Letter XX—On Such of the Nobility as Cultivate the Belles Lettres   
   
   
THERE once was a time in France when the polite arts were cultivated by persons of the highest rank in the state. The courtiers particularly were conversant in them, although indolence, a taste for trifles, and a passion for intrigue, were the divinities of the country. The Court methinks at this time seems to have given into a taste quite opposite to that of polite literature, but perhaps the mode of thinking may be revived in a little time. The French are of so flexible a disposition, may be moulded into such a variety of shapes, that the monarch needs but command and he is immediately obeyed. The English generally think, and learning is had in greater honour among them than in our country—an advantage that results naturally from the form of their government. There are about eight hundred persons in England who have a right to speak in public, and to support the interest of the kingdom and near five or six thousand may in their turns aspire to the same honour. The whole nation set themselves up as judges over these, and every man has the liberty of publishing his thoughts with regard to public affairs, which shows that all the people in general are indispensably obliged to cultivate their understandings. In England the governments of Greece and Rome are the subject of every conversation, so that every man is under a necessity of perusing such authors as treat of them, how disagreeable soever it may be to him; and this study leads naturally to that of polite literature. Mankind in general speak well in their respective professions. What is the reason why our magistrates, our lawyers, our physicians, and a great number of the clergy, are abler scholars, have a finer taste, and more wit, than persons of all other professions? The reason is, because their condition of life requires a cultivated and enlightened mind, in the same manner as a merchant is obliged to be acquainted with his traffic. Not long since an English nobleman, who was very young, came to see me at Paris on his return from Italy. He had written a poetical description of that country, which, for delicacy and politeness, may vie with anything we meet with in the Earl of Rochester, or in our Chaulieu, our Sarrasin, or Chapelle. The translation I have given of it is so inexpressive of the strength and delicate humour of the original, that I am obliged seriously to ask pardon of the author and of all who understand English. However, as this is the only method I have to make his lordship’s verses known, I shall here present you with them in our tongue:—

           “Qu’ay je donc vû dans l’Italie?   
Orgueil, astuce, et pauvreté,   
Grands complimens, peu de bonté   
Et beaucoup de ceremonie.   
   
“L’extravagante comedie   
Que souvent l’Inquisition   
Veut qu’on nomme religion   
Mais qu’ici nous nommons folie.   
   
“La Nature en vain bienfaisante   
Veut enricher ses lieux charmans,   
Des prêtres la main desolante   
Etouffe ses plus beaux présens.   
   
“Les monsignors, soy disant Grands,   
Seuls dans leurs palais magnifiques   
Y sont d’illustres faineants,   
Sans argent, et sans domestiques.   
   
“Pour les petits, sans liberté,   
Martyrs du joug qui les domine,   
Ils ont fait vœu de pauvreté,   
Priant Dieu par oisiveté   
Et toujours jeunant par famine.   
   
“Ces beaux lieux du Pape benis   
Semblent habitez par les diables;   
Et les habitans miserables   
Sont damnes dans le Paradis.”

   
Letter XXI—On the Earl of Rochester and Mr. Waller   
   
   
THE EARL OF ROCHESTER’S name is universally known. Mr. de St. Evremont has made very frequent mention of him, but then he has represented this famous nobleman in no other light than as the man of pleasure, as one who was the idol of the fair; but, with regard to myself, I would willingly describe in him the man of genius, the great poet. Among other pieces which display the shining imagination his lordship only could boast, he wrote some satires on the same subjects as those our celebrated Boileau made choice of. I do not know any better method of improving the taste than to compare the productions of such great geniuses as have exercised their talent on the same subject. Boileau declaims as follows against human reason in his “Satire on Man”:
           “Cependant à le voir plein de vapeurs légeres,   
Soi-même se bercer de ses propres chimeres,   
Lui seul de la nature est la baze et l’appui,   
Et le dixieme ciel ne tourne que pour lui.   
De tous les animaux il est ici le maître;   
Qui pourroit le nier, poursuis tu? Moi peut-être   
Ce mâitre prétendu qui leur donne des loix,   
Ce roi des animaux, combien a-t’il de rois?”   
   
“Yet, pleased with idle whimsies of his brain,   
And puffed with pride, this haughty thing would fain   
Be think himself the only stay and prop   
That holds the mighty frame of Nature up.   
The skies and stars his properties must seem,   
    .    .    .    .    .    .    .    .   
Of all the creatures he’s the lord, he cries.   
    .    .    .    .    .    .    .    .   
And who is there, say you, that dares deny   
So owned a truth? That may be, sir, do I.   
    .    .    .    .    .    .    .    .   
This boasted monarch of the world who awes   
The creatures here, and with his nod gives laws   
This self-named king, who thus pretends to be   
The lord of all, how many lords has he?”   
OLDHAM, a little altered.
  1   
  The Lord Rochester expresses himself, in his “Satire against Man,” in pretty near the following manner. But I must first desire you always to remember that the versions I give you from the English poets are written with freedom and latitude, and that the restraint of our versification, and the delicacies of the French tongue, will not allow a translator to convey into it the licentious impetuosity and fire of the English numbers:—
           “Cet esprit que je haïs, cet esprit plein d’erreur,   
Ce n’est pas ma raison c’est la tienne, docteur   
C’est la raison frivôle, inquiete, orgueilleuse   
Des sages animaux, rivale dédaigneuse,   
Qui croit entr’eux et l’Ange, occuper le milieu,   
Et pense être ici bas l’image de son Dieu.   
Vil atôme imparfait, qui croit, doute, dispute   
Rampe, s’élève, tombe, et nie encore sa chûte,   
Qui nous dit je suis libre, en nous montrant ses fers,   
Et dont l’œil, trouble et faux, croit percer l’univers.   
Allez, reverends fous, bienheureux fanatiques,   
Compilez bien l’amas de vos riens scholastiques,   
Pères de visions, et d’enigmes sacres,   
Auteurs du labirinthe, où vous vous égarez.   
Allez obscurement éclaircir vos mistères,   
Et courez dans l’école adorer vos chimères.   
Il est d’autres erreurs, il est de ces dévots   
Condamné par eux mêmes à l’ennui du repos.   
Ce mystique encloîtré, fier de son indolence   
Tranquille, au sein de Dieu. Que peut il faire? Il pense.   
Non, tu ne penses point, misérable, tu dors:   
Inutile à la terre, et mis au rang des morts.   
Ton esprit énervé croupit dans la molesse.   
Reveille toi, sois homme, et sors de ton ivresse.   
L’homme est né pour agir, et tu pretens penser?” &c.   
  2   
  The original runs thus:
           “Hold mighty man, I cry all this we know,   
And ’tis this very reason I despise,   
This supernatural gift that makes a mite   
Think he’s the image of the Infinite;   
Comparing his short life, void of all rest,   
To the eternal and the ever blest.   
This busy, puzzling stirrer up of doubt,   
That frames deep mysteries, then finds them out,   
Filling, with frantic crowds of thinking fools,   
Those reverend bedlams, colleges, and schools;   
Borne on whose wings each heavy sot can pierce   
The limits of the boundless universe.   
So charming ointments make an old witch fly,   
And bear a crippled carcass through the sky.   
’Tis this exalted power, whose business lies   
In nonsense and impossibilities.   
This made a whimsical philosopher   
Before the spacious world his tub prefer;   
And we have modern cloistered coxcombs, who   
Retire to think, ’cause they have naught to do.   
But thoughts are given for action’s government,   
Where action ceases, thought’s impertinent.”   
  3   
  Whether these ideas are true or false, it is certain they are expressed with an energy and fire which form the poet. I shall be very far from attempting to examine philosophically into these verses, to lay down the pencil, and take up the rule and compass on this occasion; my only design in this letter being to display the genius of the English poets, and therefore I shall continue in the same view.     4   
  The celebrated Mr. Waller has been very much talked of in France, and Mr. de la Fontaine, St. Evremont, and Bayle have written his eulogium, but still his name only is known. He had much the same reputation in London as Voiture had in Paris, and in my opinion deserved it better. Voiture was born in an age that was just emerging from barbarity; an age that was still rude and ignorant, the people of which aimed at wit, though they had not the least pretensions to it, and sought for points and conceits instead of sentiments. Bristol stones are more easily found than diamonds. Voiture, born with an easy and frivolous genius, was the first who shone in this aurora of French literature. Had he come into the world after those great geniuses who spread such a glory over the age of Louis XIV., he would either have been unknown, would have been despised, or would have corrected his style. Boileau applauded him, but it was in his first satires, at a time when the taste of that great poet was not yet formed. He was young, and in an age when persons form a judgment of men from their reputation, and not from their writings. Besides, Boileau was very partial both in his encomiums and his censures. He applauded Segrais, whose works nobody reads; he abused Quinault, whose poetical pieces every one has got by heart; and is wholly silent upon La Fontaine. Waller, though a better poet than Voiture, was not yet a finished poet. The graces breathe in such of Waller’s works as are writ in a tender strain; but then they are languid through negligence, and often disfigured with false thoughts. The English had not in his time attained the art of correct writing. But his serious compositions exhibit a strength and vigour which could not have been expected from the softness and effeminacy of his other pieces. He wrote an elegy on Oliver Cromwell, which, with all its faults, is nevertheless looked upon as a masterpiece. To understand this copy of verses you are to know that the day Oliver died was remarkable for a great storm. His poem begins in this manner:—
           “Il n’est plus, s’en est fait, soumettons nous au sort,   
Le ciel a signalé ce jour par des tempêtes,   
Et la voix des tonnerres éclatant sur nos tetes   
Vient d’annoncer sa mort.   
   
“Par ses derniers soupirs il ébranle cet ile;   
Cet ile que son bras fit trembler tant de fois,   
Quand dans le cours de ses exploits,   
Il brisoit la téte des Rois,   
Et soumettoit un peuple à son joug seul docile.   
   
“Mer tu t’en es troublé; O mer tes flots émus   
Semblent dire en grondant aux plus lointains rivages   
Que l’effroi de la terre et ton maitre n’est plus.   
   
“Tel au ciel autrefois s’envola Romulus,   
Tel il quitta la Terre, au milieu des orages,   
Tel d’un peuple guerrier il recut les homages;   
Obéï dans sa vie, à sa mort adoré,   
Son palais fut un Temple,” &c.   
   
“We must resign! heaven his great soul does claim   
In storms as loud as his immortal fame;   
His dying groans, his last breath shakes our isle,   
And trees uncut fall for his funeral pile:   
About his palace their broad roots are tost   
Into the air; so Romulus was lost!   
New Rome in such a tempest missed her king,   
And from obeying fell to worshipping.   
On Oe! OElig>ta’s top thus Hercules lay dead,   
With ruined oaks and pines about him spread.   
Nature herself took notice on his death,   
And, sighing, swelled the sea with such a breath,   
That to remotest shores the billows rolled,   
Th’ approaching fate of his great ruler told.”   
WALLER.
  5   
  It was this eulogium that gave occasion to the reply (taken notice of in Bayle’s Dictionary), which Waller made to King Charles II. This king, to whom Waller had a little before (as is usual with bards and monarchs) presented a copy of verses embroidered with praises, reproached the poet for not writing with so much energy and fire as when he had applauded the Usurper (meaning Oliver). “Sir,” replied Waller to the king, “we poets succeed better in fiction than in truth.” This answer was not so sincere as that which a Dutch Ambassador made, who, when the same monarch complained that his masters paid less regard to him than they had done to Cromwell: “Ah, sir!” says the Ambassador, “Oliver was quite another man ——.” It is not my intent to give a commentary on Waller’s character, nor on that of any other person; for I consider men after their death in no other light than as they were writers, and wholly disregard everything else. I shall only observe that Waller, though born in a Court, and to an estate of five or six thousand pounds sterling a year, was never so proud or so indolent as to lay aside the happy talent which Nature had indulged him. The Earls of Dorset and Roscommon, the two Dukes of Buckingham, the Lord Halifax, and so many other noblemen, did not think the reputation they obtained of very great poets and illustrious writers, any way derogatory to their quality. They are more glorious for their works than for their titles. These cultivated the polite arts with as much assiduity as though they had been their whole dependence. They also have made learning appear venerable in the eyes of the vulgar, who have need to be led in all things by the great; and who, nevertheless, fashion their manners less after those of the nobility (in England I mean) than in any other country in the world.

   
Letter XXII—On Mr. Pope and Some Other Famous Poets   
   
   
I INTENDED to treat of Mr. Prior, one of the most amiable English poets, whom you saw Plenipotentiary and Envoy Extraordinary at Paris in 1712. I also designed to have given you some idea of the Lord Roscommon’s and the Lord Dorset’s muse; but I find that to do this I should be obliged to write a large volume, and that, after much pains and trouble, you would have but an imperfect idea of all those works. Poetry is a kind of music in which a man should have some knowledge before he pretends to judge of it. When I give you a translation of some passages from those foreign poets, I only prick down, and that imperfectly, their music; but then I cannot express the taste of their harmony.     1   
  There is one English poem especially which I should despair of ever making you understand, the title whereof is “Hudibras.” The subject of it is the Civil War in the time of the grand rebellion, and the principles and practice of the Puritans are therein ridiculed. It is Don Quixote, it is our “Satire Menippée” blended together. I never found so much wit in one single book as in that, which at the same time is the most difficult to be translated. Who would believe that a work which paints in such lively and natural colours the several foibles and follies of mankind, and where we meet with more sentiments than words, should baffle the endeavours of the ablest translator? But the reason of this is, almost every part of it alludes to particular incidents. The clergy are there made the principal object of ridicule, which is understood but by few among the laity. To explain this a commentary would be requisite, and humour when explained is no longer humour. Whoever sets up for a commentator of smart sayings and repartees is himself a blockhead. This is the reason why the works of the ingenious Dean Swift, who has been called the English Rabelais, will never be well understood in France. This gentleman has the honour (in common with Rabelais) of being a priest, and, like him, laughs at everything; but, in my humble opinion, the title of the English æbelais which is given the dean is highly derogatory to his genius. The former has interspersed his unaccountably fantastic and unitelligible book with the most gay strokes of humour; but which at the same time, has a greater proportion of impertinence. He has been vastly lavish of erudition, of smut, and insipid raillery. An agreeable tale of two pages is purchased at the expense of whole volumes of nonsense. There are but few persons, and those of a grotesque taste, who pretend to understand and to esteem this work; for, as to the rest of the nation, they laugh at the pleasant and diverting touches which are found in Rabelais and despise his book. He is looked upon as the prince of buffoons. The readers are vexed to think that a man who was master of so much wit should have made so wretched a use of it; he is an intoxicated philosopher who never wrote but when he was in liquor.     2   
  Dean Swift is Rabelais in his senses, and frequently the politest company. The former, indeed, is not so gay as the latter, but then he possesses all the delicacy, the justness, the choice, the good taste, in all which particulars our giggling rural Vicar Rabelais is wanting. The poetical numbers of Dean Swift are of a singular and almost inimitable taste; true humour, whether in prose or verse, seems to be his peculiar talent; but whoever is desirous of understanding him perfectly must visit the island in which he was born.     3   
  It will be much easier for you to form an idea of Mr. Pope’s works. He is, in my opinion, the most elegant, the most correct poet; and, at the same time, the most harmonious (a circumstance which redounds very much to the honour of this muse) that England ever gave birth to. He has mellowed the harsh sounds of the English trumpet to the soft accents of the flute. His compositions may be easily translated, because they are vastly clear and perspicuous; besides, most of his subjects are general, and relative to all nations.     4   
  His “Essay on Criticism” will soon be known in France by the translation which l’Abbé de Renel has made of it.     5   
  Here is an extract from his poem entitled the “Rape of the Lock,” which I just now translated with the latitude I usually take on these occasions; for, once again, nothing can be more ridiculous than to translate a poet literally:—
           “Umbriel, à l’instant, vieil gnome rechigné,   
Va d’une aîle pesante et d’un air renfrogné   
Chercher en murmurant la caverne profonde,   
Où loin des doux raïons que répand l’œil du monde   
La Déesse aux Vapeurs a choisi son séjour,   
Les Tristes Aquilons y sifflent à l’entour,   
Et le souffle mal sain de leur aride haleine   
Y porte aux environs la fievre et la migraine.   
Sur un riche sofa derrière un paravent   
Loin des flambeaux, du bruit, des parleurs et du vent   
La quinteuse déesse incessamment repose,   
Le cœur gros de chagrin, sans en savoir la cause.   
N’aiant pensé jamais, l’esprit toujours troublé,   
L’œil chargé, le teint pâle, et l’hypocondre enflé.   
La médisante Envie, est assise auprès d’elle,   
Vieil spectre féminin, décrépite pucelle,   
Avec un air devot déchirant son prochain,   
Et chansonnant les Gens l’Evangile à la main.   
Sur un lit plein de fleurs negligemment panchée   
Une jeune beauté non loin d’elle est couchée,   
C’est l’Afectation qui grassaîe en parlant,   
Ecoute sans entendre, et lorgne en regardant.   
Qui rougit sans pudeur, et rit de tout sans joie,   
De cent maux differens pretend qu’elle est la proïe;   
Et pleine de sante sous le rouge et le fard,   
Se plaint avec molesse, et se pame avec art.”   
   
“Umbriel, a dusky, melancholy sprite   
As ever sullied the fair face of light,   
Down to the central earth, his proper scene,   
Repairs to search the gloomy cave of Spleen,   
Swift on his sooty pinions flits the gnome,   
And in a vapour reached the dismal dome.   
No cheerful breeze this sullen region knows,   
The dreaded east is all the wind that blows.   
Here, in a grotto, sheltered close from air,   
And screened in shades from day’s detested glare,   
She sighs for ever on her pensive bed,   
Pain at her side, and Megrim at her head,   
Two handmaids wait the throne. Alike in place,   
But differing far in figure and in face,   
Here stood Ill-nature, like an ancient maid,   
Her wrinkled form in black and white arrayed;   
With store of prayers for mornings, nights, and noons   
Her hand is filled; her bosom with lampoons.   
There Affectation, with a sickly mien,   
Shows in her cheek the roses of eighteen,   
Practised to lisp, and hang the head aside,   
Faints into airs, and languishes with pride;   
On the rich quilt sinks with becoming woe,   
Wrapt in a gown, for sickness and for show.”   
  6   
  This extract, in the original (not in the faint translation I have given you of it), may be compared to the description of La Molesse (softness or effeminacy), in Boileau’s “Lutrin.”     7   
  Methinks I now have given you specimens enough from the English poets. I have made some transient mention of their philosophers, but as for good historians among them, I don’t know of any; and, indeed, a Frenchman was forced to write their history. Possibly the English genius, which is either languid or impetuous, has not yet acquired that unaffected eloquence, that plain but majestic air which history requires. Possibly too, the spirit of party which exhibits objects in a dim and confused light may have sunk the credit of their historians. One half of the nation is always at variance with the other half. I have met with people who assured me that the Duke of Marlborough was a coward, and that Mr. Pope was a fool; just as some Jesuits in France declare Pascal to have been a man of little or no genius, and some Jansenists affirm Father Bourdaloüe to have been a mere babbler. The Jacobites consider Mary Queen of Scots as a pious heroine, but those of an opposite party look upon her as a prostitute, an adulteress, a murderer. Thus the English have memorials of the several reigns, but no such thing as a history. There is, indeed, now living, one Mr. Gordon (the public are obliged to him for a translation of Tacitus), who is very capable of writing the history of his own country, but Rapin de Thoyras got the start of him. To conclude, in my opinion the English have not such good historians as the French, have no such thing as a real tragedy, have several delightful comedies, some wonderful passages in certain of their poems, and boast of philosophers that are worthy writers of our nation, and therefore we ought (since they have not scrupled to be in our debt) to borrow from them. Both the English and we came after the Italians, who have been our instructors in all the arts, and whom we have surpassed in some. I cannot determine which of the three nations ought to be honoured with the palm; but happy the writer who could display their various merits.

    
Letter XXIII—On the Regard That Ought to be Shown to Men of Letters   
   
   
NEITHER the English nor any other people have foundations established in favour of the polite arts like those in France. There are Universities in most countries, but it is in France only that we meet with so beneficial an encouragement for astronomy and all parts of the mathematics, for physic, for researches into antiquity, for painting, sculpture, and architecture. Louis XIV. has immortalised his name by these several foundations, and this immortality did not cost him two hundred thousand livres a year.     1   
  I must confess that one of the things I very much wonder at is, that as the Parliament of Great Britain have promised a reward of £20,000 sterling to any person who may discover the longitude, they should never have once thought to imitate Louis XIV. in his munificence with regard to the arts and sciences.     2   
  Merit, indeed, meets in England with rewards of another kind, which redound more to the honour of the nation. The English have so great a veneration for exalted talents, that a man of merit in their country is always sure of making his fortune. Mr. Addison in France would have been elected a member of one of the academies, and, by the credit of some women, might have obtained a yearly pension of twelve hundred livres, or else might have been imprisoned in the Bastile, upon pretence that certain strokes in his tragedy of Cato had been discovered which glanced at the porter of some man in power. Mr. Addison was raised to the post of Secretary of State in England. Sir Isaac Newton was made Warden of the Royal Mint. Mr. Congreve has a considerable employment. Mr. Prior was Plenipotentiary. Dr. Swift is Dean of St. Patrick in Dublin, and is more revered in Ireland than the Primate himself. The religion which Mr. Pope professes excludes him, indeed from preferments of every kind, but then it did not prevent his gaining two hundred thousand livres by his excellent translation of Homer. I myself saw a long time in France the author of Rhadamistus ready to perish for hunger. And the son of one of the greatest men our country ever gave birth to, and who was beginning to run the noble career which his father had set him, would have been reduced to the extremes of misery had he not been patronised by Monsieur Fagon.     3   
  But the circumstance which mostly encourages the arts in England is the great veneration which is paid them. The picture of the Prime Minister hangs over the chimney of his own closet, but I have seen that of Mr. Pope in twenty noblemen’s houses. Sir Isaac Newton was revered in his lifetime, and had a due respect paid to him after his death; the greatest men in the nation disputing who should have the honour of holding up his pall. Go into Westminster Abbey, and you will find that what raises the admiration of the spectator is not the mausoleums of the English kings, but the monuments which the gratitude of the nation has erected to perpetuate the memory of those illustrious men who contributed to its glory. We view their statues in that abbey in the same manner as those of Sophocles, Plato, and other immortal personages were viewed in Athens; and I am persuaded that the bare sight of those glorious monuments has fired more than one breast, and been the occasion of their becoming great men.     4   
  The English have even been reproached with paying too extravagant honours to mere merit, and censured for interring the celebrated actress Mrs. Oldfield in Westminster Abbey with almost the same pomp as Sir Isaac Newton. Some pretend that the English had paid her these great funeral honours, purposely to make us more strongly sensible of the barbarity and injustice which they object to in us, for having buried Mademoiselle Le Couvreur ignominiously in the fields.     5   
  But be assured from me, that the English were prompted by no other principle in burying Mrs. Oldfield in Westminster Abbey than their good sense. They are far from being so ridiculous as to brand with infamy an art which has immortalised a Euripides and a Sophocles; or to exclude from the body of their citizens a set of people whose business is to set off with the utmost grace of speech and action those pieces which the nation is proud of.     6   
  Under the reign of Charles I. and in the beginning of the civil wars raised by a number of rigid fanatics, who at last were the victims to it; a great many pieces were published against theatrical and other shows, which were attacked with the greater virulence because that monarch and his queen, daughter to Henry IV. of France, were passionately fond of them.     7   
  One Mr. Prynne, a man of most furiously scrupulous principles, who would have thought himself damned had he worn a cassock instead of a short cloak, and have been glad to see one-half of mankind cut the other to pieces for the glory of God, and the Propaganda Fide; took it into his head to write a most wretched satire against some pretty good comedies, which were exhibited very innocently every night before their majesties. He quoted the authority of the Rabbis, and some passages from St. Bonaventure, to prove that the Œdipus of Sophocles was the work of the evil spirit; that Terence was excommunicated ipso facto; and added, that doubtless Brutus, who was a very severe Jansenist, assassinated Julius Cæsar for no other reason but because he, who was Pontifex Maximus, presumed to write a tragedy the subject of which was Œdipus. Lastly, he declared that all who frequented the theatre were excommunicated, as they thereby renounced their baptism. This was casting the highest insult on the king and all the royal family; and as the English loved their prince at that time, they could not bear to hear a writer talk of excommunicating him, though they themselves afterwards cut his head off. Prynne was summoned to appear before the Star Chamber; his wonderful book, from which Father Le Brun stole his, was sentenced to be burnt by the common hangman, and himself to lose his ears. His trial is now extant.     8   
  The Italians are far from attempting to cast a blemish on the opera, or to excommunicate Signor Senesino or Signora Cuzzoni. With regard to myself, I could presume top wish that the magistrates would suppress I know not what contemptible pieces written against the stage. For when the English and Italians hear that we brand with the greatest mark of infamy an art in which we excel; that we excommunicate persons who receive salaries from the king; that we condemn as impious a spectacle exhibited in convents and monasteries; that we dishonour sports in which Louis XIV. and Louis XV. performed as actors; that we give the title of the devil’s works to pieces which are received by magistrates of the most severe character, and represented before a virtuous queen; when, I say, foreigners are told of this insolent conduct, this contempt for the royal authority, and this Gothic rusticity which some presume to call Christian severity, what an idea must they entertain of our nation? And how will it be possible for them to conceive, either that our laws give a sanction to an art which is declared infamous, or that some persons dare to stamp with infamy an art which receives a sanction from the laws, is rewarded by kings, cultivated and encouraged by the greatest men, and admired by whole nations? And that Father Le Brun’s impertinent libel against the stage is seen in a bookseller’s shop’ standing the very next to the immortal labours of Racine, of Corneille, of Molière, &c.

   
Letter XXIV—On the Royal Society and Other Academies   
   
   
THE ENGLISH had an Academy of Sciences many years before us, but then it is not under such prudent regulations as ours, the only reason of which very possibly is, because it was founded before the Academy of Paris; for had it been founded after, it would very probably have adopted some of the sage laws of the former and improved upon others.     1   
  Two things, and those the most essential to man, are wanting in the Royal Society of London, I mean rewards and laws. A seat in the Academy at Paris is a small but secure fortune to a geometrician or a chemist; but this is so far from being the case at London, that the several members of the Royal Society are at a continual, though indeed small expense. Any man in England who declares himself a lover of the mathematics and natural philosophy, and expresses an inclination to be a member of the Royal Society, is immediately elected into it. But in France it is not enough that a man who aspires to the honour of being a member of the Academy, and of receiving the royal stipend, has a love for the sciences; he must at the same time be deeply skilled in them; and is obliged to dispute the seat with competitors who are so much the more formidable as they are fired by a principle of glory, by interest, by the difficulty itself, and by that inflexibility of mind which is generally found in those who devote themselves to that pertinacious study, the mathematics.     2   
  The Academy of Sciences is prudently confined to the study of Nature, and, indeed, this is a field spacious enough for fifty or three-score persons to range in. That of London mixes indiscriminately literature with physics; but methinks the founding an academy merely for the polite arts is more judicious, as it prevents confusion, and the joining, in some measure, of heterogeneals, such as a dissertation on the head-dresses of the Roman ladies with a hundred or more new curves.     3   
  As there is very little order and regularity in the Royal Society, and not the least encouragement; and that the Academy of Paris is on a quite different foot, it is no wonder that our transactions are drawn up in a more just and beautiful manner than those of the English. Soldiers who are under a regular discipline, and besides well paid, must necessarily at last perform more glorious achievements than others who are mere volunteers. It must indeed be confessed that the Royal Society boast their Newton, but then he did not owe his knowledge and discoveries to that body; so far from it, that the latter were intelligible to very few of his fellow members. A genius like that of Sir Isaac belonged to all the academies in the world, because all had a thousand things to learn of him.     4   
  The celebrated Dean Swift formed a design, in the latter end of the late Queen’s reign, to found an academy for the English tongue upon the model of that of the French. This project was promoted by the late Earl of Oxford, Lord High Treasurer, and much more by the Lord Bolingbroke, Secretary of State, who had the happy talent of speaking without premeditation in the Parliament House with as much purity as Dean Swift wrote in his closet, and who would have been the ornament and protector of that academy. Those only would have been chosen members of it whose works will last as long as the English tongue, such as Dean Swift, Mr. Prior, whom we saw here invested with a public character, and whose fame in England is equal to that of La Fontaine in France; Mr. Pope, the English Boileau, Mr. Congreve, who may be called their Molière, and several other eminent persons whose names I have forgot; all these would have raised the glory of that body to a great height even in its infancy. But Queen Anne being snatched suddenly from the world, the Whigs were resolved to ruin the protectors of the intended academy, a circumstance that was of the most fatal consequence to polite literature. The members of this academy would have had a very great advantage over those who first formed that of the French, for Swift, Prior, Congreve, Dryden, Pope, Addison, &c. had fixed the English tongue by their writings; whereas Chapelain, Colletet, Cassaigne, Faret, Perrin, Cotin, our first academicians, were a disgrace to their country; and so much ridicule is now attached to their very names, that if an author of some genius in this age had the misfortune to be called Chapelain or Cotin, he would be under a necessity of changing his name.     5   
  One circumstance, to which the English Academy should especially have attended, is to have prescribed to themselves occupations of a quite different kind from those with which our academicians amuse themselves. A wit of this country asked me for the memoirs of the French Academy. I answered, they have no memoirs, but have printed threescore or fourscore volumes in quarto of compliments. The gentleman perused one or two of them, but without being able to understand the style in which they were written; though he understood all our good authors perfectly. “All,” says he, “I see in these elegant discourses is, that the member elect having assured the audience that his predecessor was a great man, that Cardinal Richelieu was a very great man, that the Chancellor Seguier was a pretty great man, that Louis XIV. was a more than great man, the director answers in the very same strain, and adds, that the member elect may also be a sort of great man, and that himself, in quality of director, must also have some share in this greatness.”     6   
  The cause why all these academical discourses have unhappily done so little honour to this body is evident enough. Vitium est temporis potiùs quam hominis (the fault is owing to the age rather than to particular persons). It grew up insensibly into a custom for every academician to repeat these eulogiums at his reception; it was laid down as a kind of law that the public should be indulged from time to time in the sullen satisfaction of yawning over these productions. If the reason should afterwards be sought, why the greatest geniuses who have been incorporated into that body have sometimes made the worst speeches, I answer, that it is wholly owing to a strong propension, the gentlemen in question had to shine, and to display a thread-bare, worn-out subject in a new and uncommon light. The necessity of saying something, the perplexity of having nothing to say, and a desire of being witty, are three circumstances which alone are capable of making even the greatest writer ridiculous. These gentlemen, not being able to strike out any new thoughts, hunted after a new play of words, and delivered themselves without thinking at all: in like manner as people who should seem to chew with great eagerness, and make as though they were eating, at the same time that they were just starved.     7   
  It is a law in the French Academy, to publish all those discourses by which only they are known, but they should rather make a law never to print any of them.     8   
  But the Academy of the Belles Lettres have a more prudent and more useful object, which is, to present the public with a collection of transactions that abound with curious researches and critiques. These transactions are already esteemed by foreigners; and it were only to be wished that some subjects in them had been more thoroughly examined, and that others had not been treated at all. As, for instance, we should have been very well satisfied, had they omitted I know not what dissertation on the prerogative of the right hand over the left; and some others, which, though not published under so ridiculous a title, are yet written on subjects that are almost as frivolous and silly.     9   
  The Academy of Sciences, in such of their researches as are of a more difficult kind and a more sensible use, embrace the knowledge of nature and the improvements of the arts. We may presume that such profound, such uninterrupted pursuits as these, such exact calculations, such refined discoveries, such extensive and exalted views, will, at last, produce something that may prove of advantage to the universe. Hitherto, as we have observed together, the most useful discoveries have been made in the most barbarous times. One would conclude that the business of the most enlightened ages and the most learned bodies, is, to argue and debate on things which were invented by ignorant people. We know exactly the angle which the sail of a ship is to make with the keel in order to make its sailing better; and yet Columbus discovered America without having the least idea of the property of this angle: however, I am far from inferring from hence that we are to confine ourselves merely to a blind practice, but happy it were, would naturalists and geometricians unite, as much as possible, the practice with the theory.     10   
  Strange, but so it is, that those things which reflect the greatest honour on the human mind are frequently of the least benefit to it! A man who understands the four fundamental rules of arithmetic, aided by a little good sense, shall amass prodigious wealth in trade, shall become a Sir Peter Delmé, a Sir Richard Hopkins, a Sir Gilbert Heathcote, whilst a poor algebraist spends his whole life in searching for astonishing properties and relations in numbers, which at the same time are of no manner of use, and will not acquaint him with the nature of exchanges. This is very nearly the case with most of the arts: there is a certain point beyond which all researches serve to no other purpose than merely to delight an inquisitive mind. Those ingenious and useless truths may be compared to stars which, by being placed at too great a distance, cannot afford us the least light.     11   
  With regard to the French Academy, how great a service would they do to literature, to the language, and the nation, if, instead of publishing a set of compliments annually, they would give us new editions of the valuable works written in the age of Louis XIV., purged from the several errors of diction which are crept into them. There are many of these errors in Corneille and Molière, but those in La Fontaine are very numerous. Such as could not be corrected might at least be pointed out. By this means, as all the Europeans read those works, they would teach them our language in its utmost purity—which, by that means, would be fixed to a lasting standard; and valuable French books being then printed at the King’s expense, would prove one of the most glorious monuments the nation could boast. I have been told that Boileau formerly made this proposal, and that it has since been revived by a gentleman eminent for his genius, his fine sense and just taste for criticism; but this thought has met with the fate of many useful projects, of being applauded and neglected.     12   

Candide


Glava prva: Kako je Kandid odrastao u jednom lepom zamku, i kako je iz njega bio isteran

 Živeo je u Vestfaliji, u zamku g. barona Tun-der-ten-tronka, mladić kome je priroda podarila najpitomiju narav. Lice mu je već odavalo dušu. Umeo je sasvim pravilno o svemu da sudi, a bio je vrlo prostodušan. Zato su ga, mislim, i zvali Kandid. Stare sluge u kući verovale su u potaji da je on sin sestre g. barona i jednog valjanog i čestitog plemića iz susedstva, za koga ta gospođica nikako nije htela da se uda zato što je mogao dokazati da je plemić samo u sedamdeset i prvom kolenu, dok je ostatak njegovog rodoslovnog stabla propao pod zubom vremena.
 
G. baron je bio jedan od najmoćnijih vlastelina u Vestfaliji, pošto je na zamku imao vrata i prozore. Njegova velika dvorana je bila, šta više, ukrašena jednim zidnim tepihom. Od svih pasa iz njegovih staja mogla se kad ustreba sastaviti hajka, a konjušari su jahali pred njima i bili mu psari. Seoski kapelan bio je njegov veliki ispovednik. Svi su ga zvali gospodarom i smejali se kad je pričao pošalice.
 
Gospođa baronica bila je teška otprilike tri stotine i pedeset funti i time je pribavljala sebi vrlo veliko uvaženje, a dočekivala je goste u kuću tako dostojanstveno da je zbog toga sticala još veće poštovanje. Kći joj Kunigunda, devojka od sedamnaest godina, bila je rumena, sveža, punačka i na oko primamljiva. Sin baronov izgledao je u svemu dostojan svog roditelja. Domaći učitelj Panglos bio je u kući istočnik mudrosti i mladi junoša Kandid je slušao njegove pouke sa svom bezazlenošću svojih godina i svoje prirode. 
 
Panglos je predavao metafiziko-teologo-kosmo-lonigologiju. Divno je umeo dokazivati da nema posledica bez uzroka i da je, u ovom najboljem od svih mogućih svetova, zamak g. barona najlepši od svih zamkova, a Gospođa najbolja od svih mogućih baronica.
 
"Dokazano je, govorio je on, da ništa ne može biti drukčije nego što je. Jer, budući da je sve stvoreno sa izvesnom svrhom, sve mora neminovno imati najbolju svrhu. Imajte na umu da su nosevi stvoreni da nose naočare, i zato mi imamo naočare. Noge su nam očevidno date da nose čakšire, i mi imamo čakšire. Kamenje je načinjeno da bude tesano i da se od njega prave zamkovi; zato gospodar ima vrlo lep zamak: najveći baron u oblasti treba da sedi u najlepšem stanu. I kako su svinje stvorene da se jedu, jedemo svinjetinu preko cele godine. Sledstveno, oni koji su tvrdili da je sve dobro rekli su glupost: trebalo je reći da je sve ne može bolje biti."
 
Kandid je slušao pažljivo i verovao bezazleno, jer je nalazio da je gospođica Kunigunda izvanredno lepa, iako nikad nije imao smelosti i da joj to kaže. On je došao do zaključka da će, posle sreće što je neko rođen kao baron od Tunder-ten-tronka, drugi stepen sreće biti gospođica Kunigunda, treći — videti nju svakog dana, i četvrti, slušati doktora Panglosa, najvećeg filozofa u celoj toj oblasti, pa, prema tome i na celom zemljinom šaru.
 
Jednog dana, kad se šetala blizu zamka po šumici koju su nazvali parkom, Kunigunda opazi u šiblju doktora Panglosa kako daje pouke iz eksperimentalne fizike sobarici njene majke, maloj, vrlo lepoj a prilježnoj crnojki. Kako je gospođica Kunigunda imala mnogo sklonosti za prirodne nauke, posmatrala je bez ijednog daha više puta ponovljene oglede kojima je prisustvovala. Ona jasno zapazi doktorov dovoljni razlog, posledice i uzroke, i vrati se sva uzbuđena, sva duboko zamišljena, sva ispunjena željom da postane učena, pomišljajući da bi ona mogla biti sasvim dovoljan razlog mladom Kandidu, a on isto tako njoj.
 
Pri povratku u zamak srete se s Kandidom i pocrvene. I Kandid pocrvene. Ona mu nazva dobar dan uzdrhtalim glasom, a Kandid poče razgovarati s njom ne znajući ni sam šta kaže. Sutradan po ručku, kad su ustajali od stola, nađoše se Kunigunda i Kandid iza jednog zaklona. Kunigunda ispusti svoj rubac, Kandid ga podiže. Ona ga bezazleno uze za ruku, mladić bezazleno poljubi ruku mlade gospođice, sa neobično mnogo živosti, osećajnosti i ljupkosti. Usne im se sretoše, oči usplamteše, kolena zadrhtaše, ruke zalutaše. Gospodin baron od Tunder-ten-tronka prođe tad pokraj zaklona, i videći ovaj uzrok i ovu posledicu, otera Kandida iz zamka sa nekoliko dobrih udaraca nogom u stražnjicu. Kunigunda pade u nesvest. Kad se povrati, odmah je gospođa baronica išamara. I sve ostade preneraženo u najlepšem i najprijatnijem od svih mogućih zamkova.

Glava druga: Šta je bilo s Kandidom kod bugara

rognan tako iz zemaljskog raja, dugo iđaše Kandid ne znajući ni sam kuda, plačući, podižući oči nebu, okrećući ih često put najlepšeg zamka koji je skrivao u sebi najlepšu od svih baroničica. Leže da spava, bez večere, nasred polja, između dve brazde. Sneg padaše u krupnim pahuljicama. Sav promrzao od zime, odvuče se Kandid sutradan do obližnjeg grada Valdberghoftrarbk-dik-dorfa, bez ijednog novčića u džepu, polumrtav od gladi i umora. Zaustavi se tužno na vratima neke krčme. Dva čoveka u plavom primetiše ga: "Druže, reče jedan, evo nekog mladića vrlo lepo razvijenog i propisne visine". Priđoše zatim Kandidu i pozvaše ga vrlo uljudno na ručak. "Gospodo, odgovori im Kandid sa krasnom skromnošću, vi mi ukazujete veliku čast, ali ja nemam čime da platim svoj trošak". — "O gospodine, reče jedan od one dvojice u plavom, osobe vašeg izgleda i vaše vrednosti ne plaćaju nikad ništa. Zar niste visoki pet stopa i pet palaca?" — "Jesam, to je moja visina", odgovori on klanjajući se. — "O, sedite, gospodine. Ne samo što ćemo platiti za vas nego nećemo nikako dopustiti da čovek kao vi ostane bez novaca. Ljudi su zato tu da jedan drugom pomažu". — "Imate pravo, reče Kandid, to mi je uvek govorio doktor Panglos i ja zaista vidim da je sve na svetu ne može bolje biti". Zamoliše ga da primi nekoliko talira, on ih uze i htede da im izda priznanicu; oni ne htedoše nikako da prime, i svi posedaše za sto. "Vi zacelo nekog nežno volite"? — "O, da, nežno volim gospođicu Kunigundu". — "Ne mislimo to, reče jedan od te gospode; mi vas pitamo da li ne volite nežno bugarskog kralja?" — "Ni najmanje, reče on, jer ga nikad nisam ni video". — "Šta kažete! Pa to je najmiliji kralj na svetu, i sada treba da pijemo u njegovo zdravlje". — "O, vrlo rado, gospodo". I stade piti. "To je sad dovoljno, rekoše mu zatim, sad ste postali potpora, oslonac, branilac Bugara i njihov junak. Vi ste stekli svoju sreću i osigurali sebi slavu".
 
Smesta mu staviše okove oko nogu i odvedoše ga u puk. Terali su ga da se okreće na desno i na levo, da izvlači i zavlači šipku, da nišani, da puca, da udvaja korak, pa mu onda udariše trideset batina. Sutradan izveo je vežbe malo bolje i dobio samo dvadeset batina. Prekosutra mu udariše samo deset, i drugovi gledahu na njega kao na neko čudo.
 
Kandid je bio sav zabezeknut i još nikako nije mogao sebi do kraja da objasni zašto je postao junak. Jednog lepog prolećnog dana prohte mu se da iziđe malo u šetnju i pođe pravo, uveren da je izuzetna povlastica i ljudske i životinjske vrste što može upotrebiti noge za svoje uživanje. Ne pređe ni dve milje, kad pred njega ispadoše neka druga četiri junaka visoka po šest stopa, koji ga uhvatiše, vezaše i odvedoše u zatvor. Upitaše ga, prema zakonu, šta više voli: da prođe trideset i šest puta kroz šibu celoga puka ili da dobije odjedanput dvanaest olovnih zrna u glavu. Uzalud im je navodio da je ljudska volja slobodna i da on ne želi ni jedno ni drugo; morao je da izabere. On se odluči, na osnovu dara božjeg koji se zove slobodna volja, da prođe trideset i šest puta kroz šibu. Izdrža dva prolaza. Puk je bio sastavljen od dve hiljade ljudi, što je za njega značilo četiri hiljade udaraca prutom, koji mu od zatiljka do stražnjice otkriše propuste po treći put, Kandid, već iznemogao, sve živce i mišiće. Kad su se spremali da ga zamoli da budu tako dobri i milostivi pa da mu razmrskaju glavu. Tu mu milost udeliše. Vezaše mu oči, nateraše ga da klekne. Utom prođe bugarski kralj, raspita se za krivicu osuđenikovu, pa kako je taj kralj bio veliki um, razabra iz svega što doznade od Kandida da je to neki mladi metafizičar koji nema ni najmanje razumevanja za stvari ovog sveta, podari mu svoj oproštaj sa toliko blagosti i milosti da će one biti hvaljene u svim novinama i u svim vekovima. Neki valjani lekar izleči za tri nedelje Kandida melemima koje je propisao Dioskorid. Već beše dobio malo kože i mogao je hodati, kad kralj Bugara zametnu boj sa kraljem Abara.

Glava treća: Kako se Kandid izbavio od bugara, i šta se dogodilo sa njim


 Ništa nije bilo tako lepo, tako sjajno, tako okretno i tako dobro uređeno kao te dve vojske. Trube, svirale, oboe, doboši, topovi, sve je to činilo takvu harmoniju kakva se ni u paklu nikad nije čula. Najpre topovi sastaviše sa zemljom oko šest hiljada ljudi, s jedne i druge strane. Zatim puške zbrisaše s najboljeg od svih svetova otprilike devet do deset hiljada hulja koje su mu kužile površinu. Bajonet bi isto tako dovoljan razlog smrti nekoliko hiljada ljudi. Sve je to moglo iznositi oko trideset hiljada glava. Kandid, koji je drhtao kao pravi filozof, sakri se što je bolje umeo za vreme ove viteške klanice. Najzad, dok su oba kralja, svaki u svom logoru, naređivali da se peva Te Deum, on odluči da ode i na drugom mestu razmišlja o uzrocima i posledicama. Pređe tako preko mnogih mrtvaca i samrtnika, i dospe najpre u jedno obližnje selo. Ono je ležalo u pepelu. To je bilo neko abarsko selo koje Bugari behu spalili, prema propisima javnoga prava. Na jednom su mestu isprebijani starci gledali svoje zaklane žene kako umiru držeći decu na svojim iskrvavljenim dojkama; na drugom su devojke rasporena trbuha izdisale, pošto su zadovoljile prirodne potrebe nekolicine junaka. Druge, poluizgorele, preklinjale su naglas da im neko prekrati muke. Pored otsečenih ruku i nogu po zemlji bio je prosut mozak.
 
Kandid pobeže što je brže mogao u drugo jedno selo: ono je pripadalo Bugarima, i abarski junaci behu uradili s njim to isto. Neprestano gazeći preko udova koji su se trzali u ropcu, ili kroz ruševine, Kandid dospe najzad izvan ratnog poprišta, noseći nešto malo hrane u torbi i ne zaboravljajući nikako g-cu Kunigundu. Nestade mu hrane kad se nađe u Holandiji, ali, kako je slušao da su u toj zemlji svi bogati i da su tamo ljudi hrišćani, ni začas ne posumnja da će se prema njemu isto tako lepo pokazati kao i u zamku gospodina barona pre no što je odatle bio isteran zbog lepih očiju gospođice Kunigunde.
 
On zamoli milostinju od nekoliko dostojanstvenih ličnosti koje mu sve odgovoriše da će ga ako produži s tim zanatom, poslati u neki zatvor za popravku, da nauči kako se valja ponašati.
 
Zatim se obrati jednom čoveku koji je dotle govorio sam, pun čas bez prestanka, o milosrđu, na nekom velikom skupu. Odmerivši ga oštro, taj ga govornik upita: "Jeste li vi za pravednu stvar? Šta je uzrok vašeg dolaska ovde?" — "Nema posledica bez uzroka, odgovori smerno Kandid; sve je neizbežno vezano jedno s drugim i najbolje udešeno. Moralo se desiti da me oteraju od gospođice Kunigunde, da prođem kroz šibu, i moram da molim za komad hleba dok ne uzmognem da ga sam zarađujem. Sve to nije moglo biti drukčije". — "Prijatelju, reče mu govornik, verujete li vi da je papa antihrist?" — "To nisam još nikad čuo, ali bio on to ili ne bio, ja nemam hleba!" — "I ne zaslužuješ da ga jedeš!, viknu ovaj. Dalje, huljo, dalje, bedniče, i da mi nisi više prišao dok si živ!" Govornikova žena promoli glavu kroz prozor, pa ugledavši čoveka koji još sumnja da je papa antihrist, izruči mu na glavu pun... Blagi bože, do kakvih krajnosti može da ide pobožna revnost kod žena!
 
Nekakav čovek koji nije bio kršten, neka dobričina anabaptist po imenu Jakov, vide taj svirepi i sramni postupak prema jednom od svojih bližnjih, stvoru sa dve noge, bez perja a koji ima dušu. Povede ga sa sobom kući, očisti ga, dade mu hleba i piva, pokloni mu dve forinte i naumi šta više da ga nauči da radi u njegovim tvornicama persiskih tkanina koje prave u Holandiji. Kandid se skoro baci pred njega na zemlju i uzviknu: "Pravo mi je rekao doktor Panglos da je sve u svetu najbolje što može biti, jer je mene daleko više potresla vaša beskrajna plemenitost nego okrutnost onog gospodina u crnom ogrtaču i njegove gospođe supruge."
 
Sutradan, za vreme šetnje, srete on nekog nevoljnika sveg osutog gnojavicama, ugašena pogleda, s nosom nagriženim na vrhu, s iskrivljenim ustima i pocrnelim zubima; govorio je muklo iz grla, mučio ga je žestoki kašalj i uvek bi ispljuvao po jedan zub kad bi se zakašljao.

Glava četvrta: Kako se Kandid sreo sa svojim nekadašnjim učiteljem filozofije, doktorom Panglosom, i šta je iz toga proizišlo


 Još više uzbuđen sažaljenjem nego užasom, Kandid pruži tom strašnom prosjaku one dve forinte što ih je dobio od čestitog anabaptiste Jakova. Ova se avet zagleda u njega, zaplaka se i obisnu mu se oko vrata. Kandid ustuknu prestravljen. »Teško meni, reče ovaj kukavac onom drugom, zar ne poznaješ više svog dragog Panglosa?« — »Šta čujem? Vi ste to, dragi učitelju? Zar vi u tako užasnom stanju? Kakva li vam se to nesreća dogodila? Zašto niste više u najlepšem od svih zamkova? Šta je bilo sa groficom Kunigundom, tim biserom među devojkama, uzornim delom prirode?« — »Sav sam iznemogao,« reče Panglos. Kandid ga odmah odvede u anabaptistovu staju, gde mu dade malo hleba da se prihvati, a kad Panglos povrati snagu on opet upita: »A šta je sa Kunigundom?« — »Umrla je,« odgovori Panglos. Kandid se na to onesvesti. Prijatelj ga povrati sa malo rđava sirćeta koje se našlo u staji, i Kandid opet otvori oči. »Kunigunda mrtva! Ah, ti najbolji svete, gde si? A od čega je mogla umreti? da nije zato što je videla kako su me oterali iz lepog zamka svog oca nogom u leđa?« — »Nije, odgovori Panglos. Nju su rasporili bugarski vojnici, pošto su je najpre do mile volje silovali. Gospodinu baronu su razmrskali glavu kad je hteo da je brani; gospođa baronica je isečena na komade; moj jadni učenik prošao je kao i njegova sestra. A što se tiče zamka, nije ostao ni kamen na kamenu, nijedna žitnica, nijedna ovca, nijedna patka, ni jedno jedino drvo! Ali smo posle bili dostojno osvećeni, jer su Abari isto to uradili u jednoj susednoj baroniji koja je pripadala nekom bugarskom vlastelinu.«
 
Na tu priču, Kandid se opet onesvesti. Ali kad je ponovo došao sebi i rekao sve što je trebalo reći, on se raspita o uzroku i posledici kao i o dovoljnom razlogu koji je doveo Panglosa do ovako jadnog stanja. »Avaj, reče on, dovela me ljubav. Ljubav, ta utešiteljka roda ljudskog, ta hraniteljka svemira; duša svih osetljivih bića, nežna ljubav.« — »Oh, tako je, odgovori Kandid; poznao sam ja tu ljubav, tu vladarku srdaca, tu dušu naše duše. Ona mi je donela samo jedan poljubac i dvadeset udaraca nogom u stražnjicu. Kako je kod vas taj lepi uzrok mogao proizvesti tako odvratnu posledicu?«
 
Panglos ovako odgovori: »O, dragi Kandide! Vi ste poznavali Paketu, onu lepu pratilju naše uzvišene baronice. Ja sam u njenom zagrljaju poznao rajske slasti koje su mi donele ove paklene muke, što me kako vidite, proždiru sada. Ona je bila zaražena, možda je od toga već i umrla. Taj poklon dao je Paketi neki učeni franjevac, koji ga je potražio na samom izvoru, jer ga je njemu dala neka stara grofica, koja ga je dobila od nekog konjičkog kapetana, koji je za njega imao da zahvali nekoj markizi, koja ga je zaradila sa nekim pažem, koji ga je stekao od nekog jezuita, koji ga je, kao iskušenik, nasledio neposredno od jednog saputnika Hristifora Kolumba. Što se mene tiče, ja ga neću nikome dati, pošto sam na umoru.«
 
»O, Panglose, uzviknu Kandid, čudno je to neko rodoslovlje. Da mu nije sam đavo rodonačelnik?« — »O, to ne, odgovori ovaj veliki čovek; to je bilo nešto neminovno u najboljem od svih svetova, jedan neizbežni njegov sastojak.
 
Jer da Kolumbo nije na jednom američkom ostrvu zadobio tu bolest koja truje sam izvor rađanja, koja često i sprečava rađanje i koja je očigledna suprotnost velike prirodne svrhe, mi ne bismo sada imali ni čokoladu ni krmez. Treba još uzeti u obzir da je do danas ovde, na našem kontinentu, ta bolest nešto samo nama svojstveno, kao i verske prepirke. Turci, Persijanci, Indijanci, Kinezi, Sijamci, Japanci još ne znaju za nju, ali postoji dovoljan razlog da je i oni upoznaju posle nekoliko vekova. Zasad ona je čudesno napredovala među nama, a naročito po onim velikim vojskama sastavljenim od čestitih i lepo vaspitanih najamnika koji odlučuju o sudbini država. Može se slobodno reći da, kad se trideset hiljada ljudi bore u bojnom poretku sa trupama iste jačine, ima otprilike po dvadeset hiljada zaraženih sa svake strane.«
 
»Divljenja dostojna stvar! reče Kandid. Ali vi treba da se lečite«. — »A kako to mogu?« odgovori Panglos. »Nemam ni prebijene pare, a nigde na celom ovom širokom svetu nikome neću ni da puste krv ni da dadu klistir, ako ne plati ili ako nema drugog da plati za njega.«
 
Na ove poslednje reči Kandid se odluči. Ode i baci se pred noge svom milosrdnom anabaptisti Jakovu i tako mu dirljivo opisa stanje u koje je zapao njegov prijatelj da ovaj dobroćudni čovek bez predomišljanja uze u svoju kuću doktora Panglosa. Dao je da se leči o njegovom trošku. U tom lečenju Panglos izgubi samo jedno oko i jedno uho. On je imao lep rukopis, a znao je savršeno računicu. Anabaptist Jakov uze ga za knjigovođu. Posle dva meseca, kako je morao da putuje u Lisabon trgovačkim poslom, povede sa sobom na brod i svoja dva filozofa. Panglos mu je objašnjavao kako je na svetu sve ne može bolje biti. Jakov nije bio tog mišljenja. »Mora da su ljudi pomalo iskvarili prirodu, govorio je on, jer nisu rođeni kao vuci, a postali su vuci.
 
Bog im nije dao ni topove od dvadeset i četiri funte ni bajonete, a oni su sebi načinili topove i bajonete, da se uzajamno tamane. Mogu navesti uzgred i bankrotstva i pravosuđe koje stavlja ruku na imovinu bankrota da je izvuče poveriocima.« — »Sve je to neophodno, odgovori ćoravi doktor, i nesreće pojedinaca čine opšte dobro; otuda što je više pojedinačnih nesreća u toliko je sve bolje.« Dok je tako razlagao, vazduh se zamrači, vetrovi dunuše sa sve četiri strane i na brod se sruči najstrašnija bura, na domaku lisabonskog pristaništa.

Peta glava: Bura, brodolom, zemljotres, i šta se zbilo sa doktorom Panglosom, Kandidom i Anabaptitom Jakovom


Polovina putnika, iznemogla i skoro na izdisaju od one neshvatljive strave koju ljuljanje broda unosi u sve živce i sve sokove tela, potresana čas ovamo čas onamo, nije imala ni dovoljno snage da se uzrujava opasnošću. Druga polovina je glasno vikala i čitala molitve. Jedra se razderaše, katarke polomiše, brod provali. Radio je ko je mogao, niko nikog nije slušao, niko nije zapovedao. Anabaptist je pomagao malo oko upravljanja brodom. Nalazio se na zadnjem mostu i neki pobesneli mornar udari ga nemilosrdno i obori na pod lađe; ali od udara koji mu zadade toliko se i sam potrese da polete glavačke s broda u more. Ostade viseći, zakačen o jedan komad slomljene katarke. Dobri Jakov mu pritrča u pomoć, pomože mu da se opet popne, i kako se pritom mnogo napregnuo, pade u more na očigled tog mornara, koji ga pusti da potone, a ne htede ni da ga udostoji pogleda. Kandid priđe, vide svog dobrotvora kako se za trenutak opet pojavi na površini, da ga zatim voda proguta za navek. On htede da skoči za njim u more, ali ga filozof zadrža od toga, dokazujući mu da je lisabonska luka stvorena naročito zato da se taj anabaptist u njoj udavi. Dok je on to dokazivao a priori, brod se razbi i sve se podavi osim Panglosa, Kandida i onog ubojice mornara zbog koga se beše utopio plemeniti anabaptist. Ta hulja ispliva srećno do obale, na koju Kandida i Panglosa iznese neka daska.
 
Kad se malo povratiše, uputiše se u Lisabon. Ostalo im je bilo nešto novaca, pa su se nadali da se pomoću njega spasu gladi, pošto su umakli buri.
 
Tek što stupiše u grad, oplakujući smrt svog dobrotvora, kad osetiše kako im zemlja drhti pod nogama. More se podiže i poče da vri u luci, lomeći ukotvljene brodove. Vihori plamena i pepela prekriliše ulice i trgove, kuće se počeše rušiti, krovovi padahu na temelje, a temelji se rasprskoše. Trideset hiljada stanovnika oba pola i raznog uzrasta ostade smrvljeno pod ruševinama. Zviždeći i huleći, mornar uzviknu: »Ovde će biti nešto sad da se zaradi.« — »Kakav može biti dovoljni razlog ove pojave?« pitao se Panglos. — »Ovo je propast sveta,« odgovori Kandid. Ne časeći, mornar se zalete usred ruševina, idući u susret smrti, da bi se dočepao negde novaca. Nađe nešto, zgrabi i opi se, pa pošto se ispava i istrezni, kupi milost prve darežljive devojke na koju naiđe među ruševinama uništenih kuća, među samrtnicima i mrtvacima. Panglos ga u tom poče vući za rukav: »To nije lepo, prijatelju. Vi grešite protiv sveopšteg razuma. Rđavo ste izabrali trenutak za to.« — »Trista mu vragova,« odgovori ovaj; »ja sam mornar i rodom sam iz Batavije; četiri puta sam morao da gazim preko raspeća na četiri putovanja u Japan. Baš si našao koga da mu pričaš o tom tvom sveopštem razumu!«
 
Nekoliko parčadi kamenja raniše Kandida. Ležao je ispružen na ulici pokriven odlomcima. On reče Panglosu: »Jao, nađi mi malo vina i ulja, ja umirem.« — »Ovaj zemljotres nije ništa novo, odgovori Panglos. Grad Lima pretrpeo je prošle godine iste potrese u Americi. Isti uzroci, iste posledice. Zacelo postoji pod zemljom nekakav trag sumpora od Lime do Lisabona.« — »To je sasvim verovatno, odgovori Kandid, ali za ime božje, malo vina i ulja«. - »Kako verovatno? odgovori filozof. Ja tvrdim da je stvar potpuno dokazana.« Kandid izgubi svest i Panglos mu donese malo vode sa jednog obližnjeg kladenca.
 
Sutradan pošto su našli malo namirnica provlačeći se kroz ruševine, povratiše malo snagu. Zatim su, kao i ostali, pomagali stanovništvu koje je izbeglo smrt. Nekoliko građana kojima su pomogli dadoše im dobar ručak, koliko se to moglo u takvom užasu. Istina, ručak je bio tužan i svi su za stolom kvasili hleb suzama, ali ih Panglos uteši, uveravajući ih da ništa nije moglo biti drukčije. »Jer, reče on, sve je ovo najbolje što može biti. Jer ako je jedan vulkan u Lisabonu, on nije mogao biti na drugom kom mestu; jer je nemoguće da nešto ne bude tamo gde je, jer je sve dobro.«
 
Neki mali crni čovek, oficir inkvizicije, koji je bio pokraj njega, uze učtivo reč i upita: »Kako se vidi, gospodin ne veruje u praotački greh. Jer ako je sve najbolje što može biti, onda nema pravog greha ni kazne.«
 
»Najponiznije molim vaše prevashodstvo, odgovori Panglos još učtivije, da oprosti, jer su čovekov pad i prokletstvo ušli neminovno u najbolji od svih mogućih svetova«. — »Gospodin, dakle, ne veruje da ima slobodne volje?« upita oficir. — »Neka oprosti vaše prevashodstvo, reče Panglos, sloboda može postojati i pored apsolutne neminovnosti, jer je bilo neminovno da mi budemo slobodni, jer je najzad opredeljena volja...« Panglos je bio u polovini rečenice, kad oficir dade glavom znak svom pratiocu koji ga je služio vinom iz Porta ili Oporta.