a prophet like unto me from the nations and

from thy brethren; unto Him shall ye hearken." That of Isaiah--"Behold a

virgin shall conceive and bring forth a son, and shall call his name

Immanuel." That of Daniel--"Seventy weeks have been determined in favor

of thy people," etc. But our object here is not to enter into

theological detail.

Let us merely observe what is said in the Acts of the Apostles, that in

giving a successor to Judas, and on other occasions, they acted

expressly to accomplish prophecies; but the apostles themselves

sometimes quote such as are not found in the Jewish writings; such is

that alleged by St. Matthew: "And He came and dwelt in a city called

Nazareth, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets,

He shall be called a Nazarene."

St. Jude, in his epistle, also quotes a prophecy from the book of

"Enoch," which is apocryphal; and the author of the imperfect work on

St. Matthew, speaking of the star seen in the East by the Magi,

expresses himself in these terms: "It is related to me on the evidence

of I know not what writing, which is not authentic, but which far from

destroying faith encourages it, that there was a nation on the borders

of the eastern ocean which possessed a book that bears the name of Seth,

in which the star that appeared to the Magi is spoken of, and the

presents which these Magi offered to the Son of God. This nation,

instructed by the book in question, chose twelve of the most religious

persons amongst them, and charged them with the care of observing

whenever this star should appear. When any of them died, they

substituted one of their sons or relations. They were called magi in

their tongue, because they served God in silence and with a low voice.

"These Magi went every year, after the corn harvest, to a mountain in

their country, which they called the Mount of Victory, and which is very

agreeable on account of the fountains that water and the trees which

cover it. There is also a cistern dug in the rock, and after having

there washed and purified themselves, they offered sacrifices and prayed

to God in silence for three days.

"They had not continued this pious practice for many generations, when

the happy star descended on their mountain. They saw in it the figure of

a little child, on which there appeared that of the cross. It spoke to

them and told them to go to Judæa. They immediately departed, the star

always going before them, and were two days on the road."

This prophecy of the book of Seth resembles that of Zorodascht or

Zoroaster, except that the figure seen in his star was that of a young

virgin, and Zoroaster says not that there was a cross on her. This

prophecy, quoted in the "Gospel of the Infancy," is thus related by

Abulpharagius: "Zoroaster, the master of the Magi, instructed the

Persians of the future manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ, and

commanded them to offer Him presents when He was born. He warned them

that in future times a virgin should conceive without the operation of

any man, and that when she brought her Son into the world, a star should

appear which would shine at noonday, in the midst of which they would

see the figure of a young virgin. 'You, my children,' adds Zoroaster,

'will see it before all nations. When, therefore, you see this star

appear, go where it will conduct you. Adore this dawning child; offer it

presents, for it is the _word_ which created heaven.'"

The accomplishment of this prophecy is related in Pliny's "Natural

History"; but besides that the appearance of the star should have

preceded the birth of Jesus by about forty years, this passage seems

very suspicious to scholars, and is not the first nor only one which

might have been interpolated in favor of Christianity. This is the exact

account of it: "There appeared at Rome for seven days a comet so

brilliant that the sight of it could scarcely be supported; in the

middle of it a god was perceived under the human form; they took it for

the soul of Julius Cæsar, who had just died, and adored it in a

particular temple."

M. Assermany, in his "Eastern Library," also speaks of a book of

Solomon, archbishop of Bassora, entitled "The Bee," in which there is a

chapter on this prediction of Zoroaster. Hornius, who doubted not its

authenticity, has pretended that Zoroaster was Balaam, and that was very

likely, because Origen, in his first book against Celsus, says that the

Magi had no doubt of the prophecies of Balaam, of which these words are

found in Numbers: "There shall come a star out of Jacob, and a sceptre

shall rise out of Israel." But Balaam was no more a Jew than Zoroaster,

since he said himself that he came from Aram--from the mountains of the

East.

Besides, St. Paul speaks expressly to Titus of a Cretan prophet, and St.

Clement of Alexandria acknowledged that God, wishing to save the Jews,

gave them prophets; with the same motive, He ever created the most

excellent men of Greece; those who were the most proper to receive His

grace, He separated from the vulgar, to be prophets of the Greeks, in

order to instruct them in their own tongue. "Has not Plato," he further

says, "in some manner predicted the plan of salvation, when in the

second book of his 'Republic,' he has imitated this expression of

Scripture: 'Let us separate ourselves from the Just, for he incommodes

us'; and he expresses himself in these terms: 'The Just shall be beaten

with rods, His eyes shall be put out, and after suffering all sorts of

evils, He shall at last be crucified.'"

St. Clement might have added, that if Jesus Christ's eyes were not put

out, notwithstanding the prophecy, neither were His bones broken, though

it is said in a psalm: "While they break My bones, My enemies who

persecute Me overwhelm Me with their reproaches." On the contrary, St.

John says positively that the soldiers broke the legs of two others who

were crucified with Him, but they broke not those of Jesus, that the

Scripture might be fulfilled: "A bone of Him shall not be broken."

This Scripture, quoted by St. John, extended to the letter of the

paschal lamb, which ought to be eaten by the Israelites; but John the

Baptist having called Jesus the Lamb of God, not only was the

application of it given to Him, but it is even pretended that His death

was predicted by Confucius. Spizeli quotes the history of China by

Maitinus, in which it is related that in the thirty-ninth year of the

reign of King-hi, some hunters outside the gates of the town killed a

rare animal which the Chinese called kilin, that is to say, the Lamb of

God. At this news, Confucius struck his breast, sighed profoundly, and

exclaimed more than once: "Kilin, who has said that thou art come?" He

added: "My doctrine draws to an end; it will no longer be of use, since

you will appear."

Another prophecy of the same Confucius is also found in his second book,

which is applied equally to Jesus, though He is not designated under the

name of the Lamb of God. This is it: We need not fear but that when the

expected Holy One shall come, all the honor will be rendered to His

virtue which is due to it. His works will be conformable to the laws of

heaven and earth.

These contradictory prophecies found in the Jewish books seem to excuse

their obstinacy, and give good reason for the embarrassment of our

theologians in their controversy with them. Further, those which we are

about to relate of other people, prove that the author of Numbers, the

apostles and fathers, recognized prophets in all nations. The Arabs

also pretend this, who reckon a hundred and eighty thousand prophets

from the creation of the world to Mahomet, and believe that each of them

was sent to a particular nation. We shall speak of prophetesses in the

article on "Sibyls."

SECTION II.

Prophets still exist: we had two at the Bicêtre in 1723, both calling

themselves Elias. They were whipped; which put it out of all doubt.

Before the prophets of Cévennes, who fired off their guns from behind

hedges in the name of the Lord in 1704, Holland had the famous Peter

Jurieu, who published the "Accomplishment of the Prophecies." But that

Holland may not be too proud, he was born in France, in a little town

called Mer, near Orleans. However, it must be confessed that it was at

Rotterdam alone that God called him to prophesy.

This Jurieu, like many others, saw clearly that the pope was the beast

in the "Apocalypse," that he held "_poculum aureum plenum

abominationum_," the golden cup full of abominations; that the four

first letters of these four Latin words formed the word papa; that

consequently his reign was about to finish; that the Jews would re-enter

Jerusalem; that they would reign over the whole world during a thousand

years; after which would come the Antichrist; finally, Jesus seated on a

cloud would judge the quick and the dead.

Jurieu prophesies expressly that the time of the great revolution and

the entire fall of papistry "will fall justly in the year 1689, which I

hold," says he, "to be the time of the apocalyptic vintage, for the two

witnesses will revive at this time; after which, France will break with

the pope before the end of this century, or at the commencement of the

next, and the rest of the anti-Christian empire will be everywhere

abolished."

The disjunctive particle "or," that sign of doubt, is not in the manner

of an adroit man. A prophet should not hesitate; he may be obscure, but

he ought to be sure of his fact.

The revolution in papistry not happening in 1689, as Peter Jurieu

predicted, he quickly published a new edition, in which he assured the

public that it would be in 1690; and, what is more astonishing, this

edition was immediately followed by another. It would have been very

beneficial if Bayle's "Dictionary" had had such a run in the first

instance; the works of the latter have, however, remained, while those

of Peter Jurieu are not even to be found by the side of Nostradamus.

All was not left to a single prophet. An English Presbyterian, who

studied at Utrecht, combated all which Jurieu said on the seven vials

and seven trumpets of the Apocalypse, on the reign of a thousand years,

the conversion of the Jews, and even on Antichrist. Each supported

himself by the authority of Cocceius, Coterus, Drabicius, and Commenius,

great preceding prophets, and by the prophetess Christina. The two

champions confined themselves to writing; we hoped they would give each

other blows, as Zedekiah smacked the face of Micaiah, saying: "Which way

went the spirit of the Lord from my hand to thy cheek?" or literally:

"How has the spirit passed from thee to me?" The public had not this

satisfaction, which is a great pity.

SECTION III.

It belongs to the infallible church alone to fix the true sense of

prophecies, for the Jews have always maintained, with their usual

obstinacy, that no prophecy could regard Jesus Christ; and the Fathers

of the Church could not dispute with them with advantage, since, except

St. Ephrem, the great Origen, and St. Jerome, there was never any Father

of the Church who knew a word of Hebrew.

It is not until the ninth century that Raban the Moor, afterwards bishop

of Mayence, learned the Jewish language. His example was followed by

some others, and then they began disputing with the rabbi on the sense

of the prophecies.

Raban was astonished at the blasphemies which they uttered against our

Saviour; calling Him a bastard, impious son of Panther, and saying that

it is not permitted them to pray to God without cursing Jesus: "_Quod

nulla oratio posset apud Deum accepta esse nisi in ea Dominum nostrum

Jesum Christum maledicant. Confitentes eum esse impium et filium impii,

id est, nescio cujus æthnici quern nominant Panthera, a quo dicunt

matrem Domini adulteratam._"

These horrible profanations are found in several places in the "Talmud,"

in the books of Nizachon, in the dispute of Rittangel, in those of

Jechiel and Nachmanides, entitled the "Bulwark of Faith," and above all

in the abominable work of the Toldos Jeschut. It is particularly in the

"Bulwark of Faith" of the Rabbin Isaac, that they interpret all the

prophecies which announce Jesus Christ by applying them to other

persons.

We are there assured that the Trinity is not alluded to in any Hebrew

book, and that there is not found in them the slightest trace of our

holy religion. On the contrary, they point out a hundred passages,

which, according to them, assert that the Mosaic law should eternally

remain.

The famous passage which should confound the Jews, and make the

Christian religion triumph in the opinion of all our great theologians,

is that of Isaiah: "Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and

shall call his name Immanuel. Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may

know how to refuse the evil, and choose the good. For before the child

shall know how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land that

thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings. And it shall come to

pass in that day, that the Lord shall whistle for the flies that are in

the brooks of Egypt, and for the bees that are in the land of Assyria.

In the same day shall the Lord shave with a razor that is hired,

namely, by them beyond the river, by the king of Assyria, the head and

the hair of the genitals, and he will also consume the beard.

"Moreover, the Lord said unto me, take thee a great roll, and write

in it with a man's pen concerning Maher-shalal-hash-baz. And I took

unto me faithful witnesses to record, Uriah the priest, and Zachariah

the son of Jeberechiah. And I went in unto the prophetess; and

she conceived and bare a son; then said the Lord to me, call his name

Maher-shalal-hash-baz. For before the child shall have knowledge to

cry my father and my mother, the riches of Damascus, and the spoil of

Samaria, shall be taken away before the king of Assyria."

The Rabbin Isaac affirms, with all the other doctors of his law, that

the Hebrew word "alma" sometimes signifies a virgin and sometimes a

married woman; that Ruth is called "alma" when she was a mother; that

even an adulteress is sometimes called "alma"; that nobody is meant here

but the wife of the prophet Isaiah; that her son was not called

Immanuel, but Maher-shalal-hash-baz; that when this son should eat honey

and butter, the two kings who besieged Jerusalem would be driven from

the country, etc.

Thus these blind interpreters of their own religion, and their own

language, combated with the Church, and obstinately maintained, that

this prophecy cannot in any manner regard Jesus Christ. We have a

thousand times refuted their explication in our modern languages. We

have employed force, gibbets, racks, and flames; yet they will not give

up.

"He has borne our ills, he has sustained our griefs, and we have beheld

him afflicted with sores, stricken by God, and afflicted." However

striking this prediction may appear to us, these obstinate Jews say that

it has no relationship to Jesus Christ, and that it can only regard the

prophets who were persecuted for the sins of the people.

"And behold my servant shall prosper, shall be honored, and raised very

high." They say, further, that the foregoing passage regards not Jesus

Christ but David; that this king really did prosper, but that Jesus,

whom they deny, did not prosper. "Behold I will make a new pact with the

house of Israel, and with the house of Judah." They say that this

passage signifies not, according to the letter and the sense, anything

more than--I will renew my covenant with Judah and with Israel. However,

this pact has not been renewed; and they cannot make a worse bargain

than they have made. No matter, they are obstinate.

"But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands

of Judah, yet out of thee shall come forth a ruler in Israel; whose

goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting."

They dare to deny that this prophecy applies to Jesus Christ. They say

that it is evident that Micah speaks of some native captain of

Bethlehem, who shall gain some advantage in the war against the

Babylonians: for the moment after he speaks of the history of Babylon,

and of the seven captains who elected Darius. And if we demonstrate that

he treated of the Messiah, they still will not agree.

The Jews are grossly deceived in Judah, who should be a lion, and who

has only been an ass under the Persians, Alexander, the Seleucides,

Ptolemys, Romans, Arabs, and Turks.

They know not what is understood by the Shiloh, and by the rod, and the

thigh of Judah. The rod has been in Judæa but a very short time. They

say miserable things; but the Abbé Houteville says not much more with

his phrases, his neologism, and oratorical eloquence; a writer who

always puts words in the place of things, and who proposes very

difficult objections merely to reply to them by frothy discourse, or

idle words!

All this is, therefore, labor in vain; and when the French abbé would

make a still larger book, when he would add to the five or six thousand

volumes which we have on the subject, we shall only be more fatigued,

without advancing a single step.

We are, therefore, plunged in a chaos which it is impossible for the

weakness of the human mind to set in order. Once more, we have need of a

church which judges without appeal. For in fact, if a Chinese, a Tartar,

or an African, reduced to the misfortune of having only good sense, read

all these prophecies, it would be impossible for him to apply them to

Jesus Christ, the Jews, or to anyone else. He would be in astonishment

and uncertainty, would conceive nothing, and would not have a single

distinct idea. He could not take a step in this abyss without a guide.

With this guide, he arrives not only at the sanctuary of virtue, but at

good canon-ships, at large commanderies, opulent abbeys, the crosiered

and mitred abbots of which are called monseigneur by his monks and

peasants, and to bishoprics which give the title of prince. In a word,

he enjoys earth, and is sure of possessing heaven.

PROPHETS.

The prophet Jurieu was hissed; the prophets of the Cévennes were hanged

or racked; the prophets who went from Languedoc and Dauphiny to London

were put in the pillory; the Anabaptist prophets were condemned to

various modes and degrees of punishment; and the prophet Savonarola was

baked at Florence. If, in connection with these, we may advert to the

case of the genuine Jewish prophets, we shall perceive their destiny to

have been no less unfortunate; the greatest prophet among the Jews, St.

John the Baptist, was beheaded.

Zachariah is stated to have been assassinated; but, happily, this is not

absolutely proved. The prophet Jeddo, or Addo, who was sent to Bethel

under the injunction neither to eat nor drink, having unfortunately

tasted a morsel of bread, was devoured in his turn by a lion; and his

bones were found on the highway between the lion and his ass. Jonah was

swallowed by a fish. He did not, it is true, remain in the fish's

stomach more than three days and three nights; even this, however, was

passing threescore and twelve hours very uncomfortably.

Habakkuk was transported through the air, suspended by the hair of his

head, to Babylon; this was not a fatal or permanent calamity, certainly;

but it must have been an exceedingly uncomfortable method of travelling.

A man could not help suffering a great deal by being suspended by his

hair during a journey of three hundred miles. I certainly should have

preferred a pair of wings, or the mare Borak, or the Hippogriffe.

Micaiah, the son of Imla, saw the Lord seated on His throne, surrounded

by His army of celestial spirits; and the Lord having inquired who could

be found to go and deceive King Ahab, a demon volunteered for that

purpose, and was accordingly charged with the commission; and Micaiah,

on the part of the Lord, gave King Ahab an account of this celestial

adventure. He was rewarded for this communication by a tremendous blow

on his face from the hand of the prophet Zedekiah, and by being shut up

for some days in a dungeon. His punishment might undoubtedly have been

more severe; but still, it is unpleasant and painful enough for a man

who knows and feels himself divinely inspired to be knocked about in so

coarse and vulgar a manner, and confined in a damp and dirty hole of a

prison.

It is believed that King Amaziah had the teeth of the prophet Amos

pulled out to prevent him from speaking; not that a person without teeth

is absolutely incapable of speaking, as we see many toothless old ladies

as loquacious and chattering as ever; but a prophecy should be uttered

with great distinctness; and a toothless prophet is never listened to

with the respect due to his character.

Baruch experienced various persecutions. Ezekiel was stoned by the

companions of his slavery. It is not ascertained whether Jeremiah was

stoned or sawed asunder. Isaiah is considered as having been

incontestably sawed to death by order of Manasseh, king of Judah.

It cannot be denied, that the occupation of a prophet is exceedingly

irksome and dangerous. For one who, like Elijah, sets off on his tour

among the planets in a chariot of light, drawn by four white horses,

there are a hundred who travel on foot, and are obliged to beg their

subsistence from door to door. They may be compared to Homer, who, we

are told, was reduced to be a mendicant in the same seven cities which

afterwards sharply disputed with each other the honor of having given

him birth. His commentators have attributed to him an infinity of

allegories which he never even thought of; and prophets have frequently

had the like honor conferred upon them. I by no means deny that there

may have existed elsewhere persons possessed of a knowledge of the

future. It is only requisite for a man to work up his soul to a high

state of excitation, according to the doctrine of one of our doughty

modern philosophers, who speculates upon boring the earth through to the

Antipodes, and curing the sick by covering them all over with

pitch-plaster.

The Jews possessed this faculty of exalting and exciting the soul to

such a degree that they saw every future event as clearly as possible;

only unfortunately, it is difficult to decide whether by Jerusalem they

always mean eternal life; whether Babylon means London or Paris;

whether, when they speak of a grand dinner, they really mean a fast, and

whether red wine means blood, and a red mantle faith, and a white mantle

charity. Indeed, the correct and complete understanding of the prophets

is the most arduous attainment of the human mind.

There is likewise a further difficulty with respect to the Jewish

prophets, which is, that many among them were Samaritan heretics. Hosea

was of the tribe of Issachar, which dwelt in the Samaritan territory,

and Elisha and Elijah were of the same tribe. But the objection is very

easily answered. We well know that "the wind bloweth where it listeth,"

and that grace lights on the most dry and barren, as well as on the most

fertile soil.

PROVIDENCE.

I was at the grate of the convent when Sister Fessue said to Sister

Confite: "Providence takes a visible care of me; you know how I love my

sparrow; he would have been dead if I had not said nine ave-marias to

obtain his cure. God has restored my sparrow to life; thanks to the Holy

Virgin."

A metaphysician said to her: "Sister, there is nothing so good as

ave-marias, especially when a girl pronounces them in Latin in the

suburbs of Paris; but I cannot believe that God has occupied Himself so

much with your sparrow, pretty as he is; I pray you to believe that He

has other matters to attend to. It is necessary for Him constantly to

superintend the course of sixteen planets and the rising of Saturn, in

the centre of which He has placed the sun, which is as large as a

million of our globes. He has also thousands and thousands of millions

of other suns, planets, and comets to govern. His immutable laws, and

His eternal arrangement, produce motion throughout nature; all is bound

to His throne by an infinite chain, of which no link can ever be put out

of place!" If certain ave-marias had caused the sparrow of Sister Fessue

to live an instant longer than it would naturally have lived, it would

have violated all the laws imposed from eternity by the Great Being; it

would have deranged the universe; a new world, a new God, and a new

order of existence would have been rendered unavoidable.

SISTER FESSUE.--What! do you think that God pays so little attention to

Sister Fessue?

METAPHYSICIAN.--I am sorry to inform you, that like myself you are but

an imperceptible link in the great chain; that your organs, those of

your sparrow, and my own, are destined to subsist a determinate number

of minutes in the suburbs of Paris.

SISTER FESSUE.--If so, I was predestined to say a certain number of

ave-marias.

METAPHYSICIAN.--Yes; but they have not obliged the Deity to prolong the

life of your sparrow beyond his term. It has been so ordered, that in

this convent at a certain hour you should pronounce, like a parrot,

certain words in a certain language which you do not understand; that

this bird, produced like yourself by the irresistible action of general

laws, having been sick, should get better; that you should imagine that

you had cured it, and that we should hold together this conversation.

SISTER FESSUE.--Sir, this discourse savors of heresy. My confessor, the

reverend Father de Menou, will infer that you do not believe in

Providence.

METAPHYSICIAN.--I believe in a general Providence, dear sister, which

has laid down from all eternity the law which governs all things, like

light from the sun; but I believe not that a particular Providence

changes the economy of the world for your sparrow or your cat.

SISTER FESSUE.--But suppose my confessor tells you, as he has told me,

that God changes His intentions every day in favor of the devout?

METAPHYSICIAN.--He would assert the greatest absurdity that a confessor

of girls could possibly utter to a being who thinks.

SISTER FESSUE.--My confessor absurd! Holy Virgin Mary!

METAPHYSICIAN.--I do not go so far as that. I only observe that he

cannot, by an enormously absurd assertion, justify the false principles

which he has instilled into you--possibly very adroitly--in order to

govern you.

SISTER FESSUE.--That observation merits reflection. I will think of it.

PURGATORY.

It is very singular that the Protestant churches agree in exclaiming

that purgatory was invented by the monks. It is true that they invented

the art of drawing money from the living by praying to God for the dead;

but purgatory existed before the monks.

It was Pope John XIV., say they, who, towards the middle of the tenth

century, instituted the feast of the dead. From that fact, however, I

only conclude that they were prayed for before; for if they then took

measures to pray for all, it is reasonable to believe that they had

previously prayed for some of them; in the same way as the feast of All

Saints was instituted, because the feast of many of them had been

previously celebrated. The difference between the feast of All Saints

and that of the dead, is, that in the first we invoke, and that in the

second we are invoked; in the former we commend ourselves to the

blessed, and in the second the unblessed commend themselves to us.

The most ignorant writers know, that this feast was first instituted at

Cluny, which was then a territory belonging to the German Empire. Is it

necessary to repeat, "that St. Odilon, abbot of Cluny, was accustomed to

deliver many souls from purgatory by his masses and his prayers; and

that one day a knight or a monk, returning from the holy land, was cast

by a tempest, on a small island, where he met with a hermit, who said to

him, that in that island existed enormous caverns of fire and flames, in

which the wicked were tormented; and that he often heard the devils

complain of the Abbot Odilon and his monks, who every day delivered some

soul or other; for which reason it was necessary to request Odilon to

continue his exertions, at once to increase the joy of the saints in

heaven and the grief of the demons in hell?"

It is thus that Father Gerard, the Jesuit, relates the affair in his

"Flower of the Saints," after Father Ribadeneira. Fleury differs a

little from this legend, but has substantively preserved it. This

revelation induced St. Odilon to institute in Cluny the feast of the

dead, which was then adopted by the Church.

Since this time, purgatory has brought much money to those who possess

the power of opening the gates. It was by virtue of this power that

English John, that great landlord, surnamed Lackland, by declaring

himself the liegeman of Pope Innocent III., and placing his kingdom

under submission, delivered the souls of his parents, who had been

excommunicated: "_Pro mortuo excommunico, pro quo supplicant

consanguinei._"

The Roman chancery had even its regular scale for the absolution of the

dead; there were many privileged altars in the fifteenth century, at

which every mass performed for six liards delivered a soul from

purgatory. Heretics could not ascend beyond the truth, that the apostles

had the right of unbinding all who were bound on earth, but not _under_

the earth; and many of them, like impious persons, doubted the power of

the keys. It is however to be remarked, that when the pope is inclined

to remit five or six hundred years of purgatory, he accords the grace

with full power: "_Pro potestate a Deo accepta concedit_."

_Of the Antiquity of Purgatory._

It is pretended that purgatory was, from time immemorial, known to the

famous Jewish people, and it is founded on the second book of the

Maccabees, which says expressly, "that there being found concealed in

the vestments of the Jews (at the battle of Adullam), things consecrated

to the idols of Jamma, it was manifest that on that account they had

perished; and having made a gathering of twelve thousand drachms of

silver, Judas, who thought religiously of the resurrection, sent them to

Jerusalem for the sins of the dead."

Having taken upon ourselves the task of relating the objections of the

heretics and infidels, for the purpose of confounding them by their own

opinions, we will detail here these objections to the twelve thousand

drachms transmitted by Judas; and to purgatory. They say: 1. That twelve

thousand drachms of silver was too much for Judas Maccabeus, who only

maintained a petty war of insurgency against a great king.

2. That they might send a present to Jerusalem for the sins of the dead,

in order to bring down the blessing of God on the survivors.

3. That the idea of a resurrection was not entertained among the Jews at

this time, it being ascertained that this doctrine was not discussed

among them until the time of Gamaliel, a little before the ministry of

Jesus Christ.

4. As the laws of the Jews included in the "Decalogue," Leviticus and

Deuteronomy, have not spoken of the immortality of the soul, nor of the

torments of hell, it was impossible that they should contain the

doctrine of purgatory.

5. Heretics and infidels make the greatest efforts to demonstrate in

their manner, that the books of the Maccabees are evidently apocryphal.

The following are their pretended proofs:

The Jews have never acknowledged the books of the Maccabees to be

canonical, why then should we acknowledge them? Origen declares formally

that the books of the Maccabees are to be rejected, and St. Jerome

regards them as unworthy of credit. The Council of Laodicea, held in

567, admits them not among the canonical books. The Athanasiuses, the

Cyrils, and the Hilarys, have also rejected them. The reasons for

treating the foregoing books as romances, and as very bad romances, are

as follows:

The ignorant author commences by a falsehood, known to be such by all

the world. He says: "Alexander called the young nobles, who had been

educated with him from their infancy, and parted his kingdom among them

while he still lived." So gross and absurd a lie could not issue from

the pen of a sacred and inspired writer.

The author of the Maccabees, in speaking of Antiochus Epiphanes, says:

"Antiochus marched towards Elymais, and wished to pillage it, but was

not able, because his intention was known to the inhabitants, who

assembled in order to give him battle, on which he departed with great

sadness, and returned to Babylon. Whilst he was still in Persia, he

learned that his army in Judæa had fled ... and he took to his bed and

died."

The same writer himself, in another place, says quite the contrary; for

he relates that Antiochus Epiphanes was about to pillage Persepolis, and

not Elymais; that he fell from his chariot; that he was stricken with an

incurable wound; that he was devoured by worms; that he demanded pardon

of the god of the Jews; that he wished himself to be a Jew: it is there

where we find the celebrated versicle, which fanatics have applied so

frequently to their enemies; "_Orabet scelestus ille veniam quam non

erat consecuturus_." The wicked man demandeth a pardon, which he cannot

obtain. This passage is very Jewish; but it is not permitted to an

inspired writer to contradict himself so flagrantly.

This is not all: behold another contradiction, and another oversight.

The author makes Antiochus die in a third manner, so that there is quite

a choice. He remarks that this prince was stoned in the temple of

Nanneus; and those who would excuse the stupidity pretend that he here

speaks of Antiochus Eupator; but neither Epiphanes nor Eupator was

stoned.

Moreover, this author says, that another Antiochus (the Great) was taken

by the Romans, and that they gave to Eumenes the Indies and Media. This

is about equal to saying that Francis I. made a prisoner of Henry VIII.,

and that he gave Turkey to the duke of Savoy. It is insulting the Holy

Ghost to imagine it capable of dictating so many disgusting absurdities.

The same author says, that the Romans conquered the Galatians; but they

did not conquer Galatia for more than a hundred years after. Thus the

unhappy story-teller did not write for more than a hundred years after

the time in which it was supposed that he wrote: and it is thus,

according to the infidels, with almost all the Jewish books.

The same author observes, that the Romans every year nominated a chief

of the senate. Behold a well-informed man, who did not even know that

Rome had two consuls! What reliance, say infidels, can be placed in

these rhapsodies and puerile tales, strung together without choice or

order by the most imbecile of men? How shameful to believe in them! and

the barbarity of persecuting sensible men, in order to force a belief of

miserable absurdities, for which they could not but entertain the most

sovereign contempt, is equal to that of cannibals.

Our answer is, that some mistakes which probably arose from the copyists

may not affect the fundamental truths of the remainder; that the Holy

Ghost inspired the author only, and not the copyists; that if the

Council of Laodicea rejected the Maccabees, they have been admitted by

the Council of Trent; that they are admitted by the Roman Church; and

consequently that we ought to receive them with due submission.

_Of the Origin of Purgatory._

It is certain that those who admitted of purgatory in the primitive

church were treated as heretics. The Simonians were condemned who

admitted the purgation of souls--_Psuken Kadaron._

St. Augustine has since condemned the followers of Origen who maintained

this doctrine. But the Simonians and the Origenists had taken their

purgatory from Virgil, Plato and the Egyptians. You will find it clearly

indicated in the sixth book of the "Æneid," as we have already remarked.

What is still more singular, Virgil describes souls suspended in air,

others burned, and others drowned:

_Aliæ panduntur inanes_

_Suspensæ ad ventos: aliis sub gurgite vasto_

_Infectum eluitur scelus, aut exuritur igni._

--Æneid, Book vi, 740-742.

For this are various penances enjoined,

And some are hung to bleach upon the wind;

Some plunged in waters, others purged in fires,

Till all the dregs are drained, and all the rust expires.

--DRYDEN.

And what is more singular still, Pope Gregory, surnamed the great, not

only adopts this doctrine from Virgil, but in his theology introduces

many souls who arrive from purgatory after having been hanged or

drowned.

Plato has spoken of purgatory in his "Phædon," and it is easy to

discover, by a perusal of "Hermes Trismegistus" that Plato borrowed from

the Egyptians all which he had not borrowed from Timæus of Locris.

All this is very recent, and of yesterday, in comparison with the

ancient Brahmins. The latter, it must be confessed, invented purgatory

in the same manner as they invented the revolt and fall of the genii or

celestial intelligences.

It is in their Shasta, or Shastabad, written three thousand years before

the vulgar era, that you, my dear reader, will discover the doctrine of

purgatory. The rebel angels, of whom the history was copied among the

Jews in the time of the rabbin Gamaliel, were condemned by the Eternal

and His Son, to a thousand years of purgatory, after which God pardoned

and made them men. This we have already said, dear reader, as also that

the Brahmins found eternal punishment too severe, as eternity never

concludes. The Brahmins thought like the Abbé Chaulieu, and called upon

the Lord to pardon them, if, impressed with His bounties, they could not

be brought to conceive that they would be punished so rigorously for

vain pleasures, which passed away like a dream:

Pardonne alors, Seigneur, si, plein de tes bontés,

Je n'ai pu concevoir que mes fragilités,

Ni tous ces vains plaisirs que passent comme un songe,

Pussent être l'objet de tes sévérités;

Et si j'ai pu penser que tant des cruautés.

Puniraient un peu trop la douceur d'un mensonge.

--EPITRE SUR LA MORT, au Marquis de la Fare.

QUACK (OR CHARLATAN).

The abode of physicians is in large towns; there are scarcely any in

country places. Great towns contain rich patients; debauchery, excess at

the tables, and the passions, cause their maladies. Dumoulin, the

physician, who was in as much practice as any of his profession, said

when dying that he left two great physicians behind him--simple diet and

soft water.

In 1728, in the time of Law, the most famous of quacks of the first

class, another named Villars, confided to some friends, that his uncle,

who had lived to the age of nearly a hundred, and who was then killed by

an accident, had left him the secret of a water which could easily

prolong life to the age of one hundred and fifty, provided sobriety was

attended to. When a funeral passed, he affected to shrug up his

shoulders in pity: "Had the deceased," he exclaimed, "but drank my

water, he would not be where he is." His friends, to whom he generously

imparted it, and who attended a little to the regimen prescribed, found

themselves well, and cried it up. He then sold it for six francs the

bottle, and the sale was prodigious. It was the water of the Seine,

impregnated with a small quantity of nitre, and those who took it and

confined themselves a little to the regimen, but above all those who

were born with a good constitution, in a short time recovered perfect

health. He said to others: "It is your own fault if you are not

perfectly cured. You have been intemperate and incontinent, correct

yourself of these two vices, and you will live a hundred and fifty years

at least." Several did so, and the fortune of this good quack augmented

with his reputation. The enthusiastic Abbé de Pons ranked him much above

his namesake, Marshal Villars. "He caused the death of men," he

observed to him, "whereas you make men live."

It being at last discovered that the water of Villars was only river

water, people took no more of it, and resorted to other quacks in lieu

of him. It is certain that he did much good, and he can only be accused

of selling the Seine water too dear. He advised men to temperance, and

so far was superior to the apothecary Arnault, who amused Europe with

the farce of his specific against apoplexy, without recommending any

virtue.

I knew a physician of London named Brown, who had practised at

Barbadoes. He had a sugar-house and negroes, and the latter stole from

him a considerable sum. He accordingly assembled his negroes together,

and thus addressed them: "My friends," said he to them, "the great

serpent has appeared to me during the night, and has informed me that

the thief has at this moment a paroquet's feather at the end of his

nose." The criminal instantly applied his hand to his nose. "It is thou

who hast robbed me," exclaimed the master; "the great serpent has just

informed me so;" and he recovered his money. This quackery is scarcely

condemnable, but then it is applicable only to negroes.

The first Scipio Africanus, a very different person from the physician

Brown, made his soldiers believe that he was inspired by the gods. This

grand charlatanism was in use for a long time. Was Scipio to be blamed

for assisting himself by the means of this pretension? He was possibly

the man who did most honor to the Roman republic; but why the gods

should inspire him has never been explained.

Numa did better: he civilized robbers, and swayed a senate composed of a

portion of them which was the most difficult to govern. If he had

proposed his laws to the assembled tribes, the assassins of his

predecessor would have started a thousand difficulties. He addressed

himself to the goddess Egeria, who favored him with pandects from

Jupiter; he was obeyed without a murmur, and reigned happily. His

instructions were sound, his charlatanism did good; but if some secret

enemy had discovered his knavery, and had said, "Let us exterminate an

impostor who prostitutes the names of the gods in order to deceive men,"

he would have run the risk of being sent to heaven like Romulus. It is

probable that Numa took his measures ably, and that he deceived the

Romans for their own benefit, by a policy adapted to the time, the

place, and the early manners of the people.

Mahomet was twenty times on the point of failure, but at length

succeeded with the Arabs of Medina, who believed him the intimate friend

of the angel Gabriel. If any one at present was to announce in

Constantinople that he was favored by the angel Raphael, who is superior

to Gabriel in dignity, and that he alone was to be believed, he would

be publicly empaled. Quacks should know their time.

Was there not a little quackery in Socrates with his familiar dæmon, and

the express declaration of Apollo, that he was the wisest of all men?

How can Rollin in his history reason from this oracle? Why not inform

youth that it was a pure imposition? Socrates chose his time ill: about

a hundred years before he might have governed Athens.

Every chief of a sect in philosophy has been a little of a quack; but

the greatest of all have been those who have aspired to govern. Cromwell

was the most terrible of all quacks, and appeared precisely at a time in

which he could succeed. Under Elizabeth he would have been hanged; under

Charles II., laughed at. Fortunately for himself he came at a time when

people were disgusted with kings: his son followed, when they were weary

of protectors.

_Of the Quackery of Sciences and of Literature._

The followers of science have never been able to dispense with quackery.

Each would have his opinions prevail; the subtle doctor would eclipse

the angelic doctor, and the profound doctor would reign alone. Everyone

erects his own system of physics, metaphysics, and scholastic theology;

and the question is, who will value his merchandise? You have dependants

who cry it up, fools who believe you, and protectors on whom to lean.

Can there be greater quackery than the substitution of words for things,

or than a wish to make others believe what we do not believe ourselves?

One establishes vortices of subtile matter, branched, globular, and

tubular; another, elements of matter which are not matter, and a

pre-established harmony which makes the clock of the body sound the

hour, when the needle of the clock of the soul is duly pointed. These

chimeras found partisans for many years, and when these ideas went out

of fashion, new pretenders to inspiration mounted upon the ambulatory

stage. They banished the germs of the world, asserted that the sea

produced mountains, and that men were formerly fishes.

How much quackery has always pervaded history: either by astonishing the

reader with prodigies, tickling the malignity of human nature with

satire, or by flattering the families of tyrants with infamous eulogies!

The unhappy class who write in order to live, are quacks of another

kind. A poor man who has no trade, and has had the misfortune to have

been at college, thinks that he knows how to write, and repairing to a

neighboring bookseller, demands employment. The bookseller knows that

most persons keeping houses are desirous of small libraries, and require

abridgments and new tables, orders an abridgment of the history of Rapin

Thoyras, or of the church; a collection of _bon mots_ from the

Menagiana, or a dictionary of great men, in which some obscure pedant

is placed by the side of Cicero, and a sonneteer of Italy as near as

possible to Virgil.

Another bookseller will order romances or the translation of romances.

If you have no invention, he will say to his workman: You can collect

adventures from the grand Cyrus, from Gusman d'Alfarache, from the

"Secret Memoirs of a Man of Quality" or of a "Woman of Quality"; and

from the total you will make a volume of four hundred pages.

Another bookseller gives ten years' newspapers and almanacs to a man of

genius, and says: You will make an abstract from all that, and in three

months bring it me under the name of a faithful "History of the Times,"

by M. le Chevalier ----, Lieutenant de Vaisseau, employed in the office

for foreign affairs.

Of this sort of books there are about fifty thousand in Europe, and the

labor still goes on like the secret for whitening the skin, blackening

the hair, and mixing up the universal remedy.

RAVAILLAC.

I knew in my infancy a canon of Péronne of the age of ninety-two years,

who had been educated by one of the most furious burghers of the

League--he always used to say, the late M. de Ravaillac. This canon had

preserved many curious manuscripts of the apostolic times, although they

did little honor to his party. The following is one of them, which he

bequeathed to my uncle:

_Dialogue of a Page of the Duke of Sully, and of Master Filesac, Doctor

of the Sorbonne, one of the two Confessors of Ravaillac._

MASTER FILESAC.--God be thanked, my dear page, Ravaillac has died like a

saint. I heard his confession; he repented of his sin, and determined no

more to fall into it. He wished to receive the holy sacrament, but it is

not the custom here as at Rome; his penitence will serve in lieu of it,

and it is certain that he is in paradise.

PAGE.--He in paradise, in the Garden of Eden, the monster!

MASTER FILESAC.--Yes, my fine lad, in that garden, or heaven, it is the

same thing.

PAGE.--I believe so; but he has taken a bad road to arrive there.

MASTER FILESAC.--You talk like a young Huguenot. Learn that what I say

to you partakes of faith. He possessed attrition, and attrition, joined

to the sacrament of confession, infallibly works out the salvation which

conducts straightway to paradise, where he is now praying to God for

you.

PAGE.--I have no wish that he should address God on my account. Let him

go to the devil with his prayers and his attrition.

MASTER FILESAC.--At the bottom, he was a good soul; his zeal led him to

commit evil, but it was not with a bad intention. In all his

interrogatories, he replied that he assassinated the king only because

he was about to make war on the pope, and that he did so to serve God.

His sentiments were very Christian-like. He is saved, I tell you; he was

bound, and I have unbound him.

PAGE.--In good faith, the more I listen to you the more I regard you as

a man bound yourself. You excite horror in me.

MASTER FILESAC.--It is because that you are not yet in the right way;

but you will be one day. I have always said that you were not far from

the kingdom of heaven; but your time is not yet come.

PAGE.--And the time will never come in which I shall be made to believe

that you have sent Ravaillac to the kingdom of heaven.

MASTER FILESAC.--As soon as you shall be converted, which I hope will be

the case, you will believe as I do; but in the meantime, be assured that

you and the duke of Sully, your master, will be damned to all eternity

with Judas Iscariot and the wicked rich man Dives, while Ravaillac will

repose in the bosom of Abraham.

PAGE.--How, scoundrel!

MASTER FILESAC.--No abuse, my little son. It is forbidden to call our

brother "_raca_," under the penalty of the _gehenna_ or hell fire.

Permit me to instruct without enraging you.

PAGE.--Go on; thou appearest to me so "_raca_," that I will be angry no

more.

MASTER FILESAC.--I therefore say to you, that agreeably to faith you

will be damned, as unhappily our dear Henry IV. is already, as the

Sorbonne always foresaw.

PAGE.--My dear master damned! Listen to the wicked wretch! A cane! a

cane!

MASTER FILESAC.--Be patient, good young man; you promised to listen to

me quietly. Is it not true that the great Henry died without confession?

Is it not true that he died in the commission of mortal sin, being still

amorous of the princess of Condé, and that he had not time to receive

the sacrament of repentance, God having allowed him to be stabbed in the

left ventricle of the heart, in consequence of which he was instantly

suffocated with his own blood? You will absolutely find no good Catholic

who will not say the same as I do.

PAGE.--Hold thy tongue, master madman; if I thought that thy doctors

taught a doctrine so abominable, I would burn them in their lodgings.

MASTER FILESAC.--Once again, be calm; you have promised to be so. His

lordship the marquis of Cochini, who is a good Catholic, will know how

to prevent you from being guilty of the sacrilege of injuring my

colleagues.

PAGE.--But conscientiously, Master Filesac, does thy party really think

in this manner?

MASTER FILESAC.--Be assured of it; it is our catechism.

PAGE.--Listen; for I must confess to thee, that one of thy Sorbonnists

almost seduced me last year. He induced me to hope for a pension or a

benefice. Since the king, he observed, has heard mass in Latin, you who

are only a petty gentleman may also attend it without derogation. God

takes care of His elect, giving them mitres, crosses, and prodigious

sums of money, while you of the reformed doctrine go on foot, and can do

nothing but write. I own I was staggered; but after what thou hast just

said to me, I would rather a thousand times be a Mahometan than of thy

creed.

The page was wrong. We are not to become Mahometans because we are

incensed; but we must pardon a feeling young man who loved Henry IV.

Master Filesac spoke according to his theology; the page attended to his

heart.

REASONABLE, OR RIGHT.

At the time that all France was carried away by the system of Law, and

when he was comptroller-general, a man who was always in the right came

to him one day and said:

"Sir, you are the greatest madman, the greatest fool, or the greatest

rogue, who has yet appeared among us. It is saying a great deal; but

behold how I prove it. You have imagined that we may increase the riches

of a state ten-fold by means of paper. But this paper only represents

money, which is itself only a representative of genuine riches, the

production of the earth and manufacture. It follows, therefore, that you

should have commenced by giving us ten times as much corn, wine, cloth,

linen, etc.; this is not enough, they must be certain of sale. Now you

make ten times as many notes as we have money and commodities; ergo, you

are ten times more insane, stupid, or roguish, than all the comptrollers

or superintendents who have preceded you. Behold how rapidly I will

prove my major."

Scarcely had he commenced his major than he was conducted to St.

Lazarus. When he came out of St. Lazarus, where he studied much and

strengthened his reason, he went to Rome. He demanded a public audience,

and that he should not be interrupted in his harangue. He addressed his

holiness as follows:

"Holy father, you are Antichrist, and behold how I will prove it to your

holiness. I call him ante-Christ or antichrist, according to the meaning

of the word, who does everything contrary to that which Christ

commanded. Now Christ was poor, and you are very rich. He paid tribute,

and you exact it. He submitted himself to the powers that be, and you

have become one of them. He wandered on foot, and you visit Castle

Gandolfo in a sumptuous carriage. He ate of all that which people were

willing to give him, and you would have us eat fish on Fridays and

Saturdays, even when we reside at a distance from the seas and rivers.

He forbade Simon Barjonas using the sword, and you have many swords in

your service, etc. In this sense, therefore, your holiness is

Antichrist. In every other sense I exceedingly revere you, and request

an indulgence '_in articulo mortis_.'"

My free speaker was immediately confined in the castle of St. Angelo.

When he came out of the castle of St. Angelo, he proceeded to Venice,

and demanded an audience of the doge. "Your serenity," he exclaimed,

"commits a great extravagance every year in marrying the sea; for, in

the first place, people marry only once with the same person; secondly,

your marriage resembles that of Harlequin, which was only half

performed, as wanting the consent of one of the parties; thirdly, who

has told you that, some day or other, the other maritime powers will not

declare you incapable of consummating your marriage?"

Having thus delivered his mind, he was shut up in the tower of St. Mark.

When he came out of the tower of St. Mark, he proceeded to

Constantinople, where he obtained an interview with the mufti, and thus

addressed him: "Your religion contains some good points, such as the

adoration of the Supreme Being, and the necessity of being just and

charitable; nevertheless, it is a mere hash composed out of Judaism and

a wearisome heap of stories from Mother Goose. If the archangel Gabriel

had brought from some planet the leaves of the Koran to Mahomet, all

Arabia would have beheld his descent. Nobody saw him, therefore Mahomet

was a bold impostor, who deceived weak and ignorant people."

He had scarcely pronounced these words before he was empaled;

nevertheless, he had been all along in the right.

RELICS.

By this name are designated the remains or remaining parts of the body,

or clothes, of a person placed after his death by the Church in the

number of the blessed.

It is clear that Jesus condemned only the hypocrisy of the Jews, in

saying: "Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye

build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the

righteous." Thus orthodox Christians have an equal veneration for the

relics and images of saints, and I know not what. Doctor Henry ventures

to say that when bones or other relics are changed into worms, we must

not adore these worms; the Jesuit Vasquez decided that the opinion of

Henry is absurd and vain, for it signifies not in what manner corruption

takes place; "consequently," says he, "we can adore relics as much under

the form of worms as under that of ashes."

However this may be, St. Cyril of Alexandria avows that the origin of

relics is Pagan; and this is the description given of their worship by

Theodoret, who lived in the commencement of the Christian era: "They

run to the temples of martyrs," says this learned bishop, "some to

demand the preservation of their health, others the cure of their

maladies; and barren women for fruitfulness. After obtaining children,

these women ask the preservation of them. Those who undertake voyages,

pray the martyrs to accompany and conduct them; and on their return they

testify to them their gratitude. They adore them not as gods, but they

honor them as divine men; and conjure them to become their intercessors.

"The offerings which are displayed in their temples are public proofs

that those who have demanded with faith, have obtained the

accomplishment of their vows and the cure of their disorders. Some hang

up artificial eyes, others feet, and others hands of gold and silver.

These monuments publish the virtue of those who are buried in these

tombs, as their influence publishes that the god for whom they suffered

is the true God. Thus Christians take care to give their children the

names of martyrs, that they may be insured their protection."

Finally, Theodoret adds, that the temples of the gods were demolished,

and that the materials served for the construction of the temples of

martyrs: "For the Lord," said he to the Pagans, "has substituted his

dead for your gods; He has shown the vanity of the latter, and

transferred to others the honors paid to them." It is of this that the

famous sophist of Sardis complains bitterly in deploring the ruin of

the temple of Serapis at Canopus, which was demolished by order of the

emperor Theodosius I. in the year 389.

"People," says Eunapius, "who had never heard of war, were, however,

very valiant against the stones of this temple; and principally against

the rich offerings with which it was filled. These holy places were

given to monks, an infamous and useless class of people, who provided

they wear a black and slovenly dress, hold a tyrannical authority over

the minds of the people; and instead of the gods whom we acknowledge

through the lights of reason, these monks give us heads of criminals,

punished for their crimes, to adore, which they have salted in order to

preserve them."

The people are superstitious, and it is superstition which enchains

them. The miracles forged on the subject of relics became a loadstone

which attracted from all parts riches to the churches. Stupidity and

credulity were carried so far that, in the year 386, the same Theodosius

was obliged to make a law by which he forbade buried corpses to be

transported from one place to another, or the relics of any martyr to be

separated and sold.

During the first three ages of Christianity they were contented with

celebrating the day of the death of martyrs, which they called their

natal day, by assembling in the cemeteries where their bodies lay, to

pray for them, as we have remarked in the article on "Mass." They

dreamed not then of a time in which Christians would raise temples to

them, transport their ashes and bones from one place to another, show

them in shrines, and finally make a traffic of them; which excited

avarice to fill the world with false relics.

But the Third Council of Carthage, held in the year 397, having inserted

in the Scriptures the Apocalypse of St. John, the authenticity of which

was till then contested, this passage of chapter vi., "I saw under the

altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God"--authorized

the custom of having relics of martyrs under the altars; and this

practice was soon regarded so essential that St. Ambrose,

notwithstanding the wishes of the people, would not consecrate a church

where there were none; and in 692, the Council of Constantinople, in

Trullo, even ordered all the altars to be demolished under which it

found no relics.

Another Council of Carthage, on the contrary, in the year 401, ordered

bishops to build altars which might be seen everywhere, in fields and on

high roads, in honor of martyrs; from which were here and there dug

pretended relics, on dreams and vain revelations of all sorts of people.

St. Augustine relates that towards the year 415, Lucian, the priest of a

town called Caphargamata, some miles distant from Jerusalem, three times

saw in a dream the learned Gamaliel, who declared to him that his body,

that of Abibas his son, of St. Stephen, and Nicodemus, were buried in a

part of his parish which he pointed out to him. He commanded him, on

their part and his own, to leave them no longer neglected in the tomb in

which they had been for some ages, but to go and tell John, bishop of

Jerusalem, to come and dig them up immediately, if he would prevent the

ills with which the world was threatened. Gamaliel added that this

translation must be made in the episcopacy of John, who died about a

year after. The order of heaven was that the body of St. Stephen should

be transported to Jerusalem.

Either Lucian did not clearly understand, or he was unfortunate--he dug

and found nothing; which obliged the learned Jew to appear to a very

simple and innocent monk, and indicate to him more precisely the place

where the sacred relics lay. Lucian there found the treasure which he

sought, according as God had revealed it unto him. In this tomb there

was a stone on which was engraved the word "_cheliel_," which signifies

"crown" in Hebrew, as "_stephanos_" does in Greek. On the opening of

Stephen's coffin the earth trembled, a delightful odor issued, and a

great number of sick were cured. The body of the saint was reduced to

ashes, except the bones, which were transported to Jerusalem, and placed

in the church of Sion. At the same hour there fell a great rain, until

which they had had a great drouth.

Avitus, a Spanish priest who was then in the East, translated into Latin

this story, which Lucian wrote in Greek. As the Spaniard was the friend

of Lucian, he obtained a small portion of the ashes of the saint, some

bones full of an oil which was a visible proof of their holiness,

surpassing newly-made perfumes, and the most agreeable odors. These

relics, brought by Orosius into the island of Minorca, in eight days

converted five hundred and forty Jews.

They were afterwards informed by divers visions that some monks of Egypt

had relics of St. Stephen which strangers had brought there. As the

monks, not then being priests, had no churches of their own, they took

this treasure to transport it to a church which was near Usala. Above

the church some persons soon saw a star which seemed to come before the

holy martyr. These relics did not remain long in this church; the bishop

of Usala, finding it convenient to enrich his own, transported them,

seated on a car, accompanied by a crowd of people, who sang the praises

of God, attended by a great number of lights and tapers.

In this manner the relics were borne to an elevated place in the church

and placed on a throne ornamented with hangings. They were afterwards

put on a little bed in a place which was locked up, but to which a

little window was left, that cloths might be touched, which cured

several disorders. A little dust collected on the shrine suddenly cured

one that was paralytic. Flowers which had been presented to the saint,

applied to the eyes of a blind man, gave him sight. There were even

seven or eight corpses restored to life.

St. Augustine, who endeavors to justify this worship by distinguishing

it from that of adoration, which is due to God alone, is obliged to

agree that he himself knew several Christians who adored sepulchres and

images. "I know several who drink to great excess on the tombs, and who,

in giving entertainments to the dead, fell themselves on those who were

buried."

Indeed, turning fresh from Paganism, and charmed to find deified men in

the Christian church, though under other names, the people honored them

as much as they had honored their false gods; and it would be grossly

deceiving ourselves to judge of the ideas and practices of the populace

by those of enlightened and philosophic bishops. We know that the sages

among the Pagans made the same distinctions as our holy bishops. "We

must," said Hierocles, "acknowledge and serve the gods so as to take

great care to distinguish them from the supreme God, who is their author

and father. We must not too greatly exalt their dignity. And finally the

worship which we give them should relate to their sole creator, whom you

may properly call the God of gods, because He is the Master of all, and

the most excellent of all." Porphyrius, who, like St. Paul, terms the

supreme God, the God who is above all things, adds that we must not

sacrifice to Him anything that is sensible or material, because, being

a pure Spirit, everything material is impure to Him. He can only be

worthily honored by the thoughts and sentiments of a soul which is not

tainted with any sinful passion.

In a word, St. Augustine, in declaring with _naïveté_ that he dared not

speak freely on several similar abuses on account of giving opportunity

for scandal to pious persons or to pedants, shows that the bishops made

use of the artifice to convert the Pagans, as St. Gregory recommended

two centuries after to convert England. This pope, being consulted by

the monk Augustine on some remains of ceremonies, half civil and half

Pagan, which the newly converted English would not renounce, answered,

"We cannot divest hard minds of all their habits at once; we reach not

to the top of a steep rock by leaping, but by climbing step by step."

The reply of the same pope to Constantina, the daughter of the emperor

Tiberius Constantine, and the wife of Maurice, who demanded of him the

head of St. Paul, to place in a temple which she had built in honor of

this apostle, is no less remarkable. St. Gregory sent word to the

princess that the bodies of saints shone with so many miracles that they

dared not even approach their tombs to pray without being seized with

fear. That his predecessor (Pelagius II.) wishing to remove some silver

from the tomb of St. Peter to another place four feet distant, he

appeared to him with frightful signs. That he (Gregory) wishing to make

some repairs in the monument of St. Paul, as it had sunk a little in

front, and he who had the care of the place having had the boldness to

raise some bones which touched not the tomb of the apostle, to transport

them elsewhere, he appeared to him also in a terrible manner, and he

died immediately. That his predecessor also wishing to repair the tomb

of St. Lawrence, the shroud which encircled the body of the martyr was

imprudently discovered; and although the laborers were monks and

officers of the church, they all died in the space of ten days because

they had seen the body of the saint. That when the Romans gave relics,

they never touched the sacred bodies, but contented themselves with

putting some cloths, with which they approached them, in a box. That

these cloths have the same virtue as relics, and perform as many

miracles. That certain Greeks, doubting of this fact, Pope Leo took a

pair of scissors, and in their presence cutting some of the cloth which

had approached the holy bodies, blood came from it. That in the west of

Rome it is a sacrilege to touch the bodies of saints; and that if any

one attempts, he may be assured that his crime will not go unpunished.

For which reason the Greeks cannot be persuaded to adopt the custom of

transporting relics. That some Greeks daring to disinter some bodies in

the night near the church of St. Paul, intending to transport them into

their own country, were discovered, which persuaded them that the relics

were false. That the easterns, pretending that the bodies of St. Peter

and St. Paul belonged to them, came to Rome to take them to their own

country; but arriving at the catacombs where these bodies repose, when

they would have taken them, sudden lightning and terrible thunder

dispersed the alarmed multitude and forced them to renounce their

undertaking. That those who suggested to Constantina the demand of the

head of St. Paul from him, had no other design than that of making him

lose his favor. St. Gregory concludes with these words: "I have that

confidence in God, that you will not be deprived of the fruit of your

good will, nor of the virtue of the holy apostles, whom you love with

all your heart and with all your mind; and that, if you have not their

corporeal presence, you will always enjoy their protection."

Yet the ecclesiastical history pretends that the translation of relics

was equally frequent in the East and West; and the author of the notes

to this letter further observes that the same St. Gregory afterwards

gave several holy bodies, and that other popes have given so many as six

or seven to one individual.

After this, can we be astonished at the favor which relics find in the

minds of people and kings? The sermons most commonly preached among the

ancient French were composed on the relics of saints. It was thus that

the kings Gontran, Sigebert, and Chilperic divided the states of

Clotaire, and agreed to possess Paris in common. They made oath on the

relics of St. Polyeuctus, St. Hilary, and St. Martin. Yet Chilperic

possessed himself of the place and merely took the precaution of having

a shrine, with a quantity of relics, which he had carried as a safeguard

at the head of his troops, in hopes that the protection of these new

patrons would shelter him from the punishment due to his perjury.

Finally, the catechism of the Council of Trent approved of the custom of

swearing by relics.

It is further observed that the kings of France of the first and second

races kept in their palaces a great number of relics; above all, the cap

and mantle of St. Martin; and that they had them carried in their trains

and in their armies. These relics were sent from the palaces to the

provinces when an oath of fidelity was made to the king, or any treaty

was concluded.

RELIGION.

SECTION I.

The Epicureans, who had no religion, recommended retirement from public

affairs, study, and concord. This sect was a society of friends, for

friendship was their principal dogma. Atticus, Lucretius, Memmius, and a

few other such men, might live very reputably together; this we see in

all countries; philosophize as much as you please among yourselves. A

set of amateurs may give a concert of refined and scientific music; but

let them beware of performing such a concert before the ignorant and

brutal vulgar, lest their instruments be broken over their heads. If you

have but a village to govern, it _must_ have a religion.

I speak not here of an error; but of the only good, the only necessary,

the only proved, and the second revealed.

Had it been possible for the human mind to have admitted a religion--I

will not say at all approaching ours--but not so bad as all the other

religions in the world--what would that religion have been?

Would it not have been that which should propose to us the adoration of

the supreme, only, infinite, eternal Being, the former of the world, who

gives it motion and life, "_cui nec simile, nec secundum_"? That which

should re-unite us to this Being of beings, as the reward of our

virtues, and separate us from Him, as the chastisement of our crimes?

That which should admit very few of the dogmas invented by unreasoning

pride; those eternal subjects of disputation; and should teach a pure

morality, about which there should never be any dispute?

That which should not make the essence of worship consist in vain

ceremonies, as that of spitting into your mouth, or that of taking from

you one end of your prepuce, or of depriving you of one of your

testicles--seeing that a man may fulfil all the social duties with two

testicles and an entire foreskin, and without another's spitting into

his mouth?

That of serving one's neighbor for the love of God, instead of

persecuting and butchering him in God's name? That which should tolerate

all others, and which, meriting thus the goodwill of all, should alone

be capable of making mankind a nation of brethren?

That which should have august ceremonies, to strike the vulgar, without

having mysteries to disgust the wise and irritate the incredulous?

That which should offer men more encouragements to the social virtues

than expiations for social crimes?

That which should insure to its ministers a revenue large enough for

their decent maintenance, but should never allow them to usurp dignities

and power that might make them tyrants?

That which should establish commodious retreats for sickness and old

age, but never for idleness?

A great part of this religion is already in the hearts of several

princes; and it will prevail when the articles of perpetual peace,

proposed by the abbé de St. Pierre, shall be signed by all potentates.

SECTION II.

Last night I was meditating; I was absorbed in the contemplation of

nature, admiring the immensity, the courses, the relations of those

infinite globes, which are above the admiration of the vulgar.

I admired still more the intelligence that presides over this vast

machinery. I said to myself: A man must be blind not to be impressed by

this spectacle; he must be stupid not to recognize its author; he must

be mad not to adore him. What tribute of adoration ought I to render

him? Should not this tribute be the same throughout the extent of space,

since the same Supreme Power reigns equally in all that extent?

Does not a thinking being, inhabiting a star of the Milky Way, owe him

the same homage as the thinking being on this little globe where we are?

Light is the same to the dog-star as to us; morality, too, must be the

same.

If a feeling and thinking being in the dog-star is born of a tender

father and mother, who have labored for his welfare, he owes them as

much love and duty as we here owe to our parents. If any one in the

Milky Way sees another lame and indigent, and does not relieve him,

though able to do it, he is guilty in the sight of every globe.

The heart has everywhere the same duties; on the steps of the throne of

God, if He has a throne, and at the bottom of the great abyss, if there

be an abyss.

I was wrapt in these reflections, when one of those genii who fill the

spaces between worlds, came down to me. I recognized the same aerial

creature that had formerly appeared to me, to inform me that the

judgments of God are different from ours, and how much a good action is

preferable to controversy.

He transported me into a desert covered all over with bones piled one

upon another; and between these heaps of dead there were avenues of

evergreen trees, and at the end of each avenue a tall man of august

aspect gazing with compassion on these sad remains.

"Alas! my archangel," said I, "whither have you brought me?" "To

desolation," answered he. "And who are those fine old patriarchs whom I

see motionless and melancholy at the end of those green avenues, and who

seem to weep over this immense multitude of dead?" "Poor human creature!

thou shalt know," replied the genius; "but, first, thou must weep."

He began with the first heap. "These," said he, "are the twenty-three

thousand Jews who danced before a calf, together with the twenty-four

thousand who were slain while ravishing Midianitish women; the number of

the slaughtered for similar offences or mistakes amounts to nearly three

hundred thousand.

"At the following avenues are the bones of Christians, butchered by one

another on account of metaphysical disputes. They are divided into

several piles of four centuries each; it was necessary to separate them;

for had they been all together, they would have reached the sky."

"What!" exclaimed I, "have brethren thus treated their brethren; and

have I the misfortune to be one of this brotherhood?"

[Illustration: Genius inspiring the muses.]

"Here," said the spirit, "are twelve millions of Americans slain in

their own country for not having been baptized." "Ah! My God! why were

not these frightful skeletons left to whiten in the hemisphere where the

bodies were born, and where they were murdered in so many various ways?

Why are all these abominable monuments of barbarity and fanaticism

assembled here?" "For thy instruction."

"Since thou art willing to instruct me," said I to the genius, "tell me

if there be any other people than the Christians and the Jews, whom zeal

and religion, unhappily turned into fanaticism, have prompted to so many

horrible cruelties?" "Yes," said he; "the Mahometans have been stained

by the same inhuman acts, but rarely; and when their victims have cried

out '_amman_!' (mercy!) and have offered them tribute, they have

pardoned them. As for other nations, not one of them, since the

beginning of the world, has ever made a purely religious war. Now,

follow me!" I followed.

A little beyond these heaps of dead we found other heaps; there were

bags of gold and silver; and each pile had its label: "Substance of the

heretics massacred in the eighteenth century, in the seventeenth, in the

sixteenth," and so on. "Gold and silver of the slaughtered Americans,"

etc.; and all these piles were surmounted by crosses, mitres, crosiers,

and tiaras, enriched with jewels.

"What! my genius, was it then to possess these riches that these

carcasses were accumulated?"

"Yes, my son."

I shed tears; and when by my grief I had merited to be taken to the end

of the green avenues, he conducted me thither.

"Contemplate," said he, "the heroes of humanity who have been the

benefactors of the earth, and who united to banish from the world, as

far as they were able, violence and rapine. Question them."

I went up to the first of this band; on his head was a crown, and in his

hand a small censer. I humbly asked him his name. "I," said he, "am Numa

Pompilius; I succeeded a robber, and had robbers to govern; I taught

them virtue and the worship of God; after me they repeatedly forgot

both. I forbade any image to be placed in the temples, because the

divinity who animates nature cannot be represented. During my reign the

Romans had neither wars nor seditions; and my religion did nothing but

good. Every neighboring people came to honor my funeral, which has

happened to me alone...."

I made my obeisance and passed on to the second. This was a fine old

man, of about a hundred, clad in a white robe; his middle finger was

placed on his lip, and with the other hand he was scattering beans

behind him. In him I recognized Pythagoras. He assured me that he had

never had a golden thigh, and that he had never been a cock, but that he

had governed the Crotonians with as much justice as Numa had governed

the Romans about the same time, which justice was the most necessary and

the rarest thing in the world. I learned that the Pythagoreans examined

their consciences twice a day. What good people! and how far are we

behind them! Yet we, who for thirteen hundred years have been nothing

but assassins, assert that these wise men were proud.

To please Pythagoras I said not a word to him, but went on to Zoroaster,

who was engaged in concentrating the celestial fire in the focus of a

concave mirror, in the centre of a vestibule with a hundred gates, each

one leading to wisdom. On the principal of these gates I read these

words, which are the abstract of all morality, and cut short all the

disputes of the casuists: "When thou art in doubt whether an action is

good or bad, abstain from it."

"Certainly," said I to my genius, "the barbarians who immolated all the

victims whose bones I have seen had not read these fine words."

Then we saw Zaleucus, Thales, Anaximander, and all the other sages who

had sought truth and practised virtue.

When we came to Socrates I quickly recognized him by his broken nose.

"Well," said I, "you then are among the confidants of the Most High! All

the inhabitants of Europe, excepting the Turks and the Crim Tartars, who

know nothing, pronounce your name with reverence. So much is that great

name venerated, so much is it loved, that it has been sought to

discover those of your persecutors. Melitus and Anitus are known because

of you, as Ravaillac is known because of Henry IV.; but of Anitus I know

only the name. I know not precisely who that villain was by whom you

were calumniated, and who succeeded in procuring your condemnation to

the hemlock."

"I have never thought of that man since my adventure," answered

Socrates; "but now that you put me in mind of him, I pity him much. He

was a wicked priest, who secretly carried on a trade in leather, a

traffic reputed shameful amongst us. He sent his two children to my

school; the other disciples reproached them with their father's being a

currier, and they were obliged to quit. The incensed father was

unceasing in his endeavors until he had stirred up against me all the

priests and all the sophists. They persuaded the council of the five

hundred that I was an impious man, who did not believe that the moon,

Mercury, and Mars were deities. I thought indeed, as I do now, that

there is but one God, the master of all nature. The judges gave me up to

the republic's poisoner, and he shortened my life a few days. I died

with tranquillity at the age of seventy years, and since then I have led

a happy life with all these great men whom you see, and of whom I am the

least...."

After enjoying the conversation of Socrates for some time, I advanced

with my guide into a bower, situated above the groves, where all these

sages of antiquity seemed to be tasting the sweets of repose.

Here I beheld a man of mild and simple mien, who appeared to me to be

about thirty-five years old. He was looking with compassion upon the

distant heaps of whitened skeletons through which I had been led to the

abode of the sages. I was astonished to find his feet swelled and

bloody, his hands in the same state, his side pierced, and his ribs laid

bare by flogging. "Good God!" said I, "is it possible that one of the

just and wise should be in this state? I have just seen one who was

treated in a very odious manner; but there is no comparison between his

punishment and yours. Bad priests and bad judges poisoned him. Was it

also by priests and judges that you were so cruelly assassinated?"

With great affability he answered--"Yes."

"And who were those monsters?"

"They were hypocrites."

"Ah! you have said all! by that one word I understand that they would

condemn you to the worst of punishments. You then had proved to them,

like Socrates, that the moon was not a goddess, and that Mercury was not

a god?"

"No; those planets were quite out of the question. My countrymen did not

even know what a planet was; they were all arrant ignoramuses. Their

superstitions were quite different from those of the Greeks."

"Then you wished to teach them a new religion?"

"Not at all; I simply said to them--'Love God with all your hearts, and

your neighbor as yourselves; for that is all.' Judge whether this

precept is not as old as the universe; judge whether I brought them a

new worship. I constantly told them that I was come, not to abolish

their law, but to fulfil it; I had observed all their rites; I was

circumcised as they all were; I was baptized like the most zealous of

them; like them I paid the corban; like them I kept the Passover; and

ate, standing, lamb cooked with lettuce. I and my friends went to pray

in their temple; my friends, too, frequented the temple after my death.

In short, I fulfilled all their laws without one exception."

"What! could not these wretches even reproach you with having departed

from their laws?"

"Certainly not."

"Why, then, did they put you in the state in which I now see you?"

"Must I tell you?--They were proud and selfish; they saw that I knew

them; they saw that I was making them known to the citizens; they were

the strongest; they took away my life; and such as they will always do

the same, if they can, to whoever shall have done them too much

justice."

"But did you say nothing; did you do nothing, that could serve them as a

pretext?"

"The wicked find a pretext in everything."

"Did you not once tell them that you were come to bring, not peace, but

the sword?"

"This was an error of some scribe. I told them that I brought, not the

sword, but peace. I never wrote anything; what I said might be miscopied

without any ill intent."

"You did not then contribute in anything, by your discourses, either

badly rendered or badly interpreted, to those frightful masses of bones

which I passed on my way to consult you?"

"I looked with horror on those who were guilty of all these murders."

"And those monuments of power and wealth--of pride and avarice--those

treasures, those ornaments, those ensigns of greatness, which, when

seeking wisdom, I saw accumulated on the way--do they proceed from you?"

"It is impossible; I and mine lived in poverty and lowliness; my

greatness was only in virtue."

I was on the point of begging of him to have the goodness just to tell

me who he was; but my guide warned me to refrain. He told me that I was

not formed for comprehending these sublime mysteries. I conjured him to

tell me only in what true religion consisted.

"Have I not told you already?--Love God and your neighbor as yourself."

"What! Can we love God and yet eat meat on a Friday?"

"I always ate what was given me; for I was too poor to give a dinner to

any one."

"Might we love God and be just, and still be prudent enough not to

intrust all the adventures of one's life to a person one does not know?"

"Such was always my custom."

"Might not I, while doing good, be excused from making a pilgrimage to

St. James of Compostello?"

"I never was in that country."

"Should I confine myself in a place of retirement With blockheads?"

"For my part, I always made little journeys from town to town."

"Must I take part with the Greek or with the Latin Church?"

"When I was in the world, I never made any difference between the Jew

and the Samaritan."

"Well, if it be so, I take you for my only master."

Then he gave me a nod, which filled me with consolation. The vision

disappeared, and I was left with a good conscience.

SECTION III.

_Questions on Religion._

FIRST QUESTION.

Warburton, bishop of Gloucester, author of one of the most learned works

ever written, thus expresses himself ("Divine Legation of Moses," i.,

8): "A religion, a society, which is not founded on the belief of a

future state, must be supported by an extraordinary Providence. Judaism

is not founded on the belief of a future state; therefore, Judaism was

supported by an extraordinary Providence."

Many theologians rose up against him; and, as all arguments are

retorted, so was his retorted upon himself; he was told:

"Every religion which is not founded on the dogma of the immortality of

the soul, and on everlasting rewards and punishments, is necessarily

false. Now these dogmas were unknown to the Jews; therefore Judaism, far

from being supported by Providence, was, on your own principles, a false

and barbarous religion by which Providence was attacked."

This bishop had some other adversaries, who maintained against him that

the immortality of the soul was known to the Jews even in the time of

Moses; but he proved to them very clearly that neither the Decalogue,

nor Leviticus, nor Deuteronomy, had said one word of such a belief; and

that it is ridiculous to strive to distort and corrupt some passages of

other books, in order to draw from them a truth which is not announced

in the book of the law.

The bishop, having written four volumes to demonstrate that the Jewish

law proposed neither pains nor rewards after death, has never been able

to answer his adversaries in a very satisfactory manner. They said to

him: "Either Moses knew this dogma, and so deceived the Jews by not

communicating it, or he did not know it, in which case he did not know

enough to found a good religion. Indeed, if the religion had been good

why should it have been abolished? A true religion must be for all times

and all places; it must be as the light of the sun, enlightening all

nations and generations."

This prelate, enlightened as he is, has found it no easy task to

extricate himself from so many difficulties. But what system is free

from them?

SECOND QUESTION.

Another man of learning, and a much greater philosopher, who is one of

the profoundest metaphysicians of the day, advances very strong

arguments to prove that polytheism was the primitive religion of

mankind, and that men began with believing in several gods before their

reason was sufficiently enlightened to acknowledge one only Supreme

Being.

On the contrary, I venture to believe that in the beginning they

acknowledged one only God, and that afterwards human weakness adopted

several. My conception of the matter is this:

It is indubitable that there were villages before large towns were

built, and that all men have been divided into petty commonwealths

before they were united in great empires. It is very natural that the

people of a village, being terrified by thunder, afflicted at the loss

of its harvests, ill-used by the inhabitants of a neighboring village,

feeling every day its own weakness, feeling everywhere an invisible

power, should soon have said: There is some Being above us who does us

good and harm.

It seems to me to be impossible that it should have said: There are two

powers; for why more than one? In all things we begin with the simple;

then comes the compound; and after, by superior light, we go back to the

simple again. Such is the march of the human mind!

But what is this being who is thus invoked at first? Is it the sun? Is

it the moon? I do not think so. Let us examine what passes in the minds

of children; they are nearly like those of uninformed men. They are

struck, neither by the beauty nor by the utility of the luminary which

animates nature, nor by the assistance lent us by the moon, nor by the

regular variations of her course; they think not of these things; they

are too much accustomed to them. We adore, we invoke, we seek to

appease, only that which we fear. All children look upon the sky with

indifference; but when the thunder growls they tremble and run to hide

themselves. The first men undoubtedly did likewise. It could only be a

sect of philosophers who first observed the courses of the planets, made

them admired, and caused them to be adored; mere tillers of the ground,

without any information, did not know enough of them to embrace so noble

an error.

A village then would confine itself to saying: There is a power which

thunders and hails upon us, which makes our children die; let us appease

it. But how shall we appease it? We see that by small presents we have

calmed the anger of irritated men; let us then make small presents to

this power. It must also receive a name. The first that presents itself

is that of "chief," "master," "lord." This power then is styled "My

Lord." For this reason perhaps it was that the first Egyptians called

their god "knef"; the Syrians, "Adonai"; the neighboring nations,

"Baal," or "Bel," or "Melch," or "Moloch"; the Scythians, "Papæus"; all

these names signifying "lord," "master."

Thus was nearly all America found to be divided into a multitude of

petty tribes, each having its protecting god. The Mexicans, too, and the

Peruvians, forming great nations, had only one god--the one adoring

Manco Capak, the other the god of war. The Mexicans called their warlike

divinity "_Huitzilipochtli_," as the Hebrews had called their Lord

"_Sabaoth_."

It was not from a superior and cultivated reason that every people thus

began with acknowledging one only Divinity; had they been philosophers,

they would have adored the God of all nature, and not the god of a

village; they would have examined those infinite relations among all

things which prove a Being creating and preserving; but they examined

nothing--they felt. Such is the progress of our feeble understanding.

Each village would feel its weakness and its need of a protector; it

would imagine that tutelary and terrible being residing in the

neighboring forest, or on a mountain, or in a cloud. It would imagine

only one, because the clan had but one chief in war; it would imagine

that one corporeal, because it was impossible to represent it otherwise.

It could not believe that the neighboring tribe had not also its god.

Therefore it was that Jephthah said to the inhabitants of Moab: "You

possess lawfully what your god Chemoth has made you conquer; you should,

then, let us enjoy what our god has given us by his victories."

This language, used by one stranger to other strangers, is very

remarkable. The Jews and the Moabites had dispossessed the natives of

the country; neither had any right but that of force; and the one says

to the other: "Your god has protected you in your usurpation; suffer our

god to protect us in ours."

Jeremiah and Amos both ask what right the god Melchem had to seize the

country of Gad? From these passages it is evident that the ancients

attributed to each country a protecting god. We find other traces of

this theology in Homer.

It is very natural that, men's imaginations being heated, and their

minds having acquired some confused knowledge, they should soon multiply

their gods, and speedily assign protectors to the elements, the seas,

the forests, the fountains, and the fields. The more they observed the

stars, the more they would be struck with admiration. How, indeed,

should they have adored the divinity of a brook, and not have adored the

sun? The first step being taken, the earth would soon be covered with

gods; and from the stars men would at last come down to cats and

onions.

Reason, however, will advance towards perfection; time at length found

philosophers who saw that neither onions, nor cats, nor even the stars,

had arranged the order of nature. All those philosophers--Babylonians,

Persians, Egyptians, Scythians, Greeks, and Romans--admitted a supreme,

rewarding, and avenging God.

They did not at first tell it to the people; for whosoever should have

spoken ill of onions and cats before priests and old women, would have

been stoned; whosoever should have reproached certain of the Egyptians

with eating their gods would himself have been eaten--as Juvenal relates

that an Egyptian was in reality killed and eaten quite raw in a

controversial dispute.

What then did they do? Orpheus and others established mysteries, which

the initiated swore by oaths of execration not to reveal--of which

mysteries the principal was the adoration of a supreme God. This great

truth made its way through half the world, and the number of the

initiated became immense. It is true that the ancient religion still

existed; but as it was not contrary to the dogma of the unity of God, it

was allowed to exist. And why should it have been abolished? The Romans

acknowledged the "_Deus optimus maximus_" and the Greeks had their

Zeus--their supreme god. All the other divinities were only intermediate

beings; heroes and emperors were ranked with the gods, i.e., with the

blessed; but it is certain that Claudius, Octavius, Tiberius, and

Caligula, were not regarded as the creators of heaven and earth.

In short, it seems proved that, in the time of Augustus, all who had a

religion acknowledged a superior, eternal God, with several orders of

secondary gods, whose worship was called idolatry.

The laws of the Jews never favored idolatry; for, although they admitted

the Malachim, angels and celestial beings of an inferior order, their

law did not ordain that they should worship these secondary divinities.

They adored the angels, it is true; that is, they prostrated themselves

when they saw them; but as this did not often happen, there was no

ceremonial nor legal worship established for them. The cherubim of the

ark received no homage. It is beyond a doubt that the Jews, from

Alexander's time at least, openly adored one only God, as the

innumerable multitude of the initiated secretly adored Him in their

mysteries.

THIRD QUESTION.

It was at the time when the worship of a Supreme God was universally

established among all the wise in Asia, in Europe, and in Africa, that

the Christian religion took its birth.

Platonism assisted materially the understanding of its dogmas. The

"_Logos_," which with Plato meant the "wisdom," the reason of the

Supreme Being, became with us the "word," and a second person of God.

Profound metaphysics, above human intelligence, were an inaccessible

sanctuary in which religion was enveloped.

It is not necessary here to repeat how Mary was afterwards declared to

be the mother of God; how the consubstantiality of the Father and the

"word" was established; as also the proceeding of the "_pneuma_," the

divine organ of the divine _Logos_; as also the two natures and two

wills resulting from the hypostasis; and lastly, the superior

manducation--the soul nourished as well as the body, with the flesh and

blood of the God-man, adored and eaten in the form of bread, present to

the eyes, sensible to the taste, and yet annihilated. All mysteries have

been sublime.

In the second century devils began to be cast out in the name of Jesus;

before they were cast out in the name of Jehovah or Ihaho; for St.

Matthew relates that the enemies of Jesus having said that He cast out

devils in the name of the prince of devils, He answered, "If I cast out

devils by Beelzebub, by whom do your sons cast them out?"

It is not known at what time the Jews recognized Beelzebub, who was a

strange god, as the prince of devils; but it is known, for Josephus

tells us, that there were at Jerusalem exorcists appointed to cast out

devils from the bodies of the possessed; that is, of such as were

attacked by singular maladies, which were then in a great part of the

world attributed to the malific genii.

These demons were then cast out by the true pronunciation of Jehovah,

which is now lost, and by other ceremonies now forgotten.

This exorcism by Jehovah or by the other names of God, was still in use

in the first ages of the church. Origen, disputing against Celsus, says

to him: "If, when invoking God, or swearing by Him, you call Him 'the

God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,' you will by those words do things,

the nature and force of which are such that the evil spirits submit to

those who pronounce them; but if you call him by another name, as 'God

of the roaring sea,' etc., no effect will be produced. The name of

'Israel,' rendered in Greek, will work nothing; but pronounce it in

Hebrew with the other words required, and you will effect the

conjuration."

The same Origen has these remarkable words: "There are names which are

powerful from their own nature. Such are those used by the sages of

Egypt, the Magi of Persia, and the Brahmins of India. What is called

'magic,' is not a vain and chimerical art, as the Stoics and Epicureans

pretend. The names '_Sabaoth_' and '_Adonai_' were not made for created

beings, but belong to a mysterious theology which has reference to the

Creator; hence the virtue of these names when they are arranged and

pronounced according to rule."

Origen, when speaking thus, is not giving his private opinion; he is but

repeating the universal opinion.

All the religions then known admitted a sort of magic, which was

distinguished into celestial magic, and infernal magic, necromancy and

theurgy--all was prodigy, divination, oracle. The Persians did not deny

the miracles of the Egyptians, nor the Egyptians those of the Persians.

God permitted the primitive Christians to be persuaded of the truth of

the oracles attributed to the Sibyls, and left them a few other

unimportant errors, which were no essential detriment to their religion.

Another very remarkable thing is, that the Christians of the primitive

ages held temples, altars, and images in abhorrence. Origen acknowledges

this (No. 347). Everything was afterwards changed, with the discipline,

when the Church assumed a permanent form.

FOURTH QUESTION.

When once a religion is established in a state, the tribunals are all

employed in perverting the continuance or renewal of most of the things

that were done in that religion before it was publicly received. The

founders used to assemble in private, in spite of magistrates; but now

no assemblies are permitted but public ones under the eyes of the law,

and all concealed associations are forbidden. The maxim formerly was,

that "it is better to obey God than man"; the opposite maxim is now

adopted, that "to follow the laws of the state is to obey God." Nothing

was heard of but obsessions and possessions; the devil was then let

loose upon the world, but now the devil stays at home. Prodigies and

predictions were necessary; now they are no longer admitted: a man who

in the places should foretell calamities, would be sent to a madhouse.

The founders secretly received the money of the faithful; but now, a man

who should gather money for his own disposal, without being authorized

by the law, would be brought before a court of justice to answer for so

doing. Thus the scaffoldings that have served to build the edifice are

no longer made use of.

FIFTH QUESTION.

After our own holy religion, which indubitably is the only good one,

what religion would be the least objectionable?

Would it not be that which should be the simplest; that which should

teach much morality and very few dogmas; that which should tend to make

men just, without making them absurd; that which should not ordain the

belief of things impossible, contradictory, injurious to the Divinity,

and pernicious to mankind; nor dare to threaten with eternal pains

whosoever should possess common sense? Would it not be that which should

not uphold its belief by the hand of the executioner, nor inundate the

earth with blood to support unintelligible sophisms; that in which an

ambiguous expression, a play upon words, and two or three supported

charters, should not suffice to make a sovereign and a god of a priest

who is often incestuous, a murderer, and a poisoner; which should not

make kings subject to this priest; that which should teach only the

adoration of one God, justice, tolerance, and humanity.

SIXTH QUESTION.

It has been said, that the religion of the Gentiles was absurd in many

points, contradictory, and pernicious; but have there not been imputed

to it more harm than it ever did, and more absurdities than it ever

preached?

Show me in all antiquity a temple dedicated to Leda lying with a swan,

or Europa with a bull. Was there ever a sermon preached at Athens or at

Rome, to persuade the young women to cohabit with their poultry? Are the

fables collected and adorned by Ovid religious? Are they not like our

Golden Legend, our Flower of the Saints? If some Brahmin or dervish were

to come and object to our story of St. Mary the Egyptian, who not having

wherewith to pay the sailors who conveyed her to Egypt, gave to each of

them instead of money what are called "favors," we should say to the

Brahmin: Reverend father, you are mistaken; our religion is not the

Golden Legend.

We reproach the ancients with their oracles, and prodigies; if they

could return to this world, and the miracles of our Lady of Loretto and

our Lady of Ephesus could be counted, in whose favor would be the

balance?

Human sacrifices were established among almost every people, but very

rarely put in practice. Among the Jews, only Jephthah's daughter and

King Agag were immolated; for Isaac and Jonathan were not. Among the

Greeks, the story of "Iphigenia" is not well authenticated; and human

sacrifices were very rare among the ancient Romans. In short, the

religion of the Pagans caused very little blood to be shed, while ours

has deluged the earth. Ours is doubtless the only good, the only true

one; but we have done so much harm by its means that when we speak of

others we should be modest.

SEVENTH QUESTION.

If a man would persuade foreigners, or his own countrymen, of the truth

of his religion, should he not go about it with the most insinuating

mildness and the most engaging moderation? If he begins with telling

them that what he announces is demonstrated, he will find a multitude of

persons incredulous; if he ventures to tell them that they reject his

doctrine only inasmuch as it condemns their passions; that their hearts

have corrupted their minds; that their reasoning is only false and

proud, he disgusts them; he incenses them against himself; he himself

ruins what he would fain establish.

If the religion he announces be true, will violence and insolence render

it more so? Do you put yourself in a rage, when you say that it is

necessary to be mild, patient, beneficent, just, and to fulfil all the

duties of society? No; because everyone is of your own opinion. Why,

then, do you abuse your brother when preaching to him a mysterious

system of metaphysics? Because his opinion irritates your self-love. You

are so proud as to require your brother to submit his intelligence to

yours; humbled pride produces the wrath; it has no other source. A man

who has received twenty wounds in a battle does not fly into a passion;

but a divine, wounded by the refusal of your assent, at once becomes

furious and implacable.

EIGHTH QUESTION.

Must we not carefully distinguish the religion of the state from

theological religion? The religion of the state requires that the imans

keep registers of the circumcised, the vicars or pastors registers of

the baptized; that there be mosques, churches, temples, days consecrated

to rest and worship, rites established by law; that the ministers of

those rites enjoy consideration without power; that they teach good

morals to the people, and that the ministers of the law watch over the

morals of the ministers of the temples. This religion of the state

cannot at any time cause any disturbance.

It is otherwise with theological religion: this is the source of all

imaginable follies and disturbances; it is the parent of fanaticism and

civil discord; it is the enemy of mankind. A bonze asserts that _Fo_ is

a God,-that he was foretold by fakirs, that he was born of a white

elephant, and that every bonze can by certain grimaces make a _Fo_. A

_talapoin_ says, that _Fo_ was a holy man, whose doctrine the bonzes

have corrupted, and that _Sammonocodom_ is the true God. After a

thousand arguments and contradictions, the two factions agree to refer

the question to the _dalai-lama_, who resides three hundred leagues off,

and who is not only immortal, but also infallible. The two factions send

to him a solemn deputation; and the _dalai-lama_ begins, according to

his divine custom, by distributing among them the contents of his

close-stool.

The two rival sects at first receive them with equal reverence; have

them dried in the sun, and encase them in little chaplets which they

kiss devoutly; but no sooner have the _dalai-lama_ and his council

pronounced in the name of _Fo_, than the condemned party throw their

chaplets in the vice-god's face, and would fain give him a sound

thrashing. The other party defend their _lama_, from whom they have

received good lands; both fight a long time; and when at last they are

tired of mutual extermination, assassination, and poisoning, they

grossly abuse each other, while the _dalai-lama_ laughs, and still

distributes his excrement to whosoever is desirous of receiving the good

father lama's precious favors.

RHYME.

Rhyme was probably invented to assist the memory, and to regulate at the

same time the song and the dance. The return of the same sounds served

to bring easily and readily to the recollection the intermediate words

between the two rhymes. Those rhymes were a guide at once to the singer

and the dancer; they indicated the measure. Accordingly, in every

country, verse was the language of the gods.

We may therefore class it among the list of probable, that is, of

uncertain, opinions, that rhyme was at first a religious appendage or

ceremony; for after all, it is possible that verses and songs might be

addressed by a man to his mistress before they were addressed by him to

his deities; and highly impassioned lovers indeed will say that the

cases are precisely the same.

A rabbi who gave a general view of the Hebrew language, which I never

was able to learn, once recited to me a number of rhymed psalms, which

he said we had most wretchedly translated. I remember two verses, which

are as follows:

_Hibbitu clare vena haru_

_Ulph nehem al jeck pharu._

"They looked upon him and were lightened, and their faces were not

ashamed."

No rhyme can be richer than that of those two verses; and this being

admitted, I reason in the following manner:

The Jews, who spoke a jargon half Phœnician and half Syriac, rhymed;

therefore the great and powerful nations, under whom they were in

slavery, rhymed also. We cannot help believing, that the Jews--who, as

we have frequently observed, adopted almost everything from their

neighbors--adopted from them also rhyme.

All the Orientals rhyme; they are steady and constant in their usages.

They dress now as they have dressed for the long series of five or six

thousand years. We may, therefore, well believe that they have rhymed

for a period of equal duration.

Some of the learned contend that the Greeks began with rhyming, whether

in honor of their gods, their heroes, or their mistresses; but, that

afterwards becoming more sensible of the harmony of their language,

having acquired a more accurate knowledge of prosody, and refined upon

melody, they made those requisite verses without rhyme which have been

transmitted down to us, and which the Latins imitated and very often

surpassed.

As for us, the miserable descendants of Goths, Vandals, Gauls, Franks,

and Burgundians--barbarians who are incapable of attaining either the

Greek or Latin melody--we are compelled to rhyme. Blank verse, among all

modern nations, is nothing but prose without any measure; it is

distinguished from ordinary prose only by a certain number of equal and

monotonous syllables, which it has been agreed to denominate "verse."

We have remarked elsewhere that those who have written in blank verse

have done so only because they were incapable of rhyming. Blank verse

originated in an incapacity to overcome difficulty, and in a desire to

come to an end sooner.

We have remarked that Ariosto has made a series of forty-eight thousand

rhymes without producing either disgust or weariness in a single reader.

We have observed how French poetry, in rhyme, sweeps all obstacles

before it, and that pleasure arose even from the very obstacles

themselves. We have been always convinced that rhyme was necessary for

the ears, not for the eyes; and we have explained our opinions, if not

with judgment and success, at least without dictation and arrogance.

But we acknowledge that on the receipt at Mount Krapak of the late

dreadful literary intelligence from Paris, our former moderation

completely abandons us. We understand that there exists a rising sect of

barbarians, whose doctrine is that no tragedy should henceforward be

ever written but in prose. This last blow alone was wanting, in addition

to all our previous afflictions. It is the abomination of desolation in

the temple of the muses. We can very easily conceive that, after

Corneille had turned into verse the "Imitation of Jesus Christ," some

sarcastic wag might menace the public with the acting of a tragedy in

prose, by Floridor and Mondori; but this project having been seriously

executed by the abbé d'Aubignac, we well know with what success it was

attended. We well know the ridicule and disgrace that were attached to

the prose "Œdipus" of De la Motte Houdart, which were nearly as great

as those which were incurred by his "Œdipus" in verse. What miserable

Visigoth can dare, after "Cinna" and "Andromache," to banish verse from

the theatre? After the grand and brilliant age of our literature, can we

be really sunk into such degradation and opprobrium! Contemptible

barbarians! Go, then, and see this your prose tragedy performed by

actors in their riding-coats at Vauxhall, and afterwards go and feast

upon shoulder of mutton and strong beer.

What would Racine and Boileau have said had this terrible intelligence

been announced to them? "_Bon Dieu_"! Good God! from what a height have

we fallen, and into what a slough are we plunged!

It is certain that rhyme gives a most overwhelming and oppressive

influence to verses possessing mere mediocrity of merit. The poet in

this case is just like a bad machinist, who cannot prevent the harsh and

grating sounds of his wires and pulleys from annoying the ear. His

readers experience the same fatigue that he underwent while forming his

own rhymes; his verses are nothing but an empty jingling of wearisome

syllables. But if he is happy in his thoughts and happy also in his

rhyme, he then experiences and imparts a pleasure truly exquisite--a

pleasure that can be fully enjoyed only by minds endowed with

sensibility, and by ears attuned to harmony.

RESURRECTION.

SECTION I.

We are told that the Egyptians built their pyramids for no other purpose

than to make tombs of them, and that their bodies, embalmed within and

without, waited there for their souls to come and reanimate them at the

end of a thousand years. But if these bodies were to come to life again,

why did the embalmers begin the operation by piercing the skull with a

gimlet, and drawing out the brain? The idea of coming to life again

without brains would make one suspect that--if the expression may be

used--the Egyptians had not many while alive; but let us bear in mind

that most of the ancients believed the soul to be in the breast. And why

should the soul be in the breast rather than elsewhere? Because, when

our feelings are at all violent, we do in reality feel, about the region

of the heart, a dilatation or compression, which caused it to be thought

that the soul was lodged there. This soul was something aerial; it was a

slight figure that went about at random until it found its body again.

The belief in resurrection is much more ancient than historical times.

Athalides, son of Mercury, could die and come to life again at will;

Æsculapius restored Hippolytus to life, and Hercules, Alceste. Pelops,

after being cut in pieces by his father, was resuscitated by the gods.

Plato relates that Heres came to life again for fifteen days only.

Among the Jews, the Pharisees did not adopt the dogma of the

resurrection until long after Plato's time.

In the Acts of the Apostles there is a very singular fact, and one well

worthy of attention. St. James and several of his companions advise St.

Paul to go into the temple of Jerusalem, and, Christian as he was, to

observe all the ceremonies of the Old Law, in order--say they--"that all

may know that those things whereof they were informed concerning thee

are nothing, but that thou thyself also walkest orderly and keepest the

law." This is clearly saying: "Go and lie; go and perjure yourself; go

and publicly deny the religion which you teach."

St. Paul then went seven days into the temple; but on the seventh he was

discovered. He was accused of having come into it with strangers, and of

having profaned it. Let us see how he extricated himself.

But when Paul perceived that the one part were Sadducees and the other

Pharisees, he cried out in the council--"Men and brethren, I am a

Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee; of the hope and resurrection of the

dead I am called in question." The resurrection of the dead formed no

part of the question; Paul said this only to incense the Pharisees and

Sadducees against each other.

"And when he had so said there arose a dissension between the Pharisees

and the Sadducees; and the multitude was divided.

"For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, neither angel nor

spirit; but the Pharisees confess both."

It has been asserted that Job, who is very ancient, was acquainted with

the doctrine of resurrection; and these words are cited: "I know that

my Redeemer liveth, and that one day His redemption shall rise upon me;

or that I shall rise again from the dust, that my skin shall return, and

that in my flesh I shall again see God."

But many commentators understand by these words that Job hopes soon to

recover from his malady, and that he shall not always remain lying on

the ground, as he then was. The sequel sufficiently proves this

explanation to be the true one; for he cries out the next moment to his

false and hardhearted friends: "Why then do you say let us persecute

Him?" Or: "For you shall say, because we persecuted Him." Does not this

evidently mean--you will repent of having ill used me, when you shall

see me again in my future state of health and opulence. When a sick man

says: I shall rise again, he does not say: I shall come to life again.

To give forced meanings to clear passages is the sure way never to

understand one another; or rather, to be regarded by honest men as

wanting sincerity.

St. Jerome dates the birth of the sect of the Pharisees but a very short

time before Jesus Christ. The rabbin Hillel is considered as having been

the founder of the Pharisaïc sect; and this Hillel was contemporary with

St. Paul's master, Gamaliel.

Many of these Pharisees believed that only the Jews were brought to life

again, the rest of mankind not being worth the trouble. Others

maintained that there would be no rising again but in Palestine; and

that the bodies of such as were buried elsewhere would be secretly

conveyed into the neighborhood of Jerusalem, there to rejoin their

souls. But St. Paul, writing to the people of Thessalonica, says:

"For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are

alive, and remain unto the coming of the Lord, shall not prevent them

which are asleep.

"For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the

voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in

Christ shall rise first.

"Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up with them in the

clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the

Lord."

Does not this important passage clearly prove that the first Christians

calculated on seeing the end of the world? as, indeed, it was foretold

by St. Luke to take place while he himself was alive? But if they did

not see this end of the world, if no one rose again in their day, that

which is deferred is not lost.

St. Augustine believed that children, and even still-born infants, would

rise again in a state of maturity. Origen, Jerome, Athanasius, Basil,

and others, did not believe that women would rise again with the marks

of their sex.

In short, there have ever been disputes about what we have been, about

what we are, and about what we shall be.

SECTION II.

Father Malebranche proves resurrection by the caterpillars becoming

butterflies. This proof, as every one may perceive, is not more weighty

than the wings of the insects from which he borrows it. Calculating

thinkers bring forth arithmetical objections against this truth which he

has so well proved. They say that men and other animals are really fed

and derive their growth from the substance of their predecessors. The

body of a man, reduced to ashes, scattered in the air, and falling on

the surface of the earth, becomes corn or vegetable. So Cain ate a part

of Adam; Enoch fed on Cain; Irad on Enoch; Mahalaleel on Irad;

Methuselah on Mahalaleel; and thus we find that there is not one among

us who has not swallowed some portion of our first parent. Hence it has

been said that we have all been cannibals. Nothing can be clearer than

that such is the case after a battle; not only do we kill our brethren,

but at the end of two or three years, when the harvests have been

gathered from the field of battle, we have eaten them all; and we, in

turn, shall be eaten with the greatest facility imaginable. Now, when we

are to rise again, how shall we restore to each one the body that

belongs to him, without losing something of our own?

So say those who trust not in resurrection; but the resurrectionists

have answered them very pertinently.

A rabbin named Samaï demonstrates resurrection by this passage of

Exodus: "I appeared unto Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and swore

to give unto them the land of Canaan." Now--says this great

rabbin--notwithstanding this oath, God did not give them that land;

therefore, they will rise again to enjoy it, in order that the oath be

fulfilled.

The profound philosopher Calmet finds a much more conclusive proof in

vampires. He saw vampires issuing from churchyards to go and suck the

blood of good people in their sleep; it is clear that they could not

suck the blood of the living if they themselves were still dead;

therefore they had risen again; this is peremptory.

It is also certain that at the day of judgment all the dead will walk

under ground, like moles--so says the "Talmud"--that they may appear in

the valley of Jehoshaphat, which lies between the city of Jerusalem and

the Mount of Olives. There will be a good deal of squeezing in this

valley; but it will only be necessary to reduce the bodies

proportionately, like Milton's devils in the hall of Pandemonium.

This resurrection will take place to the sound of the trumpet, according

to St. Paul. There must, of course, be more trumpets than one; for the

thunder itself is not heard more than three or four leagues round. It is

asked: How many trumpets will there be? The divines have not yet made

the calculation; it will nevertheless be made.

The Jews say that Queen Cleopatra, who no doubt believed in the

resurrection like all the ladies of that day, asked a Pharisee if we

were to rise again quite naked? The doctor answered that we shall be

very well dressed, for the same reason that the corn that has been sown

and perished under ground rises again in ear with a robe and a beard.

This rabbin was an excellent theologian; he reasoned like Dom Calmet.

SECTION III.

_Resurrection of the Ancients._

It has been asserted that the dogma of resurrection was much in vogue

with the Egyptians, and was the origin of their embalmings and their

pyramids. This I myself formerly believed. Some said that the

resurrection was to take place at the end of a thousand years; others at

the end of three thousand. This difference in their theological opinions

seems to prove that they were not very sure about the matter.

Besides, in the history of Egypt, we find no man raised again; but among

the Greeks we find several. Among the latter, then, we must look for

this invention of rising again.

But the Greeks often burned their bodies, and the Egyptians embalmed

them, that when the soul, which was a small, aerial figure, returned to

its habitation, it might find it quite ready. This had been good if its

organs had also been ready; but the embalmer began by taking out the

brain and clearing the entrails. How were men to rise again without

intestines, and without the medullary part by means of which they think?

Where were they to find again the blood, the lymph, and other humors?

You will tell me that it was still more difficult to rise again among

the Greeks, where there was not left of you more than a pound of ashes

at the utmost--mingled, too, with the ashes of wood, stuffs and spices.

Your objection is forcible, and I hold with you, that resurrection is a

very extraordinary thing; but the son of Mercury did not the less die

and rise again several times. The gods restored Pelops to life, although

he had been served up as a ragout, and Ceres had eaten one of his

shoulders. You know that Æsculapius brought Hippolytus to life again;

this was a verified fact, of which even the most incredulous had no

doubt; the name of "_Virbius_," given to Hippolytus, was a convincing

proof. Hercules had resuscitated Alceste and Pirithous. Heres did, it is

true--according to Plato--come to life again for fifteen days only;

still it was a resurrection; the time does not alter the fact.

Many grave schoolmen clearly see purgatory and resurrection in Virgil.

As for purgatory, I am obliged to acknowledge that it is expressly in

the sixth book. This may displease the Protestants, but I have no

alternative:

_Non tamen omne malum miseris, nec funditus omnes_

_Corporea excedunt pestes,..._

Not death itself can wholly wash their stains;

But long contracted filth even in the soul remains.

The relics of inveterate vice they wear,

And spots of sin obscene in every face appear,...

But we have already quoted this passage in the article on "Purgatory,"

which doctrine is here expressed clearly enough; nor could the kinsfolks

of that day obtain from the pagan priests an indulgence to abridge their

sufferings for ready money. The ancients were much more severe and less

simoniacal than we are notwithstanding that they imputed so many foolish

actions to their gods. What would you have? Their theology was made up

of contradictions, as the malignant say is the case with our own.

When their purgation was finished, these souls went and drank of the

waters of Lethe, and instantly asked that they might enter fresh bodies

and again see daylight. But is this a resurrection? Not at all; it is

taking an entirely new body, not resuming the old one; it is a

metempsychosis, without any relation to the manner in which we of the

true faith are to rise again.

The souls of the ancients did, I must acknowledge, make a very bad

bargain in coming back to this world, for seventy years at most, to

undergo once more all that we know is undergone in a life of seventy

years, and then suffer another thousand years' discipline. In my humble

opinion there is no soul that would not be tired of this everlasting

vicissitude of so short a life and so long a penance.

SECTION IV.

_Resurrection of the Moderns._

Our resurrection is quite different. Every man will appear with

precisely the same body which he had before; and all these bodies will

be burned for all eternity, excepting only, at most, one in a hundred

thousand. This is much worse than a purgatory of ten centuries, in order

to live here again a few years.

When will the great day of this general resurrection arrive? This is not

positively known; and the learned are much divided. Nor do they any more

know how each one is to find his own members again. Hereupon they start

many difficulties.

1. Our body, say they, is, during life, undergoing a continual change;

at fifty years of age we have nothing of the body in which our soul was

lodged at twenty.

2. A soldier from Brittany goes into Canada; there, by a very common

chance, he finds himself short of food, and is forced to eat an Iroquois

whom he killed the day before. This Iroquois had fed on Jesuits for two

or three months; a great part of his body had become Jesuit. Here, then,

the body of a soldier is composed of Iroquois, of Jesuits, and of all

that he had eaten before. How is each to take again precisely what

belongs to him? and which part belongs to each?

3. A child dies in its mother's womb, just at the moment that it has

received a soul. Will it rise again fœtus, or boy, or man?

4. To rise again--to be the same person as you were--you must have your

memory perfectly fresh and present; it is memory that makes your

identity. If your memory be lost, how will you be the same man?

5. There are only a certain number of earthly particles that can

constitute an animal. Sand, stone, minerals, metals, contribute nothing.

All earth is not adapted thereto; it is only the soils favorable to

vegetation that are favorable to the animal species. When, after the

lapse of many ages, every one is to rise again, where shall be found the

earth adapted to the formation of all these bodies?

6. Suppose an island, the vegetative part of which will suffice for a

thousand men, and for five or six thousand animals to feed and labor for

that thousand men; at the end of a hundred thousand generations we shall

have to raise again a thousand millions of men. It is clear that matter

will be wanting: "_Materies opus est, ut crescunt post era saecla_."

7. And lastly, when it is proved, or thought to be proved, that a

miracle as great as the universal deluge, or the ten plagues of Egypt,

will be necessary to work the resurrection of all mankind in the valley

of Jehoshaphat, it is asked: What becomes of the souls of all these

bodies while awaiting the moment of returning into their cases?

Fifty rather knotty questions might easily be put; but the divines would

likewise easily find answers to them all.

RIGHTS.

SECTION I.

_National Rights--Natural Rights--Public Rights._

I know no better way of commencing this subject than with the verses of

Ariosto, in the second stanza of the 44th canto of the "_Orlando

Furioso_," which observes that kings, emperors, and popes, sign fine

treaties one day which they break the next, and that, whatever piety

they may affect, the only god to whom they really appeal, is their

interest:

_Fan lega oggi re, papi et imperatori_

_Doman saran nimici capitali:_

_Perche, qual Papparenze esteriori,_

_Non hanno i cor, non han gli animi tali,_

_Che non mirando al torto piu che al dritto._

_Attendon solamente al lor profitto._

If there were only two men on earth, how would they live together? They

would assist each other; they would annoy each other; they would court

each other; they would speak ill of each other; fight with each other;

be reconciled to each other; and be neither able to live with nor

without each other. In short, they would do as people at present do,

who possess the gift of reason certainly, but the gift of instinct also;

and will feel, reason, and act forever as nature has destined.

No god has descended upon our globe, assembled the human race, and said

to them, "I ordain that the negroes and Kaffirs go stark naked and feed

upon insects.

"I order the Samoyeds to clothe, themselves with the skins of reindeer,

and to feed upon their flesh, insipid as it is, and eat dry and half

putrescent fish without salt. It is my will that the Tartars of Thibet

all believe what their _dalai-lama_ shall say; and that the Japanese pay

the same attention to their _dairo_.

"The Arabs are not to eat swine, and the Westphalians nothing else but

swine.

"I have drawn a line from Mount Caucasus to Egypt, and from Egypt to

Mount Atlas. All who inhabit the east of that line may espouse as many

women as they please; those to the west of it must be satisfied with

one.

"If, towards the Adriatic Gulf, or the marshes of the Rhine and the

Meuse, or in the neighborhood of Mount Jura, or the Isle of Albion, any

one shall wish to make another despotic, or aspire to be so himself, let

his head be cut off, on a full conviction that destiny and myself are

opposed to his intentions.

"Should any one be so insolent as to attempt to establish an assembly

of free men on the banks of the Manzanares, or on the shores of the

Propontis, let him be empaled alive or drawn asunder by four horses.

"Whoever shall make up his accounts according to a certain rule of

arithmetic at Constantinople, at Grand Cairo, at Tafilet, at Delhi, or

at Adrianople, let him be empaled alive on the spot, without form of

law; and whoever shall dare to account by any other rule at Lisbon,

Madrid, in Champagne, in Picardy, and towards the Danube, from Ulm unto

Belgrade, let him be devoutly burned amidst chantings of the

'_Miserere_.'

"That which is just along the shores of the Loire is otherwise on the

banks of the Thames; for my laws are universal," etc.

It must be confessed that we have no very clear proof, even in the

"_Journal Chrétien_," nor in "The Key to the Cabinet of Princes," that a

god has descended in order to promulgate such a public law. It exists,

notwithstanding, and is literally practised according to the preceding

announcement; and there have been compiled, compiled, and compiled, upon

these national rights, very admirable commentaries, which have never

produced a sou to the great numbers who have been ruined by war, by

edicts, and by tax-gatherers.

These compilations closely resemble the case of conscience of Pontas. It

is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished who kill not

in large companies, and to the sound of trumpets; it is the rule.

At the time when Anthropophagi still existed in the forest of Ardennes,

an old villager met with a man-eater, who had carried away an infant to

devour it. Moved with pity, the villager killed the devourer of children

and released the little boy, who quickly fled away. Two passengers, who

witnessed the transaction at a distance, accused the good man with

having committed a murder on the king's highway. The person of the

offender being produced before the judge, the two witnesses--after they

had paid the latter a hundred crowns for the exercise of his

functions--deposed to the particulars, and the law being precise, the

villager was hanged upon the spot for doing that which had so much

exalted Hercules, Theseus, Orlando, and Amadis the Gaul. Ought the judge

to be hanged himself, who executed this law to the letter? How ought the

point to be decided upon a general principle? To resolve a thousand

questions of this kind, a thousand volumes have been written.

Puffendorff first established moral existences: "There are," said he,

"certain modes which intelligent beings attach to things natural, or to

physical operations, with the view of directing or restraining the

voluntary actions of mankind, in order to infuse order, convenience, and

felicity into human existence."

Thus, to give correct ideas to the Swedes and the Germans of the just

and the unjust, he remarks that "there are two kinds of place, in regard

to one of which, it is said, that things are for example, here or there;

and in respect to the other, that they have existed, do, or will exist

at a certain time, as for example, yesterday, to-day, or to-morrow. In

the same manner we conceive two sorts of moral existence, the one of

which denotes a moral state, that has some conformity with place, simply

considered; the other a certain time, when a moral effect will be

produced," etc.

This is not all; Puffendorff curiously distinguishes the simple moral

from the modes of opinion, and the formal from the operative qualities.

The formal qualities are simple attributes, but the operative are to be

carefully divided into original and derivated.

In the meantime, Barbeyrac has commented on these fine things, and they

are taught in the universities, and opinion is divided between Grotius

and Puffendorff in regard to questions of similar importance. Take my

recommendation; read Tully's "Offices."

SECTION II.

Nothing possibly can tend more to render a mind false, obscure, and

uncertain than the perusal of Grotius, Puffendorff, and almost all the

writers on the "_jus gentium_."

We must not do evil that good may come of it, says the writer to whom

nobody hearkens. It is permitted to make war on a power, lest it should

become too strong, says the "Spirit of Laws."

When rights are to be established by prescription, the publicists call

to their aid divine right and human right; and the theologians take

their part in the dispute. "Abraham and his seed," say they, "had a

right to the land of Canaan, because he had travelled there; and God had

given it to him in a vision." But according to the vulgate sage

teachers, five hundred and forty-seven years elapsed between the time

when Abraham purchased a sepulchre in the country and Joshua took

possession of a small part of it. No matter, his right was clear and

correct. And then prescription? Away with prescription! Ought that which

once took place in Palestine to serve as a rule for Germany and Italy?

Yes, for He said so. Be it so, gentlemen; God preserve me from disputing

with you!

The descendants of Attila, it is said, established themselves in

Hungary. Till what time must the ancient inhabitants hold themselves

bound in conscience to remain serfs to the descendants of Attila?

Our doctors, who have written on peace and war, are very profound; if we

attend to them, everything belongs of right to the sovereign for whom

they write; he, in fact, has never been able to alienate his domains.

The emperor of right ought to possess Rome, Italy, and France; such was

the opinion of Bartholus; first, because the emperor was entitled king

of the Romans; and, secondly, because the archbishop of Cologne is

chancellor of Italy, and the archbishop of Trier chancellor of Gaul.

Moreover, the emperor of Germany carries a gilded ball at his

coronation, which of course proves that he is the rightful master of the

whole globe.

At Rome there is not a single priest who has not learned, in his course

of theology, that the pope ought to be master of this earth, seeing it

is written that it was said to Simon, the son of Jonas: "Thou art Peter,

and upon this rock I will build my church." It was well said to Gregory

VII. that this treated only of souls, and of the celestial kingdom.

Damnable observation! he replied; and would have hanged the observer had

he been able.

Spirits, still more profound, establish this reasoning by an argument to

which there is no reply. He to whom the bishop of Rome calls himself

vicar has declared that his dominion is not of this world; can this

world then belong to the vicar, when his master has renounced it? Which

ought to prevail, human nature or the decretals? The decretals,

indisputably.

If it be asked whether the massacre of ten or twelve millions of unarmed

men in America was defensible, it is replied that nothing can be more

just and holy, since they were not Catholic, apostolic and Roman.

There is not an age in which the declarations of war of Christian

princes have not authorized the attack and pillage of all the subjects

of the prince, to whom war has been announced by a herald, in a coat of

mail and hanging sleeves. Thus, when this signification has been made,

should a native of Auvergne meet a German, he is bound to kill, and

entitled to rob him either before or after the murder.

The following has been a very thorny question for the schools: The ban,

and the arrière-ban, having been ordered out in order to kill and be

killed on the frontiers, ought the Suabians, being satisfied that the

war is atrociously unjust, to march? Some doctors say yes; others, more

just, pronounce no. What say the politicians?

When we have fully discussed these great preliminary questions, with

which no sovereign embarrasses himself, or is embarrassed, we must

proceed to discuss the right of fifty or sixty families upon the county

of Alost; the town of Orchies; the duchy of Berg and of Juliers; upon

the countries of Tournay and Nice; and, above all, on the frontiers of

all the provinces, where the weakest always loses his cause.

It was disputed for a hundred years whether the dukes of Orleans, Louis

XII., and Francis I., had a claim on the duchy of Milan, by virtue of a

contract of marriage with Valentina de Milan, granddaughter of the

bastard of a brave peasant, named Jacob Muzio. Judgment was given in

this process at the battle of Pavia.

The dukes of Savoy, of Lorraine, and of Tuscany still pretend to the

Milanese; but it is believed that a family of poor gentlemen exist in

Friuli, the posterity in a right line from Albion, king of the Lombards,

who possess an anterior claim.

The publicists have written great books upon the rights of the kingdom

of Jerusalem. The Turks have written none, and Jerusalem belongs to

them; at least at this present writing; nor is Jerusalem a kingdom.

CANONICAL RIGHTS--OR LAW.

_General Idea of the Rights of the Church or Canon Law, by M. Bertrand,

Heretofore First Pastor of the Church of Berne._

We assume neither to adopt nor contradict the principles of M. Bertrand;

it is for the public to judge of them.

Canon law, or the canon, according to the vulgar opinion, is

ecclesiastical jurisprudence. It is the collection of canons, rules of

the council, decrees of the popes, and maxims of the fathers.

According to reason, and to the rights of kings and of the people,

ecclesiastical jurisprudence is only an exposition of the privileges

accorded to ecclesiastics by sovereigns representing the nation.

If two supreme authorities, two administrations, having separate rights,

exist, and the one will make war without ceasing upon the other, the

unavoidable result will be perpetual convulsions, civil wars, anarchy,

tyranny, and all the misfortunes of which history presents so miserable

a picture.

If a priest is made sovereign; if the dairo of Japan remained emperor

until the sixteenth century; if the _dalai-lama_ is still sovereign at

Thibet; if Numa was at once king and pontiff; if the caliphs were heads

of the state as well as of religion; and if the popes reign at

Rome--these are only so many proofs of the truth of what we advance; the

authority is not divided; there is but one power. The sovereigns of

Russia and of England preside over religion; the essential unity of

power is there preserved.

Every religion is within the State; every priest forms a part of civil

society, and all ecclesiastics are among the number of the subjects of

the sovereign under whom they exercise their ministry. If a religion

exists which establishes ecclesiastical independence, and supports them

in a sovereign and legitimate authority, that religion cannot spring

from God, the author of society.

It is even to be proved, from all evidence, that in a religion of which

God is represented as the author, the functions of ministers, their

persons, property, pretensions, and manner of inculcating morality,

teaching doctrines, celebrating ceremonies, the adjustment of spiritual

penalties; in a word, all that relates to civil order, ought to be

submitted to the authority of the prince and the inspection of the

magistracy.

If this jurisprudence constitutes a science, here will be found the

elements.

It is for the magistracy, solely, to authorize the books admissible into

the schools, according to the nature and form of the government. It is

thus that M. Paul Joseph Rieger, counsellor of the court, judiciously

teaches canon law in the University of Vienna; and, in the like manner,

the republic of Venice examined and reformed all the rules in the states

which have ceased to belong to it. It is desirable that examples so wise

should generally prevail.

SECTION I.

_Of the Ecclesiastical Ministry._

Religion is instituted only to preserve order among mankind, and to

render them worthy of the bounty of the Deity by virtue. Everything in a

religion which does not tend to this object ought to be regarded as

foreign or dangerous.

Instruction, exhortation, the fear of punishment to come, the promises

of a blessed hereafter, prayer, advice, and spiritual consolation are

the only means which churchmen can properly employ to render men

virtuous on earth and happy to all eternity.

Every other means is repugnant to the freedom of reason; to the nature

of the soul; to the unalterable rights of conscience; to the essence of

religion; to that of the clerical ministry; and to the just rights of

the sovereign.

Virtue infers liberty, as the transport of a burden implies active

force. With constraint there is no virtue, and without virtue no

religion. Make me a slave and I shall be the worse for it.

Even the sovereign has no right to employ force to lead men to religion,

which essentially presumes choice and liberty. My opinions are no more

dependent on authority than my sickness or my health.

In a word, to unravel all the contradictions in which books on the canon

law abound, and to adjust our ideas in respect to the ecclesiastical

ministry, let us endeavor, in the midst of a thousand ambiguities, to

determine what is the Church.

The Church, then, is all believers, collectively, who are called

together on certain days to pray in common, and at all times to perform

good actions.

Priests are persons appointed, under the authority of the State, to

direct these prayers, and superintend public worship generally.

A numerous Church cannot exist without ecclesiastics; but these

ecclesiastics are not the Church.

It is not less evident that if the ecclesiastics, who compose a part of

civil society, have acquired rights which tend to trouble or destroy

such society, such rights ought to be suppressed.

It is still more obvious that if God has attached prerogatives or rights

to the Church, these prerogatives and these rights belong exclusively

neither to the head of the Church nor to the ecclesiastics; because

these are not the Church itself, any more than the magistrates are the

sovereign, either in a republic or a monarchy.

Lastly; it is very evident that it is our souls only which are submitted

to the care of the clergy, and that for spiritual objects alone.

The soul acts inwardly; its inward acts are thought, will, inclination,

and an acquiescence in certain truths, all which are above restraint;

and it is for the ecclesiastical ministry to instruct, but not to

command them.

The soul acts also outwardly. Its exterior acts are submission to the

civil law; and here constraint may take place, and temporal or corporeal

penalties may punish the violations of the law.

Obedience to the ecclesiastical order ought, consequently, to be always

free and voluntary; it ought to exact no other. On the contrary,

submission to the civil law may be enforced.

For the same reason ecclesiastical penalties, always being spiritual,

attach in this world to those only who are inwardly convinced of their

error. Civil penalties, on the contrary, accompanied by physical evil

produce physical effects, whether the offender acknowledge the justice

of them or not.

Hence it manifestly results that the authority of the clergy can only be

spiritual--that it is unacquainted with temporal power, and that any

co-operative force belongs not to the administration of the Church,

which is essentially destroyed by it.

It moreover follows that a prince, intent not to suffer any division of

his authority, ought not to permit any enterprise which places the

members of the community in an outward or civil dependence on the

ecclesiastical corporation.

Such are the incontestable principles of genuine canonical right or law,

the rules and the decisions of which ought at all times to be submitted

to the test of eternal and immutable truths, founded upon natural rights

and the necessary order of society.

SECTION II.

_Of the Possessions of Ecclesiastics._

Let us constantly ascend to the principles of society, which, in civil

as in religious order, are the foundations of all right.

Society in general is the proprietor of the territory of a country, and

the source of national riches. A portion of this national revenue is

devoted to the sovereign to support the expenses of government. Every

individual is possessor of that part of the territory, and of the

revenue, which the laws insure him; and no possession or enjoyment can

at any time be sustained, except under the protection of law.

In society we hold not any good, or any possession as a simple natural

right, as we give up our natural rights and submit to the order of civil

society, in return for assurance and protection. It is, therefore, by

the law that we hold our possessions.

No one can hold anything on earth through religion, neither lands nor

chattels; since all its wealth is spiritual. The possessions of the

faithful, as veritable members of the Church, are in heaven; it is there

where their treasures are laid up. The kingdom of Jesus Christ, which He

always announced as at hand, was not, nor could it be, of this world. No

property, therefore, can be held by divine right.

The Levites under the Hebrew law had, it is true, their tithe by a

positive law of God; but that was under a theocracy which exists no

longer--God Himself acting as the sovereign. All those laws have ceased,

and cannot at present communicate any title to possession.

If any body at present, like that of the priesthood, pretend to possess

tithes or any other wealth by positive right divine, it must produce an

express and incontestable proof enregistered by divine revelation. This

miraculous title would be, I confess, an exception to the civil law,

authorized by God, who says: "All persons ought to submit to the powers

that be, because they are ordained of God and established in His name."

In defect of such a title, no ecclesiastical body whatever can enjoy

aught on earth but by consent of the sovereignty and the authority of

the civil laws. These form their sole title to possession. If the clergy

imprudently renounce this title, they will possess none at all, and

might be despoiled by any one who is strong enough to attempt it. Its

essential interest is, therefore, to support civil society, to which it

owes everything.

For the same reason, as all the wealth of a nation is liable without

exception to public expenditure for the defence of the sovereign and the

nation, no property can be exempt from it but by force of law, which law

is always revocable as circumstances vary. Peter cannot be exempt

without augmenting the tax of John. Equity, therefore, is eternally

claiming for equality against surcharges; and the State has a right, at

all times, to examine into exemptions, in order to replace things in a

just, natural, proportionate order, by abolishing previously granted

immunities, whether permitted or extorted.

Every law which ordains that the sovereign, at the expense of the

public, shall take care of the wealth or possessions of any individual

or a body, without this body or individual contributing to the common

expenses, amounts to a subversion of law.

I moreover assert that the quota, whether the contribution of a body or

an individual, ought to be proportionately regulated, not by him or

them, but by the sovereign or magistracy, according to the general form

and law. Thus the sovereign or state may demand an account of the wealth

and of the possessions of everybody as of every individual.

It is, therefore, once more on these immutable principles that the rules

of the canon law should be founded which relate to the possessions and

revenue of the clergy.

Ecclesiastics, without doubt, ought to be allowed sufficient to live

honorably, but not as members of or as representing the Church, for the

Church itself claims neither sovereignty nor possession in this world.

But if it be necessary for ministers to preside at t the altar, it is

proper that society should support them in the same manner as the

magistracy and soldiers. It is, therefore, for the civil law to make a

suitable provision for the priesthood.

Even when the possessions of the ecclesiastics have been bestowed on

them by wills, or in any other manner, the donors have not been able to

denationalize the property by abstracting it from public charges and the

authority of the laws. It is always under the guarantee of the laws,

without which they would not possess the insured and legitimate

possessions which they enjoy.

It is, therefore, still left to the sovereign, or the magistracy in his

name, to examine at all times if the ecclesiastical revenues be

sufficient; and if they are not, to augment the allotted provision; if,

on the contrary, they are excessive, it is for them to dispose of the

superfluity for the general good of society.

But according to the right, commonly called canonical, which has sought

to form a State within the State, "_imperium in imperio_,"

ecclesiastical property is sacred and intangible, because it belongs to

religion and the Church; they have come of God, and not of man.

In the first place, it is impossible to appropriate this terrestrial

wealth to religion, which has nothing temporal. They cannot belong to

the Church, which is the universal body of the believers, including the

king, the magistracy, the soldiery, and all subjects; for we are never

to forget that priests no more form the Church than magistrates the

State.

Lastly, these goods come only from God in the same sense as all goods

come from Him, because all is submitted to His providence.

Therefore, every ecclesiastical possessor of riches, or revenue, enjoys

it only as a subject and citizen of the State, under the single

protection of the civil law.

Property, which is temporal and material, cannot be rendered sacred or

holy in any sense, neither literally nor figuratively. If it be said

that a person or edifice is sacred, it only signifies that it has been

consecrated or set apart for spiritual purposes.

The abuse of a metaphor, to authorize rights and pretensions destructive

to all society, is an enterprise of which history and religion furnish

more than one example, and even some very singular ones, which are not

at present to my purpose.

SECTION III.

_Of Ecclesiastical or Religious Assemblies._

It is certain that nobody can call any public or regular assembly in a

state but under the sanction of civil authority.

Religious assemblies for public worship must be authorized by the

sovereign, or civil magistracy, before they can be legal.

In Holland, where the civil power grants the greatest liberty, and very

nearly the same in Russia, in England, and in Prussia, those who wish to

form a church have to obtain permission, after which the new church is

in the states, although not of the religion of the states. In general,

as soon as there is a sufficient number of persons, or of families, who

wish to cultivate a particular mode of worship, and to assemble for that

purpose, they can without hesitation apply to the magistrate, who makes

himself a judge of it; and once allowed, it cannot be disturbed without

a breach of public order. The facility with which the government of

Holland has granted this permission has never produced any disorder; and

it would be the same everywhere if the magistrate alone examined,

judged, and protected the parties concerned.

The sovereign, or civil power, possesses the right at all times of

knowing what passes within these assemblies, of regulating, them in

conformity with public order, and of preventing such as produce

disorder. This perpetual inspection is an essential portion of

sovereignty, which every religion ought to acknowledge.

Everything in the worship, in respect to form of prayer, canticles, and

ceremonies, ought to be open to the inspection of the magistrate. The

clergy may compose these prayers; but it is for the State to approve or

reform them in case of necessity. Bloody wars have been undertaken for

mere forms, which would never have been waged had sovereigns understood

their rights.

Holidays ought to be no more established without the consent and

approbation of the State, who may at all times abridge and regulate

them. The multiplication of such days always produces a laxity of

manners and national impoverishment.

A superintendence over oral instruction and books of devotion, belongs

of right to the State. It is not the executive which teaches, but which

attends to the manner in which the people are taught. Morality above all

should be attended to, which is always necessary; whereas disputes

concerning doctrines are often dangerous.

If disputes exist between ecclesiastics in reference to the manner of

teaching, or on points of doctrine, the State may impose silence on both

parties, and punish the disobedient.

As religious congregations are not permitted by the State in order to

treat of political matters, magistrates ought to repress seditious

preachers, who heat the multitude by punishable declamation: these are

pests in every State.

Every mode of worship presumes a discipline to maintain order,

uniformity, and decency. It is for the magistrate to protect this

discipline, and to bring about such changes as times and circumstances

may render necessary.

For nearly eight centuries the emperors of the East assembled councils

in order to appease religious disputes, which were only augmented by the

too great attention paid to them. Contempt would have more certainly

terminated the vain disputation, which interest and the passions had

excited. Since the division of the empire of the West into various

kingdoms, princes have left to the pope the convocation of these

assemblies. The rights of the Roman pontiff are in this respect purely

conventional, and the sovereigns may agree in the course of time, that

they shall no longer exist; nor is any one of them obliged to submit to

any canon without having examined and approved it. However, as the

Council of Trent will most likely be the last, it is useless to agitate

all the questions which might relate to a future general council.

As to assemblies, synods, or national councils, they indisputably cannot

be convoked except when the sovereign or State deems them necessary. The

commissioners of the latter ought therefore to preside, direct all their

deliberations, and give their sanction to the decrees.

There may exist periodical assemblies of the clergy, to maintain order,

under the authority of the State, but the civil power ought uniformly to

direct their views and guide their deliberations. The periodical

assembly of the clergy of France is only an assembly of regulative

commissioners for all the clergy of the kingdom.

The vows by which certain ecclesiastics oblige themselves to live in a

body according to certain rules, under the name of monks, or of

religieux, so prodigiously multiplied in Europe, should always be

submitted to the inspection and approval of the magistrate. These

convents, which shut up so many persons who are useless to society, and

so many victims who regret the liberty which they have lost; these

orders, which bear so many strange denominations, ought not to be valid

or obligatory, unless when examined and sanctioned by the sovereign or

the State.

At all times, therefore, the prince or State has a right to take

cognizance of the rules and conduct of these religious houses, and to

reform or abolish them if held to be incompatible with present

circumstances, and the positive welfare of society.

The revenue and property of these religious bodies are, in like manner,

open to the inspection of the magistracy, in order to judge of their

amount and of the manner in which they are employed. If the mass of the

riches, which is thus prevented from circulation, be too great; if the

revenues greatly exceed the reasonable support of the regulars; if the

employment of these revenues be opposed to the general good; if this

accumulation impoverish the rest of the community; in all these cases it

becomes the magistracy, as the common fathers of the country, to

diminish and divide these riches, in order to make them partake of the

circulation, which is the life of the body politic; or even to employ

them in any other way for the benefit of the public.

Agreeably to the same principles, the sovereign authority ought to

forbid any religious order from having a superior who is a native or

resident of another country. It approaches to the crime of lèse-majesté.

The sovereign may prescribe rules for admission into these orders; he

may, according to ancient usage, fix an age, and hinder taking vows,

except by the express consent of the magistracy in each instance. Every

citizen is born a subject of the State, and has no right to break his

natural engagements with society without the consent of those who

preside over it.

If the sovereign abolishes a religious order, the vows cease to be

binding. The first vow is that to the State; it is a primary and tacit

oath authorized by God; a vow according to the decrees of Providence; a

vow unalterable and imprescriptible, which unites man in society to his

country and his sovereign. If we take a posterior vow, the primitive one

still exists; and when they clash, nothing can weaken or suspend the

force of the primary engagement. If, therefore, the sovereign declares

this last vow, which is only conditional and dependent on the first,

incompatible with it, he does not dissolve a vow, but decrees it to be

necessarily void, and replaces the individual in his natural state.

The foregoing is quite sufficient to dissipate all the sophistry by

which the canonists have sought to embarrass a question so simple in the

estimation of all who are disposed to listen to reason.

SECTION IV.

_On Ecclesiastical Penalties._

Since neither the Church, which is the body of believers collectively,

nor the ecclesiastics, who are ministers in the Church in the name of

the sovereign and under his authority, possess any coactive strength,

executive power, or terrestrial authority, it is evident that these

ministers can inflict only spiritual punishments. To threaten sinners

with the anger of heaven is the sole penalty that a pastor is entitled

to inflict. If the name of punishment or penalty is not to be given to

those censures or declamations, ministers of religion have none at all

to inflict.

May the Church eject from its bosom those who disgrace or who trouble

it? This is a grand question, upon which the canonists have not

hesitated to adopt the affirmative. Let us repeat, in the first place,

that ecclesiastics are not the Church. The assembled Church, which

includes the State or sovereign, doubtless possesses the right to

exclude from the congregations a scandalous sinner, after repeated

charitable and sufficient warnings. The exclusion, even in this case,

cannot inflict any civil penalty, any bodily evil, or any merely earthly

privation; but whatever right the Church may in this way possess, the

ecclesiastics belonging to it can only exercise it as far as the

sovereign and State allow.

It is therefore still more incumbent on the sovereign, in this case, to

watch over the manner in which this permitted right is exercised,

vigilance being the more necessary in consequence of the abuse to which

it is liable. It is, consequently, necessary for the supreme civil power

to consult the rules for the regulation of assistance and charity, to

prescribe suitable restrictions, without which every declaration of the

clergy, and all excommunication, will be null and without effect, even

when only applicable to the spiritual order. It is to confound different

eras and circumstances, to regulate the proceedings of present times

from the practice of the apostles. The sovereign in those days was not

of the religion of the apostles, nor was the Church included in the

State, so that the ministers of worship could not have recourse to the

magistrates. Moreover, the apostles were ministers extraordinary, of

which we now perceive no resemblance. If other examples of

excommunication, without the authority of the sovereign, be quoted, I

can only say that I cannot hear, without horror, of examples of

excommunication insolently fulminated against sovereigns and

magistrates; I boldly reply, that these denunciations amount to manifest

rebellion, and to an open violation of the most sacred duties of

religion, charity, and natural right.

Let us add, in order to afford a complete idea of excommunication, and

of the true rules of canonical right or law in this respect, that

excommunication, legitimately pronounced by those to whom the sovereign,

in the name of the Church, expressly leaves the power, includes

privation only of spiritual advantages on earth, and can extend to

nothing else: all beyond this will be abuse, and more or less

tyrannical. The ministers of the Church can do no more than declare that

such and such a man is no more a member of the Church. He may still,

however, enjoy notwithstanding the excommunication, all his natural,

civil, and temporal rights as a man and a citizen. If the magistrate

steps in and deprives such a man, in consequence, of an office or

employment in society, it then becomes a civil penalty for some fault

against civil order.

Let us suppose that which may very likely happen, as ecclesiastics are

only men, that the excommunication which they have been led to pronounce

has been prompted by some error or some passion; he who is exposed to a

censure so precipitate is clearly justified in his conscience before

God; the declaration issued against him can produce no effect upon the

life to come. Deprived of exterior communion with the true Church, he

may still enjoy the consolation of the interior communion. Justified by

his conscience, he has nothing to fear in a future existence from the

judgment of God, his only true judge.

It is then a great question, as to canonical rights, whether the clergy,

their head, or any ecclesiastical body whatever, can excommunicate the

sovereign or the magistracy, under any pretext, or for any abuse of

their power? This question is essentially scandalous, and the simple

doubt a direct rebellion. In fact, the first duty of man in society is

to respect the magistrate, and to advance his respectability, and you

pretend to have a right to censure and set him aside. Who has given you

this absurd and pernicious right? Is it God, who governs the political

world by delegated sovereignty, and who ordains that society shall

subsist by subordination?

The first ecclesiastics at the rise of Christianity--did they conceive

themselves authorized to excommunicate Tiberius, Nero, Claudius, or even

Constantine, who was a heretic? How then have pretensions thus

monstrous, ideas thus atrocious, wicked attempts equally condemned by

reason and by natural and religious rights, been suffered to last so

long? If a religion exists which teaches like horrors, society ought to

proscribe it, as directly subversive of the repose of mankind. The cry

of whole nations is already lifted up against these pretended canonical

laws, dictated by ambition and by fanaticism. It is to be hoped that

sovereigns, better instructed in their rights, and supported by the

fidelity of their people, will terminate abuses so enormous, and which

have caused so many misfortunes. The author of the "Essay on the Manners

and Spirit of Nations" has been the first to forcibly expose the

atrocity of enterprises of this nature.

SECTION V.

_Of the Superintendence of Doctrine._

The sovereign is not the judge of the truth of doctrine; he may judge

for himself, like all other men; but he ought to take cognizance of it

in respect to everything which relates to civil order, whether in regard

to purport or delivery.

This is the general rule from which magistrates ought never to depart.

Nothing in a doctrine merits the attention of the police, except as it

interests public order: it is the influence of doctrine upon manners

that decides its importance. Doctrines which have a distant connection

only with good conduct can never be fundamental. Truths which conduce to

render mankind gentle, humane, obedient to the laws and to the

government, interest the State, and proceed evidently from God.

SECTION VI.

_Superintendence of the Magistracy Over the Administration of the

Sacraments._

The administration of the sacraments ought to be submitted to the

careful inspection of the magistrates in everything which concerns

public order.

It has already been observed that the magistrate ought to watch over the

form of the public registry of marriages, baptisms, and deaths, without

any regard to the creed of the different inhabitants of the State.

Similar reasons in relation to police and good government--do they not

require an exact registry in the hands of the magistracy of all those

who make vows, and enter convents in those countries in which convents

are permitted?

In the sacrament of repentance, the minister who refuses or grants

absolution is accountable for his judgment only to God; and in the same

manner, the penitent is accountable to God alone, whether he consummates

it all, or does so well or ill.

No pastor, himself a sinner, ought to have the right of publicly

refusing, on his own private authority, the eucharist to another sinner.

The sinless Jesus Christ refused not the communion to Judas.

Extreme unction and the viaticum, if demanded or requested by the sick,

should be governed by the same, rule. The simple right of the minister

is to exhort the sick person, and it is the duty of the magistrate to

take care that the pastor abuse not circumstances, in order to persecute

the invalid.

Formerly, it was the Church collectively which called the pastors, and

conferred upon them the right of governing and instructing the flock. At

present, ecclesiastics alone consecrate others, and the magistracy ought

to be watchful of this privilege.

It is doubtless a great, though ancient abuse, that of conferring orders

without functions; it is depriving the State of members, without adding

to the Church. The magistrate is called upon to reform this abuse.

Marriage, in a civil sense, is the legitimate union of a man with a

woman for the procreation of children, to secure their due nurture and

education, and in order to assure unto them their rights and properties

under the protection of the laws. In order to confirm and establish this

union, it is accompanied by a religious ceremony, regarded by some as a

sacrament, and by others as a portion of public worship; a genuine

logomachy, which changes nothing in the thing. Two points are therefore

to be distinguished in marriage--the civil contract, or natural

engagement, and the sacrament, or sacred ceremony. Marriage may

therefore exist, with all its natural and civil effects, independently

of the religious ceremony. The ceremonies of the Church are only

essential to civil order, because the State has adopted them. A long

time elapsed before the ministers of religion had anything to do with

marriage. In the time of Justinian, the agreement of the parties, in the

presence of witnesses, without any ceremonies of the Church, legalized

marriages among Christians. It was that emperor who, towards the middle

of the sixth century, made the first laws by which the presence of

priests was required, as simple witnesses, without, however, prescribing

any nuptial benediction. The emperor Leo, who died in 886, seems to have

been the first who placed the religious ceremony in the number of

necessary conditions. The terms of the law itself indeed, which ordains

it, prove it to have been a novelty.

From the correct idea which we now form of marriage, it results in the

first place, that good order, and even piety, render religious forms

adopted in all Christian countries necessary. But the essence of

marriage cannot be denationalized, and this engagement, which is the

principal one in society, ought uniformly, as a branch of civil and

political order, to be placed under the authority of the magistracy.

It follows, therefore, that a married couple, even educated in the

worship of infidels and heretics, are not obliged to marry again, if

they have been united agreeably to the established forms of their own

country; and it is for the magistrate in all such instances to

investigate the state of the case.

The priest is at present the magistrate freely nominated by the law, in

certain countries, to receive the pledged faith of persons wishing to

marry. It is very evident, that the law can modify or change as it

pleases the extent of this ecclesiastical authority.

Wills and funerals are incontestably under the authority of the civil

magistracy and the police. The clergy have never been allowed to usurp

the authority of the law in respect to these. In the age of Louis XIV.

however, and even in that of Louis XV., striking examples have been

witnessed of the endeavors of certain fanatical ecclesiastics to

interfere in the regulation of funerals. Under the pretext of heresy,

they refused the sacraments, and interment; a barbarity which Pagans

would have held in horror.

SECTION VII.

_Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction._

The sovereign or State may, without doubt, give up to an ecclesiastical

body, or a single priest, a jurisdiction over certain objects and

certain persons, with a power suitable to the authority confided. I

examine not into the prudence of remitting a certain portion of civil

authority into the hands of any body or person who already enjoys an

authority in things spiritual. To deliver to those who ought to be

solely employed in conducting men to heaven, an authority upon earth, is

to produce a union of two powers, the abuse of which is only too easy;

but at least it is evident that any man, as well as an ecclesiastic, may

be intrusted with the same jurisdiction. By whomsoever possessed, it has

either been conceded by the sovereign power, or usurped; there is no

medium. The kingdom of Jesus Christ is not of this world; he refused to

be a judge upon earth, and ordered that men should give unto Cæsar the

things which belonged unto Cæsar: he forbade all dominations to his

apostles, and preached only humility, gentleness, and dependence. From

him ecclesiastics can derive neither power, authority, domination, nor

jurisdiction in this world. They can therefore possess no legitimate

authority, but by a concession from the sovereign or State, from which

all authority in a society can properly emanate.

There was a time in the unhappy epoch of the feudal ages in which

ecclesiastics were possessed in various countries with the principal

functions of the magistracy: the authority of the lords of the lay

fiefs, so formidable to the sovereign and oppressive to the people, has

been since bounded; but a portion of the independence of the

ecclesiastical jurisdictions still exists. When will sovereigns be

sufficiently informed and courageous to take back from them the usurped

authority and numerous privileges which they have so often abused, to

annoy the flock which they ought to protect?

It is by this inadvertence of princes that the audacious enterprises of

ecclesiastics against sovereigns themselves have originated. The

scandalous history of these attempts has been consigned to records which

cannot be contested. The bull "_In cœna Domini_," in particular,

still remains to prove the continual enterprises of the clergy against

royal and civil authority.

_Extract from the Tariff of the Rights Exacted in France by the Court of

Rome for Bulls, Dispensations, Absolutions, etc., which Tariff was

Decreed in the King's Council, Sept. 4, 1691, and Which is Reported

Entire in the Brief of James Lepelletier, Printed at Lyons in 1699, with

the Approbation and Permission of the King. Lyons: Printed for Anthony

Boudet, Eighth Edition._

1. For absolution for the crime of apostasy, payable to the pope,

twenty-four livres.

2. A bastard wishing to take orders must pay twenty-five livres for a

dispensation; if desirous to possess a benefice, he must pay in addition

one hundred and eighty livres; if anxious that his dispensation should

not allude to his illegitimacy, he will have to pay a thousand and fifty

livres.

3. For dispensation and absolution of bigamy, one thousand and fifty

livres.

4. For a dispensation for the error of a false judgment in the

administration of justice or the exercise of medicine, ninety livres.

5. Absolution for heresy, twenty-four livres.

6. Brief of forty hours, for seven years, twelve livres.

7. Absolution for having committed homicide in self-defence, or

undesignedly, ninety-five livres. All in company of the murderer also

need absolution, and are to pay for the same eighty-five livres each.

8. Indulgences for seven years, twelve livres.

9. Perpetual indulgences for a brotherhood, forty livres.

10. Dispensation for irregularity and incapacity, twenty-five livres; if

the irregularity is great, fifty livres.

11. For permission to read forbidden books, twenty-five livres.

12. Dispensation for simony, forty livres; with an augmentation

according to circumstances.

13. Brief to permit the eating of forbidden meats, sixty-five livres.

14. Dispensation for simple vows of chastity or of religion, fifteen

livres. Brief declaratory of the nullity of the profession of a monk or

a nun, one hundred livres. If this brief be requested ten years after

profession, double the amount.

_Dispensations in Relation to Marriage._

Dispensations for the fourth degree of relationship, with cause,

sixty-five livres; without cause, ninety livres; with dispensation for

familiarities that have passed between the future married persons, one

hundred and eighty livres.

For relations of the third or fourth degree, both on the side of the

father and mother, without cause, eight hundred and eighty livres; with

cause, one hundred and forty-five livres.

For relations of the second degree on one side, and the fourth on the

other; nobles to pay one thousand four hundred and thirty livres;

roturiers, one thousand one hundred and fifty livres.

He who would marry the sister of the girl to whom he has been affianced,

to pay for a dispensation, one thousand four hundred and thirty livres.

Those who are relations in the third degree, if they are nobles, or live

creditably, are to pay one thousand four hundred and thirty livres; if

the relationship is on the side of father as well as mother, two

thousand four hundred and thirty livres.

Relations in the second degree to pay four thousand five hundred and

thirty livres; and if the female has accorded favors to the male, in

addition for absolution, two thousand and thirty livres.

For those who have stood sponsors at the baptism of the children of each

other, the dispensation will cost two thousand seven hundred and thirty

livres. If they would be absolved from premature familiarity, one

thousand three hundred and thirty livres in addition.

He who has enjoyed the favors of a widow during the life of her deceased

husband, in order to legitimately espouse her, will have to pay one

hundred and ninety livres.

In Spain and Portugal, the marriage dispensations are still dearer.

Cousins-german cannot obtain them for less than two thousand crowns.

The poor not being able to pay these taxes, abatements may be made. It

is better to obtain half a right, than lose all by refusing the

dispensation.

No reference is had here to the sums paid to the pope for the bulls of

bishops, abbots, etc., which are to be found in the almanacs; but we

cannot perceive by what authority the pope of Rome levies taxes upon

laymen who choose to marry their cousins.

RIVERS.

The progress of rivers to the ocean is not so rapid as that of man to

error. It is not long since it was discovered that all rivers originate

in those eternal masses of snow which cover the summits of lofty

mountains, those snows in rain, that rain in the vapor exhaled from the

land and sea; and that thus everything is a link in the great chain of

nature.

When a boy, I heard theses delivered which proved that all rivers and

fountains came from the sea. This was the opinion of all antiquity.

These rivers flowed into immense caverns, and thence distributed their

waters to all parts of the world.

When Aristeus goes to lament the loss of his bees to Cyrene his mother,

goddess of the little river Enipus in Thessaly, the river immediately

divides itself, forming as it were two mountains of water, right and

left, to receive him according to ancient and immemorial usage; after

which he has a view of those vast and beautiful grottoes through which

flow all the rivers of the earth; the Po, which descends from Mount Viso

in Piedmont, and traverses Italy; the Teverone, which comes from the

Apennines; the Phasis, which issues from Mount Caucasus, and falls into

the Black Sea; and numberless others.

Virgil, in this instance, adopted a strange system of natural

philosophy, in which certainly none but poets can be indulged.

Such, however, was the credit and prevalence of this system that,

fifteen hundred years afterwards, Tasso completely imitated Virgil in

his fourteenth canto, while imitating at the same time with far greater

felicity Ariosto. An old Christian magician conducts underground the two

knights who are to bring back Rinaldo from the arms of Armida, as

Melissa had rescued Rogero from the caresses of Alcina. This venerable

sage makes Rinaldo descend into his grotto, from which issue all the

rivers which refresh and fertilize our earth. It is a pity that the

rivers of America are not among the number. But as the Nile, the Danube,

the Seine, the Jordan, and the Volga have their source in this cavern,

that ought to be deemed sufficient. What is still more in conformity to

the physics of antiquity is the circumstance of this grotto or cavern

being in the very centre of the earth. Of course, it is here that

Maupertuis wanted to take a tour.

After admitting that rivers spring from mountains, and that both of them

are essential parts of this great machine, let us beware how we give in

to varying and vanishing systems.

When Maillet imagined that the sea had formed the mountains, he should

have dedicated his book to Cyrano de Bergerac. When it has been said,

also, that the great chains of mountains extend from east to west, and

that the greatest number of rivers also flow always to the west, the

spirit of system has been more consulted than the truth of nature.

With respect to mountains, disembark at the Cape of Good Hope, you will

perceive a chain of mountains from the south as far north as Monomotapa.

Only a few persons have visited that quarter of the world, and travelled

under the line in Africa. But Calpe and Abila are completely in the

direction of north and south. From Gibraltar to the river Guadiana, in a

course directly northward, there is a continuous range of mountains. New

and Old Castile are covered with them, and the direction of them all is

from south to north, like that of all the mountains in America. With

respect to the rivers, they flow precisely according to the disposition

or direction of the land.

The Guadalquivir runs straight to the south from Villanueva to San

Lucar; the Guadiana the same, as far as Badajos. All the rivers in the

Gulf of Venice, except the Po, fall into the sea towards the south. Such

is the course of the Rhone from Lyons to its mouth. That of the Seine is

from the north-northwest. The Rhine, from Basle, goes straight to the

north. The Meuse does the same, from its source to the territory

overflowed by its waters. The Scheldt also does the same.

Why, then, should men be so assiduous in deceiving themselves, just for

the pleasure of forming systems, and leading astray persons of weak and

ignorant minds? What good can possibly arise from inducing a number of

people--who must inevitably be soon undeceived--to believe that all

rivers and all mountains are in a direction from east to west, or from

west to east; that all mountains are covered with oyster-shells--which

is most certainly false--that anchors have been found on the summit of

the mountains of Switzerland; that these mountains have been formed by

the currents of the ocean; and that limestone is composed entirely of

seashells? What! shall we, at the present day, treat philosophy as the

ancients formerly treated history?

To return to streams and rivers. The most important and valuable things

that can be done in relation to them is preventing their inundations,

and making new rivers--that is, canals--out of those already existing,

wherever the undertaking is practicable and beneficial. This is one of

the most useful services that can be conferred upon a nation. The canals

of Egypt were as serviceable as its pyramids were useless.

With regard to the quantity of water conveyed along the beds of rivers,

and everything relating to calculation on the subject, read the article

on "River," by M. d'Alembert. It is, like everything else done by him,

clear, exact, and true; and written in a style adapted to the subject;

he does not employ the style of Telemachus to discuss subjects of

natural philosophy.

ROADS.

It was not until lately that the modern nations of Europe began to

render roads practicable and convenient, and to bestow on them some

beauty. To superintend and keep in order the road is one of the most

important cares of both the Mogul and Chinese emperors. But these

princes never attained such eminence in this department as the Romans.

The Appian, the Aurelian, the Flaminian, the Æmilian, and the Trajan

ways exist even at the present day. The Romans alone were capable of

constructing such roads, and they alone were capable of repairing them.

Bergier, who has written an otherwise valuable book, insists much on

Solomon's employing thirty thousand Jews in cutting wood on Mount

Lebanon, eighty thousand in building the temple, seventy thousand on

carriages, and three thousand six hundred in superintending the labors

of others. We will for a moment admit it all to be true; yet still there

is nothing said about his making or repairing highways.

Pliny informs us that three hundred thousand men were employed for

twenty years in building one of the pyramids of Egypt; I am not disposed

to doubt it; but surely three hundred thousand men might have been much

better employed. Those who worked on the canals in Egypt; or on the

great wall, the canals, or highways of China; or those who constructed

the celebrated ways of the Roman Empire were much more usefully occupied

than the three hundred thousand miserable slaves in building a pyramidal

sepulchre for the corpse of a bigoted Egyptian.

We are well acquainted with the prodigious works accomplished by the

Romans, their immense excavations for lakes of water, or the beds of

lakes formed by nature, filled up, hills levelled, and a passage bored

through a mountain by Vespasian, in the Flaminian way, for more than a

thousand feet in length, the inscription on which remains at present.

Pausilippo is not to be compared with it.

The foundations of the greater part of our present houses are far from

being so solid as were the highways in the neighborhood of Rome; and

these public ways were extended throughout the empire, although not upon

the same scale of duration and solidity. To effect that would have

required more men and money than could possibly have been obtained.

Almost all the highways of Italy were erected on a foundation four feet

deep; when a space of marshy ground or bog was on the track of the road,

it was filled up; and when any part of it was mountainous, its

pretipitousness was reduced to a gentle and trifling inclination from

the general line of the road. In many parts, the roads were supported by

solid walls.

Upon the four feet of masonry, were placed large hewn stones of marble,

nearly one foot in thickness, and frequently ten feet wide; they were

indented by the chisel to prevent the slipping of the horses. It was

difficult to say which most attracted admiration--the utility or the

magnificence of these astonishing works.

Nearly all of these wonderful constructions were raised at the public

expense. Cæsar repaired and extended the Appian way out of his own

private funds; those funds, however, consisted of the money of the

republic.

Who were the persons employed upon these works? Slaves, captives taken

in war, and provincials that were not admitted to the distinction of

Roman citizens. They worked by "_corvée_," as they do in France and

elsewhere; but some trifling remuneration was allowed them.

Augustus was the first who joined the legions with the people in labors

upon the highways of the Gauls, and in Spain and Asia. He penetrated the

Alps by the valley which bore his name, and which the Piedmontese and

the French corruptly called the "Valley of Aöste." It was previously

necessary to bring under subjection all the savage hordes by which these

cantons were inhabited. There is still visible, between Great and Little

St. Bernard, the triumphal arch erected by the senate in honor of him

after this expedition. He again penetrated the Alps on another side

leading to Lyons, and thence into the whole of Gaul. The conquered never

effected for themselves so much as was effected for them by their

conquerors.

The downfall of the Roman Empire was that of all the public works, as

also of all orderly police, art, and industry. The great roads

disappeared in the Gauls, except some causeways, "_chaussées_," which

the unfortunate Queen Brunehilde kept for a little time in repair. A man

could scarcely move on horseback with safety on the ancient celebrated

ways, which were now becoming dreadfully broken up, and impeded by

masses of stone and mud. It was found necessary to pass over the

cultivated fields; the ploughs scarcely effected in a month what they

now easily accomplish in a week. The little commerce that remained was

limited to a few woollen and linen cloths, and some wretchedly wrought

hardwares, which were carried on the backs of mules to the

fortifications or prisons called "_châteaux_" situated in the midst of

marshes, or on the tops of mountains covered with snow.

Whatever travelling was accomplished--and it could be but little--during

the severe seasons of the year, so long and so tedious in northern

climates, could be effected only by wading through mud or climbing over

rocks. Such was the state of the whole of France and Germany down to the

middle of the seventeenth century. Every individual wore boots; and in

many of the cities of Germany the inhabitants went into the streets on

stilts.

At length, under Louis XIV., were begun those great roads which other

nations have imitated. Their width was limited to sixty feet in the year

1720. They are bordered by trees in many places to the extent of thirty

leagues from the capital, which has a most interesting and delightful

effect. The Roman military ways were only sixteen feet wide, but were

infinitely more solid. It was necessary to repair them every year, as is

the practice with us. They were embellished by monuments, by military

columns, and even by magnificent tombs; for it was not permitted, either

in Greece or Italy, to bury the dead within the walls of cities, and

still less within those of temples; to do so would have been no less an

offence than sacrilege. It was not then as it is at present in our

churches, in which, for a sum of money, ostentatious and barbarous

vanity is allowed to deposit the dead bodies of wealthy citizens,

infecting the very place where men assemble to adore their God in

purity, and where incense seems to be burned solely to counteract the

stench of carcasses; while the poorer classes are deposited in the

adjoining cemetery; and both unite their fatal influence to spread

contagion among survivors.

The emperors were almost the only persons whose ashes were permitted to

repose in the monuments erected at Rome.

Highways, sixty feet in width, occupy too much land; it is about forty

feet more than necessary. France measures two hundred leagues, or

thereabouts, from the mouth of the Rhone to the extremity of Brittany,

and about the same from Perpignan to Dunkirk; reckoning the league at

two thousand five hundred toises. This calculation requires, merely for

two great roads, a hundred and twenty millions of square feet of land,

all which must of course be lost to agriculture. This loss is very

considerable in a country where the harvests are by no means always

abundant.

An attempt was made to pave the high road from Orleans, which was not of

the width above mentioned; but it was seen, in no long time, that

nothing could be worse contrived for a road constantly covered with

heavy carriages. Of these hewn paving stones laid on the ground, some

will be constantly sinking, and others rising above the correct level,

and the road becomes rugged, broken, and impracticable; it was therefore

found necessary that the plan should be abandoned.

Roads covered with gravel and sand require a renewal of labor every

year; this labor interferes with the cultivation of land, and is ruinous

to agriculture.

M. Turgot, son of the mayor of Paris--whose name is never mentioned in

that city but with blessings, and who was one of the most enlightened,

patriotic, and zealous of magistrates--and the humane and beneficent M.

de Fontette have done all in their power, in the provinces of Limousin

and Normandy, to correct this most serious inconvenience.

It has been contended that we should follow the example of Augustus and

Trajan, and employ our troops in the construction of highways. But in

that case the soldier must necessarily have an increase of pay; and a

kingdom, which was nothing but a province of the Roman Empire, and which

is often involved in debt, can rarely engage in such undertakings as the

Roman Empire accomplished without difficulty.

It is a very commendable practice in the Low Countries, to require the

payment of a moderate toll from all carriages, in order to keep the

public roads in proper repair. The burden is a very light one. The

peasant is relieved from the old system of vexation and oppression, and

the roads are in such fine preservation as to form even an agreeable

continued promenade.

Canals are much more useful still. The Chinese surpass all other people

in these works, which require continual attention and repair. Louis

XIV., Colbert, and Riquet, have immortalized themselves by the canal

which joins the two seas. They have never been as yet imitated. It is no

difficult matter to travel through a great part of France by canals.

Nothing could be more easy in Germany than to join the Rhine to the

Danube; but men appear to prefer ruining one another's fortunes, and

cutting each other's throats about a few paltry villages, to extending

the grand means of human happiness.

ROD.

The Theurgists and ancient sages had always a rod with which they

operated.

Mercury passes for the first whose rod worked miracles. It is asserted

that Zoroaster also bore a great rod. The rod of the ancient Bacchus was

his Thyrsus, with which he separated the waters of the Orontes, the

Hydaspus, and the Red Sea. The rod of Hercules was his club. Pythagoras

was always represented with his rod. It is said it was of gold; and it

is not surprising that, having a thigh of gold, he should possess a rod

of the same metal.

Abaris, priest of the hyperborean Apollo, who it is pretended was

contemporary with Pythagoras, was still more famous for his rod. It was

indeed only of wood, but he traversed the air astride of it. Porphyry

and Iamblichus pretend that these two grand Theurgists, Abaris and

Pythagoras, amicably exhibited their rods to each other.

The rod, with sages, was at all times a sign of their superiority. The

sorcerers of the privy council of Pharaoh at first effected as many

feats with their rods as Moses with his own. The judicious Calmet

informs us, in his "Dissertation on the Book of Exodus," that "these

operations of the Magi were not miracles, properly speaking, but

metamorphoses, viz.: singular and difficult indeed, but nevertheless

neither contrary to nor above the laws of nature." The rod of Moses had

the superiority, which it ought to have, over those of the Chotins of

Egypt.

Not only did the rod of Aaron share in the honor of the prodigies of

that of his brother Moses, but he performed some admirable things with

his own. No one can be ignorant that, out of thirteen rods, Aaron's

alone blossomed, and bore buds and flowers of almonds.

The devil, who, as is well known, is a wicked aper of the deeds of

saints, would also have his rod or wand, with which he gratified the

sorcerers: Medea and Circe were always armed with this mysterious

instrument. Hence, a magician never appears at the opera without his

rod, and on which account they call their parts, "_rôles de baguette_."

No performer with cups and balls can manage his hey presto! without his

rod or wand.

Springs of water and hidden treasures are discovered by means of a rod

made of a hazel twig, which fails not to press the hand of a fool who

holds it too fast, but which turns about easily in that of a knave. M.

Formey, secretary of the academy of Berlin, explains this phenomenon by

that of the loadstone. All the conjurers of past times, it was thought,

repaired to a sabbath or assembly on a magic rod or on a broom-stick;

and judges, who were no conjurers, burned them.

Birchen rods are formed of a handful of twigs of that tree with which

malefactors are scourged on the back. It is indecent and shameful to

scourge in this manner the posteriors of young boys and girls; a

punishment which was formerly that of slaves. I have seen, in some

colleges, barbarians who have stripped children almost naked; a kind of

executioner, often intoxicated, lacerate them with long rods, which

frequently covered them with blood, and produced extreme inflammation.

Others struck them more gently, which from natural causes has been known

to produce consequences, especially in females, scarcely less

disgusting.

By an incomprehensible species of police, the Jesuits of Paraguay

whipped the fathers and mothers of families on their posteriors. Had

there been no other motive for driving out the Jesuits, that would have

sufficed.

ROME (COURT OF).

Before the time of Constantine, the bishop of Rome was considered by the

Roman magistrates, who were unacquainted with our holy religion, only as

the chief of a sect, frequently tolerated by the government, but

frequently experiencing from it capital punishment. The names of the

first disciples, who were by birth Jews, and of their successors, who

governed the little flock concealed in the immense city of Rome, were

absolutely unknown by all the Latin writers. We well know that

everything was changed, and in what manner everything was changed under

Constantine.

The bishop of Rome, protected and enriched as he was, was always in

subjection to the emperors, like the bishop of Constantinople, and of

Nicomedia, and every other, not making even the slightest pretension to

the shadow of sovereign authority. Fatality, which guides the affairs of

the universe, finally established the power of the ecclesiastical Roman

court, by the hands of the barbarians who destroyed the empire.

The ancient religion, under which the Romans had been victorious for

such a series of ages, existed still in the hearts of the population,

notwithstanding all the efforts of persecution, when, in the four

hundred and eighth year of our era, Alaric invaded Italy and beseiged

Rome. Pope Innocent I. indeed did not think proper to forbid the

inhabitants of that city sacrificing to the gods in the capitol, and in

the other temples, in order to obtain the assistance of heaven against

the Goths. But this same Pope Innocent, if we may credit Zosimus and

Orosius, was one of the deputation sent to treat with Alaric, a

circumstance which shows that the pope was at that time regarded as a

person of considerable consequence.

When Attila came to ravage Italy in 452, by the same right which the

Romans themselves had exercised over so many and such powerful nations;

by the right of Clovis, of the Goths, of the Vandals, and the Heruli,

the emperor sent Pope Leo I., assisted by two personages of consular

dignity, to negotiate with that conqueror. I have no doubt, that

agreeably to what we are positively told, St. Leo was accompanied by an

angel, armed with a flaming sword, which made the king of the Huns

tremble, although he had no faith in angels, and a single sword was not

exceedingly likely to inspire him with fear. This miracle is very finely

painted in the Vatican, and nothing can be clearer than that it never

would have been painted unless it had actually been true. What

particularly vexes and perplexes me is this angel's suffering Aquileia,

and the whole of Illyria, to be sacked and ravaged, and also his not

preventing Genseric, at a later period, from giving up Rome to his

soldiers for fourteen days of plunder. It was evidently not the angel of

extermination.

Under the exarchs, the credit and influence of the popes augmented, but

even then they had not the smallest degree of civil power. The Roman

bishop, elected by the people, craved protection for the bishop, of the

exarch of Ravenna, who had the power of confirming or of cancelling the

election.

After the exarchate was destroyed by the Lombards, the Lombard kings

were desirous of becoming masters also of the city of Rome; nothing

could certainly be more natural.

Pepin, the usurper of France, would not suffer the Lombards to usurp

that capital, and so become too powerful against himself; nothing again

can be more natural than this.

It is pretended that Pepin and his son Charlemagne gave to the Roman

bishops many lands of the exarchate, which was designated the Justices

of St. Peter--"_les Justices de St. Pierre_." Such is the real origin of

their temporal power. From this period, these bishops appear to have

assiduously exerted themselves to obtain something of rather more

consideration and of more consequence than these justices.

We are in possession of a letter from Pope Arian I. to Charlemagne, in

which he says, "The pious liberality of the emperor Constantine the

Great, of sacred memory, raised and exalted, in the time of the blessed

Roman Pontiff, Sylvester, the holy Roman Church, and conferred upon it

his own power in this portion of Italy."

From this time, we perceive, it was attempted to make the world believe

in what is called the Donation of Constantine, which was, in the sequel,

for a period of five hundred years, not merely regarded as an article of

faith, but an incontestable truth. To entertain doubts on the subject of

this donation included at once the crime of treason and the guilt of

mortal sin.

After the death of Charlemagne, the bishop augmented his authority in

Rome from day to day; but centuries passed away before he came to be

considered as a sovereign prince. Rome had for a long period a patrician

municipal government.

Pope John XII., whom Otho I., emperor of Germany, procured to be deposed

in a sort of council, in 963, as simoniacal, incestuous, sodomitical, an

atheist, in league with the devil, was the first man in Italy as

patrician and consul, before he became bishop of Rome; and

notwithstanding all these titles and claims, notwithstanding the

influence of the celebrated Marosia, his mother, his authority was

always questioned and contested.

Gregory VII., who from the rank of a monk became pope, and pretended to

depose kings and bestow empires, far from being in fact complete master

of Rome, died under the protection, or rather as the prisoner of those

Norman princes who conquered the two Sicilies, of which he considered

himself the paramount lord.

In the grand schism of the West, the popes who contended for the empire

of the world frequently supported themselves on alms.

It is a fact not a little extraordinary that the popes did not become

rich till after the period when they dared not to exhibit themselves at

Rome.

According to Villani, Bertrand de Goth, Clement V. of Bordeaux, who

passed his life in France, sold benefices publicly, and at his death

left behind him vast treasures.

The same Villani asserts that he died worth twenty-five millions of gold

florins. St. Peter's patrimony could not certainly have brought him such

a sum.

In a word, down to the time of Innocent VIII., who, made himself master

of the castle of St. Angelo, the popes never possessed in Rome actual

sovereignty.

Their spiritual authority was undoubtedly the foundation of their

temporal; but had they confined themselves to imitating the conduct of

St. Peter, whose place it was pretended they filled, they would never

have obtained any other kingdom than that of heaven. Their policy always

contrived to prevent the emperors from establishing themselves at Rome,

notwithstanding the fine and flattering title of "king of the Romans."

The Guelph faction always prevailed in Italy over the Ghibelline. The

Romans were more disposed to obey an Italian priest than a German king.

In the civil wars, which the quarrel between the empire and the

priesthood excited and kept alive for a period of five hundred years,

many lords obtained sovereignties, sometimes in quality of vicars of the

empire, and sometimes in that of vicars of the Holy See. Such were the

princes of Este at Ferrara, the Bentivoglios at Bologna, the Malatestas

at Rimini, the Manfredis at Faenza, the Bagliones at Perouse, the Ursins

in Anguillara and in Serveti, the Collonas in Ostia, the Riarios at

Forli, the Montefeltros in Urbino, the Varanos in Camerino, and the

Gravinas in Senigaglia.

All these lords had as much right to the territories they possessed as

the popes had to the patrimony of St. Peter; both were founded upon

donations.

It is known in what manner Pope Alexander VI. made use of his bastard to

invade and take possession of all these principalities. King Louis XII.

obtained from that pope the cancelling of his marriage, after a

cohabitation of eighteen years, on condition of his assisting the

usurper.

The assassinations committed by Clovis to gain possession of the

territories of the petty kings who were his neighbors, bear no

comparison to the horrors exhibited on this occasion by Alexander and

his son.

The history of Nero himself is less abominable; the atrocity of whose

crimes was not increased by the pretext of religion; and it is worth

observing, that at the very time these diabolical excesses were

performed, the kings of Spain and Portugal were suing to that pope, one

of them for America, and the other for Asia, which the monster

accordingly granted them in the name of that God he pretended to

represent. It is also worth observing that not fewer than a hundred

thousand pilgrims flocked to his jubilee and prostrated themselves in

adoration of his person.

Julius II. completed what Alexander had begun. Louis XII., born to

become the dupe of all his neighbors, assisted Julius in seizing upon

Bologna and Perouse. That unfortunate monarch, in return for his

services, was driven out of Italy, and excommunicated by the very pope

whom the archbishop of Auch, the king's ambassador at Rome, addressed

with the words "your wickedness," instead of "your holiness."

To complete his mortification, Anne of Brittany, his wife, a woman as

devout as she was imperious, told him in plain terms, that he would be

damned for going to war with the pope.

If Leo X. and Clement VII. lost so many states which withdrew from the

papal communion, their power continued no less absolute than before over

the provinces which still adhered to the Catholic faith. The court of

Rome excommunicated the emperor Henry III., and declared Henry IV.

unworthy to reign.

It still draws large sums from all the Catholic states of Germany, from

Hungary, Poland, Spain, and France. Its ambassadors take precedence of

all others; it is no longer sufficiently powerful to carry on war; and

its weakness is in fact its happiness. The ecclesiastical state is the

only one that has regularly enjoyed the advantages of peace since the

sacking of Rome by the troops of Charles V. It appears, that the popes

have been often treated like the gods of the Japanese, who are sometimes

presented with offerings of gold, and sometimes thrown into the river.

SAMOTHRACE.

Whether the celebrated isle of Samothrace be at the mouth of the river

Hebrus, as it is said to be in almost all the geographical dictionaries,

or whether it be twenty miles distant from it, which is in fact the

case, is not what I am now investigating.

This isle was for a long time the most famous in the whole archipelago,

and even in the whole world. Its deities called Cabiri, its hierophants,

and its mysteries, conferred upon it as much reputation as was obtained

not long since by St. Patrick's cave in Ireland.

This Samothrace, the modern name of which is Samandrachi, is a rock

covered with a very thin and barren soil, and inhabited by poor

fishermen. They would be extremely surprised at being told of the glory

which was formerly connected with their island; and they would probably

ask, What is glory?

I inquire, what were these hierophants, these holy free masons, who

celebrated their ancient mysteries in Samothrace, and whence did they

and their gods Cabiri come?

It is not probable that these poor people came from Phœnicia, as

Bochart infers by a long train of Hebrew etymologies, and as the Abbé

Barrier, after him, is of opinion also. It is not in this manner that

gods gain establishments in the world. They are like conquerors who

subjugate nations, not all at once, but one after another. The distance

from Phœnicia to this wretched island is too great to admit of the

supposition that the gods of the wealthy Sidon and the proud Tyre should

come to coop themselves up in this hermitage. Hierophants are not such

fools.

The fact is, that there were gods of the Cabiri, priests of the Cabiri,

and mysteries of the Cabiri, in this contemptible and miserable island.

Not only does Herodotus mention them, but the Phœnician historian

Sanchoniathon, who lived long before Herodotus, speaks of them in those

fragments which have been so fortunately preserved by Eusebius. What is

worse still, this Sanchoniathon, who certainly lived before the period

in which Moses flourished, cites the great Thaut, the first Hermes, the

first Mercury of Egypt; and this same great Thaut lived eight hundred

years before Sanchoniathon, as that Phœnician acknowledges himself.

The Cabiri were therefore in estimation and honor two thousand and three

or four hundred years before the Christian era.

Now, if you are desirous of knowing whence those gods of the Cabiri,

established in Samothrace, came, does it not seem probable that they

came from Thrace, the country nearest to that island, and that that

small island was granted them as a theatre on which to act their farces,

and pick up a little money? Orpheus might very possibly be the prime

minstrel of these gods.

But who were these gods? They were what all the gods of antiquity were,

phantoms invented by coarse and vulgar knaves, sculptured by artisans

coarser still, and adored by brutes having the name of men.

There were three sorts of Cabiri; for, as we have already observed,

everything in antiquity was done by threes. Orpheus could not have made

his appearance in the world until long after the invention of these

three gods; for he admits only one in his mysteries. I am much disposed

to consider Orpheus as having been a strict Socinian.

I regard the ancient gods Cabiri as having been the first gods of

Thrace, whatever Greek names may have been afterwards given to them.

There is something, however, still more curious, respecting the history

of Samothrace. We know that Greece and Thrace were formerly afflicted

by many inundations. We have read of the deluges of Deucaleon and

Ogyges. The isle of Samothrace boasted of a yet more ancient deluge; and

its deluge corresponds, in point of time, with the period in which it is

contended that the ancient king of Thrace, Xixuter, lived, whom we have

spoken of under the article on "Ararat."

You may probably recollect that the gods of Xixuter, or Xissuter, who

were in all probability the Cabiri, commanded him to build a vessel

about thirty thousand feet long, and a hundred and twelve wide; that

this vessel sailed for a long time over the mountains of Armenia during

the deluge; that, having taken on board with him some pigeons and many

other domestic animals, he let loose his pigeons to ascertain whether

the waters had withdrawn; and that they returned covered with dirt and

slime, which induced Xixuter to resolve on disembarking from his immense

vessel.

You will say that it is a most extraordinary circumstance that

Sanchoniathon does not make any mention of this curious adventure. I

reply, that it is impossible for us to decide whether it was mentioned

in his history or not, as Eusebius, who has only transmitted to us some

fragments of this very ancient historian, had no particular inducement

to quote any passage that might have existed in his work respecting the

ship and pigeons. Berosus, however, relates the case, and he connects it

with the marvellous, according to the general practice of the ancients.

The inhabitants of Samothrace had erected monuments of this deluge.

What is more extraordinary and astonishing still is, as indeed we have

already partly remarked, that neither Greece nor Thrace, nor the people

of any other country, ever knew anything of the real and great deluge,

the deluge of Noah.

How could it be possible, we once more ask, that an event so awful and

appalling as that of the submersion of the whole earth should be unknown

by the survivors? How could the name of our common father, Noah, who

re-peopled the world, be unknown to all those who were indebted to him

for life? It is the most prodigious of all progidies, that, of so many

grandchildren, not one should have ever spoken of his grandfather!

I have applied to all the learned men that I have seen, and said, Have

you ever met with any old work in Greek, Tuscan, Arabian, Egyptian,

Chaldæan, Indian, Persian, or Chinese, in which the name of Noah is to

be found? They have all replied in the negative. This is a fact that

perpetually perplexes and confounds me.

But that the history of this universal inundation should be found in a

single page of a book written in the wilderness by fugitives, and that

this page should have been unknown to all the rest of the world till

about nine hundred years after the foundation of Rome--this perfectly

petrifies me. I cannot not recover from its impression. The effect

is completely overpowering. My worthy reader, let us both together

exclaim: "_O altitudo ignorantiarum!_"

[Illustration: Samson Destroying the Temple.]

SAMSON.

In quality of poor alphabetical compilers, collectors of anecdotes,

gatherers of trifles, pickers of rags at the corners of the streets, we

glorify ourselves with all the pride attached to our sublime science, on

having discovered that "Samson the Strong," a tragedy, was played at the

close of the sixteenth century, in the town of Rouen, and that it was

printed by Abraham Couturier. John Milton, for a long time a

schoolmaster of London, afterwards Latin secretary to the protector,

Cromwell--Milton, the author of "Paradise Lost" and "Paradise

Regained"--wrote the tragedy of "Samson Agonistes"; and it is very

unfortunate that we cannot tell in what year.

We know, however, that it has been printed with a preface, in which much

is boasted, by one of our brethren, the commentator named Paræus, who

first perceived by the force of his genius, that the Apocalypse is a

tragedy. On the strength of this discovery he divided the Apocalypse

into five acts, and inserted choruses worthy of the elegance and fine

nature of the piece. The author of this preface speaks to us of the fine

tragedies of St. Gregory of Nazianzen. He asserts, that a tragedy should

never have more than five acts, and to prove it, he gives us the

"Samson Agonistes" of Milton, which has but one. Those who like

elaborate declamation will be satisfied with this piece.

A comedy of Samson was played for a long time in Italy. A translation of

it was made in Paris in 1717, by one named Romagnesi; it was represented

on the French theatre of the pretended Italian comedy, formerly the

palace of the dukes of Burgundy. It was published, and dedicated to the

duke of Orleans, regent of France.

In this sublime piece, Arlequin, the servant of Samson, fights with a

turkey-cock, whilst his master carries off the gates of Gaza on his

shoulders.

In 1732, it was wished to represent, at the opera of Paris, a tragedy of

Samson, set to music by the celebrated Rameau; but it was not permitted.

There was neither Arlequin nor turkey-cock; but the thing appeared too

serious; besides, certain people were very glad to mortify Rameau, who

possessed great talents. Yet at that time they performed the opera of

"Jephthah," extracted from the Old Testament, and the comedy of the

"Prodigal Son," from the New Testament.

There is an old edition of the "Samson Agonistes" of Milton, preceded by

an abridgment of the history of the hero. The following is this

abridgment:

The Jews, to whom God promised by oath all the country which is between

the river of Egypt and the Euphrates, and who through their sins never

had this country, were on the contrary reduced to servitude, which

slavery lasted for forty years. Now there was a Jew of the tribe of Dan,

named Manoah; and the wife of this Manoah was barren; and an angel

appeared to this woman, and said to her, "Behold, thou shalt conceive

and bear a son; and now drink no wine nor strong drink, neither eat any

unclean thing; for the child shall be a Nazarite to God, from the womb

to the day of his death."

The angel afterwards appeared to the husband and wife; they gave him a

kid to eat; he would have none of it, and disappeared in the midst of

the smoke; and the woman said, We shall surely die, because we have seen

God; but they died not.

The slave Samson being born, was consecrated a Nazarite. As soon as he

was grown up, the first thing he did was to go to the Phœnician or

Philistine town of Timnath, to court a daughter of one of his masters,

whom he married.

In going to his mistress he met a lion, and tore him in pieces with his

naked hand, as he would have done a kid. Some days after, he found a

swarm of bees in the throat of the dead lion, with some honey, though

bees never rest on carrion.

Then he proposed this enigma to his companions: Out of the eater came

forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness: if you guess, I

will give you thirty tunics and thirty gowns; if not, you shall give me

thirty gowns and thirty tunics. The comrades, not being able to guess in

what the solution of the enigma consisted, gained over the young wife

of Samson; she drew the secret from her husband, and he was obliged to

give them thirty tunics and thirty gowns. "Ah," said he to them, "if ye

had not ploughed with my heifer, ye would not have found out my riddle."

Soon after, the father-in-law of Samson gave another husband to his

daughter.

Samson, enraged at having lost his wife, immediately caught three

hundred foxes, tied them two together by the tails with lighted

firebrands, and they fired the corn of the Philistines.

The Jewish slaves, not being willing to be punished by their masters for

the exploits of Samson, surprised him in the cavern in which he dwelt,

tied him with great ropes, and delivered him to the Philistines. As soon

as he was in the midst of them, he broke his cords, and finding the

jawbone of an ass, with one effort he killed a thousand Philistines.

Such an effort making him very warm, he was dying of thirst, on which

God made a fountain spout from one of the teeth of the ass's jaw-bone.

Samson, having drunk, went into Gaza, a Philistine town; he there

immediately became smitten with a courtesan. As he slept with her, the

Philistines shut the gates of the town, and surrounded the house, when

he arose, took the gates, and carried them away. The Philistines, in

despair at not being able to overcome this hero, addressed themselves to

another courtesan named Delilah, with whom he afterwards slept. She

finally drew from him the secret in which his strength consisted: it was

only necessary to shave him, to render him equal to other men. He was

shaved, became weak, and his eyes being put out, he was made to turn a

mill and to play on the violin. One day, while playing in a Philistine

temple, between two of its columns, he became indignant that the

Philistines should have columned temples, whilst the Jews had only a

tabernacle supported on four poles. He also felt that his hair began to

grow; and being transported with a holy zeal, he pulled down the two

pillars; by which concussion the temple was overthrown, the Philistines

were crushed to death, and he with them.

Such is this preface, word for word.

This is the history which is the subject of the piece of Milton, and

Romagnesi: it is adapted to Italian farce.

SATURN'S RING.

This astonishing phenomenon, but not more astonishing than others, this

solid and luminous body, which surrounds the planet Saturn, which it

enlightens, and by which it is enlightened, whether by the feeble

reflection of the sun's rays, or by some unknown cause, was, according

to a dreamer who calls himself a philosopher, formerly a sea. This sea,

according to him, has hardened and become earth or rock; once it

gravitated towards two centres, whereas at present it gravitates only

towards one.

How pleasantly you proceed, my ingenious dreamer! how easily you

transform water into rock! Ovid was nothing in the comparison. What a

marvellous power you exercise over nature; imagination by no means

confounds you. Oh, greediness to utter novelties! Oh, fury for systems!

Oh, weakness of the human mind! If anyone has spoken of this reverie in

the "Encyclopædia," it is doubtless to ridicule it, without which other

nations would have a right to say: Behold the use which the French make

of the discovery of other people! Huyghens discovered the ring of

Saturn, and calculated its appearances; Hook and Flamstead have done the

same thing. A Frenchman has discovered that this solid body was even a

circular ocean, and this Frenchman is not Cyrano de Bergerac!

SCANDAL.

Without inquiring whether scandal originally meant a stone which might

occasion people to stumble and fall, or a quarrel, or a seduction, we

consider it here merely in its present sense and acceptation. A scandal

is a serious indecorum which is used generally in reference to the

clergy. The tales of Fontaine are libertine or licentious; many passages

of Sanchez, of Tambourin, and of Molina are scandalous.

A man is scandalous by his writings or by his conduct. The siege which

the Augustins maintained against the patrol, at the time of the Fronde,

was scandalous. The bankruptcy of the brother La Valette, of the Society

of Jesuits, was more than scandalous. The lawsuit carried on by the

reverend fathers of the order of the Capuchins of Paris, in 1764, was a

most satisfactory and delightful scandal to thousands. For the

edification of the reader, a word or two upon that subject in this place

will not be ill employed.

These reverend fathers had been fighting in their convent; some of them

had hidden their money, and others had stolen the concealed treasure. Up

to this point the scandal was only particular, a stone against which

only Capuchins could trip and tumble; but when the affair was brought

before the parliament, the scandal became public.

It is stated in the pleadings in the cause, that the convent of the St.

Honoré consumes twelve hundred pounds of bread a week, and meat and wood

in proportion; and that there are four collecting friars, "_quêteurs_,"

whose office it is, conformably to the term, to raise contributions in

the city. What a frightful, dreadful scandal! Twelve hundred pounds of

meat and bread per week for a few Capuchins, while so many artisans

overwhelmed with old age, and so many respectable widows, are exposed to

languish in want, and die in misery!

That the reverend father Dorotheus should have accumulated an income of

three thousand livres a year at the expense of the convent, and

consequently of the public, is not only an enormous scandal, but an

absolute robbery, and a robbery committed upon the most needy class of

citizens in Paris; for the poor are the persons who pay the tax imposed

by the mendicant monks. The ignorance and weakness of the people make

them imagine that they can never obtain heaven without parting with

their absolute necessaries, from which these monks derive their

superfluities.

This single brother, therefore, the chief of the convent, Dorotheus, to

make up his income of a thousand crowns a year, must have extorted from

the poor of Paris, no less a sum than twenty thousand crowns.

Consider, my good reader, that such cases are by no means rare, even in

this eighteenth century of our era, which has produced useful books to

expose abuses and enlighten minds; but, as I have before observed, the

people never read. A single Capuchin, Recollet, or Carmelite is capable

of doing more harm than the best books in the world will ever be able to

do good.

I would venture to propose to those who are really humane and

well-disposed, to employ throughout the capital a certain number of

anti-Capuchins and anti-Recollets, to go about from house to house

exhorting fathers and mothers to virtue, and to keep their money for the

maintenance of their families, and the support of their old age; to love

God with all their hearts, but to give none of their money to monks.

Let us return, however, to the real meaning of the word "scandal."

In the above-mentioned process on the subject of the Capuchin convent,

Brother Gregory is accused of being the father of a child by

Mademoiselle Bras-defer, and of having her afterwards married to

Moutard, the shoe-maker. It is not stated whether Brother Gregory

himself bestowed the nuptial benediction on his mistress and poor

Moutard, together with the required dispensation. If he did so, the

scandal is rendered as complete as possible; it includes fornication,

robbery, adultery, and sacrilege. "_Horresco referens_."

I say in the first place "fornication," as Brother Gregory committed

that offence with Magdalene Bras-defer, who was not at the time more

than fifteen years of age.

I also say "robbery," as he gave an apron and ribbons to Magdalene; and

it is clear he must have robbed the convent in order to purchase them,

and to pay for suppers, lodgings, and other expenses attending their

intercourse.

I say "adultery," as this depraved man continued his connection with

Magdalene after she became Madame Moutard.

And I say "sacrilege," as he was the confessor of Magdalene. And, if he

himself performed the marriage ceremony for his mistress, judge what

sort of man Brother Gregory must really have been.

One of our colleagues in this little collection of philosophic and

encyclopædic questions is now engaged on a moral work, on the subject of

scandal, against the opinion of Brother Patouillet. We hope it will not

be long before it sees the light.

SCHISM.

All that we had written on the subject of the grand schism between the

Greeks and Latins, in the essay on the manners and spirit of nations,

has been inserted in the great encyclopædic dictionary. We will not here

repeat ourselves.

But when reflecting on the meaning of the word "schism," which signifies

a dividing or rending asunder, and considering also the present state of

Poland, divided and rent as it is in a manner the most pitiable, we

cannot help anew deploring that a malady so destructive should be

peculiar to Christians. This malady, which we have not described with

sufficient particularity, is a species of madness which first affects

the eyes and the mouth; the patient looks with an impatient and

resentful eye on the man who does not think exactly like himself, and

soon begins to pour out all the abuse and reviling that his command of

language will permit. The madness next seizes the hands; and the

unfortunate maniac writes what exhibits, in the most decided manner, the

inflamed and delirious state of the brain. He falls into demoniacal

convulsions, draws his sword, and fights with fury and desperation to

the last gasp. Medicine has never been able to find a remedy for this

dreadful disease. Time and philosophy alone can effect a cure.

The Poles are now the only people among whom this contagion at present

rages. We may almost believe that the disorder is born with them, like

their frightful plica. They are both diseases of the head, and of a most

noxious character. Cleanliness will cure the plica; wisdom alone can

extirpate schism.

We are told that both these diseases were unknown to the Samartians

while they were Pagans. The plica affects only the common people at

present, but all the evils originating in schism are corroding and

destroying the higher classes of the republic.

The cause of the evil is the fertility of their land, which produces too

much corn. It is a melancholy and deplorable case that even the blessing

of heaven should in fact have involved them in such direful calamity.

Some of the provinces have contended that it was absolutely necessary to

put leaven in their bread, but the greater part of the nation entertain

an obstinate and unalterable belief, that, on certain days of the year,

fermented bread is absolutely mortal.

Such is one of the principal causes of the schism or the rending asunder

of Poland; the dispute has infused acrimony into their blood. Other

causes have added to the effect.

Some have imagined, in the paroxysms and convulsions of the malady under

which they labor, that the Holy Spirit proceeded both from the Father

and the Son: and the others have exclaimed, that it proceeded from the

Father only. The two parties, one of which is called the Roman party,

and the other the Dissident, look upon each other as if they were

absolutely infected by the plague; but, by a singular symptom peculiar

to this complaint, the infected Dissidents have always shown an

inclination to approach the Catholics, while the Catholics on the other

hand have never manifested any to approach them.

There is no disease which does not vary in different circumstances and

situations. The diet, which is generally esteemed salutary, has been so

pernicious to this unhappy nation, that after the application of it in

1768, the cities of Uman, Zablotin, Tetiou, Zilianki, and Zafran were

destroyed and inundated with blood; and more than two hundred thousand

patients miserably perished.

On one side the empire of Russia, and on the other that of Turkey, have

sent a hundred thousand surgeons provided with lancets, bistouries, and

all sorts of instruments, adapted to cut off the morbid and gangrened

parts; but the disease has only become more virulent. The delirium has

even been so outrageous, that forty of the patients actually met

together for the purpose of dissecting their king, who had never been

attacked by the disease, and whose brain and all the vital and noble

parts of his body were in a perfectly sound state, as we shall have to

remark under the article on "Superstition." It is thought that if the

contending parties would refer the case entirely to him, he might effect

a cure of the whole nation; but it is one of the symptoms of this cruel

malady to be afraid of being cured, as persons laboring under

hydrophobia dread even the sight of water.

There are some learned men among us who contend that the disease was

brought, a long time ago, from Palestine, and that the inhabitants of

Jerusalem and Samaria were long harassed by it. Others think that the

original seat of the disease was Egypt, and that the dogs and cats,

which were there held in the highest consideration, having become mad,

communicated the madness of schism, or tearing asunder, to the greater

part of the Egyptians, whose weak heads were but too susceptible to the

disorder.

It is remarked also, that the Greeks who travelled to Egypt, as, for

example, Timeus of Locris and Plato, somewhat injured their brains by

the excursion. However, the injury by no means reached madness, or

plague, properly so called; it was a sort of delirium which was not at

all times easily to be perceived, and which was often concealed under a

very plausible appearance of reason. But the Greeks having, in the

course of time, carried the complaint among the western and northern

nations, the malformation or unfortunate excitability of the brain in

our unhappy countries occasioned the slight fever of Timeus and Plato to

break out among us into the most frightful and fatal contagion, which

the physicians sometimes called intolerance, and sometimes persecution;

sometimes religious war, sometimes madness, and sometimes pestilence.

We have seen the fatal ravages committed by this infernal plague over

the face of the earth. Many physicians have offered their services to

destroy this frightful evil at its very root. But what will appear to

many scarcely credible is, that there are entire faculties of medicine,

at Salamanca and Coimbra, in Italy and even in Paris, which maintain

that schism, division, or tearing asunder, is necessary for mankind;

that corrupt humors are drawn off from them through the wounds which it

occasions; that enthusiasm, which is one of the first symptoms of the

complaint, exalts the soul, and produces the most beneficial

consequences; that toleration is attended with innumerable

inconveniences; that if the whole world were tolerant, great geniuses

would want that powerful and irresistible impulse which has produced so

many admirable works in theology; that peace is a great calamity to a

state, because it brings back the pleasures in its train; and pleasures,

after a course of time, soften down that noble ferocity which forms the

hero; and that if the Greeks had made a treaty of commerce with the

Trojans, instead of making war with them, there would never have been an

Achilles, a Hector, or a Homer, and that the race of man would have

stagnated in ignorance.

These reasons, I acknowledge, are not without force; and I request time

for giving them due consideration.

SCROFULA.

It has been pretended that divine power is appealed to in regard to this

malady, because it is scarcely in human power to cure it.

Possibly some monks began by supposing that kings, in their character of

representatives of the divinity, possessed the privilege of curing

scrofula, by touching the patients with their anointed hands. But why

not bestow a similar power on emperors, whose dignity surpasses that of

kings, or on popes, who call themselves the masters of emperors, and who

are more than simple images of God, being His vicars on earth? It is

possible, that some imaginary dreamer of Normandy, in order to render

the usurpation of William the Bastard the more respectable, conceded to

him, in quality of God's representative, the faculty of curing scrofula

by the tip of his finger.

It was some time after William that this usage became established. We

must not gratify the kings of England with this gift, and refuse it to

those of France, their liege lords. This would be in defiance of the

respect due to the feudal system. In short, this power is traced up to

Edward the Confessor in England, and to Clovis in France.

The only testimony, in the least degree credible, of the antiquity of

this usage, is to be found in the writings in favor of the house of

Lancaster, composed by the judge, Sir John Fortescue, under Henry VI.,

who was recognized king of France at Paris in his cradle, and then king

of England, but who lost both kingdoms. Sir John Fortescue asserts, that

from time immemorial, the kings of England were in possession of the

power of curing scrofula by their touch. We cannot perceive, however,

that this pretension rendered their persons more sacred in the wars

between the roses.

Queens consort could not cure scrofula, because they were not anointed

in the hands, like the kings: but Elizabeth, a queen regnant and

anointed, cured it without difficulty.

A sad thing happened to Mortorillo the Calabrian, whom we denominate St.

Francis de Paulo. King Louis XI. brought him to Plessis les Tours to

cure him of his tendency to apoplexy, and the saint arrived afflicted by

scrofula.

"_Ipse fuit detentus gravi, inflatura, quam in parte inferiori, genæ suæ

dextrae circa guttur patiebatur. Chirugii dicebant, mortum esse

scrofarum._"

The saint cured not the king, and the king cured not the saint.

When the king of England, James II., was conducted from Rochester to

Whitehall, somebody proposed that he should exhibit a proof of genuine

royalty, as for instance, that of touching for the evil; but no one was

presented to him. He departed to exercise his sovereignty in France at

St. Germain, where he touched some Hibernians. His daughter Mary, King

William, Queen Anne, and the kings of the house of Brunswick have cured

nobody. This sacred gift departed when people began to reason.

SECT.

SECTION I.

Every sect, of whatever opinion it may be, is a rallying point for doubt

and error. Scotists, Thomists, Realists, Nominalists, Papists,

Calvinists, Molinists, and Jansenists, are only warlike appellations.

There is no sect in geometry; we never say: A Euclidian, an Archimedian.

When truth is evident, it is impossible to divide people into parties

and factions. Nobody disputes that it is broad day at noon.

That part of astronomy which determines the course of the stars, and the

return of eclipses, being now known, there is no longer any dispute

among astronomers.

It is similar with a small number of truths, which are similarly

established; but if you are a Mahometan, as there are many men who are

not Mahometans, you may possibly be in error.

What would be the true religion, if Christianity did not exist? That in

which there would be no sects; that in which all minds necessarily

agreed.

Now, in what doctrine are all minds agreed? In the adoration of one God,

and in probity. All the philosophers who have professed a religion have

said at all times: "There is a God, and He must be just." Behold then

the universal religion, established throughout all time and among all

men! The point then in which all agree is true; the systems in regard to

which all differ are false.

My sect is the best, says a Brahmin. But, my good friend, if thy sect is

the best, it is necessary; for if not absolutely necessary, thou must

confess that it is useless. If, on the contrary, it is necessary, it

must be so to all men; how then is it that all men possess not what is

absolutely necessary to them? How is it that the rest of the world

laughs at thee and thy Brahma?

When Zoroaster, Hermes, Orpheus, Minos, and all the great men say: Let

us worship God, and be just, no one laughs; but all the world sneers at

him who pretends, that to please God it is proper to die holding a cow

by the tail; at him who cuts off a particle of foreskin for the same

purpose; at him who consecrates crocodiles and onions; at him who

attaches eternal salvation to the bones of dead men carried underneath

the shirt, or to a plenary indulgence purchased at Rome for two sous and

a half.

Whence this universal assemblage of laughing and hissing from one end of

the universe to the other? It must be that the things which all the

world derides are not evident truths. What shall we say to a secretary

of Sejanus, who dedicates to Petronius a book, in a confused and

involved style, entitled "The Truth of the Sibylline Oracles, Proved

from Facts."

This secretary at first proves to you, that God sent upon earth many

Sibyls, one after the other, having no other means of instructing men.

It is demonstrated, that God communicated with these Sibyls, because the

word "sibyl" signifies "Council of God." They ought to live a long time,

for this privilege at least belongs to persons with whom God

communicates. They amounted to twelve, because this number is sacred.

They certainly predicted all the events in the world, because Tarquin

the Proud bought their book from an old woman for a hundred crowns. What

unbeliever, exclaims the secretary, can deny all these evident facts,

which took place in one corner of the earth, in the face of all the

world? Who can deny the accomplishment of their prophecies? Has not

Virgil himself cited the predictions of the Sibyls? If we have not the

first copies of the Sibylline books, written at a time when no one could

read and write, we have authentic copies. Impiety must be silent before

such proofs. Thus spoke Houteville to Sejanus, and hoped to obtain by it

the place of chief augur, with a revenue of fifty thousand livres; but

he obtained nothing.

That which my sect teaches me is obscure, I confess it, exclaims a

fanatic; and it is in consequence of that obscurity that I must believe

it; for it says itself that it abounds in obscurities. My sect is

extravagant, therefore it is divine; for how, appearing so insane,

would it otherwise have been embraced by so many people. It is precisely

like the Koran, which the Sonnites say presents at once the face of an

angel and that of a beast. Be not scandalized at the muzzle of the

beast, but revere the face of the angel. Thus spoke this madman; but a

fanatic of another sect replied to the first fanatic: It is thou who art

the beast, and I who am the angel.

Now who will judge this process, and decide between these two inspired

personages? The reasonable and impartial man who is learned in a science

which is not that of words; the man divested of prejudice, and a lover

of truth and of justice; the man, in fine, who is not a beast, and who

pretends not to be an angel.

SECTION II.

Sect and error are synonymous terms. Thou art a peripatetic and I a

Platonist; we are therefore both in the wrong; for thou opposest Plato,

because his chimeras repel thee; and I fly from Aristotle, because it

appears to me that he knew not what he said. If the one or the other had

demonstrated the truth, there would have been an end of sect. To declare

for the opinion of one in opposition to that of another, is to take part

in a civil war. There is no sect in mathematics or experimental

philosophy: a man who examines the relation between a cone and a sphere

is not of the sect of Archimedes; and he who perceived that the square

of the hypotenuse of a right-angled triangle is equal to the sum of the

squares of the other two sides, is not in consequence a Pythagorean.

When we say that the blood circulates, that the air is weighty, that the

rays of the sun are a bundle of seven refrangible rays, it follows not

that we are of the sect of Harvey, of Torricelli, or of Newton; we

simply acquiesce in the truths which they demonstrate, and the whole

universe will be of the same opinion.

Such is the character of truth, which belongs to all time and to all

men. It is only to be produced to be acknowledged, and admits of no

opposition. A long dispute signifies that both parties are in error.

SELF-LOVE.

Nicole, in his "Moral Essays," written after two or three thousand

volumes on morals (Treatise on Charity, chap, ii.), says, that "by means

of the gibbets and tortures which are established in common, the

tyrannical designs of the self-love of each individual are repressed."

I will not examine whether we have gibbets in common, as we have fields

and woods in common, and a common purse, or if thoughts are repressed by

wheels; but it seems to me very strange that Nicole has taken highway

robbery and murder for self-love. The distinctions must be a little

more examined. He who should say that Nero killed his mother from

self-love, that Cartouche had much self-love, would not express himself

very correctly. Self-love is not a wickedness; it is a sentiment natural

to all men; it is much more the neighbor of vanity than of crime.

A beggar of the suburbs of Madrid boldly asked alms; a passenger said to

him: Are you not ashamed to carry on this infamous trade, when you can

work? Sir, replied the mendicant, I ask you for money, and not for

advice; and turned his back on him with Castilian dignity. This

gentleman was a haughty beggar; his vanity was wounded by very little:

he asked alms for love of himself, and would not suffer the reprimand

from a still greater love of himself.

A missionary, travelling in India, met a fakir loaded with chains, naked

as an ape, lying on his stomach, and lashing himself for the sins of his

countrymen, the Indians, who gave him some coins of the country. What a

renouncement of himself! said one of the spectators. Renouncement of

myself! said the fakir, learn that I only lash myself in this world to

serve you the same in the next, when you will be the horses and I the

rider.

Those who said that love of ourselves is the basis of all our sentiments

and actions were right; and as it has not been written to prove to men

that they have a face, there is no occasion to prove to them that they

possess self-love. This self-love is the instrument of our

preservation; it resembles the provision for the perpetuity of mankind;

it is necessary, it is dear to us, it gives us pleasure, and we must

conceal it.

SENSATION.

Oysters, it is said, have two senses; moles four; all other animals,

like man, five. Some people contend for a sixth, but it is evident that

the voluptuous sensation to which they allude is reducible to that of

touch; and that five senses are our lot. It is impossible for us to

imagine anything beyond them, or to desire out of their range.

It may be, that in other globes the inhabitants possess sensations of

which we can form no idea. It is possible that the number of our senses

augments from globe to globe, and that an existence with innumerable and

perfect senses will be the final attainment of all being.

But with respect to ourselves and our five senses, what is the extent of

our capacity? We constantly feel in spite of ourselves, and never

because we will do so: it is impossible for us to avoid having the

sensation which our nature ordains when any object excites it. The

sensation is within us, but depends not upon ourselves. We receive it,

but how do we receive it? It is evident that there is no connection

between the stricken air, the words which I sing, and the impression

which these words make upon my brain.

We are astonished at thought, but sensation is equally wonderful. A

divine power is as manifest in the sensation of the meanest of insects

as in the brain of Newton. In the meantime, if a thousand animals die

before our eyes, we are not anxious to know what becomes of their

faculty of sensation, although it is as much the work of the Supreme

Being as our own. We regard them as the machines of nature, created to

perish, and to give place to others.

For what purpose and in what manner may their sensations exist, when

they exist no longer? What need has the author of all things to preserve

qualities, when the substance is destroyed? It is as reasonable to

assert that the power of the plant called "sensitive," to withdraw its

leaves towards its branches, exists when the plant is no more. You will

ask, without doubt, in what manner the sensation of animals perishes

with them, while the mind of man perishes not? I am too ignorant to

solve this question. The eternal author of mind and of sensation alone

knows how to give, and how to preserve them.

All antiquity maintains that our understanding contains nothing which

has not been received by our senses. Descartes, on the contrary, asserts

in his "Romances," that we have metaphysical ideas before we are

acquainted with the nipple of our nurse. A faculty of theology

proscribed this dogma, not because it was erroneous, but because it was

new. Finally, however, it was adopted, because it had been destroyed by

Locke, an English philosopher, and an Englishman must necessarily be in

the wrong. In fine, after having so often changed opinion, the ancient

opinion which declares that the senses are the inlets to the

understanding is finally proscribed. This is acting like deeply indebted

governments, who sometimes issue certain notes which are to pass

current, and at other times cry them down; but for a long time no one

will accept the notes of the said faculty of theology.

All the faculties in the world will never prevent a philosopher from

perceiving that we commence by sensation, and that our memory is nothing

but a continued sensation. A man born without his five senses would be

destitute of all idea, supposing it possible for him to live.

Metaphysical notions are obtained only through the senses; for how is a

circle or a triangle to be measured, if a circle or a triangle has

neither been touched nor seen? How form an imperfect notion of infinity,

without a notion of limits? And how take away limits, without having

either beheld or felt them?

Sensation includes all our faculties, says a great philosopher. What

ought to be concluded from all this? You who read and think, pray

conclude.

The Greeks invented the faculty "_Psyche_" for sensation, and the

faculty "_Nous_" for mind. We are, unhappily, ignorant of the nature of

these two faculties: we possess them, but their origin is no more known

to us than to the oyster, the sea-nettle, the polypus, worms, or plants.

By some inconceivable mechanism, sensitiveness is diffused throughout my

body, and thought in my head alone. If the head be cut off, there will

remain a very small chance of its solving a problem in geometry. In the

meantime, your pineal gland, your fleshly body, in which abides your

soul, exists for a long time without alteration, while your separated

head is so full of animal spirits that it frequently exhibits motion

after its removal from the trunk. It seems as if at this moment it

possessed the most lively ideas, resembling the head of Orpheus, which

still uttered melodious song, and chanted Eurydice, when cast into the

waters of the Hebrus.

If we think no longer, after losing our heads, whence does it happen

that the heart beats, and appears to be sensitive after being torn out?

We feel, you say, because all our nerves have their origin in the brain;

and in the meantime, if you are trepanned, and a portion of your brain

be thrown into the fire, you feel nothing the less. Men who can state

the reason of all this are very clever.

SENTENCES (REMARKABLE).

_On Natural Liberty._

In several countries, and particularly in France, collections have been

made of the juridical murders which tyranny, fanaticism, or even error

and weakness, have committed with the sword of justice.

There are sentences of death which whole years of vengeance could

scarcely expiate, and which will make all future ages tremble. Such are

the sentences given against the natural king of Naples and Sicily, by

the tribunal of Charles of Anjou; against John Huss and Jerome of

Prague, by priests and monks; and against the king of England, Charles

I., by fanatical citizens.

After these enormous crimes, formally committed, come the legal murders

committed by indolence, stupidity, and superstition, and these are

innumerable. We shall relate some of them in other articles.

In this class we must principally place the trials for witchcraft, and

never forget that even in our days, in 1750, the sacerdotal justice of

the bishop of Würzburg has condemned as a witch a nun, a girl of

quality, to the punishment of fire. I here repeat this circumstance,

which I have elsewhere mentioned, that it should not be forgotten. We

forget too much and too soon.

Every day of the year I would have a public crier, instead of crying as

in Germany and Holland what time it is--which is known very well without

their crying--cry: It was on this day that, in the religious wars

Magdeburg and all its inhabitants were reduced to ashes. It was on May

14th that Henry IV. was assassinated, only because he was not submissive

to the pope; it was on such a day that such an abominable cruelty was

perpetrated in your town, under the name of justice.

These continual advertisements would be very useful; but the judgments

given in favor of innocence against persecutors should be cried with a

much louder voice. For example, I propose, that every year, the two

strongest throats which can be found in Paris and Toulouse shall cry

these words in all the streets: It was on such a day that fifty

magistrates of the council re-established the memory of John Calas, with

a unanimous voice, and obtained for his family the favors of the king

himself, in whose name John Calas had been condemned to the most

horrible execution.

It would not be amiss to have another crier at the door of all the

ministers, to say to all who came to demand _lettres de cachet_, in

order to possess themselves of the property of their relations, friends,

or dependents: Gentlemen, fear to seduce the minister by false

statements, and to abuse the name of the king. It is dangerous to take

it in vain. There was in the world one Gerbier, who defended the cause

of the widow and orphan oppressed under the weight of a sacred name. It

was he who, at the bar of the Parliament of Paris, obtained the

abolishment of the Society of Jesus. Listen attentively to the lesson

which he gave to the society of St. Bernard, conjointly with Master

Loiseau, another protector of widows.

You must first know, that the reverend Bernardine fathers of Clairvaux

possess seventeen thousand acres of wood, seven large forges, fourteen

large farms, a quantity of fiefs, benefices, and even rights in foreign

countries. The yearly revenue of the convent amounts to two hundred

thousand livres. The treasure is immense; the abbot's palace is that of

a prince. Nothing is more just; it is a poor recompense for the services

which the Bernardines continually render to the State.

It happened, that a youth of seventeen years of age, named Castille,

whose baptismal name was Bernard, believed, for that reason, that he

should become a Bernardine. It is thus that we reason at seventeen, and

sometimes at thirty. He went to pass his novitiate at Lorraine, in the

abbey of Orval. When he was required to pronounce his vows, grace was

wanting in him: he did not sign them; he departed and became a man

again. He established himself at Paris, and at the end of thirty years,

having made a little fortune, he married, and had children.

The reverend father, attorney of Clairvaux, named Mayeur, a worthy

solicitor, brother of the abbot, having learned from a woman of pleasure

at Paris, that this Castille was formerly a Bernardine, plotted to

challenge him as a deserter--though he was not really engaged--to make

his wife pass for his concubine, and to place his children in the

hospital as bastards. He associated himself with another rogue, to

divide the spoils. Both went to the court for _lettres de cachet_,

exposed their grievances in the name of St. Bernard, obtained the

letter, seized Bernard Castille, his wife, and their children, possessed

themselves of all the property, and are now devouring it, you know

where.

Bernard Castille was shut up at Orval in a dungeon, where he was

executed after six months, for fear that he should demand justice. His

wife was conducted to another dungeon, at St. Pelagie, a house for

prostitutes. Of three children, one died in the hospital.

Things remained in this state for three years. At the end of this time,

the wife of Castille obtained her enlargement. God is just: He gave a

second husband to the widow. The husband, named Lannai, was a man of

head, who discovered all the frauds, horrors, and crimes employed

against his wife. They both entered into a suit against the monks. It is

true, that brother Mayeur, who is called Dom Mayeur, was not hanged, but

the convent of Clairvaux was condemned to pay forty thousand livres.

There is no convent which would not rather see its attorney hanged than

lose its money.

This history should teach you, gentlemen, to use much moderation in the

fact of _lettres de cachet_. Know, that Master Elias de Beaumont, that

celebrated defender of the memory of Calas, and Master Target that other

protector of oppressed innocence, caused the man to pay a fine of twenty

thousand francs, who by his intrigues had gained a _lettre de cachet_

to seize upon the dying countess of Lancize, to drag her from the bosom

of her family and divest her of all her titles.

When tribunals give such sentences as these, we hear clapping of hands

from the extent of the grand chamber to the gates of Paris. Take care of

yourselves, gentlemen; do not lightly demand _lettres de cachet_.

An Englishman, on reading this article, exclaimed, "What is a _lettre de

cachet_?" We could never make him comprehend it.

SENTENCES OF DEATH.

In reading history, and seeing its course continually interrupted with

innumerable calamities heaped upon this globe, which some call the best

of all possible worlds, I have been particularly struck with the great

quantity of considerable men in the State, in the Church, and in

society, who have suffered death like robbers on the highway. Setting

aside assassinations and poisonings, I speak only of massacres in a

juridical form, performed with loyalty and ceremony; I commence with

kings and queens; England alone furnishes an ample list; but for

chancellors, knights, and esquires, volumes are required. Of all who

have thus perished by justice, I do not believe that there are four in

all Europe who would have undergone their sentence if their suits had

lasted some time longer, or if the adverse parties had died of apoplexy

during the preparation.

If fistula had gangrened the rectum of Cardinal Richelieu some months

longer, the virtuous de Thou, Cinq-Mars, and so many others would have

been at liberty. If Barneveldt had had as many Arminians for his judges

as Gomerists, he would have died in his bed; if the constable de Luynes

had not demanded the confiscation of the property of the lady of the

Marshal d'Ancre, she would not have been burned as a witch. If a really

criminal man, an assassin, a public thief, a poisoner, a parricide, be

arrested, and his crime be proved, it is certain that in all times and

whoever the judges, he will be condemned. But it is not the same with

statesmen; only give them other judges, or wait until time has changed

interests, cooled passions, and introduced other sentiments, and their

lives will be in safety.

Suppose Queen Elizabeth had died of an indigestion on the eve of the

execution of Mary Stuart, then Mary Stuart would have been seated on the

throne of England, Ireland, and Scotland, instead of dying by the hand

of an executioner in a chamber hung with black. If Cromwell had only

fallen sick, care would have been taken how Charles I.'s head was cut

off. These two assassinations--disguised, I know not how, in the garb of

the laws--scarcely entered into the list of ordinary injustice. Figure

to yourself some highwaymen who, having bound and robbed two passengers,

amuse themselves with naming in the troop an attorney-general, a

president, an advocate and counsellors, and who, having signed a

sentence, cause the two victims to be hanged in ceremony; it was thus

that the Queen of Scotland and her grandson were judged.

But of common judgments, pronounced by competent judges against princes

or men in place, is there a single one which would have been either

executed, or even passed, if another time had been chosen? Is there a

single one of the condemned, immolated under Cardinal Richelieu, who

would not have been in favor if their suits had been prolonged until the

regency of Anne of Austria? The Prince of Condé was arrested under

Francis II., he was condemned to death by commissaries; Francis II.

died, and the Prince of Condé again became powerful.

These instances are innumerable; we should above all consider the spirit

of the times. Vanini was burned on a vague suspicion of atheism. At

present, if any one was foolish and pedantic enough to write such books

as Vanini, they would not be read, and that is all which could happen to

them. A Spaniard passed through Geneva in the middle of the sixteenth

century; the Picard, John Calvin, learned that this Spaniard was lodged

at an inn; he remembered that this Spaniard had disputed with him on a

subject which neither of them understood. Behold! my theologian, John

Calvin, arrested the passenger, contrary to all laws, human or divine,

contrary to the right possessed by people among all nations; immured him

in a dungeon, and burned him at a slow fire with green faggots, that the

pain might last the longer. Certainly this infernal manœuvre would

never enter the head of any one in the present day; and if the fool

Servetus had lived in good times, he would have had nothing to fear;

what is called justice is therefore as arbitrary as fashion. There are

times of horrors and follies among men, as there are times of

pestilence, and this contagion has made the tour of the world.

SERPENTS.

"I certify that I have many times killed serpents by moistening in a

slight degree, with my spittle, a stick or a stone, and giving them a

slight blow on the middle of the body, scarcely sufficient to produce a

small contusion. January 19, 1757. Figuier, Surgeon."

The above surgeon having given me this certificate, two witnesses, who

had seen him kill serpents in this manner, attested what they had

beheld. Notwithstanding, I wished to behold the thing myself; for I

confess that, in various parts of these queries, I have taken St. Thomas

of Didymus for my patron saint, who always insisted on an examination

with his own hands.

For eighteen hundred years this opinion has been perpetuated among the

people, and it might possibly be even eighteen thousand years old, if

Genesis had not supplied us with the precise date of our enmity to this

reptile. It may be asserted that if Eve had spit on the serpent when he

took his place at her ear, a world of evil would have been spared human

nature.

Lucretius, in his fourth book, alludes to this manner of killing

serpents as very well known:

_Est utique ut serpens hominis contacta salivis._

_Disperit, ac sese mandendo conficit ipsa._

--LIB., iv, v. 642-643.

Spit on a serpent, and his vigor flies,

He straight devours himself, and quickly dies.

There is some slight contradiction in painting him at once deprived of

vigor and self-devouring, but my surgeon Figuier asserts not that the

serpents which he killed were self-devouring. Genesis says wisely that

we kill them with our heels, and not with spittle.

We are in the midst of winter on January 19, which is the time when

serpents visit us. I cannot find any at Mount Krapak; but I exhort all

philosophers to spit upon every serpent they meet with in the spring. It

is good to know the extent of the power of the saliva of man.

It is certain that Jesus Christ employed his spittle to cure a man who

was deaf and dumb. He took him aside, placed His fingers on his ears,

and looking up to heaven, sighed and said to him: "_Ephphatha_"--"be

opened"--when the deaf and dumb person immediately began to speak.

It may therefore be true that God has allowed the saliva of man to kill

serpents; but He may have also permitted my surgeon to assail them with

heavy blows from a stick or a stone, in such a way that they would die

whether he spat upon them or not.

I beg of all philosophers to examine the thing with attention. For

example, should they meet Freron in the street, let them spit in his

face, and if he die, the fact will be confirmed, in spite of all the

reasoning of the incredulous.

I take this opportunity also to beg of philosophers not to cut off the

heads of any more snails; for I affirm that the head has returned to

snails which I have decapitated very effectively. But it is not enough

that I know it by experience, others must be equally satisfied in order

that the fact be rendered probable; for although I have twice succeeded,

I have failed thirty times. Success depends upon the age of the snail,

the time in which the head is cut off, the situation of the incision,

and the manner in which it is kept until the head grows again.

If it is important to know that death may be inflicted by spitting, it

is still more important to know that heads may be renewed. Man is of

more consequence than a snail, and I doubt not that in due time, when

the arts are brought to perfection, some means will be found to give a

sound head to a man who has none at all.

SHEKEL.

A weight and denomination of money among the Jews; but as they never

coined money, and always made use of the coinage of other people, all

gold coins weighing about a guinea, and all silver coins of the weight

of a small French crown, were called a shekel; and these shekels were

distinguished into those of the weight of the sanctuary, and those of

the weight of the king.

It is said in the Book of Samuel that Absalom had very fine hair, from

which he cut a part every year. Many profound commentators assert that

he cut it once a month, and that it was valued at two hundred shekels.

If these shekels were of gold, the locks of Absalom were worth two

thousand four hundred guineas per annum. There are few seigniories which

produce at present the revenue that Absalom derived from his head.

It is said that when Abraham bought a cave in Hebron from the Canaanite

Ephron, Ephron sold him the cave for four hundred shekels of silver, of

current money with the merchant--_probatæ monetæ publicæ_.

We have already remarked that there was no coined money in these days,

and thus these four hundred shekels of silver became four hundred

shekels in weight, which, valued at present at three livres four sous

each, are equal to twelve hundred and eighty livres of France.

It follows that the little field, which was sold with this cavern, was

excellent land, to bring so high a price.

When Eleazar, the servant of Abraham, met the beautiful Rebecca, the

daughter of Bethnel, carrying a pitcher of water upon her shoulder, from

which she gave him and his camels leave to drink, he presented her with

earrings of gold, which weighed two shekels, and bracelets which weighed

ten, amounting in the whole to a present of the value of twenty-four

guineas.

In the laws of Exodus it is said that if an ox gored a male or female

slave, the possessor of the ox should give thirty shekels of silver to

the master of the slave, and that the ox should be stoned. It is

apparently to be understood that the ox in this case has produced a very

dangerous wound, otherwise thirty-two crowns was a large sum for the

neighborhood of Mount Sinai, where money was uncommon. It is for the

same reason that many grave, but too hasty, persons suspect that Exodus

as well as Genesis was not written until a comparatively late period.

What tends to confirm them in this erroneous opinion is a passage in the

same Exodus: "Take of pure myrrh five hundred shekels, and of sweet

cinnamon half as much; of sweet calamus two hundred and fifty shekels;

of cassia five hundred shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary; and

of olive-oil a ton, to form an ointment to annoint the tabernacle"; and

whosoever anointed himself or any stranger with a similar composition,

was to be put to death.

It is added that with all these aromatics were to be united stacte,

onyx, galbanum, and frankincense; and that a perfume was to be mixed up

according to the art of the apothecary or perfumer.

But I cannot perceive anything in this composition which ought to excite

the doubt of the incredulous. It is natural to imagine that the

Jews--who, according to the text, stole from the Egyptians all which

they could bring away--had also taken frankincense, galbanum, onyx,

stacte, olive-oil, cassia, sweet calamus, cinnamon, and myrrh. They

also, without doubt, stole many shekels; indeed, we have seen, that one

of the most zealous partisans of this Hebrew horde estimates what they

stole, in gold alone, at nine millions. I abide by his reckoning.

SIBYL.

The first woman who pronounced oracles at Delphos was called Sibylla.

According to Pausanias, she was the daughter of Jupiter, and of Lamia,

the daughter of Neptune, and she lived a long time before the siege of

Troy. From her all women were distinguished by the name of sibyls, who,

without being priestesses, or even attached to a particular oracle,

announced the future, and called themselves inspired. Different ages and

countries have had their sibyls, or preserved predictions which bear

their name, and collections were formed of them.

The greatest embarrassment to the ancients was to explain by what happy

privilege these sibyls had the gift of predicting the future. Platonists

found the cause of it in the intimate union which the creature, arrived

at a certain degree of perfection, might have with the Divinity. Others

attribute this divine property of the sibyls to the vapors and

exhalations of the caves which they inhabited. Finally others attributed

the prophetic spirit of the sibyls to their sombre and melancholy humor,

or to some singular malady.

St. Jerome maintained that this gift was to them a recompense for their

chastity; but there was at least one very celebrated one who boasted of

having had a thousand lovers without being married. It would have been

much more sensible in St. Jerome and other fathers of the Church to have

denied the prophetic spirit of the sibyls, and to have said that by

means of hazarding predictions at a venture, they might sometimes have

been fulfilled, particularly with the help of a favorable commentary, by

which words, spoken by chance, have been turned into facts which it was

impossible they could have predicted.

It is singular that their predictions were collected after the event.

The first collection of sibylline leaves, bought by Tarquin, contained

three books; the second was compiled after the fire of the capitol, but

we are ignorant how many books it contained; and the third is that which

we possess in eight books, and in which it is doubtful whether the

author has not inserted several predictions of the second. This

collection is the fruit of the pious fraud of some Platonic Christians,

more zealous than clever, who in composing it thought to lend arms to

the Christian religion, and to put those who defended it in a situation

to combat paganism with the greatest advantage.

This confused compilation of different prophecies was printed for the

first time in the year 1545 from manuscripts, and published several

times after, with ample commentaries, burdened with an erudition often

trivial, and almost always foreign to the text, which they seldom

enlightened. The number of works composed for and against the

authenticity of these sibylline books is very great, and some even very

learned; but there prevails so little order and reasoning, and the

authors are so devoid of all philosophic spirit that those who might

have courage to read them would gain nothing but ennui and fatigue. The

date of the publication is found clearly indicated in the fifth and

eighth books. The sibyl is made to say that the Roman Empire will have

only fifteen emperors, fourteen of which are designated by the numeral

value of the first letter of their names in the Greek alphabet. She adds

that the fifteenth, who would be a man with a white head, would bear the

name of a sea near Rome. The fifteenth of the Roman emperors was Adrian,

and the Asiatic gulf is the sea of which he bears the name.

From this prince, continues the sibyl, three others will proceed who

will rule the empire at the same time; but finally one of them will

remain the possessor. These three shoots were Antoninus, Marcus

Aurelius, and Lucius Verus. The sibyl alludes to the adoptions and

associations which united them. Marcus Aurelius found himself sole

master of the empire at the death of Lucius Verus, at the commencement

of the year 169; and he governed it without any colleague until the year

177, when he associated with his son Commodus. As there is nothing which

can have any relation to this new colleague of Marcus Aurelius, it is

evident that the collection must have been made between the years 169

and 177 of the vulgar era.

Josephus, the historian, quotes a work of the sibyl, in which the Tower

of Babel and the confusion of tongues are spoken of nearly as in

Genesis; which proves that the Christians are not the first authors of

the supposition of the sibylline books. Josephus not relating the exact

words of the sibyl, we cannot ascertain whether what is said of the same

event in our collection was extracted from the work quoted by Josephus;

but it is certain that several lines, attributed to the sibyl, in the

exhortations found in the works of St. Justin, of Theophilus of Antioch,

of Clement of Alexandria, and in some other fathers, are not in our

collection; and as most of these lines bear no stamp of Christianity,

they might be the work of some Platonic Jew.

In the time of Celsus, sibyls had already some credit among the

Christians, as it appears by two passages of the answer of Origen. But

in time sibylline prophecies appearing favorable to Christianity, they

were commonly made use of in works of controversy with much more

confidence than by the pagans themselves, who, acknowledging sibyls to

be inspired women, confined themselves to saying that the Christians had

falsified their writings, a fact which could only be decided by a

comparison of the two manuscripts, which few people are in a situation

to make.

Finally, it was from a poem of the sibyl of Cumea that the principal

dogmas of Christianity were taken. Constantine, in the fine discourse

which he pronounced before the assembly of the saints, shows that the

fourth eclogue of Virgil is only a prophetic description of the Saviour;

and if that was not the immediate object of the poet, it was that of the

sibyl from whom he borrowed his ideas, who, being filled with the spirit

of God, announced the birth of the Redeemer.

He believed that he saw in this poem the miracle of the birth of Jesus

of a virgin, the abolition of sin by the preaching of the gospel, and

the abolition of punishment by the grace of the Redeemer. He believed he

saw the old serpent overthrown, and the mortal venom with which he

poisoned human nature entirely deadened. He believed that he saw that

the grace of the Lord, however powerful it might be, would nevertheless

suffer the dregs and traces of sin to remain in the faithful; in a

word, he believed that he saw Jesus Christ announced under the great

character of the Son of God.

In this eclogue there are many other passages which might have been said

to be copies of the Jewish prophets, who apply it themselves to Jesus

Christ; it is at least the general opinion of the Church. St. Augustine,

like others, has been persuaded of it, and has pretended that the lines

of Virgil can only be applied to Jesus Christ. Finally, the most clever

moderns maintain the same opinion.

SINGING.

_Questions on Singing, Music, Modulation, Gesticulation, etc._

Could a Turk conceive that we have one kind of singing for the first of

our mysteries when we celebrate it in music, another kind which we call

"motetts" in the same temple, a third kind at the opera, and a fourth at

the theatre?

In like manner, can we imagine how the ancients blew their flutes,

recited on their theatres with their heads covered by enormous masks,

and how their declamation was written down.

Law was promulgated in Athens nearly as in Paris we sing an air on the

Pont-Neuf. The public crier sang an edict, accompanying himself on the

lyre.

It is thus that in Paris the rose in bud is cried in one tone; old

silver lace to sell in another; only in the streets of Paris the lyre is

dispensed with.

After the victory of Chæronea, Philip, the father of Alexander, sang the

decree by which Demosthenes had made him declare war, and beat time with

his foot. We are very far from singing in our streets our edicts, or

finances, or upon the two sous in the livre.

It is very probable that the melopée, or modulation, regarded by

Aristotle in his poetic art as an essential part of tragedy, was an

even, simple chant, like that which we call the preface to mass, which

in my opinion is the Gregorian chant, and not the Ambrosian, and which

is a true melopée.

When the Italians revived tragedy in the sixteenth century the

recitative was a melopée which could not be written; for who could write

inflections of the voice which are octaves and sixths of tone? They were

learned by heart. This custom was received in France when the French

began to form a theatre, more than a century after the Italians. The

"_Sophonisba_" of Mairet was sung like that of Trissin, but more

grossly; for throats as well as minds were then rather coarser at Paris.

All the parts of the actors, but particularly of the actresses, were

noted from memory by tradition. Mademoiselle Bauval, an actress of the

time of Corneille, Racine, and Molière, recited to me, about sixty years

ago or more, the commencement of the part of _Emilia_, in "Cinna," as it

had been played in the first representations by La Beaupré. This

modulation resembled the declamation of the present day much less than

our modern recitative resembles the manner of reading the newspaper.

I cannot better compare this kind of singing, this modulation, than to

the admirable recitative of Lulli, criticised by adorers of double

crochets, who have no knowledge of the genius of our language, and who

are ignorant what help this melody furnishes to an ingenious and

sensible actor.

Theatrical modulation perished with the comedian Duclos, whose only

merit being a fine voice without spirit and soul, finally rendered that

ridiculous which had been admired in Des Œuillets, and in Champmeslé.

Tragedy is now played dryly; if we were not heated by the pathos of the

spectacle and the action, it would be very insipid. Our age, commendable

in other things, is the age of dryness.

It is true that among the Romans one actor recited and another made

gestures. It was not by chance that the abbé Dubos imagined this

pleasant method of declaiming. Titus Livius, who never fails to instruct

us in the manners and customs of the Romans, and who, in that respect is

more useful than the ingenious and satirical Tacitus, informs us, I say,

that Andronicus, being hoarse while singing in the interludes, got

another to sing for him while he executed the dance; and thence came the

custom of dividing interludes between dancers and singers: "_Dicitur

cantum egisse magis vigente motu quum nihil vocis usis impediebat_." The

song is expressed by the dance. "Cantum egisse magis vigente motu." With

more vigorous movements.

But they divided not the story of the piece between an actor who only

gesticulates and another who only sings. The thing would have been as

ridiculous as impracticable.

The art of pantomimes, which are played without speaking, is quite

different, and we have seen very striking examples of it; but this art

can please only when a marked action is represented, a theatrical event

which is easily presented to the imagination of the spectator. It can

represent Orosmanes killing Zaïre and killing himself; Semiramis

wounded, dragging herself on the frontiers to the tomb of Ninus, and

holding her son in her arms. There is no occasion for verses to express

these situations by gestures to the sound of a mournful and terrible

symphony. But how would two pantomimes paint the dessertation of Maximus

and Cinna on monarchical and popular governments?

Apropos of the theatrical execution of the Romans, the abbé Dubos says

that the dancers in the interludes were always in gowns. Dancing

requires a closer dress. In the Pays de Vaud, a suite of baths built by

the Romans, is carefully preserved, the pavement of which is mosaic.

This mosaic, which is not decayed, represents dancers dressed like opera

dancers. We make not these observations to detect errors in Dubos;

there is no merit in having seen this antique monument which he had not

seen; and besides, a very solid and just mind might be deceived by a

passage of Titus Livius.

SLAVES.

SECTION I.

Why do we denominate slaves those whom the Romans called "_servi_," and

the Greeks "_duloi_"? Etymology is here exceedingly at fault; and

Bochart has not been able to derive this word from the Hebrew.

The most ancient record that we possess in which the word "slave" is

found is the will of one Ermangaut, archbishop of Narbonne, who

bequeathed to Bishop Fredelon his slave Anaph--"Anaphinus Slavonium."

This Anaph was very fortunate in belonging to two bishops successively.

It is not unlikely that the Slavonians came from the distant North with

other indigent and conquering hordes, to pillage from the Roman Empire

what that empire had pilliged from other nations, and especially in

Dalmatia and Illyria. The Italians called the misfortune of falling into

their hands "_shiavitu_," and "_schiavi_" the captives themselves.

All that we can gather from the confused history of the middle ages is

that in the time of the Romans the known world was divided between

freemen and slaves. When the Slavonians, Alans, Huns, Heruli,

Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Vandals, Burgundians, Franks and Normans came to

despoil Europe, there was little probability that the multitude of

slaves would diminish. Ancient masters, in fact, saw themselves reduced

to slavery, and the smaller number enslaved the greater, as negroes are

enslaved in the colonies, and according to the practice in many other

cases.

We read nothing in ancient authors concerning the slaves of the

Assyrians and the Babylonians. The book which speaks most of slaves is

the "Iliad." In the first place, Briseis is slave to Achilles; and all

the Trojan women, and more especially the princesses, fear becoming

slaves to the Greeks, and spinners for their wives.

Slavery is also as ancient as war, and war as human nature. Society was

so accustomed to this degradation of the species that Epictetus, who was

assuredly worth more than his master, never expresses any surprise at

his being a slave.

No legislator of antiquity ever attempted to abrogate slavery; on the

contrary, the people most enthusiastic for liberty--the Athenians, the

Lacedæmonians, the Romans, and the Carthaginians--were those who enacted

the most severe laws against their serfs. The right of life and death

over them was one of the principles of society. It must be confessed

that, of all wars, that of Spartacus was the most just, and possibly the

only one that was ever absolutely so.

Who would believe that the Jews, created as it might appear to serve all

nations in turn, should also appear to possess slaves of their own? It

is observed in their laws, that they may purchase their brethren for

six years, and strangers forever. It was said, that the children of Esau

would become bondsmen to the children of Jacob; but since, under a

different dispensation, the Arabs, who call themselves descendants of

Esau, have enslaved the posterity of Jacob.

The Evangelists put not a single word into the mouth of Jesus Christ

which recalls mankind to the primitive liberty to which they appear to

be born. There is nothing said in the New Testament on this state of

degradation and suffering, to which one-half of the human race was

condemned. Not a word appears in the writings of the apostles and the

fathers of the Church, tending to change beasts of burden into citizens,

as began to be done among ourselves in the thirteenth century. If

slavery be spoken of, it is the slavery of sin.

It is difficult to comprehend how, in St. John, the Jews can say to

Jesus: "We have never been slaves to any one"--they who were at that

time subjected to the Romans; they who had been sold in the market after

the taking of Jerusalem; they of whom ten tribes, led away as slaves by

Shalmaneser, had disappeared from the face of the earth, and of whom two

other tribes were held in chains by the Babylonians for seventy years;

they who had been seven times reduced to slavery in their promised land,

according to their own avowal; they who in all their writings speak of

their bondage in that Egypt which they abhorred, but to which they ran

in crowds to gain money, as soon as Alexander condescended to allow

them to settle there. The reverend Dom Calmet says, that we must

understand in this passage, "intrinsic servitude," an explanation which

by no means renders it more comprehensible.

Italy, the Gauls, Spain, and a part of Germany, were inhabited by

strangers, by foreigners become masters, and natives reduced to serfs.

When the bishop of Seville, Opas, and Count Julian called over the

Mahometan Moors against the Christian kings of the Visigoths, who

reigned in the Pyrenees, the Mahometans, according to their custom,

proposed to the natives, either to receive circumcision, give battle, or

pay tribute in money and girls. King Roderick was vanquished, and slaves

were made of those who were taken captive.

The conquered preserved their wealth and their religion by paying; and

it is thus that the Turks have since treated Greece, except that they

imposed upon the latter a tribute of children of both sexes, the boys of

which they circumcise and transform into pages and janissaries, while

the girls are devoted to the harems. This tribute has since been

compromised for money. The Turks have only a few slaves for the interior

service of their houses, and these they purchase from the Circassians,

Mingrelians, and nations of Lesser Tartary.

Between the African Mahometans and the European Christians, the custom

of piracy, and of making slaves of all who could be seized on the high

seas, has always existed. They are birds of prey who feed upon one

another; the Algerines, natives of Morocco, and Tunisians, all live by

piracy. The Knights of Malta, successors to those of Rhodes, formally

swear to rob and enslave all the Mahometans whom they meet; and the

galleys of the pope cruise for Algerines on the northern coasts of

Africa. Those who call themselves whites and Christians proceed to

purchase negroes at a good market, in order to sell them dear in

America. The Pennsylvanians alone have renounced this traffic, which

they account flagitious.

SECTION II.

I read a short time ago at Mount Krapak, where it is known that I

reside, a book written at Paris, abounding in wit and paradoxes, bold

views and hardihood, resembling in some respects those of Montesquieu,

against whom it is written. In this book, slavery is decidedly preferred

to domesticity, and above all to the free labor. This book exceedingly

pities those unhappy free men who earn a subsistence where they please,

by the labor for which man is born, and which is the guardian of

innocence, as well as the support of life. It is incumbent on no one,

says the author, either to nourish or to succor them; whereas, slaves

are fed and protected by their masters like their horses. All this is

true; but human beings would rather provide for themselves than depend

on others; and horses bred in the forest prefer them to stables.

He justly remarks that artisans lose many days in which they are

forbidden to work, which is very true; but this is not because they are

free, but because ridiculous laws exist in regard to holidays.

He says most truly, that it is not Christian charity which has broken

the fetters of servitude, since the same charity has riveted them for

more than twelve centuries; and that Christians, and even monks, all

charitable as they are, still possess slaves reduced to a frightful

state of bondage, under the name of "_mortaillables, mainmortables_" and

serfs of the soil.

He asserts that which is very true, that Christian princes only

affranchised their serfs through avarice. It was, in fact, to obtain the

money laboriously amassed by these unhappy persons, that they signed

their letters of manumission. They did not bestow liberty, but sold it.

The emperor Henry V. began: he freed the serfs of Spires and Worms in

the twelfth century. The kings of France followed his example; and

nothing tends more to prove the value of liberty than the high price

these gross men paid for it.

Lastly, it is for the men on whose condition the dispute turns to decide

upon which state they prefer. Interrogate the lowest laborer covered

with rags, fed upon black bread, and sleeping on straw, in a hut half

open to the elements; ask this man, whether he will be a slave, better

fed, clothed, and bedded; not only will he recoil with horror at the

proposal, but regard you with horror for making the proposal. Ask a

slave if he is willing to be free, and you will hear his answer. This

alone ought to decide the question.

It is also to be considered that a laborer may become a farmer, and a

farmer a proprietor. In France, he may even become a counsellor of the

king, if he acquire riches. In England, he may become a freeholder, or a

member of parliament. In Sweden, he may become a member of the national

states. These possibilities are of more value than that of dying

neglected in the corner of his master's stable.

SECTION III.

Puffendorff says, that slavery has been established "by the free consent

of the opposing parties." I will believe Puffendorff, when he shows me

the original contract.

Grotius inquires, whether a man who is taken captive in war has a right

to escape; and it is to be remarked, that he speaks not of a prisoner on

his parole of honor. He decides, that he has no such right; which is

about as much as to say that a wounded man has no right to get cured.

Nature decides against Grotius.

Attend to the following observations of the author of the "Spirit of

Laws," after painting negro slavery with the pencil of Molière:

"Mr. Perry says that the Moscovites sell themselves readily; I can

guess the reason--their liberty is worth nothing."

Captain John Perry, an Englishman, who wrote an account of the state of

Russia in 1714, says nothing of that which the "Spirit of Laws" makes

him say. Perry contains a few lines only on the subject of Russian

bondage, which are as follows: "The czar has ordered that, throughout

his states, in future, no one is to be called '_golup_' or slave; but

only '_raab_,' which signifies subject. However, the people derive no

real advantage from this order, being still in reality slaves."

The author of the "Spirit of Laws" adds, that according to Captain

Dampier, "everybody sells himself in the kingdom of Achem." This would

be a singular species of commerce, and I have seen nothing in the

"Voyage" of Dampier which conveys such a notion. It is a pity that a man

so replete with wit should hazard so many crudities, and so frequently

quote incorrectly.

SECTION IV.

_Serfs of the Body, Serfs of the Glebe, Mainmort, etc._

It is commonly asserted that there are no more slaves in France; that it

is the kingdom of the Franks, and that slave and Frank are contradictory

terms; that people are so free there that many financiers die worth more

than thirty millions of francs, acquired at the expense of the

descendants of the ancient Franks. Happy French nation to be thus free!

But how, in the meantime, is so much freedom compatible with so many

species of servitude, as for instance, that of the _mainmort_?

Many a fine lady at Paris, who sparkles in her box at the opera, is

ignorant that she descends from a family of Burgundy, the Bourbonnais,

Franche-Comté, Marche, or Auvergne, which family is still enslaved,

_mortaillable_ and _mainmortable_.

Of these slaves, some are obliged to work three days a week for the

lord, and others two. If they die without children, their wealth belongs

to the lord; if they leave children, the lord takes only the finest

cattle and, according to more than one custom, the most valuable

movables. According to other customs, if the son of a _mainmortable_

slave visits not the house of his father within a year and a day from

his death, he loses all his father's property, yet still remains a

slave; that is to say, whatever wealth he may acquire by his industry,

becomes at his death the property of the lord.

What follows is still better: An honest Parisian pays a visit to his

parents in Burgundy and in Franche-Comté, resides a year and a day in a

_mainmortable_ house, and returning to Paris finds that his property,

wherever situated, belongs to the lord, in case he dies without issue.

It is very properly asked how the province of Burgundy obtained the

nickname of "free," while distinguished by such a species of servitude?

It is without doubt upon the principle that the Greeks called the

furies _Eumenides_, "good hearts."

But the most curious and most consolatory circumstance attendant on this

jurisprudence is that the lords of half these _mainmortable_ territories

are monks.

If by chance a prince of the blood, a minister of state, or a chancellor

cast his eyes upon this article, it will be well for him to recollect,

that the king of France, in his ordinance of May 18, 1731, declares to

the nation, "that the monks and endowments possess more than half of the

property of Franche-Comté."

The marquis d'Argenson, in "_Le Droit Public Ecclesiastique_," says,

that in Artois, out of eighteen ploughs, the monks possess thirteen. The

monks themselves are called _mainmortables_, and yet possess slaves. Let

us refer these monkish possessions to the chapter of contradictions.

When we have made some modest remonstrances upon this strange tyranny on

the part of people who have vowed to God to be poor and humble, they

will then reply to us: We have enjoyed this right for six hundred years;

why then despoil us of it? We may humbly rejoin, that for these thirty

or forty thousand years, the weasels have been in the habit of sucking

the blood of our pullets; yet we assume to ourselves the right of

destroying them when we can catch them.

N.B. It is a mortal sin for a Chartreux to eat half an ounce of mutton,

but he may with a safe conscience devour the entire substance of a

family. I have seen the Chartreux in my neighborhood inherit a hundred

thousand crowns from one of their mainmortable slaves, who had made a

fortune by commerce at Frankfort. But all the truth must be told; it is

no less true, that his family enjoys the right of soliciting alms at the

gate of the convent.

Let us suppose that the monks have still fifty or sixty thousand slaves

in the kingdom of France. Time has not been found hitherto to reform

this Christian jurisprudence; but something is beginning to be thought

about it. It is only to wait a few hundred years, until the debts of the

state be paid.

SLEEPERS (THE SEVEN).

Fable supposes that one Epimenides in a single nap, slept twenty-seven

years, and that on his awaking he was quite astonished at finding his

grandchildren--who asked him his name--married, his friends dead, his

town and the manners of its inhabitants changed. It was a fine field for

criticism, and a pleasant subject for a comedy. The legend has borrowed

all the features of the fable, and enlarged upon them.

The author of the "Golden Legend" was not the first who, in the

thirteenth century, instead of one sleeper, gave us seven, and bravely

made them seven martyrs. He took his edifying history from Gregory de

Tours, a veridical writer, who took it from Sigebert, who took it from

Metaphrastes, who had taken it from Nicephorus. It is thus that truth is

handed down from man to man.

The reverend father Peter Ribadeneira, of the company of Jesus, goes

still further in this celebrated "Flower of the Saints," of which

mention Is made in Molière's "_Tartuffe_." It was translated, augmented;

and enriched with engravings, by the reverend Antony Girard, of the same

society: nothing was wanting to it.

Some of the curious will doubtless like to see the prose of the reverend

father Girard: behold a specimen! "In the time of the emperor Decius,

the Church experienced a violent and fearful persecution. Among other

Christians, seven brothers were accused, young, well disposed, and

graceful; they were the children of a knight of Ephesus, and called

Maximilian, Marius, Martinian, Dionysius, John, Serapion, and

Constantine. The emperor first took from them their golden girdles; then

they hid themselves in a cavern, the entrance of which Decius caused to

be walled up that they might die of hunger."

Father Girard proceeds to say, that all seven quickly fell asleep, and

did not awake again until they had slept one hundred and seventy-seven

years.

Father Girard, far from believing that this is the dream of a man awake,

proves its authenticity by the most demonstrative arguments; and when

he could find no other proof, alleges the names of these seven

sleepers--names never being given to people who have not existed. The

seven sleepers doubtless could neither be deceived nor deceivers, so

that it is not to dispute this history that we speak of it, but merely

to remark that there is not a single fabulous event of antiquity which

has not been _rectified_ by ancient legendaries. All the history of

Œdipus, Hercules, and Theseus is found among them, accommodated to

their style. They have invented little, but they have _perfected_ much.

I ingenuously confess that I know not whence Nicephorus took this fine

story. I suppose it was from the tradition of Ephesus; for the cave of

the seven sleepers, and the little church dedicated to them, still

exist. The least awakened of the poor Greeks still go there to perform

their devotions. Sir Paul Rycaut and several other English travellers

have seen these two monuments; but as to their devotions there, we hear

nothing about them.

Let us conclude this article with the reasoning of Abbadie: "These are

memorials instituted to celebrate forever the adventure of the seven

sleepers. No Greek in Ephesus has ever doubted of it, and these Greeks

could not have been deceived, nor deceive anybody else; therefore the

history of the seven sleepers is incontestable."

SLOW BELLIES (VENTRES PARESSEUX).

St. Paul says, that the Cretans were all "liars," "evil beasts," and

"slow bellies." The physician Hequet understood by slow bellies, that

the Cretans were costive, which vitiated their blood, and rendered them

ill-disposed and mischievous. It is doubtless very true that persons of

this habit are more prone to choler than others: their bile passes not

away, but accumulates until their blood is overheated.

When you have a favor to beg of a minister, or his first secretary,

inform yourself adroitly of the state of his stomach, and always seize

on "mollia fandi tempora."

No one is ignorant that our character and turn of mind are intimately

connected with the water-closet. Cardinal Richelieu was sanguinary,

because he had the piles, which afflicted his rectum and hardened his

disposition. Queen Anne of Austria always called him "_cul pourri_"

(sore bottom), which nickname redoubled his bile, and possibly cost

Marshal Marillac his life, and Marshal Bassompierre his liberty; but I

cannot discover why certain persons should be greater liars than others.

There is no known connection between the anal sphincter and falsehood,

like that very sensible one between our stomach and our passions, our

manner of thinking and our conduct.

I am much disposed to believe, that by "slow bellies" St. Paul

understood voluptuous men and gross feeders--a kind of priors, canons,

and abbots-commendatory--rich prelates, who lay in bed all the morning

to recover from the excesses of the evening, as Marot observes in his

eighty-sixth epigram in regard to a fat prior, who lay in bed and

fondled his grandson while his partridges were preparing:

_Un gros prieur son petit fils baisait,_

_Et mignardait au matin dans sa couche,_

_Tandis rôtir sa perdrix en faisait, etc._

But people may lie in bed all the morning without being either liars, or

badly disposed. On the contrary, the voluptuously indolent are generally

socially gentle, and easy in their commerce with the world.

However this may be, I regret that St. Paul should offend an entire

people. In this passage, humanly speaking, there is neither politeness,

ability, or even truth. Nothing is gained from men by calling them evil

beasts; and doubtless men of merit were to be found in Crete. Why thus

outrage the country of Minos, which Archbishop Fénelon, infinitely more

polished than St. Paul, so much eulogizes in his "Telemachus"?

Was not St. Paul somewhat difficult to live with, of a proud spirit, and

of a hard and imperious character? If I had been one of the apostles, or

even a disciple only, I should infallibly have quarrelled with him. It

appears to me, that the fault was all on his side, in his dispute with

Simon Peter Barjonas. He had a furious passion for domination. He often

boasts of being an apostle, and more an apostle than his associates--he

who had assisted to stone St. Stephen, he who had been assistant

persecutor under Gamaliel, and who was called upon to weep longer for

his crimes than St. Peter for his weakness!--always, however, humanly

speaking.

He boasts of being a Roman citizen born at Tarsus, whereas St. Jerome

pretends that he was a poor provincial Jew, born at Giscala in Galilee.

In his letters addressed to the small flock of his brethren, he always

speaks magisterially: "I will come," says he to certain Corinthians,

"and I will judge of you all on the testimony of two or three witnesses;

and I will neither pardon those who have sinned, nor others." This "nor

others" is somewhat severe.

Many men at present would be disposed to take the part of St. Peter

against St. Paul, but for the episode of Ananias and Sapphira, which has

intimidated persons inclined to bestow alms.

I return to my text of the Cretan liars, evil beasts, and slow bellies;

and I recommend to all missionaries never to commence their labors among

any people with insults.

It is not that I regard the Cretans as the most just and respectable of

men, as they were called by fabulous Greece. I pretend not to reconcile

their pretended virtue with the pretended bull of which the beautiful

Pasiphæ was so much enamored; nor with the skill exerted by the artisan

Dædalus in the construction of a cow of brass, by which Pasiphæ was

enabled to produce a Minotaur, to whom the pious and equitable Minos

sacrificed every year--and not every nine years--seven grown-up boys and

seven virgins of Athens.

It is not that I believe in the hundred large cities in Crete, meaning a

hundred poor villages standing upon a long and narrow rock, with two or

three towns. It is to be regretted that Rollin, in his elegant

compilation of "Ancient History," has repeated so many of the ancient

fables of Crete, and that of Minos among others.

With respect to the poor Greeks and Jews who now inhabit the steep

mountains of this island, under the government of a pasha, they may

possibly be liars and evil disposed, but I cannot tell if they are slow

of digestion: I sincerely hope, however, that they have sufficient to

eat.

SOCIETY (ROYAL) OF LONDON, AND ACADEMIES.

Great men have all been formed either before academies or independent of

them. Homer and Phidias, Sophocles and Apelles, Virgil and Vitruvius,

Ariosto and Michelangelo, were none of them academicians. Tasso

encountered only unjust criticism from the Academy della Crusca, and

Newton was not indebted to the Royal Society of London for his

discoveries in optics, upon gravitation, upon the integral calculus, and

upon chronology. Of what use then are academies? To cherish the fire

which great genius has kindled.

The Royal Society of London was formed in 1660, six years before the

French Academy of Science. It has no rewards like ours, but neither has

it any of the disagreeable distinctions invented by the abbé Bignon, who

divided the Academy of Sciences between those who paid, and honorary

members who were not learned. The society of London being independent,

and only self-encouraged, has been composed of members who have

discovered the laws of light, of gravitation, of the aberration of the

stars, the reflecting telescope, the fire engine, solar microscope, and

many other inventions, as useful as admirable. Could they have had

greater men, had they admitted pensionaries or honorary members?

The famous Doctor Swift, in the last years of the reign of Queen Anne,

formed the idea of establishing an academy for the English language,

after the model of the Académie Française. This project was countenanced

by the earl of Oxford, first lord of the treasury, and still more by

Lord Bolingbroke, secretary of state, who possessed the gift of speaking

extempore in parliament with as much purity as Doctor Swift composed in

his closet, and who would have been the patron and ornament of this

academy. The members likely to compose it were men whose works will last

as long as the English language. Doctor Swift would have been one, and

Mr. Prior, whom we had among us as public minister, and who enjoyed a

similar reputation in England to that of La Fontaine among ourselves.

There were also Mr. Pope, the English Boileau, and Mr. Congreve, whom

they call their Molière, and many more whose names escape my

recollection. The queen, however, dying suddenly, the Whigs took it into

their heads to occupy themselves in hanging the protectors of academies,

a process which is very injurious to the belles-lettres. The members of

this body would have enjoyed much greater advantages than were possessed

by the first who composed the French Academy. Swift, Prior, Congreve,

Dryden, Pope, Addison, and others, had fixed the English language by

their writings, whereas Chapelain, Colletet, Cassaigne, Faret, and

Cotin, our first academicians, were a scandal to the nation; and their

names have become so ridiculous that if any author had the misfortune to

be called Chapelain or Cotin at present, he would be obliged to change

his name.

Above all, the labors of an English academy would have materially

differed from our own. One day, a wit of that country asked me for the

memoirs of the French Academy. It composes no memoirs, I replied; but it

has caused sixty or eighty volumes of compliments to be printed. He ran

through one or two, but was not able to comprehend the style, although

perfectly able to understand our best authors. "All that I can learn by

these fine compositions," said he to me, "is, that the new member,

having assured the body that his predecessor was a great man, Cardinal

Richelieu a very great man, and Chancellor Séguier a tolerably great

man, the president replies by a similar string of assurances, to which

he adds a new one, implying that the new member is also a sort of great

man; and as for himself, the president, he may also perchance possess a

spice of pretension." It is easy to perceive by what fatality all the

academic speeches are so little honorable to the body. "_Vitium est

temporis, potius quam hominis_." It insensibly became a custom for every

academician to repeat those eulogies at his reception; and thus the body

imposed upon themselves a kind of obligation to fatigue the public. If

we wish to discover the reason why the most brilliant among the men of

genius, who have been chosen by this body, have so frequently made the

worst speeches, the cause may be easily explained. It is, that they have

been anxious to shine, and to treat worn-out matter in a new way. The

necessity of saying something; the embarrassment produced by the

consciousness of having nothing to say; and the desire to exhibit

ability, are three things sufficient to render even a great man

ridiculous. Unable to discover new thoughts, the new members fatigue

themselves for novel terms of expression, and often speak without

thinking; like men who, affecting to chew with nothing in their mouths,

seem to eat while perishing with hunger. Instead of a law in the French

Academy to have these speeches printed, a law should be passed in

prevention of that absurdity.

The Academy of Belles-Lettres imposed upon itself a task more judicious

and useful--that of presenting to the public a collection of memoirs

comprising the most critical and curious disquisitions and researches.

These memoirs are already held in great esteem by foreigners. It is only

desirable, that some subjects were treated more profoundly, and others

not treated of at all. They might, for example, very well dispense with

dissertations upon the prerogative of the right hand over the left; and

of other inquiries which, under a less ridiculous title, are not less

frivolous. The Academy of Sciences, in its more difficult and useful

investigation, embraces a study of nature, and the improvement of the

arts; and it is to be expected that studies so profound and

perseveringly pursued, calculations so exact, and discoveries so

refined, will in the end produce a corresponding benefit to the world at

large.

As to the French Academy, what services might it not render to letters,

to the language, and the nation, if, instead of printing volumes of

compliments every year, it would reprint the best works of the age of

Louis XIV., purified from all the faults of language which have crept

into them! Corneille and Molière are full of them, and they swarm in La

Fontaine. Those which could not be corrected might at least be marked,

and Europe at large, which reads these authors, would then learn our

language with certainty, and its purity would be forever fixed. Good

French books, printed with care at the expense of the king, would be

one of the most glorious monuments of the nation. I have heard say, that

M. Despréaux once made this proposal, which has since been renewed by a

man whose wit, wisdom, and sound criticism are generally acknowledged;

but this idea has met with the fate of several other useful

projects--that of being approved and neglected.

SOCRATES.

Is the mould broken of those who loved virtue for itself, of a

Confucius, a Pythagoras, a Thales, a Socrates? In their time, there were

crowds of devotees to their pagods and divinities; minds struck with

fear of Cerberus and of the Furies, who underwent initiations,

pilgrimages, and mysteries, who ruined themselves in offerings of black

sheep. All times have seen those unfortunates of whom Lucretius speaks:

_Qui quocumque tamen miseri venere parentant,_

_Et nigras mactant pecudes, et manibu Divis_

_In ferias mittunt; multoque in rebus acerbis_

_Acrius advertunt animus ad religionem._

--LUCRETIUS, iii, 51-54.

Who sacrifice black sheep on every tomb

To please the manes; and of all the rout

When cares and dangers press, grow most devout.

--CREECH.

Mortifications were in use; the priests of Cybele castrated themselves

to preserve continence. How comes it, that among all the martyrs of

superstition, antiquity reckons not a single great man--a sage? It is,

that fear could never make virtue, and that great men have been

enthusiasts in moral good. Wisdom was their predominant passion; they

were sages as Alexander was a warrior, as Homer was a poet, and Apelles

a painter--by a superior energy and nature; which is all that is meant

by the demon of Socrates.

One day, two citizens of Athens, returning from the temple of Mercury,

perceived Socrates in the public place. One said to the other: "Is not

that the rascal who says that one can be virtuous without going every

day to offer up sheep and geese?" "Yes," said the other, "that is the

sage who has no religion; that is the atheist who says there is only one

God." Socrates approached them with his simple air, his dæmon, and his

irony, which Madame Dacier has so highly exalted. "My friends," said he

to them, "one word, if you please: a man who prays to God, who adores

Him, who seeks to resemble Him as much as human weakness can do, and who

does all the good which lies in his power, what would you call him?" "A

very religious soul," said they. "Very well; we may therefore adore the

Supreme Being, and have a great deal of religion?" "Granted," said the

two Athenians. "But do you believe," pursued Socrates, "that when the

Divine Architect of the world arranged all the globes which roll over

our heads, when He gave motion and life to so many different beings, He

made use of the arm of Hercules, the lyre of Apollo, or the flute of

Pan?" "It is not probable," said they. "But if it is not likely that He

called in the aid of others to construct that which we see, it is not

probable that He preserves it through others rather than through

Himself. If Neptune was the absolute master of the sea, Juno of the air,

Æolus of the winds, Ceres of harvests--and one would have a calm, when

the other would have rain--you feel clearly, that the order of nature

could not exist as it is. You will confess, that all depends upon Him

who has made all. You give four white horses to the sun, and four black

ones to the moon; but is it not more likely, that day and night are the

effect of the motion given to the stars by their Master, than that they

were produced by eight horses?" The two citizens looked at him, but

answered nothing. In short, Socrates concluded by proving to them, that

they might have harvests without giving money to the priests of Ceres;

go to the chase without offering little silver statues to the temple of

Diana; that Pomona gave not fruits; that Neptune gave not horses; and

that they should thank the Sovereign who had made all.

His discourse was most exactly logical. Xenophon, his disciple, a man

who knew the world, and who afterwards sacrificed to the wind, in the

retreat of the ten thousand, took Socrates by the sleeve, and said to

him: "Your discourse is admirable; you have spoken better than an

oracle; you are lost; one of these honest people to whom you speak is a

butcher, who sells sheep and geese for sacrifices; and the other a

goldsmith, who gains much by making little gods of silver and brass for

women. They will accuse you of being a blasphemer, who would diminish

their trade; they will depose against you to Melitus and Anitus, your

enemies, who have resolved upon your ruin: have a care of hemlock; your

familiar spirit should have warned you not to say to a butcher and a

goldsmith what you should only say to Plato and Xenophon."

Some time after, the enemies of Socrates caused him to be condemned by

the council of five hundred. He had two hundred and twenty voices in his

favor, which may cause it to be presumed that there were two hundred and

twenty philosophers in this tribunal; but it shows that, in all

companies, the number of philosophers is always the minority.

Socrates therefore drank hemlock, for having spoken in favor of the

unity of God; and the Athenians afterwards consecrated a temple to

Socrates--to him who disputed against all temples dedicated to inferior

beings.

SOLOMON.

Several kings have been good scholars, and have written good books. The

king of Prussia, Frederick the Great, is the latest example we have had

of it: German monarchs will be found who compose French verses, and who

write the history of their countries. James I. in England, and even

Henry VIII. have written. In Spain, we must go back as far as Alphonso

X. Still it is doubtful whether he put his hand to the "Alphonsine

Tables."

France cannot boast of having had an author king. The empire of Germany

has no book from the pen of its emperors; but Rome was glorified in

Cæsar, Marcus Aurelius, and Julian. In Asia, several writers are

reckoned among the kings. The present emperor of China, Kien Long,

particularly, is considered a great poet; but Solomon, or Solyman, the

Hebrew, has still more reputation than Kien Long, the Chinese.

The name of Solomon has always been revered in the East. The works

believed to be his, the "Annals of the Jews," and the fables of the

Arabs, have carried his renown as far as the Indies. His reign is the

great epoch of the Hebrews.

He was the third king of Palestine. The First Book of Kings says that

his mother, Bathsheba, obtained from David, the promise that he should

crown Solomon, her son, instead of Adonijah, his eldest. It is not

surprising that a woman, an accomplice in the death of her first

husband, should have had artifice enough to cause the inheritance to be

given to the fruit of her adultery, and to cause the legitimate son to

be disinherited, who was also the eldest.

It is a very remarkable fact that the prophet Nathan, who reproached

David with his adultery, the murder of Uriah, and the marriage which

followed this murder, was the same who afterwards seconded Bathsheba in

placing that Solomon on the throne, who was born of this sanguine and

infamous marriage. This conduct, reasoning according to the flesh, would

prove, that the prophet Nathan had, according to circumstances, two

weights and two measures. The book even says not that Nathan received a

particular mission from God to disinherit Adonijah. If he had one, we

must respect it; but we cannot admit that we find it written.

It is a great question in theology, whether Solomon is most renowned for

his ready money, his wives, or his books. I am sorry that he commenced

his reign in the Turkish style by murdering his brother.

Adonijah, excluded from the throne by Solomon, asked him, as an only

favor, permission to espouse Abishag, the young girl who had been given

to David to warm him in his old age. Scripture says not whether Solomon

disputed with Adonijah, the concubine of his father; but it says, that

Solomon, simply on this demand of Adonijah, caused him to be

assassinated. Apparently God, who gave him the spirit of wisdom, refused

him that of justice and humanity, as he afterwards refused him the gift

of continence.

It is said in the same Book of Kings that he was the master of a great

kingdom which extended from the Euphrates to the Red Sea and the

Mediterranean; but unfortunately it is said at the same time, that the

king of Egypt conquered the country of Gezer, in Canaan, and that he

gave the city of Gezer as a portion to his daughter, whom it is

pretended that Solomon espoused. It is also said that there was a king

at Damascus; and the kingdoms of Tyre and Sidon flourished. Surrounded

thus with powerful states, he doubtless manifested his wisdom in living

in peace with them all. The extreme abundance which enriched his country

could only be the fruit of this profound wisdom, since, as we have

already remarked, in the time of Saul there was not a worker in iron in

the whole country. Those who reason find it difficult to understand how

David, the successor of Saul, so vanquished by the Philistines, could

have established so vast an empire.

The riches which he left to Solomon are still more wonderful; he gave

him in ready money one hundred and three thousand talents of gold, and

one million thirteen thousand talents of silver. The Hebraic talent of

gold, according; to Arbuthnot, is worth six thousand livres sterling,

the talent of silver, about five hundred livres sterling. The sum total

of the legacy in ready money, without the jewels and other effects, and

without the ordinary revenue--proportioned no doubt to this

treasure--amounted, according to this calculation, to one billion, one

hundred and nineteen millions, five hundred thousand pounds sterling, or

to five billions, five hundred and ninety-seven crowns of Germany, or to

twenty-five billions, forty-eight millions of francs. There was not then

so much money circulating through the whole world. Some scholars value

this treasure at a little less, but the sum is always very large for

Palestine.

We see not, after that, why Solomon should torment himself so much to

send fleets to Ophir to bring gold. We can still less divine how this

powerful monarch, in his vast states, had not a man who knew how to

fashion wood from the forest of Libanus. He was obliged to beg Hiram,

king of Tyre, to lend him wood cutters and laborers to work it. It must

be confessed that these contradictions exceedingly exercise the genius

of commentators.

Every day, fifty oxen, and one hundred sheep were served up for the

dinner and supper of his houses, and poultry and game in proportion,

which might be about sixty thousand pounds weight of meat per day. He

kept a good house. It is added, that he had forty thousand stables, and

as many houses for his chariots of war, but only twelve thousand stables

for his cavalry. Here is a great number of chariots for a mountainous

country; and it was a great equipage for a king whose predecessor had

only a mule at his coronation, and a territory which bred asses alone.

It was not becoming a prince possessing so many chariots to be limited

in the article of women; he therefore possessed seven hundred who bore

the name of queen; and what is strange, he had but three hundred

concubines; contrary to the custom of kings, who have generally more

mistresses than wives.

He kept four hundred and twelve thousand horses, doubtless to take the

air with them along the lake of Gennesaret, or that of Sodom, in the

neighborhood of the Brook of Kedron, which would be one of the most

delightful places upon earth, if the brook was not dry nine months of

the year, and if the earth was not horribly stony.

As to the temple which he built, and which the Jews believed to be the

finest work of the universe, if the Bramantes, the Michelangelos, and

the Palladios, had seen this building, they would not have admired it.

It was a kind of small square fortress, which enclosed a court; in this

court was one edifice of forty cubits long, and another of twenty; and

it is said, that this second edifice, which was properly the temple, the

oracle, the holy of holies, was only twenty cubits in length and

breadth, and twenty cubits high. M. Souflot would not have been quite

pleased with those proportions.

The books attributed to Solomon have lasted longer than his temple.

The name of the author alone has rendered these books respectable. They

should be good, since they were written by a king, and this king passed

for the wisest of men.

The first work attributed to him is that of Proverbs. It is a collection

of maxims, which sometimes appear to our refined minds trifling, low,

incoherent, in bad taste, and without meaning. People cannot be

persuaded that an enlightened king has composed a collection of

sentences, in which there is not one which regards the art of

government, politics, manners of courtiers, or customs of a court. They

are astonished at seeing whole chapters in which nothing is spoken of

but prostitutes, who invite passengers in the streets to lie with them.

They revolt against sentences in the following style: "There are three

things that are never satisfied, a fourth which never says 'enough'; the

grave; the barren womb; the earth that is not filled with water, are the

three; and the fourth is fire, which never sayeth 'enough.'

"There be three things which are too wonderful for me; yea, four which I

know not. The way of an eagle in the air, the way of a serpent upon a

rock, the way of a ship in the midst of the sea, and the way of a man

with a maid.

"There be four things which are little upon the earth, but they are

exceeding wise. The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their

meat in the summer; the conies are but a feeble race, yet they make

their houses in rocks; the locusts have no king, yet go they forth all

of them by bands; the spider taketh hold with her hands, and is in

kings' palaces."

Can we impute such follies as these to a great king, to the wisest of

mortals? say the objectors. This criticism is strong; it should deliver

itself with more respect.

The Proverbs have been attributed to Isaiah, Elijah, Sobna, Eliakim,

Joachim, and several others; but whoever compiled this collection of

Eastern sentences, it does not appear that it was a king who gave

himself the trouble. Would he have said that the terror of the king is

like the roaring of a lion? It is thus that a subject or a slave speaks,

who trembles at the anger of his master. Would Solomon have spoken so

much of unchaste women? Would he have said: "Look thou not upon the wine

when it is red, when it giveth its color in the glass"?

I doubt very much whether there were any drinking glasses in the time of

Solomon; it is a very recent invention; all antiquity drank from cups of

wood or metal; and this single passage perhaps indicates that this

Jewish collection was composed in Alexandria, as well as most of the

other Jewish books.

The Book of Ecclesiastes, which is attributed to Solomon, is in quite a

different order and taste. He who speaks in this work seems not to be

deceived by visions of grandeur, to be tired of pleasures, and disgusted

with science. We have taken him for an Epicurean who repeats on each

page, that the just and unjust are subject to the same accidents; that

man is nothing more than the beast which perishes; that it is better not

to be born than to exist; that there is no other life; and that there is

nothing more good and reasonable than to enjoy the fruit of our labors

with a woman whom we love.

It might happen that Solomon held such discourse with some of his wives;

and it is pretended that these are objections which he made; but these

maxims, which have a libertine air, do not at all resemble objections;

and it is a joke to profess to understand in an author the exact

contrary of that which he says.

We believe that we read the sentiments of a materialist, at once sensual

and disgusted, who appears to have put an edifying word or two on God in

the last verse, to diminish the scandal which such a book must

necessarily create. As to the rest, several fathers say that Solomon did

penance; so that we can pardon him.

Critics have difficulty in persuading themselves that this book can be

by Solomon; and Grotius pretends that it was written under Zerubbabel.

It is not natural for Solomon to say: "Woe to thee, O land, when thy

king is a child!" The Jews had not then such kings.

It is not natural for him to say: "I observe the face of the king." It

is much more likely, that the author spoke of Solomon, and that by this

alienation of mind, which we discover in so many rabbins, he has often

forgotten, in the course of the book, that it was a king whom he caused

to speak.

What appears surprising to them is that this work has been consecrated

among the canonical books. If the canon of the Bible were to be

established now, say they, perhaps the Book of Ecclesiastes might not be

inserted; but it was inserted at a time when books were very rare, and

more admired than read. All that can be done now is to palliate the

Epicureanism which prevails in this work. The Book of Ecclesiastes has

been treated like many other things which disgust in a particular

manner. Being established in times of ignorance, we are forced, to the

scandal of reason, to maintain them in wiser times, and to disguise the

horror or absurdity of them by allegories. These critics are too bold.

The "Song of Songs" is further attributed to Solomon, because the name

of that king is found in two or three places; because it is said to the

beloved, that she is beautiful as the curtains of Solomon; because she

says that she is black, by which epithet it is believed that Solomon

designated his Egyptian wife.

These three reasons have not proved convincing:

1. When the beloved, in speaking to her lover, says "The king hath

brought me into his chamber," she evidently speaks of another than her

lover; therefore the king is not this lover; it is the king of the

festival; it is the paranymph, the master of the house, whom she means;

and this Jewess is so far from being the mistress of a king, that

throughout the work she is a shepherdess, a country girl, who goes

seeking her lover through the fields, and in the streets of the town,

and who is stopped at the gates by a porter who steals her garment.

2. "I am beautiful as the curtains of Solomon," is the expression of a

villager, who would say: I am as beautiful as the king's tapestries; and

it is precisely because the name of Solomon is found in this work, that

it cannot be his. What monarch could make so ridiculous a comparison?

"Behold," says the beloved, "behold King Solomon with the crown

wherewith his mother crowned him in the day of his espousals!" Who

recognizes not in these expressions the common comparisons which girls

make in speaking of their lovers? They say: "He is as beautiful as a

prince; he has the air of a king," etc.

It is true that the shepherdess, who is made to speak in this amorous

song, says that she is tanned by the sun, that she is brown. Now if this

was the daughter of the king of Egypt, she was not so tanned. Females of

quality in Egypt were fair. Cleopatra was so; and, in a word, this

person could not be at once a peasant and a queen.

A monarch who had a thousand wives might have said to one of them: "Let

her kiss me with the lips of her mouth; for thy breasts are better than

wine." A king and a shepherd, when the subject is of kissing, might

express themselves in the same manner. It is true, that it is strange

enough it should be pretended, that the girl speaks in this place, and

eulogizes the breasts of her lover.

We further avow that a gallant king might have said to his mistress: "A

bundle of myrrh is my well beloved unto me; he shall lie all night

between my breasts."

That he might have said to her: "Thy navel is like a round goblet which

wanteth not liquor; thy belly is like a heap of wheat set about with

lilies; thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins; thy neck

is as a tower of ivory; thine eyes like the fish pools in Heshbon; and

thy nose as the tower of Lebanon."

I confess that the "Eclogues" of Virgil are in a different style; but

each has his own, and a Jew is not obliged to write like Virgil.

We have not noticed this fine turn of Eastern eloquence: "We have a

little sister, and she hath no breasts. What shall we do for our sister

in the day when she shall be spoken for? If she be a wall, we will build

upon her; and if she be a door, we will close it."

Solomon, the wisest of men, might have spoken thus in his merry moods;

but several rabbins have maintained, not only that this voluptuous

eclogue was not King Solomon's, but that it is not authentic. Theodore

of Mopsuestes was of this opinion, and the celebrated Grotius calls the

"Song of Songs," a libertine flagitious work. However, it is

consecrated, and we regard it as a perpetual allegory of the marriage of

Jesus Christ with the Church. We must confess, that the allegory is

rather strong, and we see not what the Church could understand, when the

author says that his little sister has no breasts.

After all, this song is a precious relic of antiquity; it is the only

book of love of the Hebrews which remains to us. Enjoyment is often

spoken of in it. It is a Jewish eclogue. The style is like that of all

the eloquent works of the Hebrews, without connection, without order,

full of repetition, confused, ridiculously metaphorical, but containing

passages which breathe simplicity and love.

The "Book of Wisdom" is in a more serious taste; but it is no more

Solomon's than the "Song of Songs." It is generally attributed to Jesus,

the son of Sirac, and by some to Philo of Biblos; but whoever may be the

author, it is believed, that in his time the Pentateuch did not exist;

for he says in chapter x., that Abraham was going to sacrifice Isaac at

the time of the Deluge; and in another place he speaks of the patriarch

Joseph as of a king of Egypt. At least, it is the most natural sense.

The worst of it is, that the author in the same chapter pretends, that

in his time the statue of salt into which Lot's wife was changed was to

be seen. What critics find still worse is that the book appears to them

a tiresome mass of commonplaces; but they should consider that such

works are not made to follow the vain rules of eloquence. They are

written to edify, and not to please, and we should even combat our

disinclination to read them.

It is very likely that Solomon was rich and learned for his time and

people. Exaggeration, the inseparable companion of greatness, attributes

riches to him which he could not have possessed, and books which he

could not have written. Respect for antiquity has since consecrated

these errors.

But what signifies it to us, that these books were written by a Jew?

Our Christian religion is founded on the Jewish, but not on all the

books which the Jews have written.

For instance, why should the "Song of Songs" be more sacred to us than

the fables of Talmud? It is, say they, because we have comprised it in

the canon of the Hebrews. And what is this canon? It is a collection of

authentic works. Well, must a work be divine to be authentic? A history

of the little kingdoms of Judah and Sichem, for instance--is it anything

but a history? This is a strange prejudice. We hold the Jews in horror,

and we insist that all which has been written by them, and collected by

us, bears the stamp of Divinity. There never was so palpable a

contradiction.

SOMNAMBULISTS AND DREAMERS.

SECTION I.

I have seen a somnambulist, but he contented himself with rising,

dressing himself, making a bow, and dancing a minuet, all which he did

very properly; and having again undressed himself, returned to bed and

continued to sleep.

This comes not near the somnambulist of the "Encyclopædia." The last was

a young seminarist, who set himself to compose a sermon in his sleep. He

wrote it correctly, read it from one end to the other, or at least

appeared to read it, made corrections, erased some lines, substituted

others, and inserted an omitted word. He even composed music, noted it

with precision, and after preparing his paper with his ruler, placed the

words under the notes without the least mistake.

It is said, that an archbishop of Bordeaux has witnessed all these

operations, and many others equally astonishing. It is to be wished that

this prelate had affixed his attestation to the account, signed by his

grand vicars, or at least by his secretary.

But supposing that this somnambulist has done all which is imputed to

him, I would persist in putting the same queries to him as to a simple

dreamer. I would say to him: You have dreamed more forcibly than

another; but it is upon the same principle; one has had a fever only,

the other a degree of madness; but both the one and the other have

received ideas and sensations to which they have not attended. You have

both done what you did not intend to do.

Of two dreamers, the one has not a single idea, the other a crowd; the

one is as insensible as marble, while the other experiences desires and

enjoyments. A lover composes a song on his mistress in a dream, and in

his delirium imagines himself to be reading a tender letter from her,

which he repeats aloud:

_Scribit amatori meretrix; dat adultera munus_

_In noctis spatio miserorum vulnera durant._

--PETRONIUS, chap. civ.

Does anything pass within you during this powerful dream more than what

passes every day when you are awake?

You, Mr. Seminarist, born with the gift of imitation, you have listened

to some hundred sermons, and your brain is prepared to make them: moved

by the talent of imitation, you have written them waking; and you are

led by the same talent and impulse when you are asleep. But how have you

been able to become a preacher in a dream? You went to sleep, without

any desire to preach. Remember well the first time that you were led to

compose the sketch of a sermon while awake. You thought not of it a

quarter of an hour before; but seated in your chamber, occupied in a

reverie, without any determinate ideas, your memory recalls, without

your will interfering, the remembrance of a certain holiday; this

holiday reminds you that sermons are delivered on that day; you remember

a text; this text suggests an exordium; pens, ink, and paper, are lying

near you; and you begin to write things you had not the least previous

intention of writing. Such is precisely what came to pass in your

noctambulism.

You believe yourself, both in the one and the other occupation, to have

done only what you intended to do; and you have been directed without

consciousness by all which preceded the writing of the sermon.

In the same manner when, on coming from vespers, you are shut up in your

cell to meditate, you have no design to occupy yourself with the image

of your fair neighbor; but it somehow or another intrudes; your

imagination is inflamed; and I need not refer to the consequences. You

may have experienced the same adventure in your sleep.

What share has your will had in all these modifications of sensation?

The same that it has had in the coursing of your blood through your

arteries and veins, in the action of your lymphatic vessels, or in the

pulsation of your heart, or of your brain.

I have read the article on "Dreams" in the "Encyclopædia," and have

understood nothing; and when I search after the cause of my ideas and

actions, either in sleeping or waking, I am equally confounded.

I know well, that a reasoner who would prove to me when I wake, and when

I am neither mad nor intoxicated, that I am then an active agent, would

but slightly embarrass me; but I should be still more embarrassed if I

undertook to prove to him that when he slept he was passive and a pure

automaton.

Explain to me an animal who is a mere machine one-half of his life, and

who changes his nature twice every twenty-four hours.

SECTION II.

_Letter on Dreams to the Editor of the Literary Gazette, August, 1764._

Gentlemen: All the objects of science are within your jurisdiction;

allow chimeras to be so also. "_Nil sub sole novum_"--"nothing new under

the sun". Thus it is not of anything which passes in noonday that I am

going to treat, but of that which takes place during the night. Be not

alarmed; it is only with dreams that I concern myself.

I confess, gentlemen, that I am constantly of the opinion of the

physician of M. Pourceaugnac; he inquires of his patient the nature of

his dreams, and M. Pourceaugnac, who is not a philosopher, replies that

they are of the nature of dreams. It is most certain however, with no

offence to your Limousin, that uneasy and horrible dreams denote pain

either of body or mind; a body overcharged with aliment, or a mind

occupied with melancholy ideas when awake.

The laborer who has waked without chagrin, and fed without excess,

sleeps sound and tranquil, and dreams disturb him not; so long as he is

in this state, he seldom remembers having a dream--a truth which I have

fully ascertained on my estate in Herefordshire. Every dream of a

forcible nature is produced by some excess, either in the passions of

the soul, or the nourishment of the body; it seems as if nature intended

to punish us for them, by suggesting ideas, and making us think in spite

of ourselves. It may be inferred from this, that those who think the

least are the most happy; but it is not that conclusion which I seek to

establish.

We must acknowledge, with Petronius, "_Quidquid luce fuit, tenebris

agit_." I have known advocates who have pleaded in dreams;

mathematicians who have sought to solve problems; and poets who have

composed verses. I have made some myself, which are very passable. It

is therefore incontestable, that consecutive ideas occur in sleep, as

well as when we are awake, which ideas as certainly come in spite of us.

We think while sleeping, as we move in our beds, without our will having

anything to do either in the motive or the thought. Your Father

Malebranche is right in asserting that we are not able to give ourselves

ideas. For why are we to be masters of them, when waking, more than

during sleep? If your Malebranche had stopped there, he would have been

a great philosopher; he deceived himself only by going too far: of him

we may say:

_Processit longe flammantia mœnia mundi._

--LUCRETIUS, i, 74.

His vigorous and active mind was hurled

Beyond the flaming limits of this world.

--CREECH.

For my part, I am persuaded that the reflection that our thoughts

proceed not from ourselves, may induce the visit of some very good

thoughts. I will not, however, undertake to develop mine, for fear of

tiring some readers, and astonishing others.

I simply beg to say two or three words in relation to dreams. Have you

not found, like me, that they are the origin of the opinion so generally

diffused throughout antiquity, touching spectres and manes? A man

profoundly afflicted at the death of his wife or his son, sees them in

his sleep; he speaks to them; they reply to him; and to him they have

certainly appeared. Other men have had similar dreams; it is therefore

impossible to deny that the dead may return; but it is certain, at the

same time, that these deceased, whether inhumed, reduced to ashes, or

buried in the abyss of the sea, have not been able to reserve their

bodies; it is, therefore, the soul which we have seen. This soul must

necessarily be extended, light, and impalpable, because in speaking to

it we have not been able to embrace it: "_Effugit imago par levibus

ventis_." It is moulded and designed from the body that it inhabits,

since it perfectly resembles it. The name of shade or manes is given it;

from all which a confused idea remains in the head, which differs itself

so much more because no one can understand it.

Dreams also appear to me to have been the sensible origin of primitive

prophecy or prediction. What more natural or common than to dream that a

person dear to us is in danger of dying, or that we see him expiring?

What more natural, again, than that such a person may really die soon

after this ominous dream of his friend? Dreams which have come to pass

are always predictions which no one can doubt, no account being taken of

the dreams which are never fulfilled; a single dream accomplished has

more effect than a hundred which fail. Antiquity abounds with these

examples. How constructed are we for the reception of error! Day and

night unite to deceive us!

You see, gentlemen, that by attending to these ideas, we may gather

some fruit from the book of my compatriot, the dreamer; but I finish,

lest you should take me myself for a mere visionary.

Yours,

JOHN DREAMER.

SECTION III.

_Of Dreams._

According to Petronius, dreams are not of divine origin, but

self-formed:

_Somnia qua mentes ludunt volitantibus umbris,_

_Non delumbra deum nec ab æthere numina mittunt,_

_Sed sibi quisque facit._

But how, all the senses being defunct in sleep, does there remain an

internal one which retains consciousness? How is it, that while the eyes

see not, the ears hear not, we notwithstanding understand in our dreams?

The hound renews the chase in a dream: he barks, follows his prey, and

is in at the death. The poet composes verses in his sleep; the

mathematician examines his diagram; and the metaphysician reasons well

or ill; of all which there are striking examples.

Are they only the organs of the machine which act? Is it the pure soul,

submitted to the empire of the senses, enjoying its faculties at

liberty?

If the organs alone produce dreams by night, why not alone produce ideas

by day? If the soul, pure and tranquil, acting for itself during the

repose of the senses, is the sole cause of our ideas while we are

sleeping, why are all these ideas usually irregular, unreasonable, and

incoherent? What! at a time when the soul is least disturbed, it is so

much disquieted in its imagination? Is it frantic when at liberty? If it

was produced with metaphysical ideas, as so many sages assert who dream

with their eyes open, its correct and luminous ideas of being, of

infinity, and of all the primary principles, ought to be revealed in the

soul with the greatest energy when the body sleeps. We should never be

good philosophers except when dreaming.

Whatever system we embrace, whatever our vain endeavors to prove that

the memory impels the brain, and that the brain acts upon the soul, we

must allow that our ideas come, in sleep, independently of our will. It

is therefore certain that we can think seven or eight hours running

without the least intention of doing so, and even without being certain

that we think. Pause upon that, and endeavor to divine what there is in

this which is animal.

Dreams have always formed a great object of superstition, and nothing is

more natural. A man deeply affected by the sickness of his mistress

dreams that he sees her dying; she dies the next day; and of course the

gods have predicted her death.

The general of an army dreams that he shall gain a battle; he

subsequently gains one; the gods had decreed that he should be a

conqueror. Dreams which are accomplished are alone attended to. Dreams

form a great part of ancient history, as also of oracles.

The "Vulgate" thus translates the end of Leviticus, xix, 26: "You shall

not observe dreams." But the word "dream" exists not in the Hebrew; and

it would be exceedingly strange, if attention to dreams was reproved in

the same book in which it is said that Joseph became the benefactor of

Egypt and his family, in consequence of his interpretation of three

dreams.

The interpretation of dreams was a thing so common, that the supposed

art had no limits, and the interpreter was sometimes called upon to say

what another person had dreamed. Nebuchadnezzar, having forgotten his

dream, orders his Magi to say what it was he had dreamed, and threatened

them with death if they failed; but the Jew Daniel, who was in the

school of the Magi, saved their lives by divining at once what the king

had dreamed, and interpreting it. This history, and many others, may

serve to prove that the laws of the Jews did not forbid oneiromancy,

that is to say, the science of dreams.

SECTION IV.

Lausanne, Oct. 25, 1757.

In one of my dreams, I supped with M. Touron, who appeared to compose

verses and music, which he sang to us. I addressed these four lines to

him in my dream:

_Mon cher Touron, que tu m'enchantes_

_Par la douceur de tes accens!_

_Que tes vers sont doux et coulans!_

_Tu les fais comme tu tes chantes._

Thy gentle accents, Touron dear,

Sound most delightful to my ear!

With how much ease the verses roll,

Which flow, while singing, from thy soul!

In another dream, I recited the first canto of the "Henriade" quite

different from what it is. Yesterday, I dreamed that verses were recited

at supper, and that some one pretended they were too witty. I replied

that verses were entertainments given to the soul, and that ornaments

are necessary in entertainments.

I have therefore said things in my sleep which I should have some

difficulty to say when awake; I have had thoughts and reflections, in

spite of myself, and without the least voluntary operation on my own

part, and nevertheless combined my ideas with sagacity, and even with

genius. What am I, therefore, if not a machine?

SOPHIST.

A geometrician, a little severe, thus addressed us one day: There is

nothing in literature more dangerous than rhetorical sophists; and among

these sophists none are more unintelligible and unworthy of being

understood than the divine Plato.

The only useful idea to be found in him, is that of the immortality of

the soul, which was already admitted among cultivated nations; but,

then, how does he prove this immortality?

We cannot too forcibly appeal to this proof, in order to correctly

appreciate this famous Greek. He asserts, in his "Phædon" that death is

the opposite of life, that death springs from life, and the living from

the dead, consequently that our souls will descend beneath the earth

when we die.

If it is true that the sophist Plato, who gives himself out for the

enemy of all sophists, reasons always thus, what have been all these

pretended great men, and in what has consisted their utility?

The grand defect of the Platonic philosophy is the transformation of

abstract ideas into realities. A man can only perform a fine action,

because a beauty really exists, which is its archetype.

We cannot perform any action, without forming an idea of the

action--therefore these ideas exist I know not where, and it is

necessary to study them.

God formed an idea of the world before He created it. This was His

_logos_: the world, therefore, is the production of the _logos_!

What disputes, how many vain and even sanguinary contests, has this

manner of argument produced upon earth! Plato never dreamed that his

doctrine would be able, at some future period, to divide a church which

in his time was not in existence.

To conceive a just contempt for all these foolish subtilties, read

Demosthenes, and see if in any one of his harangues he employs one of

these ridiculous sophisms. It is a clear proof that, in serious

business, no more attention is paid to these chimeras than in a council

of state to theses of theology.

Neither will you find any of this sophistry in the speeches of Cicero.

It was a jargon of the schools, invented to amuse idleness--the quackery

of mind.

SOUL.

SECTION I.

This is a vague and indeterminate term, expressing an unknown principle

of known effects, which we feel in ourselves. This word "soul" answers

to the "anima" of the Latins--to the "pneuma" of the Greeks--to the term

which each and every nation has used to express what they understood no

better than we do.

In the proper and literal sense of the Latin and the languages derived

from it, it signifies that which animates. Thus people say, the soul of

men, of animals, and sometimes of plants, to denote their principle of

vegetation and life. This word has never been uttered with any but a

confused idea, as when it is said in Genesis: "God breathed into his

nostrils the breath of life, and he became a living soul"; and: "The

soul of animals is in the blood"; and: "Stay not my soul."

Thus the soul was taken for the origin and the cause of life, and for

life itself. Hence all known nations long imagined that everything died

with the body. If anything can be discerned with clearness in the chaos

of ancient histories, it seems that the Egyptians were at least the

first who made a distinction between the intelligence and the soul; and

the Greeks learned from them to distinguish their "_nous_" and their

"_pneuma_." The Latins, after the example of the Greeks, distinguished

"_animus_" and "_anima_"; and we have, too, our soul and our

understanding. But are that which is the principle of our life, and that

which is the principle of our thoughts, two different things? Does that

which causes us to digest, and which gives us sensation and memory,

resemble that which is the cause of digestion in animals, and of their

sensations and memory?

Here is an eternal object for disputation: I say an eternal object, for

having no primitive notion from which to deduce in this investigation,

we must ever continue in a labyrinth of doubts and feeble conjectures.

We have not the smallest step on which to set our foot, to reach the

slightest knowledge of what makes us live and what makes us think. How

should we? For we must then have seen life and thought enter a body.

Does a father know how he produced his son? Does a mother know how she

conceived him? Has anyone ever been able to divine how he acts, how he

wakes, or how he sleeps? Does anyone know how his limbs obey his will?

Has anyone discovered by what art his ideas are traced in his brain, and

issue from it at his command? Feeble automata, moved by the invisible

hand which directs us on the stage of this world, which of us has ever

perceived the thread which guides us?

We dare to put in question, whether the intelligent soul is spirit or

matter; whether it is created before us, or proceeds from nothing at our

birth; whether, after animating us for a day on this earth, it lives

after us in eternity. These questions appear sublime; what are they?

Questions of blind men asking one another: What is light?

When we wish to have a rude knowledge of a piece of metal, we put it on

the fire in a crucible; but have we any crucible wherein to put the

soul? It is spirit, says one; but what is spirit? Assuredly, no one

knows. This is a word so void of meaning, that to tell what spirit is,

you are obliged to say what it is not. The soul is matter, says another;

but what is matter? We know nothing of it but a few appearances and

properties; and not one of these properties, not one of these

appearances, can bear the least affinity to thought.

It is something distinct from matter, you say; but what proof have you

of this? Is it because matter is divisible and figurable, and thought is

not? But how do you know that the first principles of matter are

divisible and figurable? It is very likely that they are not; whole

sects of philosophers assert that the elements of matter have neither

figure nor extent. You triumphantly exclaim: Thought is neither wood,

nor stone, nor sand, nor metal; therefore, thought belongs not to

matter. Weak and presumptuous reasoners! Gravitation is neither wood,

nor sand, nor metal, nor stone; nor is motion, or vegetation, or life,

any of all these; yet life, vegetation, motion, gravitation, are given

to matter. To say that God cannot give thought to matter, is to say the

most insolently absurd thing that has ever been advanced in the

privileged schools of madness and folly. We are not assured that God has

done this; we are only assured that He can do it. But of what avail is

all that has been said, or all that will be said, about the soul? What

avails it that it has been called "_entelechia_," quintessence, flame,

ether--that it has been believed to be universal, uncreated,

transmigrant?

Of what avail, in these questions inaccessible to reason, are the

romances of our uncertain imaginations? What avails it, that the fathers

in the four primitive ages believed the soul to be corporeal? What

avails it that Tertullian, with a contradictoriness that was familiar to

him, decided that it is at once corporeal, figured, and simple? We have

a thousand testimonies of ignorance, but not one which affords us a ray

of probability.

How, then, shall we be bold enough to affirm what the soul is? We know

certainly that we exist, that we feel, that we think. Seek we to advance

one step further--we fall into an abyss of darkness; and in this abyss,

we have still the foolish temerity to dispute whether this soul, of

which we have not the least idea, is made before us or with us, and

whether it is perishable or immortal?

The article on "Soul," and all articles belonging to metaphysics,

should begin with a sincere submission to the indubitable tenets of the

Church. Revelation is doubtless much better than philosophy. Systems

exercise the mind, but faith enlightens and guides it.

Are there not words often pronounced of which we have but a very

confused idea, or perhaps no idea at all? Is not the word "soul" one of

these? When the tongue of a pair of bellows is out of order, and the

air, escaping through the valve, is not driven with violence towards the

fire, the maid-servant says: "The soul of the bellows is burst." She

knows no better, and the question does not at all disturb her quiet.

The gardener uses the expression, "Soul of the plants"; and cultivates

them very well without knowing what the term means.

The musical-instrument maker places, and shifts forward or backward, the

soul of a violin, under the bridge, in the interior of the instrument: a

sorry bit of wood more or less gives it or takes from it a harmonious

soul.

We have several manufactures in which the workmen give the appellation

of "soul" to their machines; but they are never heard to dispute about

the word: it is otherwise with philosophers.

The word "soul," with us, signifies in general that which animates. Our

predecessors, the Celts, gave their soul the name of "_seel_," of which

the English have made soul, while the Germans retain "_seel_"; and it

is probable that the ancient Teutons and the ancient Britons had no

university quarrels about this expression.

The Greeks distinguished three sorts of souls: "_Psyche_," signifying

the sensitive soul--the soul of the senses; and hence it was that Love,

the son of Aphrodite, had so much passion for Psyche, and that she loved

him so tenderly; "_Pneuma_," the breath which gave life and motion to

the whole machine, and which we have rendered by "_spiritus_"--spirit--a

vague term, which has received a thousand different acceptations: and

lastly, "_nous_," intelligence.

Thus we possess three souls, without having the slightest notion of any

one of them. St. Thomas Aquinas admits these three souls in his quality

of peripatetic, and distinguishes each of the three into three parts.

"_Psyche_" was in the breast; "_Pneuma_" was spread throughout the body;

and "_Nous_" was in the head. There was no other philosophy in our

schools until the present day; and woe to the man who took one of these

souls for another!

In this chaos of ideas, there was however a foundation. Men had clearly

perceived that in their passions of love, anger, fear, etc., motions

were excited within them; the heart and the liver were the seat of the

passions. When thinking deeply, one feels a laboring in the organs of

the head; "therefore, the intellectual soul is in the brain. Without

respiration there is no vegetation, no life; therefore, the vegetative

soul is in the breast, which receives the breath of the air."

When men had seen in their sleep their dead relatives or friends, they

necessarily sought to discover what had appeared to them. It was not the

body, which had been consumed on a pile or swallowed up in the sea and

eaten by the fishes. However, they would declare it was something, for

they had seen it; the dead man had spoken; the dreamer had questioned

him. Was it "_Psyche_"; was it "_Pneuma_"; was it "_Nous_" with whom he

had conversed in his sleep? Then a phantom was imagined--a slight

figure; it was "_skia_"--it was "_daimonos_"--a shade of the manes; a

small soul of air and fire, extremely slender, wandering none knew

where.

In after times, when it was determined to sound the matter, the

undisputed result was, that this soul was corporeal, and all antiquity

had no other idea of it. At length came Plato, who so subtilized this

soul, that it was doubted whether he did not entirely separate it from

matter; but the problem was never resolved until faith came to enlighten

us.

In vain do the materialists adduce the testimony of some fathers of the

Church who do not express themselves with exactness. St. Irenæus says

that the soul is but the breath of life, that it is incorporeal only in

comparison with the mortal body, and that it retains the human figure in

order that it may be recognized.

In vain does Tertullian express himself thus:

"The corporality of the soul shines forth in the Gospel. _'Corporalitas

animæ in ipso evangelio relucesseit.'_" For if the soul had not a body,

the image of the soul would not have the image of the body.

In vain does he even relate the vision of a holy woman who had seen a

very brilliant soul of the color of the air.

In vain does Tatian expressly say:

_Ψυχὴ μὲν οὖν εἰ τῶν ἀνθρώπων πυλυμερής ἐστιν_

--"The soul of man is composed of several parts."

In vain do they adduce St. Hilary, who said in later times: "There is

nothing created which is not corporeal, neither in heaven nor on earth;

neither visible nor invisible; all is formed of elements; and souls,

whether they inhabit a body or are without a body, have always a

corporeal substance."

In vain does St. Ambrose, in the fourth century, say: "We know nothing

but what is material, excepting only the ever-venerable Trinity."

The whole body of the Church has decided that the soul is immaterial.

These holy men had fallen into an error then universal; they were men:

but they were not mistaken concerning immortality, because it is

evidently announced in the Gospels.

So evident is our need of the decision of the infallible Church on these

points of philosophy, that indeed we have not of ourselves any

sufficient notion of what is called pure spirit, nor of what is called

matter. Pure spirit is an expression which gives us no idea; and we are

acquainted with matter only by a few phenomena. So little do we know of

it, that we call it substance, which word "substance" means that which

is beneath; but this beneath will eternally be concealed from us; this

beneath is the Creator's secret, and this secret of the Creator is

everywhere. We do not know how we receive life, how we give it, how we

grow, how we digest, how we sleep, how we think, nor how we feel. The

great difficulty is, to comprehend how a being, whatsoever it be, has

thoughts.