VOLTAIRE'S BIOGRAPHY TEMPEST, SHIPWRECK, EARTHQUAKE, AND WHAT BECAME OF DOCTOR PANGLOSS, CANDIDE, AND JAMES THE ANABAPTIST.
Half dead of that inconceivable anguish which the rolling of a ship produces, one-half of the passengers were not even sensible of the danger. The other half shrieked and prayed. The sheets were rent, the masts broken, the vessel gaped. Work who would, no one heard, no one commanded. The Anabaptist being upon deck bore a hand; when a brutish sailor struck him roughly and laid him sprawling; but with the violence of the blow he himself tumbled head foremost overboard, and stuck upon a piece of the broken mast. Honest James ran to his assistance, hauled him up, and from the effort he made was precipitated into the sea in sight of the sailor, who left him to perish, without deigning to look at him. Candide drew near and saw his benefactor, who rose above the water one moment and was then swallowed up for ever. He was just going to jump after him, but was prevented by the philosopher Pangloss, who demonstrated to him that the Bay of Lisbon had been made on purpose for the Anabaptist to be drowned. While he was proving this à priori[1], the ship foundered; all perished except Pangloss, Candide, and that brutal sailor who had drowned the good Anabaptist. The villain swam safely to the shore, while Pangloss and Candide were borne thither upon a plank.
As soon as they recovered themselves a little they walked toward Lisbon. They had some money left, with which they hoped to save themselves from starving, after they had escaped drowning. Scarcely had they reached the city, lamenting the death of their benefactor, when they felt the earth tremble under their feet. The sea swelled and foamed in the harbour, and beat to pieces the vessels riding at anchor. Whirlwinds of fire and ashes covered the streets and public places; houses fell, roofs were flung upon the pavements, and the pavements were scattered. Thirty thousand inhabitants of all ages and sexes were crushed under the ruins.[2] The sailor, whistling and swearing, said there was booty to be gained here.
"What can be the sufficient reason of this phenomenon?" said Pangloss.
"This is the Last Day!" cried Candide.
The sailor ran among the ruins, facing death to find money; finding it, he took it, got drunk, and having slept himself sober, purchased the favours of the first good-natured wench whom he met on the ruins of the destroyed houses, and in the midst of the dying and the dead. Pangloss pulled him by the sleeve.
"My friend," said he, "this is not right. You sin against the universal reason; you choose your time badly."
"S'blood and fury!" answered the other; "I am a sailor and born at Batavia. Four times have I trampled upon the crucifix in four voyages to Japan[3]; a fig for thy universal reason."
Some falling stones had wounded Candide. He lay stretched in the street covered with rubbish.
"Alas!" said he to Pangloss, "get me a little wine and oil; I am dying."
"This concussion of the earth is no new thing," answered Pangloss. "The city of Lima, in America, experienced the same convulsions last year[4]; the same cause, the same effects; there is certainly a train of sulphur under ground from Lima to Lisbon.[5]"
"Nothing more probable," said Candide; "but for the love of God a little oil and wine."
"How, probable?" replied the philosopher. "I maintain that the point is capable of being demonstrated."
Candide fainted away, and Pangloss fetched him some water from a neighbouring fountain. The following day they rummaged among the ruins and found provisions, with which they repaired their exhausted strength. After this they joined with others in relieving those inhabitants who had escaped death. Some, whom they had succoured, gave them as good a dinner as they could in such disastrous circumstances; true, the repast was mournful, and the company moistened their bread with tears; but Pangloss consoled them, assuring them that things could not be otherwise.
"For," said he, "all that is is for the best. If there is a volcano[6] at Lisbon it cannot be elsewhere. It is impossible that things should be other than they are; for everything is right."
A little man dressed in black, Familiar of the Inquisition[7], who sat by him, politely took up his word and said:
"Apparently, then, sir, you do not believe in original sin; for if all is for the best there has then been neither Fall nor punishment.[8]"
"I humbly ask your Excellency's pardon," answered Pangloss, still more politely; "for the Fall and curse of man necessarily entered into the system of the best of worlds."
"Sir," said the Familiar, "you do not then believe in liberty?"
"Your Excellency will excuse me," said Pangloss; "liberty is consistent with absolute necessity, for it was necessary we should be free; for, in short, the determinate will——[9]"
Pangloss was in the middle of his sentence, when the Familiar beckoned to his footman, who gave him a glass of wine from Porto or Opporto.
HOW THE PORTUGUESE MADE A BEAUTIFUL AUTO-DA-FÉ, TO PREVENT ANY FURTHER EARTHQUAKES; AND HOW CANDIDE WAS PUBLICLY WHIPPED.
After the earthquake had destroyed three-fourths of Lisbon, the sages of that country could think of no means more effectual to prevent utter ruin than to give the people a beautiful auto-da-fé[10]; for it had been decided by the University of Coimbra, that the burning of a few people alive by a slow fire, and with great ceremony, is an infallible secret to hinder the earth from quaking.
In consequence hereof, they had seized on a Biscayner, convicted of having married his godmother[11], and on two Portuguese, for rejecting the bacon which larded a chicken they were eating[12]; after dinner, they came and secured Dr. Pangloss, and his disciple Candide, the one for speaking his mind, the other for having listened with an air of approbation. They were conducted to separate apartments, extremely cold[13], as they were never incommoded by the sun.
Eight days after they were dressed in san-benitos[14] and their heads ornamented with paper mitres[15]. The mitre and san-benito belonging to Candide were painted with reversed flames[16] and with devils that had neither tails nor claws; but Pangloss's devils had claws and tails and the flames were upright. They marched in procession thus habited and heard a very pathetic sermon, followed by fine church music. Candide was whipped in cadence while they were singing; the Biscayner, and the two men who had refused to eat bacon, were burnt; and Pangloss was hanged, though that was not the custom. The same day[17] the earth sustained a most violent concussion.
Candide, terrified, amazed, desperate, all bloody, all palpitating, said to himself:
"If this is the best of possible worlds, what then are the others? Well, if I had been only whipped I could put up with it, for I experienced that among the Bulgarians; but oh, my dear Pangloss! thou greatest of philosophers, that I should have seen you hanged, without knowing for what! Oh, my dear Anabaptist, thou best of men, that thou should'st have been drowned in the very harbour! Oh, Miss Cunegonde, thou pearl of girls! that thou should'st have had thy belly ripped open!"
Thus he was musing, scarce able to stand, preached at, whipped, absolved, and blessed, when an old woman accosted him saying:
"My son, take courage and follow me."
HOW THE OLD WOMAN TOOK CARE OF CANDIDE, AND HOW HE FOUND THE OBJECT HE LOVED.
Candide did not take courage, but followed the old woman to a decayed house, where she gave him a pot of pomatum to anoint his sores, showed him a very neat little bed, with a suit of clothes hanging up, and left him something to eat and drink.
"Eat, drink, sleep," said she, "and may our lady of Atocha[18], the great St. Anthony of Padua[19], and the great St. James of Compostella[20], receive you under their protection. I shall be back to-morrow."
Candide, amazed at all he had suffered and still more with the charity of the old woman, wished to kiss her hand.
"It is not my hand you must kiss," said the old woman; "I shall be back to-morrow. Anoint yourself with the pomatum, eat and sleep."
Candide, notwithstanding so many disasters, ate and slept. The next morning the old woman brought him his breakfast, looked at his back, and rubbed it herself with another ointment: in like manner she brought him his dinner; and at night she returned with his supper. The day following she went through the very same ceremonies.
"Who are you?" said Candide; "who has inspired you with so much goodness? What return can I make you?"
The good woman made no answer; she returned in the evening, but brought no supper.
"Come with me," she said, "and say nothing."
She took him by the arm, and walked with him about a quarter of a mile into the country; they arrived at a lonely house, surrounded with gardens and canals. The old woman knocked at a little door, it opened, she led Candide up a private staircase into a small apartment richly furnished. She left him on a brocaded sofa, shut the door and went away. Candide thought himself in a dream; indeed, that he had been dreaming unluckily all his life, and that the present moment was the only agreeable part of it all.
The old woman returned very soon, supporting with difficulty a trembling woman of a majestic figure, brilliant with jewels, and covered with a veil.
"Take off that veil," said the old woman to Candide.
The young man approaches, he raises the veil with a timid hand. Oh! what a moment! what surprise! he believes he beholds Miss Cunegonde? he really sees her! it is herself! His strength fails him, he cannot utter a word, but drops at her feet. Cunegonde falls upon the sofa. The old woman supplies a smelling bottle; they come to themselves and recover their speech. As they began with broken accents, with questions and answers interchangeably interrupted with sighs, with tears, and cries. The old woman desired they would make less noise and then she left them to themselves.
"What, is it you?" said Candide, "you live? I find you again in Portugal? then you have not been ravished? then they did not rip open your belly as Doctor Pangloss informed me?"
"Yes, they did," said the beautiful Cunegonde; "but those two accidents are not always mortal."
"But were your father and mother killed?"
"It is but too true," answered Cunegonde, in tears.
"And your brother?"
"My brother also was killed."
"And why are you in Portugal? and how did you know of my being here? and by what strange adventure did you contrive to bring me to this house?"
"I will tell you all that," replied the lady, "but first of all let me know your history, since the innocent kiss you gave me and the kicks which you received."
Candide respectfully obeyed her, and though he was still in a surprise, though his voice was feeble and trembling, though his back still pained him, yet he gave her a most ingenuous account of everything that had befallen him since the moment of their separation. Cunegonde lifted up her eyes to heaven; shed tears upon hearing of the death of the good Anabaptist and of Pangloss; after which she spoke as follows to Candide, who did not lose a word and devoured her with his eyes[21].
THE HISTORY OF CUNEGONDE.
"I was in bed and fast asleep when it pleased God to send the Bulgarians to our delightful castle of Thunder-ten-Tronckh; they slew my father and brother, and cut my mother in pieces. A tall Bulgarian, six feet high, perceiving that I had fainted away at this sight, began to ravish me; this made me recover; I regained my senses, I cried, I struggled, I bit, I scratched, I wanted to tear out the tall Bulgarian's eyes—not knowing that what happened at my father's house was the usual practice of war. The brute gave me a cut in the left side with his hanger, and the mark is still upon me."
"Ah! I hope I shall see it," said honest Candide.
"You shall," said Cunegonde, "but let us continue."
"Do so," replied Candide.
Thus she resumed the thread of her story:
"A Bulgarian captain came in, saw me all bleeding, and the soldier not in the least disconcerted. The captain flew into a passion at the disrespectful behaviour of the brute, and slew him on my body. He ordered my wounds to be dressed, and took me to his quarters as a prisoner of war. I washed the few shirts that he had, I did his cooking; he thought me very pretty—he avowed it; on the other hand, I must own he had a good shape, and a soft and white skin; but he had little or no mind or philosophy, and you might see plainly that he had never been instructed by Doctor Pangloss. In three months time, having lost all his money, and being grown tired of my company, he sold me to a Jew, named Don Issachar, who traded to Holland and Portugal, and had a strong passion for women. This Jew was much attached to my person, but could not triumph over it; I resisted him better than the Bulgarian soldier. A modest woman may be ravished once, but her virtue is strengthened by it. In order to render me more tractable, he brought me to this country house. Hitherto I had imagined that nothing could equal the beauty of Thunder-ten-Tronckh Castle; but I found I was mistaken.
"The Grand Inquisitor, seeing me one day at Mass, stared long at me, and sent to tell me that he wished to speak on private matters. I was conducted to his palace, where I acquainted him with the history of my family, and he represented to me how much it was beneath my rank to belong to an Israelite. A proposal was then made to Don Issachar that he should resign me to my lord. Don Issachar, being the court banker, and a man of credit, would hear nothing of it. The Inquisitor threatened him with an auto-da-fé. At last my Jew, intimidated, concluded a bargain, by which the house and myself should belong to both in common; the Jew should have for himself Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday, and the Inquisitor should have the rest of the week. It is now six months since this agreement was made. Quarrels have not been wanting, for they could not decide whether the night from Saturday to Sunday belonged to the old law or to the new. For my part, I have so far held out against both, and I verily believe that this is the reason why I am still beloved.
"At length, to avert the scourge of earthquakes, and to intimidate Don Issachar, my Lord Inquisitor was pleased to celebrate an auto-da-fé. He did me the honour to invite me to the ceremony. I had a very good seat, and the ladies were served with refreshments between Mass and the execution. I was in truth seized with horror at the burning of those two Jews, and of the honest Biscayner who had married his godmother; but what was my surprise, my fright, my trouble, when I saw in a san-benito and mitre a figure which resembled that of Pangloss! I rubbed my eyes, I looked at him attentively, I saw him hung; I fainted. Scarcely had I recovered my senses than I saw you stripped, stark naked, and this was the height of my horror, consternation, grief, and despair. I tell you, truthfully, that your skin is yet whiter and of a more perfect colour than that of my Bulgarian captain. This spectacle redoubled all the feelings which overwhelmed and devoured me. I screamed out, and would have said, 'Stop, barbarians!' but my voice failed me, and my cries would have been useless after you had been severely whipped. How is it possible, said I, that the beloved Candide and the wise Pangloss should both be at Lisbon, the one to receive a hundred lashes, and the other to be hanged by the Grand Inquisitor, of whom I am the well-beloved? Pangloss most cruelly deceived me when he said that everything in the world is for the best.
"Agitated, lost, sometimes beside myself, and sometimes ready to die of weakness, my mind was filled with the massacre of my father, mother, and brother, with the insolence of the ugly Bulgarian soldier, with the stab that he gave me, with my servitude under the Bulgarian captain, with my hideous Don Issachar, with my abominable Inquisitor, with the execution of Doctor Pangloss, with the grand Miserere[22] to which they whipped you, and especially with the kiss I gave you behind the screen the day that I had last seen you. I praised God for bringing you back to me after so many trials, and I charged my old woman to take care of you, and to conduct you hither as soon as possible. She has executed her commission perfectly well; I have tasted the inexpressible pleasure of seeing you again, of hearing you, of speaking with you. But you must be hungry, for myself, I am famished; let us have supper."
They both sat down to table, and, when supper was over, they placed themselves once more on the sofa; where they were when Signor Don Issachar arrived. It was the Jewish Sabbath, and Issachar had come to enjoy his rights, and to explain his tender love.
NOTES:
Chapter 5
[1] The Lisbon earthquake and fire of November 1, 1755, had an enormous impact on V oltaire and was one of the contemporary tragedies that caused him to question Liebniz’s philosophical optimism, as especially evident in his eloquent Poem on the Lisbon Disaster (1756) and, of course, in Candide.
[2] It was reported that Europeans were allowed to trade in Japan only if they first demonstrated their repudiation of Christianity by trampling on their crucifix.
[3] “Familiars” were undercover agents of the Inquisition who had the power to arrest suspects. Established in the Middle Ages to suppress heresy, the inquisition was still active in the eighteenth century .
[4] Free will versus determinism is widely debated in philosophical and theological circles. Blindly faithful to Liebniz in this respect, as in so many others, Pangloss feebly tries to to explain the philosopher’s attempt to reconcile metaphysical necessity with his belief in freedom.
[5] (Latin) argument based on theory rather than experience; Voltaire considered it characteristic of Leibnizian reasoning and philosophy .
[6] there had also been a great earthquake in Lima, Peru.
[7] widespread theory regarding the cause of earthquakes
[8] reference to yet another current theory regarding earthquakes
[9] There was indeed a second earthquake, on December 21, 1755.
Chapter 6
[10] Portuguese for act of faith – The name of a church ceremony consisting of a procession, mass, and burning at the stake of heretics condemned by the inquisition. An auto-da-fé took place in Lisbon on June 20, 1756.
[11] Such a marriage was condemned as incest, since the Catholic Church viewed a godmother as a relative.
[12] The two Portuguese men who removed the bacon thereby revealed themselves as converts who secretly still practiced the Jewish religion.
[13] ironical description of prison cells
[14] yellow robe worn by heretics whom the inquisition condemned to be burned at the stake
[15] cone-shaped caps meant to resemble a bishop’s ceremonial headdress
[16] The inverted flames on the san benito and mitre worn by Candide signify that he had repented, while the upright flames on Dr. Pangloss’s outfit indicate an unrepentant heretic.
[17] mercenaries, professional soldiers hired to serve in foreign armies
Chapter 7
[18] Va shrine in Madrid
[19] patron saint of Portugal and Padua
[20] according to tradition, he preached in Spain; his shrine at Santiago de Compostella became a renowned place of pilgrimage
[21] Voltaire had recently sustained a significant financial loss through the bankruptcy proceedings against one of his brokers.
Chapter 8
[22] Psalm 51 of the Bible; hymn of penitence invoking God’s mercy