a Fifteen Volumes in an Oak Bookcase, Price One Guinea. " Marvels of clear type and general neatness." Daily Telegraph MORLEY'S UNIVERSAL LIBRARY In Monthly Volumes, ONE SHILLING Each. READY ON THE i$th OF EACH MONTH. MORLEY'S UNIVERSAL LIBRARY. Complete in Sixty-Three Volumes, ONE SHILLING Each, cloth, cut edges; or, Is. 6d. Parchment Back, uncut edges. 1. SHERIDAN'S PLAYS. 2. PLAYS FROM MO LI ERE, By English Dramatists. 3. MARLOWE'S FAUSTUS & GOETHE'S FAUST. 4- CHRONICLE OF THE CID. 5. RABELAIS' GARGANTUA AND THE HEROIC DEEDS OF PANTAGRUEL. 6. THE PRINCE. By Machiavelli. 7. BACON'S ESSAYS. 8. DE FOE'S JOURNAL OF THE PLAGUE YEAR. 9. LOCKE ON CIVIL GOVERNMENT; WITH SIR ROBERT FILMER'S PATRIARCHA. 10. BUTLER'S ANALOGY OF RELIGION. IT. DRYDEN'S VIRGIL. 12. SIR WALTER SCOTT'S DEMONOLOGY AND WITCHCRAFT. 13. HERRICK'S HESPERIDES. 14. COLERIDGE'S TABLE TALK: WITH THE ANCIENT MARINER AND CHRISTABEL 15. BOCCACCIO'S DECAMERON. 16. STERNE'S TRISTRAM SHANDY. 17. 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Baflantjme .press BALLANTYNE, HANSON AND CO. EDINBURGH AND LONDON VOLTAIRE'S CANDIDE OR THE OPTIMIST AND RASSELAS PRINCE OF ABYSSINIA BY WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY HENRY MORLEY LL.D., I'ROFESSOR OF ENGLISH LITERATURE AT UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, LONDON THIRD EDITION LONDON GEORGE ROUTLEDGE AND SONS BROADWAY, LUDGATE HILT. GLASGOW AND NEW YORK 1888 MORLEY'S UNIVERSAL LIBRARY. I. Sheridan's Plays. 32. The History of Thomas 2. Plays from Moliere. By English Dramatists. Elhuood. 33. Emerson's Essays, &c. 3- Marlowe's Faustus and 34. Southey's Life of Nelson. Goethe's Faust. 35. De Quincey's Confessions 4- Chronicle of the Cid. of an Opium-Eater, &*c. S- Rabelais' 'Gargantua&n&t\\e 36. Stories of Ireland. By Miss Heroic Deeds of Pantagruel. EDGEWORTH. 6. Mac hi avc Hi's Prince. 37. Frere's Aristophanes: 7- 8. Bacon's Essays. Defoe's Journal of the Plague Year. Achamians, Knights, Birds. 38. Burke' s Speeches and Letters. 39. Thomas ci Kempis. 9- Locke on Civil Government 40. Popular Songs of Ireland. and Filme^s "Pntriarcha." 41. Potter's jQLschylus. 10. Butler's Analogy ofRclig ion. 42. Goethe's Faust: Part II. ii. Dryden's Virgil. ANSTER'S Translation. 12. Scott's Dcmonology and 43. Famous Pamphlets. Witchcraft. 44. Francklin's Sophocles. 13- Herrick's Hesperides. 45. M. G. Lewis's Tales of 14. Coleridge's J^able- Talk. Terror and Wonder. IS- Boccaccio's Decameron. 46. Vestiges of the Natural 1 6. 17- Sterne's Tristram Shandy. Chapman' s Homer's Iliad. History of Creation. 47. Drayton's Barons' Wars, 18. 19. Mediceval Tales. Voltaire's Candide, and Nymphidia, &*c. 48. Cobbetfs Advice to Voting Men. 20. 21. 22. Johnson's Rasselas. yonson's Plays and Poems. Hobbes's Leviathan. Samuel Butlers Hudibras. 49. The Banquet of Dante. 50. Walker's Original. 51. Schiller's Poems and Ballads. 23- 24. 25 27 Ideal Commonwealths. Cavendish's Life of IVolsey. & 26. Don Quixote. Burlesque Plays and Poems. 52. Peele's Plays and Poems. 53. Harrington's Oceana. 54. Euripides : ALestis and other Plays. 28. Dante's Divine Comedy. 55. Praed's Essays. LONGFELLOW'S Translation. 56. Traditional Tales. 29. Goldsmith's Vicar of 1 \-~ake- ALLAN CUNNINGHAM. field, Plays, and Poews. 57. Hooker s Ecclesiastical 30. Fables and Proverbs from Polity. Books I.- IV. the Sanskrit. (Hitofiadesa.) 58. Euripides: The Bacchanals 3'. Lamb's Essays of Eha. and other Plays. " Marvels of clear type aurt general neatness." Daily Telegraph. INTRODUCTION, WHEN Thomas Carlyle spoke of the eighteenth century as an age of "shams and windy sentimentalities," he might have added that the great feature of the century was a reaction against shams, and that the windy sentimentalities represented only some part of the reaction as it touched weak minds. Rousseau's notion that men were overcivilized whereas the most advanced nation upon earth is, at this day, barely half civilized and that we should go backwards instead of forwards, returning nearer to the state of primitive man, was expressed in England, before Rousseau was born, by Bernard Mandeville in his " Fable of the Bees." Impatience of dead form in a corrupt civilization led to the question, Whether such a world as men were living in could have been shaped by a just God or directed by wise Providence ? Man and Nature seemed to many faithful and earnest searchers through the darkness to answer to that question, No. Such honest scepticism, born of aspiration for the right and good, has been referred to in the Introduction to another volume of this Library, Butler's " Analogy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course of Nature." We pass along one line of thought from Leibnitz's "Theodice'e" to Pope's "Essay on Man" and Butler's " Analogy " all books that sought to arm our reason against doubt. And we may pass also by another line of thought, attack- ing the wide-spread evil in life ; in Church and State and in society, and even in the home ; everywhere dead forms of dead authority, dead worship of conventions that had no more in them of live civilization than the tattoo of the savage ; we may pass by that line through books like Swift's " Gulliver's Travels," Gay's "Beggars' Opera," and more especially its sequel, "Polly," expressing the full strength of the conviction of wrong that must precede the struggle for a remedy. And so we come to " Can- dide " and " Rasselas," both published in the same year, 1759. Voltaire in " Candide," as Johnson in " Rasselas," expressed the despair of the time over the problem of man's life on earth. Voltaire mocked and Johnson mourned over the notion that 6 INTRODUCTION. this is the best possible world. Each taught the vanity of human wishes. Voltaire, with no glance beyond, ended the first part of " Candide " with a shrug of light-hearted despair ; every man has his bit work to do, his garden to dig, " he must take care of his garden." Johnson took good care of his garden, but in " Rasselas " his glance is ever across the waves of this life to the life beyond. He finds in time the schoolhouse for eternity. It must not be forgotten that these utterances in 1759 preceded by only thirty years the struggle of the French Revolution. That came upon many a young heart as endeavour prompted by an ardent hope to raise men by one great effort to the higher ground that we seek now to reach only by slow and patient climbing. There is no reason why, as men rise in civilization, they should not come to build their happiness on sure founda- tions, paying less heed to the " Lo here " and " Lo there," as they learn more surely that the kingdom of God is within them. Voltaire was about fifteen years older than Johnson ; for he was born in February 1694, and Johnson in September 1709. Voltaire was sixty-five years old when he published " Candide ; " Johnson fifty when, at the same time, he published " Rasselas." Voltaire died in May 1778, Johnson in December 1784 ; both were dead, therefore, at the time of the outburst of the French Revolution. Voltaire was the third child of Francois Arouet, a rich notary. His mother died when he was five years old. His brother Armand, ten years older than himself, was drawn towards the Jansenists ; but he was himself placed in a school of the Jesuits the College Louis le Grand that was favoured by the nobility, among whose sons he could make friends for the future. He was a lively student, and when but eleven years old earned credit for his verse. He won the favour of Ninon 1'Enclos, who left him at her death, in 1705, two thousand livres to buy books with. Voltaire left the Jesuit school in 1711, with the credit of brilliant success as a student, and much literary skill. He passed into a law school that disgusted him, then turned to literature and wrote odes in 1712 and 1713; that of 1713 was " Sur les Malheurs du Temps." Then he began a tragedy on CEdipus. His father, to send him away from the temptation to rhyme and live idly, attached him as secretary to an ambassador to the Hague. But at the Hague he consoled himself by an increase of dis- sipation, and was sent back to Paris, where he had at first to hide from the wrath of his father. Then he allowed himself to be placed as clerk with a lawyer, but picked up friends among young poets, who became companions in his dissipation. In 1715 his father placed Frangois-Marie Arouet under the care of M. de Caumartin, who had a father loud often in praise of Henri IV. Here he conceived the plan of his " Henriade," and of a history INTRODUCTION. y of the age of Louis XIV. He worked on at his " CEdipus," and resolved to give all energies to literature that were not occupied with dissipation. Louis XIV. died on the ist of September 1715, and soon afterwards young Arouet was made answerable for verses on the Regent. He was banished to Sully-sur-Loire, and found there so much idle pleasure that nothing, he said, was wanting to his enjoyment of the place except the liberty to leave it. As verses had caused his banishment, verses obtained his recall to Paris ; but a spy having fixed on him the writing of another satire on the Regency, he was arrested in May 1717, and sent to the Bastille. There he remained prisoner for a year, wrote the two first books of the " Henriade," and finished " CEdipus." It was when he left the Bastille that he changed his name to Voltaire. " I have been very unhappy," he said, " with the old name ; let me see whether I shall do better with the new." The first sign of improvement was the success of his " CEdipus," first acted in November 1718. He was now sought as a poet by the world of fashion. There was another banishment to Sully, much dissipation, much work with the pen. The "Henriade" was finished ; more plays were written and acted. In 1722, his father's death left Voltaire a fortune, and he received also a pension of two thousand livres from the King. Insulted by the Chevalier de Rohan, who caused him to be fallen upon and beaten, Voltaire challenged him, and was again locked up in the Bastille. The indignity and wrong thus suffered caused Voltaire, when set free, to ask for his passport to England. He came to England in August 1726. In England, in 1728, he published the "Henriade." In the spring of 1729 he returned to Paris. The mocking spirit in which he dealt with the religion of England in his " Lettres sur les Anglais " caused that book to be burned and his own liberty to be again in danger. He withdrew to Cirey, and wrote for Madame du Chatelet a " Traitd de Meta- physique." His literary energy remained unbroken ; his works multiplied. In 1740 he first met Frederick II. of Prussia. In 1750, after many changes of life in France, he accepted the invitation of Frederick to live with him at his Court, with a large pension. But after three years at Potsdam, he escaped from his Majesty, and settled in France with a niece, Madame Denis. He had bought an estate at Tourney and another at Ferney. It was not until 1760 that he settled wholly upon his property at Ferney, and became the patriarch of the place. Ferney was the garden in which he worked, and he helped to transform the place from a poor hamlet into a town of thriving watchmakers. Wherever Voltaire went he spent energies freely for evil and for good. He could share in the false pleasures of life, well knowing their emptiness, and mock at vanity without finding in it vexation of spirit. Witty, not wise, he made just war upon all hypocrisies of life, but could not separate them from its truths. 8 INTRODUCTION. Samuel Johnson, born with a taint of scrofula that throughout life unfitted the physical frame for the uses of the mind within, born also to long struggle against poverty, achieved within himself that conquest over difficulty which is the problem of the race of man. Johnson's father was a bookseller in Lichfield, who died, little prosperous, when his son, aged 22, had struggled through a liberal education that had been hard to secure, and had included work at Pembroke College, Oxford, under conditions of almost abso- lute penury, and with depression of mind that sometimes made insanity seem very near. He struggled on, married, attempted in vain to earn his bread as a schoolmaster, was forced to live by his pen, and with a stout heart and humble trust in God bore toil and poverty, and infirmity of a body that had to be daily conquered to the uses of the soul. He lifted no voice of com- plaint ; said, " I hate a complainer." But he fought steadily in the battle that brings out those energies through use of which alone man can draw nearer to the life that is in God. As we toil on towards a higher civilization, the difficulties caused by our own yet imperfect sense of right will slowly pass away, and there will remain only the healthy battle against sur- rounding nature, with the contests of opinion through which God bids us use our energies for the securing of new power from new truth, contests of which the issues will be no longer obscured by anger and evil-speaking. Who would forego the use of energies by which alone man feels that he is made in the likeness of God, to become one of many creatures all born to attain one definite perfection ; to be as one cabbage in a cabbage garden, or one peach in the ripe crop upon a sunny wall ? All evils of life, wittily heaped together in "Candide," when they arise from man's fraud and wrong-doing are conquerable in long course of time; and conquest of them means that -advance of civilization towards which we have begun to labour in this century with more definite aims than heretofore. The struggle of the French Revolution to lift men at once above those grosser ills of life which pressed upon them in the eighteenth century, and wrung from them such books as " Candide " and " Rasselas," failed only in its immediate aim. Its highest hope is with us still, quickened though sobered by the failure of immediate attainment. A State can be no better than the citizens of which it is composed. Our labour now is not to mould States but make citizens. Voltaire, when in witty mockery he wrote " Candide," was a rich man owning two estates. Johnson, when he wrote "Rasselas" in humble faith, was very poor. His old mother had just died, and that he might have money to pay the little debts she left, and bury her, he wrote " Rasselas " in the evenings and nights of a single week. H. M. November 1884. CANDIDE; OR, THE C A N D I D E. PART I. CHAPTER I. Hoiv Candide ivas brought up in a magnificent castle ; and how he was driven from thence. IN the cour try of Westphalia, in the castle of the most noble baron of Thunder-ten-tronckh, lived a youth, whom nature had endowed with a most sweet disposition. His face was the true index of his mind. He had a solid judgment joined to the most unaffected simplicity ; and hence, I pre- sume, he had his name of Candide. The old servants of the house suspected him to have been the son of the baron's sister by a mighty good sort of a gentleman of the neigh- bourhood, whom that young lady refused to marry, because he could produce no more than threescore and eleven quar- terings in his arms, the rest of the genealogical tree belonging to the family having been lost through the injuries of time. The baron was one of the most powerful lords in West- phalia, for his castle had not only a gate, but even windows, and his great hall was hung with tapestry. He used to hunt with his mastiffs and spaniels instead of greyhounds ; his groom served him for huntsman, and the parson of the parish officiated as his grand almoner. He was called " My 12 CANDIDE. Lord " by all his people, and he never told a story but every one laughed at it My Lady Baroness weighed three hundred and fifty pounds, consequently was a person of no small considera- tion ; and then she did the honours of the house with a dignity that commanded universal respect. Her daughter was about seventeen years of age, fresh-coloured, comely, plump, and amiable. The baron's son seemed to be a youth in every respect worthy of the father he sprung from. Pangloss, the preceptor, was the oracle of the family, and little Candide listened to his instructions with all the sim- plicity natural to his age and disposition. Master Pangloss taught the metaphysico-theologo-cos- molo-nigology. He could prove to admiration that there is no effect without a cause, and in this best of all possible worlds the baron's castle was the most magnificent of all castles, and my lady the best of all possible baronesses. " It is demonstrable," said he, " that things cannot be otherwise than they are ; for as all things have been created for some end, they must necessarily be created for the best end. Observe, for instance, the nose is formed for spectacles ; therefore we wear spectacles. The legs are visibly designed for stockings; accordingly we wear stockings. Stones were made to be hewn and to construct castles ; therefore my lord has a magnificent castle ; for the geatest baron in the province ought to be the best lodged. Swine were intended to be eaten ; therefore we eat pork all the year round. And they who assert that everything is right , do not express themselves correctly ; they should say that everything is best" Candide listened attentively, and believed implicitly; for he thought Miss Cunegund excessively handsome, though he never had the courage to tell her so. He concluded that next to the happiness of being Baron of Thunder-ten- tronckh, the next was that of being Miss Cunegund, the CA^ 7 DIDE. I 3 next that of seeing her every day, and the last that of hear- ing the doctrine of Master Pangloss, the greatest philosopher of the whole province, and consequently of the whole world. One day, when Miss Cunegund went to take a walk in a little neighbouring wood, which was called a park, she saw, through the bushes, the sage Doctor Pangloss giving a lecture in experimental philosophy to her mother's chamber- maid, a little brown wench, very pretty and very tractable. In her way back she happened to meet Candide. She blushed ; he blushed also. She wished him a good morning in a flattering tone ; he returned the salute without knowing what he said. The next day, as they were rising from dinner, Cunegund and Candide slipped behind the screen ; Miss dropped her handkerchief the young man picked it up. She innocently took hold of his hand, and he as innocently kissed hers with a warmth, a sensibility, a grace all very particular : their lips met ; their eyes sparkled ; their knees trembled ; their hands strayed. The baron chanced to come by ; he beheld the cause and effect, and without hesitation salutes Candide with some notable kicks on the rear, and drove him out of doors. Miss Cunegund, the tender, the lovely Miss Cunegund, fainted away, and, as soon she came to herself, the baroness boxed her ears. Thus a general consternation was spread over this most magnificent and most agreeable of all possible castles. CHAPTER II. What befell Candide among the Bulgarians. CANDIDE, thus driven out of this terrestrial paradise, rambled a long time without knowing where he went ; sometimes he raised his eyes, all bedewed with tears, towards heaven, and sometimes he cast a melancholy look towards the mag- I 4 CANDIDE. nificent castle, where dwelt the fairest of young baronesses. He laid himself down to sleep in a furrow, heart-broken and supperless. The snow fell in great flakes, and in the morn- ing when he awoke, he was almost frozen to death ; how- ever, he made shift to crawl to the next town, which was called Walds-berghoff-trarbk-dikdorff, without a penny in his pocket, and half-dead with hunger and fatigue. He took up his stand at the door of an inn. He had not been long there, before two men dressed in blue fixed their eyes sted- fastly upon him. " Faith, comrade," said one of them to the other, "yonder is a well-made young fellow, and of the right size ; " upon which they made up to Candide, and with the greatest civility and politeness invited him to dine with them. " Gentlemen," replied Candide, with a most engaging modesty, " you do me much honour ; but upon my word I have no money." " Money, sir," said one of the blues to him, " young persons of your appearance and merit never pay anything why, are not you five feet five inches high ? " ' Yes, gentlemen, that is really my size," replied he, with a low bow. " Come then, sir, sit down along with us ; we will not only pay your reckoning, but will never suffer such a clever young fellow as you to want money. Mankind were born to assist one another." " You are perfectly right, gentlemen," said Candide, " this is precisely the doctrine of Master Pangloss ; and I am convinced that everything is for the best." His generous companions next entreat him to accept of a few crowns, which he readily complies with, at the same time offering them his note for the payment, which they refuse, and sit down to table. " Have you not a great affection for " " O yes ; I have a great affection for the lovely Miss Cunegund." " Maybe so," replied one of the blues ; " but that is not the question. We ask you whether you have not a great affection for the King of the Bulgarians ?" " For the King of the Bulgarians ?" said Can- dide. " Oh, Lord ! not at all ; why, I never saw him in my life." CANDIDE. 15 "Is it possible ! Oh, he is a most charming king. Come, we must drink his health." " With all my heart, gentlemen," says Candide, and off he tosses his glass. " Bravo ! " cry the blues ; " you are now the support, the defender, the hero of the Bulgarians ; your fortune is made ; you are in the high road to glory." So saying, they handcuff him, and carry him away to the regiment. There he is made to wheel about to the right, to the left, to draw his rammer, to return his rammer, to present, to fire, to march ; and they give him thirty blows with a cane. The next day he performs his exercise a little better, and they give him but twenty. The day following he comes off with ten, and is looked upon as a young fellow of surprising genius by all his comrades. Candide was struck with amazement, and could not, for the soul of him, conceive how he came to be a hero. One fine spring morning he took it into his head to take a walk, and he marched straight forward, conceiving it to be a privi- lege of the human species, as well as of the brute creation, to make use of their legs how and when they pleased. He had not gone above two leagues when he was overtaken by four other heroes, six feet high, who bound him neck and heels, and carried him to a dungeon. A court-martial sat upon him, and he was asked which he liked best, either to run the gauntlet six-and-thirty times through the whole regi- ment, or to have his brains blown out with a dozen of musket-balls. In vain did he remonstrate with them, that the human will is free, and that he chose neither. They obliged him to make a choice, and he determined, in virtue of that divine gift called free-will, to run the gauntlet six-and-thirty times. He had gone through his discipline twice, and the regiment being composed of 2,000 men, they composed for him exactly 4,000 strokes, which laid bare all his muscles and nerves from the nape of his neck to his rump. As they were preparing to make him set out the third time, our young hero, unable to support it any longer, begged as a 1 6 C AND IDE. favour they would be so obliging as to shoot him through the head. The favour being granted, a bandage was tied over his eyes, and he was made to kneel down. At that very instant his Bulgarian Majesty happening to pass by, made a stop, and inquired into the delinquent's crime, and being a prince of great penetration, he found, from what he heard of Candide, that he was a young metaphysician, entirely ignorant of the world ; and therefore, out of his great clemency, he condescended to pardon him, for which his name will be celebrated in every journal and in every age. A skilful surgeon made a cure of the flagellated Candide in three weeks, by means of emollient unguents prescribed by Dioscorides. His sores were now skinned over, and he was able to march, when the King of the Bul- garians gave battle to the King of the Abares. CHAPTER III. How Candide escaped from the Bulgarians, c.n.t what befell him afterwards. NEVER was anything so gallant, so well accoutred, so bril- liant, and so finely disposed as the two armies. The trumpets, fifes, hautboys, drums, and cannon made such harmony as never was heard in hell itself. The entertain- ment began by a discharge of cannon, which in the twink- ling of an eye laid flat about 6,000 men on each side. The musket bullets swept away, out of the best of all possible worlds, nine or ten thousand scoundrels that infected its surface. The bayonet was next the sufficient reason of the deaths of several thousands. The whole might amount to 30,000 souls. Candide trembled like a philosopher, and concealed himself as well as he could during this heroic butchery. At length, while the two kings were causing " Te Deum " CANDIDE. 17 to be sung in each of their camps, Candida took a resolu- tion to go and reason somewhere else upon causes and effects. After passing over heaps of dead or dying men, the first place he came to was a neighbouring village in the Abarian territories, which had been burnt to the ground by the Bulgarians, agreeably to the laws of war. Here lay a number of old men covered with wounds, who beheld their wives dying with their throats cut, and hugging their children to their breasts, all stained with blood. There several young virgins, whose bodies had been ripped open, after they had satisfied the natural necessities of the Bulgarian heroes, breathed their last ; while others, half-burnt in the flames, begged to be despatched out of the world. The ground about them was covered with the brains, arms, and legs of dead men. Candide made all the haste he could to another village, which belonged to the Bulgarians, and there he found that the heroic Abares had acted the same tragedy. From thence, continuing to walk over palpitating limbs or through ruined buildings, at length he arrived beyond the theatre of war, with a little provision in his budget and Miss Cunegund's image in his heart. When he arrived in Holland, his pro- visions failed him ; but having heard that the inhabitants of that country were all rich and Christians, he made himself sure of being treated by them in the same manner as at the baron's castle, before he had been driven from thence through the power of Miss Cunegund's bright eyes. He asked charity of several grave-looking people, who one and all answered him, that if he continued to follow this trade, they would have him sent to the house of correc- tion, where he should be taught to get his bread. He next addressed himself to a person who was just come from haranguing a numerous assembly for a whole hour on the subject of charity. The orator, squinting at him under his broad-brimmed hat, asked him sternly what brought i8 C AND IDE. him thither, and whether he was for the good old cause ? "Sir," said Candide in a submissive manner, "I conceive there can be no effect without a cause ; everything is neces- sarily concatenated and arranged for the best. It was necessary that I should be banished the presence of Miss Cunegund ; that I should afterwards run the gauntlet ; and it is necessary I should beg my bread, till I am able to get it : all this could not have been otherwise." " Hark ye, friend," said the orator, " do you hold the Pope to be Antichrist ? " " Truly, I never heard anything about it," said Candide ; " but whether he is or not, I am in want of something to eat." " Thou deservest not to eat or to drink," replied the orator, ' ' wretch, monster that thou art ! Hence ! avoid my sight, nor ever come near me again while thou livest." The orator's wife happened to put her head out of the window at that instant, when, seeing a man who doubted whether the Pope was Antichrist, she discharged upon his head a chamber-pot full of . Good heavens ! to what excess does religious zeal transport the female kind ! A man who had never been christened, an honest Ana- baptist named James, was witness to the cruel and igno- minious treatment showed to one of his brethren, to a rational, two-footed, unfledged being. Moved with pity, he carried him to his own house, caused him to be cleaned, gave him meat and drink, and made him a present of two florins, at the same time proposing to instruct him in his own trade of weaving Persian silks, which are fabricated in Holland. Candide, penetrated with so much goodness, threw himself at his feet, crying, " Now I am convinced that my master Pangloss told me truth when he said that every- thing was for the best in this world; for I am infinitely more affected with your extraordinary generosity than with the inhumanity of that gentleman in the black coat, and his wife." The next day, as Candide was walking out, he met CANDIDE. ig a beggar all covered with scabs, his eyes were sunk in his head, the end of his nose eaten off, his mouth drawn on one side, his teeth as black as a cloak, snuffling and cough- ing most violently, and every time he attempted to spit, out dropped a tooth. CHAPTER IV. How Candide found his old Master Pangloss again, and what happened to them. CANDIDE, divided between compassion and horror, but giving way to the former, bestowed on this shocking figure the two florins which the honest Anabaptist James had just before given to him. The spectre looked at him very earnestly, shed tears, and threw his arms about his neck. Candide started back aghast. " Alas ! " said the one wretch to the other, " don't you know your dear Pangloss ? " " What do I hear? Is it you, my dear master you I behold in this piteous plight? What dreadful misfortune has befallen you ? What has made you leave the most magnificent and delightful of all castles ? What has become of Miss Cune- gund, the mirror of young ladies, and Nature's master- piece?" "Oh Lord!" cried Pangloss, "lam so weak I cannot stand ; " upon which Candide instantly led him to the Anabaptist's stable, and procured him something to eat. As soon as Pangloss had a little refreshed himself, Candide began to repeat his inquiries concerning Miss Cunegund. " She is dead," replied the other. " Dead ! " cried Candide, and immediately fainted away. His friend recovered him by the help of a little bad vinegar, which he found by chance in the stable. Candide opened his eyes, and again repeated, " Dead ! Is Miss Cunegund dead ? Ah, where is the best of worlds now ? But of what illness did she die ? Was it for grief upon seeing her father 20 CANDIDE. kick me out of his magnificent castle ? " " No," replied Pangloss. " Her body was ripped open by the Bulgarian soldiers after they had ravished her as much as it was pos- sible for damsel to be ravished. They knocked the baron her father on the head for attempting to defend her ; my lady her mother was cut in pieces ; my poor pupil was served just in the same manner as his sister; and as for the castle, they have not left one stone upon another. They have destroyed all the ducks and the sheep, the barns and the trees ; but we have had our revenge, for the Abares have done the very same thing in a neighbouring barony, which belonged to a Bulgarian lord." At hearing this, Candide fainted away a second time, but having come to himself again, he said all that it became him to say. He inquired into the cause and effect, as well as into the sufficing reason, that had reduced Pangloss to so miserable a condition. " Alas," replied the preceptor, " it was love ; love, the comfort of the human species ; love, the preserver of the universe the soul of all sensible beings ; love, tender love ! " " Alas," replied Candide, " I have had some knowledge of love myself, this sovereign of hearts, this soul of souls ; yet it never cost me more than a kiss and twenty kicks in the rear. But how could this beautiful cause produce in you so hideous an effect ? " Pangloss made answer in these terms : " Oh, my dear Candide, you must remember Pacquette, that pretty wench who waited on our noble baroness ; in her arms I tasted the pleasures of paradise, which produced these hell torments with which you see me devoured. She was infected with disease, and perhaps is since dead of it. She received this present of a learned cordelier, who derived it from the fountain-head. He was indebted for it to an old countess, who had it of a captain of horse, who had it of a mar- chioness, who had it of a page, the page had it of a Jesuit, who during his noviciate had it in a direct line from one of CANDfDE. 21 the fellow-adventurers of Christopher Columbus. For my part, I shall give it to nobody. I am a dying man." "O sage Pangloss," cried Candide, "what a strange genealogy is this. Is not the devil the root of it ? " " Not at all," replied the great man ; " it was a thing unavoidable, a necessary ingredient in the best of worlds ; for if Columbus had riot caught in an island in America this disease, which is evidently opposite to the great end of nature, we should have had neither chocolate nor cochineal. It is also to be observed that, even to the present time, in this continent of ours, this malady, like our religious controversies, is peculiar to ourselves. The Turks, the Indians, the Persians, the Chinese, the Siamese, and the Japanese are entirely unac- quainted with it ; but there is a sufficing reason for them to know it in a few centuries. In the meantime, it is making prodigious havoc among us, especially in those armies com- posed of well-disciplined hirelings, who determine the fate of nations ; for we may safely affirm that, when an army of 30,000 men fights another equal in number, there are about 20,000 of them so diseased on each side." " Very surprising indeed," said Candide, " but you must get cured." " Lord help me ! how can I ? " said Pangloss. " My dear friend, I have not a penny in the world ; and you know one cannot be bled or have a glister without a fee," This last speech had its effect on Candide. He flew to the charitable Anabaptist James. He flung himself at his feet, and gave him so striking a picture of the miserable situation of his friend, that the good man, without any fur- ther hesitation, agreed to take Dr. Pangloss into his house and to pay for his cure. The cure was effected with only the loss of one eye and an ear. As he wrote a good hand and understood accounts tolerably well, the Anabaptist made him his bookkeeper. At the expiration of two months, being obliged to go to Lisbon about some mercantile affairs, he took the two philosophers with him in the same ship, 22 CANDIDE. Pangloss during the course of the voyage explained to him how everything was so constituted that it could not be better. James did not quite agree with him on this point. " Mankind," said he, " must in some things have deviated from their original innocence ; for they were not born wolves, and yet they worry one another like those beasts of prey. God never gave them twenty-four pounders nor bayonets, and yet they have made cannon and bayonets to destroy one another. To this account I might add not only bankruptcies, but the law which seizes on the effects of bankrupts, only to cheat the creditors." " All this was in- dispensably necessary," replied the one-eyed doctor ; " for private misfortunes are public benefits ; so that the more private misfortunes there are the greater is the general good." While he was arguing in this manner the sky was overcast, the winds blew from the four quarters of the compass, and the ship was assailed by a most terrible tempest within sight of the port of Lisbon. CHAPTER V. A Tempest, a Shipwreck, an Earthquake, and what else befell Dr. Pangloss, Candide, and James the Anabaptist. ONE-HALF of the passengers, weakened and half- dead with the inconceivable anxiety and sickness which the rolling of a vessel at sea occasions through the whole human frame, were lost to all sense of the danger that surrounded them. The other made loud outcries, or betook themselves to their prayers. The sails were blown into shivers, and the masts were brought by the board. The vessel was a perfect wreck. Every one was busily employed, but nobody could be either heard or obeyed. The Anabaptist, being upon deck, lent a helping hand as well as the rest, when a brutish sailor gave him a blow and laid him speechless ; but with the violence C AND IDE. 23 of the blow the tar himself tumbled head-foremost overboard, and fell upon a piece of the broken mast, which he imme- diately grasped. Honest James, forgetting the injury he had so lately received from him, flew to his assistance, and with great difficulty hauled him in again, but in the attempt was, by a sudden jerk of the ship, thrown overboard himself, in sight of the very fellow whom he had risked his life to save, and who took not the least notice of him in this distress. Candide, who beheld all that passed, and saw his benefactor one moment rising above water and the next swallowed up by the merciless waves, was preparing to jump after him ; but was prevented by the philosopher Pangloss, who demon- strated to him that the coast of Lisbon had been made on purpose for the Anabaptist to be drowned there. While he was proving his argument a priori, the ship foundered, and the whole crew perished, except Pangloss, Candide, and the sailor who had been the means of drowning the good Ana- baptist. The villain swam ashore, but Pangloss and Can- dide got to land upon a plank. As soon as they had recovered themselves from their sur- prise and fatigue, they walked towards Lisbon. With what little money they had left they thought to save themselves from starving after having escaped drowning. Scarce had they done lamenting the loss of their benefactor and set foot in the city, when they perceived the earth to tremble under their feet, and the sea, swelling and foaming in the harbour, dash in pieces the vessels that were riding at an anchor. Large sheets of flame and cinders covered the streets and public places. The houses tottered, and were tumbled topsy-turvy, even to their foundations, which were themselves destroyed ; and thirty thousand inhabitants of both sexes, young and old, were buried beneath the ruins. The sailor, whistling and swearing, cried, "' Damn it, there's something to be got here ! " " What can be the ' sufficient reason ' of this phenomenon ? " said Pangloss. " It is 24 CANDIDA. certainly the Day of Judgment," said Candide. The sailor, defying death in the pursuit of plunder, rushed into the midst of the ruin, where he found some money, with which he got drunk, and after he had slept himself sober, he pur- chased the favours of the first good-natured wench that came in his way, amidst the ruins of demolished houses and the groans of half-buried and expiring persons. Pangloss pulled him by the sleeve : " Friend," said he, " this ^is not right ; you trespass against the universal reason, and have mistaken your time." " Death and 'ounds ! " answered the other, " I am a sailor and born at Batavia, and have trampled four times upon the crucifix in as many voyages to Japan ; you are come to a good hand with your universal reason" In the meantime, Candide, who had been wounded by some pieces of stone that fell from the houses, lay stretched in the street, almost covered with rubbish. " For God's sake," said he to Pangloss, " get me a little wine and oil ; I am dying." " This concussion of the earth is no new thing," replied Pangloss ; " the city of Lima in America experienced the same last year : the same cause, the same effect ; there is certainly a train of sulphur all the way underground from Lima to Lisbon." " Nothing more probable," said Candide ; " but for the love of God a little oil and wine." " Probable ! " replied the philosopher. " I maintain that the thing is demonstrable." Candide fainted away, and Pangloss fetched him some water from a neighbouring spring. The next day, in searching among the ruins, they found some eatables, with which they repaired their exhausted strength. After this they assisted the inhabitants in relieving the distressed and wounded. Some whom they had humanely assisted, gave them as good a dinner as could be expected under such terrible circumstances. The repast, indeed, was mournful, and the company moistened their bread with their tears; but Pangloss endeavoured to comfort them under this affliction by affirm ing that things could not be otherwise CANDIDE. 25 than they were : " for," said he, " all this is for the very best end, for if there is a volcano at Lisbon, it could be in no other spot ; for it is impossible but things should be as they are, for everything is for the best." By the side of the preceptor sat a little man dressed in black, who was one of the familiars of the Inquisition. This person, taking him up with great complaisance, said, " Possibly, my good sir, you do not believe in original sin ; for if everything is best, there could have been no such thing as the fall or punishment of men." " I humbly ask your excellency's pardon," answered Pangloss, still more politely ; " for the fall of man, and the curse consequent thereupon, necessarily entered into the system of the best of worlds." " That is as much as to say, sir," rejoined the familiar, "you do not believe in free-will." " Your excellency will be so good as to excuse me," said Pangloss ; " free-will is consistent with absolute necessity ; for it was necessary we should be free, for in that the will " Pangloss was in the midst of his proposition when the Inquisitor beckoned to his attendant to help him to a glass of port wine. CHAPTER VI. How the Poriugtiese made a superb Auto da-fe to prei>ent any future Earthquakes, and how Candide underwent public flagellation. AFTER the earthquake, which had destroyed three-fourths of the city of Lisbon, the sages of that country could think of no means more effectual to preserve the kingdom from utter ruin than to entertain the people with an auto-da-fe, it having been decided by the University of Coimbra that the burning a few people alive by a slow fire, and with great ceremony, is an infallible secret to prevent earthquakes. 26 C AND IDE. In consequence thereof, they had seized on a Biscayner for marrying his godmother, and on two Portuguese for taking out the bacon of a larder pullet they were eating ; after dinner, they came and secured Doctor Pangloss and his pupil Candide, the one for speaking his mind, and the other for seeming to approve what he had said. They were conducted to separate apartments, extremely cool, where they were never incommoded with the sun. Eight days afterwards they were each dressed in a san-benito, and their heads were adorned with paper mitres. The mitre and san-benito worn by Candide were painted with flames reversed, and with devils that had neither tails nor claws ; but Doctor Pangloss's devils had both tails and claws, and his flames were upright. In these habits they marched in procession, and heard a very pathetic sermon, which was followed by an anthem accompanied by bagpipes. Candide was flogged to some tune while the anthem was singing ; the Biscayner and the two men who would not eat bacon were burnt ; and Pangloss was hanged, which is not a common custom at these solemnities. The same day there was another earthquake, which made most dreadful havoc. Candide, amazed, terrified, confounded, astonished, all bloody and trembling from head to foot, said to himself, "If this is the best of all possible worlds, what are the others ? If I had only been whipped, I could have put up with it, as I did among the Bulgarians ; but, oh my dear Pangloss ! my beloved master ! thou greatest of philosophers ! that ever I should live to see thee hanged, without knowing for what ! O my dear Anabaptist, thou best of men, that it should be thy fate to be drowned in the very harbour ! O Miss Cunegund, you mirror of young ladies ! that it should be your fate to be ripped open ! " He was making the best of his way from the place where he had been preached to, whipped, absolved, and received benediction, when he was accosted by an old woman, who said to him, " Take courage, child, and follow me." C AND IDE. 27 CHAPTER VII. How the Old Woman took care of Candide, and /i he found the Object of his Love. CANDIDE followed the old woman, though without taking courage, to a decayed house, where she gave him a pot of pomatum to anoint his sores, showed him a very neat bed with a suit of clothes hanging up by it, and set victuals and drink before him. " There," said she, " eat, drink, and sleep ; and may our Blessed Lady of Atocha, and the great St. Anthony of Padua, and the illustrious St. James of Com- postella, take you under their protection. I shall be back to-morrow." Candide, struck with amazement at what he had seen, at what he had suffered, and still more with the charity of the old woman, would have shown his acknow- ledgment by kissing her hand. " It is not my hand you ought to kiss," said the old woman ; " I shall be back to- morrow. Anoint your back, eat, and take your rest." Candide, notwithstanding so many disasters, ate and slept. The next morning the old woman brought him his break- fast, examined his back, and rubbed it herself with another ointment. She returned at the proper time and brought him his dinner, and at night she visited him again with his supper. The next day she observed the same ceremonies. " Who are you ? " said Candide to her. " What God has inspired you with so much goodness ? What return can I make you for this charitable assistance ? " The good old beldame kept a profound silence. In the evening she re- turned, but without his supper. " Come along with me," said she, " but do not speak a word." She took him under her arm, and walked with him about a quarter of a mile into the country, till they came to a lonely house surrounded with moats and gardens. The old conductress knocked at 2 8 CANDIDE. a little door, which was immediately opened, and she showed him up a pair of back-stairs into a small but richly- furnished apartment. There she made him sit down on a brocaded sofa, shut the door upon him, and left him. Candide thought himself in a trance ; he looked upon his whole life hitherto as a frightful dream, and the present moment a very agreeable one. The old woman soon returned, supporting, with great difficulty, a young lady, who appeared scarce able to stand. She was of a majestic mien and stature, her dress was rich and glittering with diamonds, and her face was covered with a veil. " Take off that veil," said the old woman to Candide. The young man approaches, and with a trem- bling hand takes off her veil. What a happy moment ! What surprise ! He thought he beheld Miss Cunegund. He did behold her : it was she herself ! His strength fails him, he cannot utter a word, he falls at her feet. Cunegund faints upon the sofa. The old woman bedews them with spirits ; they recover ; they begin to speak. At first they could express themselves only in broken accents their questions and answers were alternately interrupted with sighs, tears, and exclamations. The old woman desired them to make less noise, and after this prudent admonition, left them together. " Good heavens ! " cried Candide, " is it you ? Is it Miss Cunegund I behold, and alive ? Do I find you again in Portugal? Then you have not been ravished? They did not rip you open, as the philo- sopher Pangloss informed me ? " " Indeed, but they did," replied Miss Cunegund ; " but these two accidents do not always prove mortal." " But were your father and mother killed?" "Alas!" answered she, . " it is but too true!" and she wept. "And your brother?" "And my brother also." " And how came you into Portugal ? And how did you know of my being here ? And by what strange adven- ture did you contrive to have me brought into this house ? CANDIDE. 29 And how " f ' I will tell you all," replied the lady ; " but first you must acquaint me with all that has befallen you since the innocent kiss you gave me, and the rude kicking you received in consequence of it." Candide, with the greatest submission, prepared to obey the commands of his fair mistress, and though he was still wrapt in amazement, though his voice was low and tremu- lous, though his back pained him, yet he gave her a most ingenious account of everything that had befallen him since the moment of their separation. Cunegund, with her eyes uplifted to heaven, shed tears when he related the death of the good Anabaptist James, and of Pangloss ; after which she thus related her adventures to Candide, who lost not one syllable she uttered, and seemed to devour her with his eyes all the time she was speaking. CHAPTER VIII. The History of Cunegund. " L WAS in bed and fast asleep when it pleased heaven to send the Bulgarians to our delightful castle of Thunder- ten- tronckh, where they murdered my father and brother, and cut my mother in pieces. A tall Bulgarian soldier, six feet high, perceiving that I had fainted away at this sight, attempted to ravish me. The operation brought me to my senses. I cried, I struggled, I bit, I scratched, I would have torn the tall Bulgarian's eyes out, not knowing that what had happened at my father' s castle was a customary thing. The brutal soldier, enraged at my resistance, gave me a cut in the left groin with his hanger, the mark of which I still carry." " Methinks I long to see it," said Candide, with all imaginable simplicity. " You shall,'' said Cune- gund ; " but let me proceed." " Pray do," replied Candide. She continued : " A Bulgarian captain came in, and saw 3 o CANDIDE. me weltering in my blood, and the soldier still as busy as if no one had been present. The officer, enraged at the fellow's want of respect to him, killed him with one stroke of his sabre. This captain took care of me, had me cured, and carried me prisoner of war to his quarters. I washed what little linen he was master of, and dressed his victuals. He was very fond of me, that was certain ; neither can I deny that he was well-made, and had a white soft skin ; but he was very stupid, and knew nothing of philosophy. It might plainly be perceived that he had not been educated under Doctor Pangloss. In three months' time, having gamed away all his money, and being grown tired of me, he sold me to a Jew named Don Issachar, who traded to Holland and Portugal, and was passionately fond of women. This Jew showed me great kindness, in hopes to gain my favours ; but he never could prevail on me. A modest woman may be once outraged, but her virtue is greatly strengthened thereby. In order to make sure of me, he brought me to this country-house you now see. I had hitherto believed that nothing could equal the beauty of the castle of Thunder-ten-tronckh, but I found I was mistaken. " The Grand Inquisitor saw me one day at mass, ogled me all the time of service, and when it was over sent to let me know he wanted to speak with me about some private busi- ness. I was conducted to his palace, where I told him all my story. He represented to me how much it was beneath a person of my birth to belong to a circumcised Israelite. He caused a proposal to be made to Don Issachar, that he should resign me to his lordship. Don Issachar, being the court banker and a man of credit, was not easy to be pre- vailed upon. His lordship threatened him with an auto- da-fe ; in short, my Jew was frightened into a composition, and it was agreed between them that the house and myself should belong to both in common ; that the Jew should CAN DID E. 3I have Monday, Wednesday, and the Sabbath to himself, and the Inquisitor the other four days of the week. This agree- ment has subsisted almost six months, but not without several contests whether the space from Saturday night to Sunday morning belonged to the old or the new law. For my part, I have hitherto withstood them both, and truly I believe that this is the very reason why they are both so fond of me. " At length, to turn aside the scourge of earthquakes, and to intimidate Don Issachar, my Lord Inquisitor was pleased to celebrate an auto-da-fe. He did me the honour to invite me to the ceremony. I had a very good seat ; and refreshments of all kinds were offered the ladies between mass and the execution. I was dreadfully shocked at the burning the two Jews and the honest Biscayner who married his godmother ; but how great was my surprise, my consternation, and concern, when I beheld a figure so like Pangloss, dressed in a san-benito and mitre ! I rubbed my eyes, I looked at him attentively. I saw him hanged, and I fainted away. Scarce had I recovered my senses when I beheld you, stark naked : this was the height of horror, grief, and despair. I must confess to you for a truth, that your skin is far whiter and more blooming than that of the Bulgarian captain. This spectacle worked me up to a pitch of distraction. I screamed out, and would have said, ' Hold, barbarians ! ' but my voice failed me ; and indeed my cries would have signified nothing. After you had been severely whipped, ' How is it possible,' said I to myself, ' that the lovely Candide and the sage Pangloss should be at Lisbon, the one to receive an hundred lashes, and the other to be hanged, by order of my Lord Inquisitor, of whom I am so great a favourite ? ' Pangloss deceived me most cruelly in saying that everything is fittest and best. " Thus agitated and perplexed, now distracted and lost, now half- dead with grief, I revolved in my mind the murder of my father, mother, and brother, committed before my 32 CANDIDE. eyes ; the indolence of the rascally Bulgarian soldier ; the wound he gave me in the groin ; my servitude ; my being a cook wench to my Bulgarian captain ; my subjection to the dirty Jew and my cruel Inquisitor ; the hanging of Doctor Pangloss ; the Miserere sung while you were whipping ; and particularly the kiss I gave you behind the screen the last day I ever beheld you. I returned thanks to God for having brought you to the place where I was after so many trials. I charged the old woman who attends me to bring you hither as soon as was convenient. She has punctually executed my orders, and I now enjoy the inexpressible satisfaction of seeing you, hearing you, and speaking to you. But you must certainly be half-dead with hunger ; I myself have a great inclination to eat ; and so let us sit down to supper." Upon this the two lovers immediately placed themselves at table, and after having supped, they returned to seat themselves again on the magnificent sofa already mentioned, where they were in amorous dalliance when Signor Don Issachar, one of the masters of the house, entered unex- pectedly. It was the Sabbath-day, and he came to enjoy his privilege, and sigh forth his passion at the feet of the fair Cunegund. CHAPTER IX. What happened to Cunegund, Candide, the Grand Inquisitor, and the Jkw. THIS same Issachar was the most choleric little Hebrew that had ever been in Israel since the captivity of Babylon. "What, then," said he, " thou Galilean wretch? The Inquisitor was not enough for thee, but this rascal must come in for a share with me ! " In uttering these words he drew out a long poignard which he always carried about with him, and never dreaming that his adversary had any arms, CANDIDE. 33 he attacked him most furiously ; but our honest Westphalian had received a handsome s\vord of the old woman with the suit of clothes. Candide draws his rapier, and though he was the most gentle, sweet-tempered young man breathing, he whips it into the Israelite, and lays him sprawling on the floor at the fair Cunegund's feet. "Holy Virgin!" cried she, "what will become of us? A man killed in my apartment ! If the peace officers come we are undone." " Had not Pangloss been hanged," replied Candide. " he would have given us most excellent advice in this emergency, for he was a profound philosopher. But since he is not here, let us consult the old woman." She was very understanding, and was beginning to give her advice, when another door opened on a sudden. It was now one o'clock in the morning, and of course the beginning of Sunday, which, by agreement, fell to the lot of my Lord Inquisitor. Entering, he discovers the flagellated Candide, with his drawn sword in his hand, a dead body stretched on the floor, Cunegund frightened out of her wits, and the old woman giving advice. At that very moment a sudden thought came into Can- dide's head. " If this holy man," thought he, " should call assistance, I shall most undoubtedly be consigned to the flames, and Miss Cunegund may perhaps meet with no better treatment. Besides, he was the cause of my being so cruelly whipped ; he is my rival ; and as I have now begun to dip my hands in blood, I will kill away, for there is no time to hesitate." This whole train of reasoning was clear and in- stantaneous ; so that, without giving time to the Inquisitor to recover from his surprise, he ran him through the body, and laid him by the side of the Jew. " Good God ! " cries Cunegund, " here's another fine piece of work ! Now there can be no mercy for us ; we are excommunicated to all the devils in hell ; our last hour has come ! But how in the name of wonder could you, who are of so mild a temper, despatch 34 CANDIDE. a Jew and Inquisitor in two minutes' time ? " " Beau- tiful miss," answered Candide, " when a man is in love, is jealous, and has been flogged by the Inquisition, he becomes lost to all reflection." The old woman then put in her word. " There are three Andalusian horses in the stable," said she, " with as many bridles and saddles. Let the brave Candide get them ready ; madame has a parcel of moidores and jewels. Let us mount immediately, though I have only one side to sit upon. Let us set out for Cadiz ; it is the finest weather in the world, and there is great pleasure in travel- ling in the cool of the night." Candide, without any further hesitation, saddles the three horses ; and Miss Cunegund, the old woman, and he set out, and travelled thirty miles without once baiting. While they were making the best of their way, the Holy Brother- hood entered the house. My lord the Inquisitor was interred in a magnificent manner ; and Master Issachar's body was thrown upon a dunghill. Candide, Cunegunde, and the old woman had by this time reached the little town of Avecina, in the midst of the mountains of Sierra Morena, and were engaged in the fol- lowing conversation in an inn where they had taken up their quarters. CHAPTER X. In what distress Candide, Cunegund, and the Old Woman arrive at Cadiz; and of their Embarkation. " WHO could it be that has robbed me of my moidores and jewels ? " exclaimed Miss Cunegund, all bathed in tears. " How shall we live ? what shall we do ? where shall I find Inquisitors and Jews who can give me more ? " " Alas ! " said the old woman, " I have a shrewd suspicion of a reverend Father Cordelier, who lay last night in the same inn CANDIDE. 35 with us at Badajoz. God forbid I should condemn anyone wrongfully, but he came into our room twice, and he set off in the morning long before us." " Alas ! " said Candide, ' Pangloss has often demonstrated to me that the goods of this world are common to all men, and that every one has an equal right to the enjoyment of them ; but according to these principles, the Cordelier ought to have left us enough to carry us to the end of our journey. Have you nothing at all left, my dear Miss Cunegund? " "Not a sous," re- plied she. " What is to be done, then ? " said Candide. " Sell one of the horses," replied the old woman. " I will get behind Miss Cunegund, though I have only one side to ride on ; and we shall reach Cadiz, never fear." In the same inn there was a Benedictine friar, who bought the horse very cheap. Candide, Cunegund, and the old woman, after passing through Lucina, Chellas, and Letrixa, arrived at length at Cadiz. A fleet was then getting ready, and troops were assembling, in order to reduce the reverend father Jesuits of Paraguay, who were accused of having ex- cited one of the Indian tribes in the neighbourhood of the town of the Holy Sacrament to revolt against the kings of Spain and Portugal. Candide, having been in the Bulgarian service, performed the military exercise of that nation before the general of this little army with so intrepid an air, and with such agility and expedition, that he gave him the command of a company of foot. Being now made a captain, he em- barks with Miss Cunegund, the old woman, two valets, and the two Andalusian horses which had belonged to the Grand Inquisitor of Portugal. During their voyage they amused themselves with many profound reasonings on poor Pangloss's philosophy. " We are now going into another world, and surely it must be there that everything is best ; for I must confess that we have had some little reason to complain of what passes m ours, both as to the physical and moral part. Though I have a sincere B 2 36 CANDIDE. love for you," said Miss Cunegund, " yet I still shudder at the reflection of what I have seen and experienced." " All will be well," replied Candide. " The sea of this new world is already better than our European seas ; it is smoother, and the winds blow more regularly." " God grant it," said Cunegund. " But I have met with such terrible treatment in this that I have almost lost all hopes of a better." " What murmuring and complaining is here indeed ! " cried the old woman. " If you had suffered half what I have done there might be some reason for it." Miss Cunegund could scarce refrain laughing at the good old woman, and thought it droll enough to pretend to a greater share of misfortunes than herself. " Alas ! my good dame," said she, " unless you had been ravished by two Bulgarians, had received two deep wounds in your body, had seen two of your own castles demolished, had lost two fathers and two mothers, and seen both of them barbarously murdered before your eyes, and, to sum up all, had two lovers whipped at an auto-da-fe, I cannot see how you could be more unfortunate than I. Add to this, though born a baroness, and bearing seventy- two quarterings, I have been reduced to a cook-wench." " Miss," replied the old woman, " you do not know my family as yet ; but if I were to show you everything, you would not talk in this manner, but suspend your judgment." This speech raised a high curiosity in Candide and gund, and the old Avoman continued as follows. CHAPTER XI. The History of the Old Woman. " I HAVE not always been blear eyed ; my nose did not always touch my chin ; nor was I always a servant. You must know that I am the daughter of Pope Urban X. and of the Princess of Palestrina. To the age of fourteen I was CANDIDE. 37 brought up in a castle, to which all the castles of the Ger- man barons would not have been fit for stabling, and one of my robes would have bought half the province of West- phalia. I grew up, and improved in beauty, wit, and every graceful accomplishment ; and in the midst of pleasures, homage, and the highest expectations. I already began to inspire the men with love. My breast began to take its right form ; and such a breast white, firm, and formed like that of Venus of Medicis. My eyebrows were as black as jet ; and as for my eyes, they darted flames, and eclipsed the lustre of the stars, as I was told by the poets of our part of the world. My maids, when they dressed and undressed me, used to fall into an ecstasy in viewing me before and behind ; and all the men longed to be in their places. I was contracted to a sovereign prince of Massa Carara. Such a prince! as handsome as myself, sweet-tempered, agreeable, witty, and in love with me over head and ears. I loved him too, as our sex generally do for the first time, with rapture, transport, and idolatry. The nuptials were prepared with surprising pomp and magnificence ; the ceremony was attended with feasts, carousals, and burlettas : all Italy composed sonnets in my praise, though not one of them was tolerable. I was on the point of reaching the summit of bliss, when an old marchioness, who had been mistress to the prince my husband, invited him to drink chocolate. In less than two hours after he returned from the visit, he died of most terrible convulsions. But this is a mere trifle. My mother, distracted to the highest degree, and yet less afflicted than I, determined to absent herself for some time from so fatal a place. As she had a very fine estate in the neighbourhood of Gaieta, we embarked on board a galley, which was gilded like the high altar of St. Peter's at Rome. In our passage we were boarded by a Sallee rover. Our men defended themselves like true pope's soldiers ; they flung themselves upon their knees, laid down 38 C AND IDE. their arms, and begged the corsair to give them absolution in articulo mortis. The Moors presently stripped us as bare as ever we were born. My mother, my maids of honour, and myself, were served all in the same manner. It is amazing how quick these gentry are at undressing people. But what surprised me most was, that they thrust their fingers into every part of our bodies that their fingers could in any way reach. I thought it a very strange kind of ceremony ; for thus we are generally apt to judge of things when we have not seen the world. I afterwards learnt that it was to discover if we had no diamonds concealed. This practice has been established time immemorial among those civilized nations that scour the seas. I was informed that the religious Knights of Malta never fail to make this search whenever any Moors of either sex fall into their hands. It is a part of the law of nations, from which they never deviate. I need not tell you how great a hardship it was for a young princess and her mother to be made slaves and carried to Morocco. You may easily imagine what we must have suffered on board a corsair. My mother was still extremely handsome, our maids of honour, and even our common waiting-women, had more charms than were to be found in all Africa. As to myself, I was enchanting ; I was beauty itself, and then I had my innocence. But, alas ! I did not retain it long ; this precious flower, which was reserved for the lovely prince of Massa Carara, was cropt by the captain of the Moorish vessel, who was a hideous negro, and thought he did me infinite honour. Indeed, both the Princess of Palestrina and myself must have had very strong constitutions to undergo all the hardships and violences we suffered till our arrival at Morocco. But I will not detain you any longer with such common things ; they are hardly worth mentioning. CANDIDE. 39 Upon our arrival at Morocco we found that kingdom bathed in blood. Fifty sons of the Emperor Muley Ishmael were each at the head of a party. This produced fifty civil wars of blacks against blacks, of tawnies against tawnies, and of mulattoes against mulattoes. In short, the whole empire was one continued scene of carcases. No sooner were we landed than a party of blacks, of a contrary faction to that of my captain, came to rob him of his booty. Next to the money and jewels we were the most valuable things he had. I was witness on this occasion to such a battle as you never beheld in your cold European climates. The northern nations have not that fermentation in their blood, nor that raging lust for women that is so common in Africa. The natives of Europe seem to have their veins filled with milk only ; but fire and vitrol circulate in those of the inhabitants of Mount Atlas and the neigh- bouring provinces. They fought with the fury of the lions, tigers, and serpents of their country, to know who should have us. A Moor seized my mother by the right arm, while my captain's lieutenant held her by the left ; another Moor laid hold of her by the right leg, and one of our corsairs held her by the other. In this manner were almost every one of our women dragged between four soldiers. My captain kept me concealed behind him, and with his drawn scymetar cut down every one who opposed him ; at length I saw all our Italian women and my mother mangled and torn in pieces by the monsters who contended for them. The captives, my companions, the Moors who took us, the soldiers, the sailors, the blacks, the whites, the mulattoes, and lastly my captain himself, were all slain, and I remained alone, expiring upon a heap of dead bodies. The like barbarous scenes were transacted every day over the whole country, which is an extent of three hundred leagues, and yet they never missed the five stated times of prayer en- joined by their prophet Mahomet. 40 CANDIDA. I disengaged myself with great difficulty from such a. he'ap of slaughtered bodies, and made a shift to crawl to a large orange tree that stood on the bank of a neighbouring rivulet, where I fell down exhausted with fatigue, and overwhelmed with horror, despair, and hunger. My senses being over- powered, I fell asleep, or rather seemed to be in a trance. Thus I lay in a state of weakness and insensibility, between life and death, when I felt myself pressed by something that moved up and down upon my body. This brought me to myself; I opened my eyes, and saw a pretty fair-faced man, who sighed, and muttered these words between his teeth : " O che sciagura d'essere senza coglioni ! " CHAPTER XII. The Adventures of the Old Woman (continued}. ASTONISHED and delighted to hear my native language, and no less surprised at the young man's words, I told him that there were far greater misfortunes in the world than what he complained of. And to convince him of it, I gave him a short history of the horrible disasters that had befallen me ; and as soon as I had finished, fell into a swoon again. He carried me in his arms to a neighbouring cottage, where he had me put to bed, procured me something to eat, waited on me with the greatest attention, comforted me, caressed me, told me that he had never seen anything so perfectly beautiful as myself, and that he had never so much regretted the loss of what no one could restore to him. " I was born at Naples," said he, "where they caponize two or three thousand children every year ; several die of the operation ; some acquire voices far beyond the most tuneful of your ladies ; and others are sent to govern states and empires. I underwent this operation very happily, and was one of the singers in the Princess of Palestrina's chapel." "How," cried I, " in my mother's chapel ! " " The Princess of CANDIDE. 41 Palestrina, your mother !" cried he, bursting into a flood of tears. " Is it possible you should be the beautiful young princess whom I had the care of bringing up till she was six years old, and who at that tender age promised to be as fair as I now behold you ? " "I am the same," replied I. " My mother lies about a hundred yards from hence, cut in pieces, and buried under a heap of dead bodies." I then related to him all that had befallen me, and he, in return, acquainted me with all his adventures, and how he had been sent to the court of the King of Morocco by a Christian prince, to conclude a treaty with that monarch ; in consequence of which he was to be furnished with military stores and ships to enable him to destroy the commerce of other Christian governments. " I have executed my com- mission," said the eunuch ; " I am going to take shipping at Ceuta, and I'll take you along with me to Italy. ' Ma che sciagura d'essere senza coglioni ! ' ' : I thanked him with tears of joy; and instead of taking me with him into Italy, he carried me to Algiers, and sold me to the Dey of that province. I had not been long a slave, when the plague, which had made the tour of Africa, Asia, and Europe, broke out at Algiers with redoubled fury. You have seen an earthquake ; but tell me, miss, had you ever the plague ? " Never," answered the young baroness. If you ever had (continued the old woman) you would own an earthquake was a trifle to it. It is very common in Africa ; I was seized with it. Figure to yourself the distressed situation of the daughter of a pope, only fifteen years old, and who in less than three months had felt the miseries of poverty and slavery ; had been ravished almost every day ; had beheld her mother cut into four quarters ; had experi- enced the scourges of famine and war, and was now dying of the plague at Algiers. I did not, however, die of it ; but my eunuch and the Dey, and almost the whole seraglio of Algiers, were swept off, 42 CANDIDE. As soon as the first fury of this dreadful pestilence was over, a sale was made of the Dey's slaves. I was purchased by a merchant, who carried me to Tunis. This man sold me to another merchant, who sold me again to another at Tripoli; from Tripoli I was sold to Alexandria, from Alexandria to Smyrna, and from Smyrna to Constantinople. After many changes, I at length became the property of an aga of the janissaries, who, soon after I came into his pos- session, was ordered away to the defence of Asoph, then besieged by the Russians. The aga, being very fond of women, took his whole seraglio with him, and lodged us in a small fort, with two black eunuchs and twenty soldiers for our guard. Our army made a great slaughter among the Russians ; but they soon returned us the compliment. Asoph was taken by storm, and the enemy spared neither age, sex, nor condition, but put all to the sword, and laid the city in ashes. Our little fort alone held out they resolved to reduce us by famine. The twenty janissaries, who were left to defend it, had bound themselves by an oath never to surrender the place. Being reduced to the extremity of famine, they found themselves obliged to kill our two eunuchs, and eat them, rather than violate their oath. But this horrible repast soon failing them, they next determined to support the remains of life by devouring the women. We had a very pious and humane iman, who made them a most excellent sermon on this occasion, exhorting them not to kill us all at once ; " Only cut off one of the buttocks of each of those ladies," said he, " and you will fare extremely well ; if ye are still under the necessity of having recourse to the same expedient again, ye will find the like supply a few days hence. Heaven will approve of so charitable an action, and work your deliverance." By the force of this eloquence he easily persuaded them, and all underwent the operation. The imam applied the C AND WE. 43 same balsam as they do to children after circumcision. We were all ready to give up the ghost. The janissaries had scarcely time to finish the repast with which we had supplied them, when the Russians attacked the place by means of flat-bottomed boats, and not a single janissary escaped. The Russians paid no regard to the con- dition we were in ; but as there are French surgeons in all parts of the world, a skilful operator took us under his care, and made a cure of us ; and I shall never forget while I live, that as soon as my wounds were perfectly healed he made me certain proposals. In general, he desired us all to have a good heart, assuring us that the like had happened in many sieges and that it was perfectly agreeable to the laws of war. As soon as my companions were in a condition to walk, they were sent to Moscow. As for me, I fell to the lot of a boyard, who put me to work in his garden, and gave me twenty lashes a day. But this nobleman having in about two years afterwards been broke alive upon the wheel, with about thirty others, for some court intrigues, I took advantage of the event, and made my escape. I travelled over great part of Russia. I was a long time an innkeeper's servant at Riga, then at Rostock, Wismar, Leipsick, Cassel, Utrecht, Leyden, the Hague, and Rotter- dam : I have grown old in misery and disgrace, living with only one buttock, and in the perpetual remembrance that I was a pope's daughter. I have been an hundred times upon the point of killing myself, but still was fond of life. This ridiculous weakness is perhaps one of the dangerous principles implanted in our nature. For what can be more absurd than to persist in carrying a burden of which we wish to be eased? to detest, and yet to strive to preserve our existence? In a word, to caress the serpent that devours us, and hug him close to our bosoms till he has gnawed into our hearts ? 44 CANDIDE. In the different countries which it has been' my fate to traverse, and the many inns where I have been a servant, I have observed a prodigious number of people who held their existence in abhorrence, and yet I never knew more than twelve who voluntarily put an end to their misery ; namely, three negroes, four Englishmen, as many Genoese, and a German professor named Robek. My last place was with the Jew, Don Issachar, who placed me near your person, my fair lady ; to whose fortunes I have attached my- self, and have been more affected to your misfortunes than my own. I should never have even mentioned the latter to you, had you not a little piqued me on the head of suffer- ings ; and if it was not customary to tell stories on board a ship in order to pass away the time. In short, my dear miss, I have a great deal of knowledge and experience in the world ; therefore take my advice divert yourself, and pre- vail upon each passenger to tell his story, and if there is one of them all that has not cursed his existence many times, and said to himself over and over again that he was the most wretched of mortals, I give you leave to throw me head-foremost into the sea. CHAPTER XIII. flow Candide was obliged to leave the fair Cunegund and the Old Woman. THE fair Cunegund, being thus made acquainted with the history of the old woman's life and adventures, paid her all the respect and civility due to a person of her rank and merit. She very readily came into her proposal of engaging every one of the passengers to relate their adventures in their turns, and was at length, as well as Candide, compelled to acknowledge that the old woman was in the right. " It is a thousand pities," said Candide, " that the sage Pangloss CANDIDE. 45 should have been hanged, contrary to the custom of an auto-da-fe, for he would have read us a most admirable lecture on the moral and physical evil which overspread the earth and sea ; and I think I should have courage enough to presume to offer, with all due respect, some few objections." While every one was reciting his adventures, the ship continued on her way, and at length arrived at Buenos Ayres, where Cunegund, Captain Candide, and the old woman landed, and went to wait upon the Governor, Don Fernando d'Ibaraa y Figueora y Mascarenes y Lampour- dos y Souza. This nobleman carried himself with a haughti- ness suitable to a person who bore so many names. He spoke with the most noble disdain to every one, carried his nose so high, strained his voice to such a pitch, assumed so imperious an air, and stalked with so much loftiness and pride, that every one who had the honour of conversing with him was violently tempted to bastinade his excel- lency. He was immoderately fond of women, and Miss Cunegund appeared in his eyes a paragon of beauty. The first thing he did was to ask her if she was not the captain's wife. The air with which he made this demand alarmed Candide, who did not dare to say he was married to her, because indeed he was not ; neither durst he say she was his sister, because she was not ; and though a lie of this nature proved of great service to one of the ancients, and might possibly be useful to some of the moderns, yet the purity of his heart would not permit him to violate the truth. " Miss Cunegund," replied he, " is to do me the iionour to marry me, and we humbly beseech your ex- cellency to condescend to grace the ceremony with your presence." Don Fernando d'Ibaraa y Figueora y Mascarenes y Lam- pourdos y Souza, twirling his mustachio, and putting on a sarcastic smile, ordered Captain Candide to go and review his company. The gentle Candide obeyed, and the Governor 46 CANDIDE. was left with Miss Cunegund. He made her a strong de- claration of love, protesting that he was ready to give her his hand in the face of the Church, or otherwise, as should appear most agreeable to a young lady of her prodigious beauty. Cunegund desired leave to retire a quarter of an hour to consult the old woman, and determine how she should proceed. The old woman gave her the following counsel : " Miss, you have seventy-two quarterings in your arms, it is true, but you have not a penny to bless yourself with. It is your own fault if you are not wife to one of the greatest noble- men in South America, with an exceeding fine mustachio. What business have you to pride yourself upon an unshaken constancy ? You have been ravished by a Bulgarian soldier ; a Jew and an Inquisitor have both tasted of your favours. People take advantage of misfortunes. I must confess, were I in your place I should without the least scruple give my hand to the Governor, and thereby make the fortune of the brave Captain Candide." While the old woman was thus haranguing, with all the prudence that old age and experi- ence furnish, a small bark entered the harbour, in which was an alcayde and his alguazils. Matters had fallen out as follows : The old woman rightly guessed that the Cordelier with the long sleeves was the person who had taken Miss Cune- gund's money and jewels, while they and Candide were at Badajoz, in their flight from Lisbon. This same friar attempted to sell some of the diamonds to a jeweller, who presently knew them to have belonged to the Grand Inquisi- tor, and stopped them. The Cordelier, before he was hanged, acknowledged that he had stolen them, and described the persons and the road they had taken. The flight of Cune- gund and Candide was already the town talk. They sent in pursuit of them to Cadiz ; and the vessel which had been sent to make the greater despatch had now reached the port CANDIDE. 47 of Buenos Ayres. A report was spread that an alcayde was going to land, and that he was in pursuit of the murderers of my lord the Inquisitor. The sage old woman immediately saw what was to be done. " You cannot run away/' said she to Cunegund ; " but you have nothing to fear. It was not you who killed my Lord Inquisitor. Besides, as the Governor is in love with you, he will not suffer you to be ill- treated. Therefore stand your ground." Then hurrying away to Candide, " Begone," said she, " from hence this instant, or you will be burnt alive ! " Candide found there was no time to be lost. But how could he part from Cune- gund. and whither must he fly for shelter ? CHAPTER XIV. The reception Candide and Cacambo met with among the Jesuits in Paraguay. CANDIDE had brought with him from Cadiz such a footman as one often meets with on the coasts of Spain and in the colonies. He was the fourth part of a Spaniard, of a mongrel breed, and born in Tucuman. He had successfully gone through the profession of a singing boy, sexton, sailor, monk, pedlar, soldier, and lacquey. His name was Cacambo. He had a great affection for his master, because his master was a mighty good man. He immediately saddled the two Andalusian horses. " Come, my good master, let us follow the old woman's advice, and make all the haste we can from this place without staying to look behind us." Candide burst into a flood of tears : " Oh, my dear Cunegund, must I then be compelled to quit you just as the governor was going to honour us with his presence at our wedding ? Cunegund, so long lost and found again, what will now become of you ? " " Lord," said Cacambo, '' she must do as well as she can : women are never at a 48 CANDIDE. loss. God takes care of them, and so let us make the best of our way." " But whither wilt thou carry me ? Where can we go ? What can we do without Cunegund ? " cried the disconsolate Candide. " By St. James of Compostella," said Cacambo, " you were going to fight against the Jesuits of Paraguay ; now let us e'en go and fight for them. I know the road perfectly well ; I'll conduct you to their kingdom ; they will be delighted with a captain that under- stands the Bulgarian exercise ; you will certainly make a prodigious fortune. If we cannot find our account in this world we may in another. It is a great pleasure to see new objects and perform new exploits." " Then you have been to Paraguay," said Candide. " Ay, marry, have I," replied Cacambo. " I was a scout in the College of the Assumption, and am as well acquainted with the new government of Los Padres as I am with the streets of Cadiz. Oh, it is an admirable government, that is most certain ! The kingdom is at present upwards of three hundred leagues in diameter, and divided into thirty provinces ; the fathers are there masters of everything, and the people have no money at all. This you must allow is the masterpiece of justice and reason. For my part, I see nothing so divine as the good fathers, who wage war in this part of the world against the troops of Spain and Portugal, at the same time that they hear the confessions of those very princes in Europe ; who kill Spaniards in America, and send them to heaven at Madrid. This pleases me exceedingly; but let us push forward ; you are going to see the happiest and most fortunate of all mortals. How charmed will those fathers be to hear that a captain who understands the Bulgarian exercise is coming among them." As soon as they reached the first barrier, Cacambo called to the advance-guard, and told them that a captain wanted to speak to my lord the general. 'Notice was given to the main-guard, and immediately a Paraguayan officer ran to CANDIDE. 49 throw himself at the feet of the commandant, to impart this news to him. Candide and Cacambo were immediately disarmed, and their two Andalusian horses were seized. The two strangers are now conducted between two files of musketeers. The commandant was at the farther end with a three-cornered cap on his head, his gown tucked up, a sword by his side, and a half-pike in his hand. He made a sign, and instantly four-and-twenty soldiers drew up round the new-comers. A sergeant told them that they must wait, the commandant could not speak to them ; and that the reverend father provincial did not suffer any Spaniard to open his mouth but in his presence, or to stay above three hours in the province. "And where is the reverend father provincial ? " said Cacambo. " He is just come from mass, and is at the parade," replied the sergeant, " and in about three hours time you may possibly have the honour to kiss his spurs." " But," said Cacambo, " the captain, who as well as myself is perishing with hunger, is no Spaniard, but a German ; therefore, pray, might we not be permitted to break our fast till we can be introduced to his reverence ? " The serjeant immediately went and acquainted the com- mandant with what he heard. " God be praised," said the reverend commandant ; " since he is a German, I will hear what he has to say ; let him be brought to my arbour. Immediately they conducted Candide to a beautiful pavilion adorned with a colonnade of green marble spotted with yellow, and with an intertexture of vines, which served as a kind of cage for parrots, humming-birds, fly-birds, Guinea hens, and all other curious kinds of birds. An excellent breakfast was provided in vessels of gold, and while the Paraguayans were eating coarse Indian corn out of wooden dishes in the open air, and exposed to the burning heat of the sun, the reverend father commandant retired to his cool arbour. He was a very handsome young ma.n, round-faced, fair, 50 CA^ 7 DIDE. and fresh-coloured, his eyebrows were finely arched, he had a piercing eye, the tips of his ears were red, his lips ver- milion, and he had a bold and commanding air ; but such a boldness as neither resembled that of a Spaniard nor of a Jesuit. He ordered Candide and Cacambo to have their arms restored to them, together with their two Andalusian horses. Cacambo gave the poor beasts some oats to eat close by the arbour, keeping a strict eye upon them all the while for fear of surprise. Candide having kissed the hem of the commandant's robe, they sat down to table. " It seems you are a German," says the Jesuit to him in that language. " Yes, reverend father," answered Candide. As they pronounced these words they looked at each other with great amazement, and with an emotion that neither could conceal. " From what part of Germany do you come ? " said the Jesuit. " From the dirty province of Westphalia," answered Candide. " I was born in the castle of Thunder-ten-tronckh." " Oh heavens ! is it possible ? " said the commandant. " What a miracle ! " cried Candide. " Can it be you ? " said the commandant. On this they both retired a few steps backwards, then running into each other's arms, embraced, and let fall a shower of tears. " Is it you, then, reverend father ? You are the brother of the fair Miss Cunegund ? you that were slain by the Bulgarians ! you the baron's son ! you a Jesuit in Paraguay ! I must confess this is a strange world we live in. O Pangloss ! Pangloss ! what joy would this have given you if you had not been hanged." The commandant dismissed the negro slaves and the Paraguayans, who presented them with liquor in crystal goblets. He returned thanks to God and St. Ignatius a thousand times; he clasped Candide in his arms, and both their faces were bathed in tears. " You will be more sur- prised, more affected, more transported," said Candide, " when I tell you that Miss Cunegund, your sister, whose CANDIDE. 51 body was supposed to have been ripped open, is in perfect health." " Where ? " " In your neighbourhood, with the governor of Buenos Ayres ; and I myself was going to fight against you." Every word they uttered during this long conversation was productive of some new matter of astonish- ment. Their souls fluttered on their tongues, listened in their ears, and sparkled in their eyes. Like true Germans, they continued a long while at table, waiting for the reverend father, and the commandant spoke to his dear Candide as follows. CHAPTER XV. HOT.V Candide killed the Brother of his dear Citnegund. " NEVER while I live shall I lose the remembrance of that horrible day on which I saw my father and brother barba- rously butchered before my eyes, and my sister ravished. When the Bulgarians retired, we searched in vain for my dear sister. She was nowhere to be found ; but the bodies of my father, mother, and myself, with two servant-maids and three little boys, all of whom had beer murdered by the remorseless enemy, were thrown into a cart to be buried in a chapel belonging to the Jesuits, within two leagues of our family seat. A Jesuit sprinkled us with some holy water, which was confoundedly salt, and a few drops of it went into my eyes. The father perceived that my eyelids stirred a little ; he put his hand upon my breast, and felt my heart beat, upon which he gave me proper assistance, and at the end of three weeks I was perfectly recovered. You know, my dear Candide, I was very handsome. I became still more so, and the reverend father Croust, superior of that house, took a great fancy to me. He gave me the habit of the order, and some years afterwards I was sent to Rome. Our general stood in need of new levies of young German 52 CANDIDE. Jesuits. The sovereigns of Paraguay admit of as few Spanish Jesuits as possible ; they prefer those of other nations, as being more obedient to command. The reverend father- general looked upon me as a proper person to work in that vineyard. I set out in company with a Polander and a Tyrolese. Upon my arrival I was honoured with a sub- deaconship and a lieutenancy. Now I am colonel and priest. We shall give a warm reception to the King of Spain's troops ; I can assure you they will be well excom- municated and beaten. Providence has sent you hither to assist us. But is it true that my dear sister Cunegund is in the neighbourhood with the governor of Buenos Ayres ? " Candide swore that nothing could be more true ; and the tears began again to trickle down their cheeks. The baron knew no end of embracing Candide ; he called him his brother, his deliverer. " Perhaps," said he, " my dear Candide, we shall be fortunate enough to enter the town sword in hand, and recover my sister Cunegund." "Ah! that would crown my wishes," replied Candide, "for I intended to marry her ; and I hope I shall still be able to effect it." " Insolent fellow ! " replied the baron. " You ! you have the impudence to marry my sister, who bears seventy-two quarterings ! Really I think you have an in- sufferable degree of assurance to dare so much as to mention such an audacious design to me." Candide, thunderstruck at the oddness of this speech, answered : " Reverend father, all the quarterings in the world are of no signification. I have delivered your sister from a Jew and an Inquisitor ; she is under many obligations to me, and she is resolved to give me her hand. My master Pangloss always told me that mankind are by nature equal. Therefore, you may depend upon it that I will marry your sister." " We shall see that, villain ! " said the Jesuit baron of Thunder-ten-Tronckh, and struck him across the face with the flat side of his sword. Candide in an instant draws his rapier, and plunges it up to CANDIDE. 53 the hilt in the Jesuit's body; but in pulling it out, reeking hot, he burst into tears. " Good God ! " cried he, "I have killed my old master, my friend, my brother-in-law. I am the best man in the world, and yet I have already killed three men ; and of these three two were priests." Cacambo, who was standing sentry near the door of the arbour, instantly ran up. " Nothing remains," said his master, " but to sell our lives as dearly as possible. They will undoubtedly look into the arbour ; we must die sword in hand." Cacambo, who had seen many of these kind of adventures, was not discouraged. He stripped the baron of his Jesuit's habit and put it upon Candide, then gave him the dead man's three-cornered cap, and made him mount on horseback. All this was done as quick as thought. " Gallop, master," cried Cacambo; " everybody will take you for a Jesuit going to give orders, and we shall have passed the frontiers before they will be able to overtake us." He flew as he spoke these words, crying out aloud in Spanish, " Make way ! make way for the reverend father- colonel ! " CHAPTER XVI. What happened to Candide, willing to choose au_ thr)se who appeared most likd {Q answer his intention, selected tweu v _ M seemed tQ him the most sociable, and who all pretended to merit ..* ference. He invited them to his inn, and promised to treat them with a supper, on condition that every man should bind himself by an oath to relate his own history ; declaring at the same time that he would make choice of that person who should appear to him the most deserving of compassion and the most justly dissatisfied with his condition of life, and that he would make a present to the rest. This extraordinary assembly continued sitting till four in the morning. Candide, while he was listening to their adven- tures, called to mind what the old woman had said to him in their voyage to Buenos Ayres, and the wager she had laid that there was not a person on board the ship but had met with some great misfortunes. Every story he heard put him in mind of Pangloss. " My old master," said he, " would be confoundedly put to it to demonstrate his favourite system. Would he were here ! Certainly, if everything is for the best, it is in El Dorado, and not in the other parts of the world." At length he determined in favour of a poor scholar, who had laboured ten years for the booksellers at Amsterdam, being of opinion that no employment could be more detestable. This scholar, who was in fact a very honest man, had been robbed by his wife, beaten by his son, and forsaken by his daughter, who had run away with a Portuguese. He had been likewise deprived of a small employment on which he subsisted, and he was persecuted by the clergy of Surinam, who took him for a Socinian. It must be acknowledged that the other competitors were at least as wretched as he. But Candide was in hopes that the company of a man of letters would relieve the tediousness of the voyage. All 74 C AND WE. the other candidates complained that Candide had done them great injustice, but he stopped their mouths V J * P re - sent of a hundred piastres to each. CHAPTER XX. What befell Candide and Martin on their Passage. THE old philosopher, whose name was Martin, took shipping with Candide for Bordeaux. They both had seen and suffered a great deal; and had the ship been to go from Surinam to Japan round the Cape of Good Hope, they could have found sufficient entertainment for each other daring the whole voyage in discoursing upon moral and natural evil. Candide, however, had one advantage over Martin ; he lived in the pleasing hopes of seeing Miss Cunegund once more whereas the poor philosopher had nothing to hope for ; besides, Candide had money and jewels, and notwithstanding he had lost an hundred red sheep laden with the greatest treasure on the earth, and though he still smarted from the reflection of the Dutch skipper's knavery, yet when he considered what he had still left, and repeated the name of Cunegund, especially after meal times, he inclined to Pangloss's doctrine. " And pray," said he to Martin, " what is your opinion of the whole of this system ? What notion have you of moral and natural evil?" "Sir," replied Martin, "our priest accused me of being a Socinian ; but the real truth is, I am a Manichasan." " Nay, you are jesting," said Candide, " there are no Manichasans existing at present in the world." " And yet I am one/' said Martin ; " but I cannot help it; I cannot for the soul of me think otherwise." " Surely the devil must be in you," said Candide. " He concerns himself so much," replied Martin, " in the affairs of this world, that it is very probable he may be in me as C AND WE. 75 well as everywhere else ; but I must confess, when I cast my eye on this globe, or rather globule, I cannot help think- ing that God has abandoned it to some malignant being. I always except El Dorado. I scarce ever knew a city that did not wish the destruction of its neighbouring city, nor a family that did not desire to exterminate some other family. The poor in all parts of the world bear an inveterate hatred to the rich, even while they creep and cringe to them ; and the rich treat the poor like sheep, whose wool and flesh they barter for money : a million of regimental assassins traverse Europe from one end to the other, to get their bread by regular depredation and murder, because it is the most gentleman- like profession. Even in those cities which seem to enjoy the blessings of peace, and where the arts flourish, the inhabitants are devoured with envy, care, and in- quietudes, which are greater plagues than any experienced in a town besieged. Private chagrins are still more dread- ful than public calamities. In a word," concluded the philosopher, " I have seen and suffered so much that I am a Manichsean." " And yet there is some good in the world," replied Candide. ' Maybe so," said Martin ; " but it has escaped my knowledge." While they were deeply engaged in this dispute they heard the report of cannon, which redoubled every moment. Each takes out his glass, and they espy two ships warmly engaged at the distance of about three miles. The wind brought them both so near the French ship that those on board her had the pleasure of seeing the fight with great ease. After several smart broadsides, the one gave the other a shot between wind and water, which sunk her outright. Then could Candide and Martin plainly perceive an hundred men on the deck of the vessel which was sinking, who, withstands uplifted to heaven, sent forth piercing cries, and were in a moment swallowed up by the waves. 76 CANDIDE. " Well," said Martin, you now see in what manner man- kind treat each other." " It is certain," said Candide, " that there is something diabolical in this affair." As he was speaking thus, he spied something of a shining red hue, which swam close to the vessel. The boat was hoisted out to see what it might be, when it proved to be one of his sheep. Candide felt more joy at the recovery of this one animal than he did grief when he lost the other hundred, though laden with the large diamonds of El Dorado. The French captain quickly perceived that the victorious ship belonged to the crown of Spain ; that the other was a Dutch pirate, and the very same captain who had robbed Candide. The immense riches which this villain had amassed were buried with him in the deep, and only this one sheep saved out of the whole. " You see," said Candide to Martin, " that vice is sometimes punished ; this villain the Dutch skipper has met with the fate he deserved." "Very true," said Martin, " but why should the passengers be doomed also to destruction ? God has punished the knave, and the devil has drowned the rest." The French and Spanish ships continued their cruise, and Candide and Martin their conversation. They disputed fourteen days successively, at the end of which they were just as far advanced as the first moment they began. How- ever, they had the satisfaction of disputing, of communicating their ideas, and of mutually comforting each other. Candide embraced his sheep with transport : " Since I have found thee again," said he," I may possibly find my Cunegund once more," CANDIDE. 77 CHAPTER XXI. Candide and Martin, while thus reasoning with each other, draio mar to the coast of France. AT length they descried the coast of France, when Candide said to Martin, " Pray, Mr. Martin, were you ever in France ? " " Yes, sir," said Martin, " I have been in several provinces of that kingdom. In some one-half of the people are fools and madmen ; in some they are too artful ; in others, again, they are in general either very good- natured or very brutal ; while in others they affect to be witty ; and in all, their ruling passion is love, the next is slander, and the last is to talk nonsense." " But pray, Mr. Martin, were you ever in Paris ? " " Yes, sir, I have been in that city, and it is a place that contains the several species just described. It is a chaos, a confused multitude, where every one seeks for pleasure without being able to find it : at least, as far as I have observed during my short stay in that city. At my arrival I was robbed of all I had in the world by pickpockets and sharpers, at the fair of St. Germain. I was taken up myself for a robber, and confined in prison a whole week, after which I hired myself as corrector to a press, in order to get a little money towards defraying my expenses back to Holland on foot. I knew the whole tribe of scribblers, malcontents, and fanatics. It is said the people of that city are very polite : I believe they may be so." " For my part, I have no curiosity to see France," said Candide. " You may easily conceive, my friend, that after spending a month at El Dorado, I can desire to behold nothing upon earth but Miss Cunegund ; I am going to wait for her at Venice. I intend to pass through France in my way to Italy ; will you not bear me company ? " " With 7 8 CANDIDE. all my heart," said Martin. " They say Venice is agreeable to none but noble Venetians, but that, nevertheless, strangers are well received there when they have plenty of money. Now I have none, but you have ; therefore I will attend you whither you please." " Now we are upon this subject," said Candida, "do you think that the earth was originally sea, as we read in that great book which belongs to the captain of the ship ? " "I believe nothing of it." replied Martin, "any more than I do of the many other chimeras which have been related to us for some time past." " But then to what end," said Candide, " was the world formed ? " " To make us mad," said Martin. " Are you not surprised," continued Candide, "at the love which the two girls in the country of the Oreillons had for those two monkeys ? You know I have told you the story." "Surprised !" replied Martin, " not in the least ; I see nothing strange in this passion. I have seen so many extraordinary, things that there is nothing extraordinary to me now." " Do you think," said Candide, "that mankind always massacred each other as they do now ? Were they always guilty of lies, fraud, treachery, ingratitude, inconstancy, envy, ambi- tion, and cruelty ? Were they always thieves, fools, cowards, gluttons, drunkards, misers, calumniators, debauchees, fanatics, and hypocrites ? " " Do you believe," said Martin, " that hawks have always been accustomed to eat pigeons when they came in their way ? " " Doubtless," said Candide. " Well, then," replied Martin, " if hawks have always had the same nature, why should you pretend that mankind change theirs ? " " Oh ! " said Candide, " there is a great deal of difference ; for free will " And reasoning thus, they arrived at Bourdeaux. CANDIDE. 79 CHAPTER XXII. What happened to Candide and Martin in France. CANDIDE stayed no longer at Bourdeaux than was necessary to dispose of a few of the pebbles he had brought from El Dorado, and to provide himself with a post-chaise for two persons, for he could no longer stir a step without his philosopher Martin. The only thing that gave him concern was the being obliged to leave his sheep behind him, which he entrusted to the care of the Academy of Sciences at Bourdeaux, who proposed, as a prize subject for the year, to prove why the wool of this sheep was red ; and the prize was adjudged to a northern sage, who demonstrated by A plus B minus C, divided by Z, why the sheep must neces- sarily be red, and die of the mange. In the meantime, all the travellers whom Candide met with in the inns or on the road told him to a man that they were going to Paris. This general eagerness gave him likewise a great desire to see this capital, and it was not much out of his way to Venice. He entered the city by the suburbs of St. Marceau, and thought himself in one of the vilest hamlets in all West- phalia. Candide had not been long at his inn before he was seized with a slight disorder, owing to the fatigue he had undergone. As he wore a diamond of an enormous size on his finger, and had among the rest of his equipage a strong box that seemed very weighty, he soon found himself between two physicians whom he had not sent for, a number of intimate friends whom he had never seen and who would not quit his bedside, and two female /devotees, who were very careful in providing him hot suppers. " I remember," said Martin to him, " that the first time I So CANDIDE. came to Paris I was likewise taken ill. I was very poor, and accordingly I had neither friends, nurses, nor physi- cians, and yet I did very well." However, by dint of purging and bleeding, Candide's dis- order became very serious. The priest of the parish came with all imaginable politeness to desire a note of him, pay- able to the bearer in the other world. Candide refused to comply with his request, but the two devotees assured him that it was a new fashion. Candide replied that he was not one that followed the fashion. Martin was for throwing the priest out of the window. The clerk swore Candide should not have Christian burial. Martin swore in his turn that he would bury the clerk alive if he continued to plague them any longer. The dispute grew warm ; Martin took him by the shoulders and turned him out of the room, which gave great scandal, and occasioned a verbal process. Candide recovered, and till he was in a condition to go abroad, had a great deal of very good company to pass the evenings with him in his chamber. They played deep. Candide was surprised to find he could never turn a trick, and Martin was not at all surprised at the matter. Among those who did him the honours of the place was a little spruce Abbe of Perigord one of those insinuating, busy, fawning, impudent necessary fellows that lay wait for strangers at their arrival, tell them all the scandal of the town, and offer to minister to their pleasures at various prices. This man conducted Candide and Martin to the playhouse : they were acting a new tragedy. Candide found himself placed near a cluster of wits. This, however, did not prevent him from shedding tears at some parts of the piece, which were most affecting and best acted. One of these talkers said to him between the acts : " You are greatly to blame to shed tears. That actress plays horribly, and the man that plays with her still worse, and the piece itself is still more execrable than the representation. The author CANDIDE. 8 1 does not understand a word of Arabic, and yet he has laid his scene in Arabia ; and what is more, he is a fellow who does not believe in innate ideas. To-morrow I will bring ycu a score of pamphlets that have been written against hinx" " Pray, sir," said Candide to the Abbe, "how many theatrical pieces have you in France ? " " Five or six thou- sand," replied the other. " Indeed ! that is a great number," said Candide ; " but how many good ones may there be ? " " About fifteen or sixteen." " Oh ! that is a great number," said Martin. Candide was greatly taken with an actress who performed the part of Queen Elizabeth in a dull kind of tragedy that is played sometimes. "That actress," said he to Martin, " pleases me greatly. She has some sort of resemblance to Miss Cunegund. I should be very glad to pay my respects to her." The Abbe of Perigord offered his service to intro- duce him to her at her own house. Candide, who was brought up in Germany, desired to know what might be the ceremonial used on those occasions, and how a Queen of England was treated in France. " There is a necessary distinction to be observed in these matters/' said the Abbe. " In a country town we take them to a tavern ; here in Paris they are treated with great respect during their life- time, provided they are handsome, and when they die we throw their bodies upon a dunghill." " How," said Candide, " throw a queen's body upon a dunghill ! " " The gentle- man is quite right," said Martin ; " he tells you nothing but the truth. I happened to be at Paris when Miss Monimia made her exit, as one may say, out of this world into another. She was refused what they call here the rites of sepulture ; that is to say, she was denied the privilege of rotting in a churchyard by the side of all the beggars in the parish. They buried her at the corner of Burgundy Street, which must certainly have shocked her extremely, as she had very exalted notions of things." "This is acting very unpo- 82 CANDIDE. litely," said Candide. " Lord ! " said Martin, "what can be said to it ? It is the way of these people. Figure to yourseL' all the contradictions, all the inconsistencies possible, ard you may meet with them in the government, the courts of justice, the churches, and the public spectacles of this odd nation." " Is it true/' said Candide, " that the people of Paris are always laughing ? " " Yes," replied the Abbe ; " but it is with anger in their hearts. They express all their complaints by loud bursts of laughter, and commit the most detestable crimes with a smile on their faces." " Who was that great overgrown beast," said Candide, " who spoke so ill to me of the piece with which I was so much affected, and of the players who gave me so much pleasure ? " "A very good-for-nothing sort of a man, I assure you," answered the Abbe ; " one who gets his liveli- hood by abusing every new book and play that is written or performed. He abominates to see any one meet with success, like eunuchs who detest every one that possesses those powers they are deprived of. He is one of those vipers in literature who nourish themselves with their own venom; a pamphlet-monger." "A pamphlet-monger?" said Candide ; " what is that ? " " Why, a pamphlet- monger," replied the Abbe", " is a writer of pamphlets, a fool." Candide, Martin, and the Abbe of Perigord argued thus on the staircase while they stood to see the people go out of the playhouse. " Though I am very earnest to see Miss Cunegund again," said Candide, "yet I have a great incli- nation to sup with Miss Clairon, for I am really much taken with her." The Abbe was not a person to show his face at this lady's house, which was frequented by none but the best company. " She is engaged this evening," said he ; " but I will do my- self the honour to introduce you to a lady of quality of my acquaintance, at whose house you will see as much of CAND1DE. 83 tne manners of Paris as if you had lived here for forty years." Candide, who was naturally curious, suffered himself to be conducted to this lady's house, which was in the suburbs of St. Honore- The company were engaged at basset ; :\velve melancholy punters held each in his hand a small pack of cards, the corners of which, doubled down, were so many registers of their ill-fortune. A profound silence reigned through the assembly, a pallid dread had taken possession of the countenances of the punters, and restless inquietude stretched every muscle of the face of him who kept the bank ; and the lady of the house, who was seated next to him, observed with lynx's eyes every parole and sept-k-va as they were going, as likewise those who tallied, and made them undouble their cards with a severe exactness, though mixed with a politeness, which she thought neces- sary not to frighten away her customers. This lady assumed the title of Marchioness of Parolignac. Her daughter, a girl of about fifteen years of age, was one of the punters, and took care to give her mamma an item, by signs, when any one of them attempted to repair the rigour of their ill- fortune by a little innocent deception. The company were thus occupied, when Candide, Martin, and the Abbe, made their entrance. Not a creature rose to salute them, or indeed took the least notice of them, being wholly intent upon the business in hand. "Ah!" said Candide, "my Lady Baroness of Thunder-ten-tronckh would have behaved more civily." However, the Abbe whispered the Marchioness in the ear, who, half raising herself from her seat, honoured Candide with a gracious smile, and gave Martin a nod of her head with an air of inexpressible dignity. She then ordered a seat for Candide, and desired him to make one. at their party of play. He did so, and in a few deals lost near a thousand pieces ; after which they supped very elegantly, 84 CANDIDE. and every one was surprised at seeing Candide lose so much money, without appearing to be the least disturbed at it. The servants in waiting said to each other, " This is certainly some English lord." The supper was like most others of this kind at Paris. At first every one was silent ; then followed a few confused murmurs, and afterwards several insipid jokes passed and repassed, with false reports, false reasonings, a little politics, and a great deal of scandal. The conversation then turned upon the new productions in literature. " Pray," said the Abbe, "good folks, have you seen the romance written by the Sieur Gauchat, doctor of divinity?" " Yes," answered one of the company, " but I had not patience to go through it. The town is pestered with a swarm of imperti- nent productions, but this of Dr. Gauchat's outdoes them all. In short, I was so horribly tired of reading this vile stuff, that I even resolved to come here, and make a party at basset." "But what say you to the Archdeacon T 's miscellaneous collection," said the Abbe". " Oh, my God !" cried the Marchioness of Parolignac, never mention the tedious creature. Only think what pains he is at to tell one things that all the world knows ; and how he labours an argument that is hardly worth the slightest consideration ! How absurdly he makes use of otfier people's wit ! how miserably he mangles what he has pilfered from them ! The man makes me quite sick. A few pages of the good archdeacon are enough in conscience to satisfy any one." There was at the table a person of learning and taste, who supported what the Marchioness had advanced. They next began to talk of tragedies, The lady desired to know how it came about that there were several tragedies which still continued to be played, though they would not bear reading ? The man of taste explained very clearly, how a piece may be in some manner interesting without having a grain of merit. He showed, in a few words, that it is not CANDIDE. 85 sufficient to throw together a few incidents that are to be met with in every romance, and that dazzle the spectator ; the thoughts should be new without being far-fetched ; frequently sublime, but always natural; the author should have a thorough knowledge of the human heart, and make it speak properly ; he should be a complete poet, without showing an affectation of it in any of the characters of his piece ; he should be a perfect master of his language, speak it with all its purity and with the utmost harmony, and yet so as not to make the sense a slave to the rhyme. " Whoever," added he, " neglects any one of these rales, though he may write two or three tragedies with tolerable success, will never be reckoned in the number of good authors. There are very few good tragedies ; some are idylliums, in well written and harmonious dialogue; and others a chain of political reasonings that set one asleep ; or else pompous and high-flown amplifications, that disgust rather than please. Others again are the ravings of a madman, in an uncouth style, unmeaning flights, or long apostrophes to the deities, for want of knowing how to address mankind : in a word, a collection of false maxims and dull commonplace." Candide listened to this discourse with great attention, and conceived a high opinion of the person who delivered it ; and as the Marchioness had taken care to place him near her side, he took the liberty to whisper her softly in the ear, and ask who this person was that spoke so well. " He is a man of letters," replied her ladyship, " who never plays, and whom the Abbe brings with him to my house sometimes to spend an evening. He is a great judge of writing, especially in tragedy : he has composed one himself, which was damned, and has written a book that was never seen out of his bookseller's shop, excepting only one copy, which he sent me with a dedication, to which he had prefixed my name." " Oh, the great man ! " cried Candide ; " he is a second Pangloss," 86 CANDIDE. Then turning towards him : " Sir," said he, you are doubt- less of opinion that everything is for the best in the physical and moral world, and that nothing could be otherwise than it is ? " " I, sir ! " replied the man of letters ; " I think no such thing, I assure you ; I find that all in this world is set the wrong end uppermost. No one knows what is his rank, his office, nor what he does, nor what he should do ; and that except our evenings, which we generally pass tolerably merrily, the rest of our time is spent in idle disputes and quarrels : Jansenists against Molinists, the Parliament against the Church, and one armed body of men against another ; courtier against courtier, husband against wife, and relations against relations. In short, this world is nothing but one continued scene of civil war." " Yes," said Candide, " and I have seen worse than all that ; and yet a learned man, who had the misfortune to be hanged, taught me that everything was marvellously well, and that these evils you are speaking of were only so many shades in a beautiful picture." " Your hempen sage," said Martin, " laughed at you. These shades, as you call them, are the most horrible blemishes." " The men make these blemishes," rejoined Candide, " and they cannot do other- wise." " Then it is not their fault," added Martin. The greatest part of the gamesters, who did not understand a syllable of this discourse, amused themselves with drinking, while Martin reasoned with the learned gentleman ; and Candide entertained the lady of the house with a part of his adventures. After supper the Marchioness conducted Candide into her dressing-room, and made him sit down under a canopy. " Well," said she, " are you still so violently fond of Miss Cunegund of Thunder-ten-tronck ? " Yes, madam," replied Candide. The Marchioness says to him, with a tender smile, " You answer me like a young man born in West- phalia. A Frenchman would have said, ' It is true, madam, CANDIDE. 87 I had a great passion for Miss Cunegund ; but since I have seen you I fear I can no longer love her as I did.' " " Alas ! madam," replied Candide, " I will make you what answer you please." " You fell in love with her, I find, in stooping to pick up her handkerchief, which she had dropped. You shall pick up my garter." " With all my heart, madam," said Candide ; and he picked it up. " But you must tie it on again," said the lady. " Look ye, young man," said the Marchioness, " you are a stranger. I make some of my lovers here in Paris lan- guish for me a whole fortnight ; but I surrender to you the first night, because I am willing to do the honours of my country to a young Westphalian." The fair one having cast her eye on two very large diamonds that were upon the young stranger's finger, praised them in so earnest a manner that they were in an instant transferred from his finger to hers. As Candide was going home with the Abbe he felt some qualms of conscience for having been guilty of infidelity to Miss Cunegund. The Abbe took part with him in his un- easiness. He had but an inconsiderable share in the thou- sand pieces Candide had lost at play, and the two diamonds which had been in a manner extorted from him ; and there- fore very prudently designed to make the most he could of his new acquaintance which chance had thrown in his way. He talked much of Miss Cunegund ; and Candide assured him that he would heartily ask pardon of that fair one for his infidelity to her when he saw her at Venice. The Abbe redoubled his civilities, and seemed to in- terest himself warmly in everything that Candide said, did, or seemed inclined to do. " And so, sir, you have an engagement at Venice ? " " Yes, Monsieur 1'AbbeY' answered Candide, " I must abso- lutely wait upon Miss Cunegund ; " and then the pleasure he took in talking about the object he Icved led him insensibly to relate, according to custom, part of his adventures with that illustrious Westphalian beauty. 88 CANDIDE. " I fancy," said the Abbe", " Miss Cunegund has a great deal of wit, and that her letters must be very entertaining." " I never received any from her," said Candide, " for you are to consider that, being expelled from the castle upon her account, I could not write to her, especially as soon after my departure I heard she was dead ; but, thank God, I found afterwards she was living. I left her again after this, and now I have sent a messenger to her near two thousand leagues from hence, and wait here for his return with an answer from her." The artful Abbe let not a word of all this escape him, though he seemed to be musing upon something else. He soon took his leave of the two adventurers, after having embraced them with the greatest cordiality. The next morning, almost as soon as his eyes were open, Candide received the following billet : " My dearest Lover, I have been ill in this city these eight days. I have heard of your arrival, and should fly to your arms were I able to stir. I was informed of your being on the way hither at Bourdeaux, where I left the faithful Cacambo and the old woman, who will soon follow me. The Governor of Buenos Ayres has taken everything from me but your heart, which I still retain. Come to me immediately on receipt of this. Your presence will either give me new life or kill me with the pleasure." At the receipt of this charming, this unexpected letter, Candide felt the utmost transports of joy ; though, on the other hand, the indisposition of his beloved Miss Cunegund, overwhelmed him with grief. Distracted between these two passions, he takes his gold and his diamonds, and procured a person to conduct him and Martin to the house where Miss Cunegund lodged. Upon entering the room he felt his limbs tremble, his heart flutter, his tongue falter. He attempted to undraw the curtain, and called Tor a light to the bedside. " Lord, sir," cried a maid-servant, who was CANDIDE. 89 waiting in the room, " take care what you do; Miss cannot bear the least light." And so saying, she pulls the curtain close again. " Cunegund ! my dear Cunegund ! " cried Candide, bathed in tears, " how do you do ? If you cannot bear the light, speak to me at least." " Alas ! she cannot speak," said the maid. The sick lady then puts a plump hand out of the bed, and Candide first bathes it with his tears, then fills it with diamonds, leaving a purse of gold upon the easy chair. In the midst of his transports comes an officer into the room, followed by the Abbe and a file of musketeers. "There," said he, "are the two suspected foreigners." At the same time he orders them to be seized and carried to prison. " Travellers are not treated in this manner in the country of El Dorado," said Candide. " I am more of a Manichaean now than ever," said Martin. " But pray, good sir, where are you going to carry us," said Candide. " To a dungeon, my dear sir," replied the officer. When Martin had a little recovered himself, so as to for a cool judgment of what had passed, he plainly perceiveo that the person who had acted the part of Miss Cunegund was a cheat, that the Abbe of Perigord was a sharper, who had imposed upon the honest simplicity of Candide, and that the officer was a knave, whom they might easily get rid of. Candide, following the advice of his friend Martin, and burning with impatience to see the real Miss Cunegund, rather than be obliged to appear at a court of justice, pro- poses to the officer to make him a present of three small diamonds, each of them worth three thousand pistoles. "Ah, sir," said this understrapper of justice, "had you committed ever so much villainy, this would render you the honestest man living in my eyes. Three diamonds worth three thousand pistoles ! Why, my dear sir, go far from carrying you to jai), I would lose my life to serve you. There are orders for stopping all strangers ; but leave it to 90 CANDIDE. me. I have a brother at Dieppe, in Normandy. I myself will conduct you thither, and if you have a diamond left to give him, he will take as much care of you as I myself should." " But why," said Candide, " do they stop all strangers ? " The Abbe of Perigord made answer that it was because a poor devil of the country of Atrebata heard somebody tell foolish stories, and this induced him to commit a parricide ; not such a one as that in the month of May 1610, but such as that in the month of December in the year 1594, and such as many that have been perpetrated in other months and years by other poor devils who had heard foolish stories. The officer then explained to them what the Abbe meant. " Horrid monsters ! " exclaimed Candide. " Is it possible that such scenes should pass among a people who are per- petually singing and dancing? Is there no flying this abominable country immediately, this execrable kingdom, where monkeys provoke tigers? I have seen bears in my country, but men I have beheld nowhere but in El Dorado. In the name of God, sir," said he to the officer, " do me the kindness to conduct me to Venice, where I am to wait for Miss Cunegund." " Really, sir," replied the officer, " I cannot possibly wait on you farther than Lower Normandy." So saying, he ordered Candide's irons to be struck off, acknowledged himself mistaken, and sent his followers about their business; after which he conducted Candide and Martin to Dieppe, and left them to the care of his brother. There happened just then to be a small Dutch ship in the roads. The Norman, whom the other three diamonds had converted into the most obliging, serviceable being that ever breathed, took care to see Candide and his attendants safe on board this vessel, that was just ready to sail for Ports- mouth in England. This was not the nearest way to Venice indeed ; but Candide thought himself escaped out of hell, and did not in the least doubt but he should quickly find an opportunity of resuming his voyage to Venice. C AND IDE. 91 CHAPTER XXIII. Candidc and Martin touch upon the English Coast: ivhat they see there. " AH, Pangloss ! Pangloss ! Ah, Martin ! Martin ! Ah, my dear Miss Cunegund ! What sort of a world is this ? " Thus exclaimed Candide as soon as he had got on board the Dutch ship. " Why, something very foolish and very abominable," said Martin. " You are acquainted with England," said Candide ; " are they as great fools in that country as in France ? " " Yes but in a different manner," answered Martin. " You know that these two nations are at war about a few acres of barren land in the neighbourhood of Canada, and that they have expended much greater sums in the contest than all Canada is worth. To say exactly whether there are a greater number fit to be inhabitants of a madhouse in the one country than the other, exceeds the limits of my imperfect capacity. I know in general that the people we are going to visit are of a very dark and gloomy disposition." As they were chatting thus together they arrived at Ports- mouth. The shore on each side the harbour was lined with a multitude of people, whose eyes were stedfastly fixed on a lusty man who was kneeling down on the deck of one of the men-of-war, with something tied over his eyes. Oppo- .site to this personage stood four soldiers, each of whom shot three bullets into his skull with all the composure imaginable ; and when it was done, the whole company went away perfectly well satisfied. " What the devil is all this for?" said Candide; "and what demon or foe to mankind lords it thus tyrannically over the world?" He then asked who was that lusty man who had been sent out of the world with so much ceremony, when he received for answer that it was an admiral. " And pray why do you put your admiral' 92 CANDIDE, to death ? " " Because he did not put a sufficient number of his fellow-a eatures to death. You must know, he had an engagement with a French admiral, and it has been proved against him that he was not near enough to his antagonist." " But/' replied Candide, " the French admiral must have been as far from him." " There is no doubt of that ; but in this country it is found requisite, now and then, to put one admiral to death in order to spirit up the others to fight." Candide was so shocked at what he saw and heard that he would not set foot on shore, but made a bargain with the Dutch skipper (were he even to rob him like the captain of Surinam) to carry him directly to Venice. The skipper was ready in two days. They sailed along the coast of France, and passed within sight of Lisbon, at which Candide trembled. From thence they proceeded to the straits, entered the Mediterranean, and at length arrived at Venice. " God be praised," said Candide, embracing Martin, " this is the place where I am to behold my beloved Cunegund once again. I can confide in Cacambo like another self. All is well all very well ; all as well as possible." CHAPTER XXIV. Of Pacqtictle and Friar Girojtie. UPON their aerival at Venice he went in search of Cacambo at every inn and coffee-house, and among all the ladies of pleasure ; but could hear nothing of him. He sent every day to inquire what ships were come in ; still no news of Cacambo. " It is strange," said he to Martin, " very strange, that I should have had time to sail from Surinam to Bour- deaux ; to travel from thence to Paris, to Dieppe, to Ports- mouth ; to sail along the coast of Portugal and Spain, and up the Mediterranean to spend some months at Venice ; and that my lovely Cunegund should not be arrived. Instead CANDIDE. 93 of her, I only met with a Parisian impostor and a rascally Abbe of Perigord. Cunegund is actually dead, and I have nothing to do but to follow her. Alas ! how much better would it have been for me to have remained in the paradise of El Dorado, than to have returned to this wicked Europe ! You are in the right, my dear Martin ; you are certainly in the right : all is misery and deceit." He fell into a deep melancholy, and neither went to the opera in vogue, nor partook of any of the diversions of the Carnival : nay, he even slighted the fair sex. Martin said to him, " Upon my word, I think you are very simple to imagine that a rascally valet, with five or six millions in his pocket, would go in search of your mistress to the further end of the world, and bring her to Venice to meet you. If he finds her, he will take her for himself; if he does not, he will take another. Let me advise you to forget your valet Cacambo, and your mistress Cunegund." Martin's speech was not the most consolatory to the dejected Candide. His melancholy increased, and Martin never left proving to him, that there is very little virtue or happiness in this world except, perhaps, in El Dorado, where hardly any- body can gain admittance. While they were disputing on this important subject, and still expecting Miss Cunegund, Candide perceived a young Theatin friar in St. Mark's Place, with a girl under his arm. The Theatin looked fresh-coloured, plump, and vigorous ; his eyes sparkled ; his air and gait were bold and lofty. The girl was very pretty, and was singing a song ; and every now and then gave her Theatin an amorous ogle, and wantonly pinched his ruddy cheeks. " You will at least allow," said Candide to Martin, " that these two are happy. Hitherto I have met with none but unfortunate people in the whole habitable globe, except in El Dorado ; but as to this couple, I would venture to lay a wager that they are happy." " Done \ " said Martin ; " they are not, for what 94 CANDIDE. you will." " Well, we have only to ask them to dine with us," said Candide, " and you will see whether I am mistaken or not." Thereupon he accosts them, and with great politeness invites them to his inn to eat some macaroni, with Lombard partridges and caviare, and to drink a bottle of Montepul- ciano, Lacryma Christi, Cyprus and Samos wine. The girl blushed ; the Theatin accepted the invitation, and she fol- lowed him, eyeing Candide every now and then with a mixture of surprise and confusion, while the tears stole down her cheeks. No sooner did she enter his apartment than she cried out : " How, Mr. Candide, have you quite forgot your Pacquette ? Do you not know her again ? " Candide, who had not regarded her with any degree of attention be- fore, being wholly occupied with the thoughts of his dear Cunegund : " Ah ! is it you, child ? Was it you that reduced Doctor Pangloss to that fine condition I saw him in?" " Alas ! sir," answered Pacquette, " it was I indeed. I find you are acquainted with everything ; and I have been informed of all the misfortunes that happened to the whole family of my lady baroness and the fair Cunegund. But I can safely swear to you that my lot was no less deplorable ; I was innocence itself when you saw me last. A Cordelier, who was my confessor, easily misled me ; the consequences proved terrible. I was obliged to leave the castle some time after the baron kicked you out from thence ; and if a famous surgeon had not taken compassion on me, I had been a dead woman. Gratitude obliged me to live with him some time as a companion. His wife, who was a very devil for jealousy, beat me unmercifully every day. Oh ! she was a perfect fury. The doctor himself was the most ugly of all mortals, and I the most wretched creature existing, to be continually beaten for a man whom I did not love. You are sensible, sir, how dangerous it was for an ill-natured CANDIDE. 95 woman to be married to a physician. Incensed at the be- haviour of his wife, he one day gave her so affectionate a remedy for a slight cold she had caught, that she died in less than two hours in most dreadful convulsions. Her relations prosecuted the husband, who was obliged to fly, and I was sent to prison. My innocence would not have saved me, if I had not been tolerably handsome. The judge gave me my liberty on condition he should succeed the doctor. How- ever, I was soon supplanted by a rival, turned off without a farthing, and obliged to continue the abominable trade which you men think so pleasing, but which to us unhappy creatures is the most dreadful of all sufferings. At length I came to follow the business at Venice. Ah, sir ! did you but know what it is to be companion with every fellow with old trades- men, with counsellors, with monks, watermen, and abbes; to be exposed to all their insolence and abuse ; to be often, obliged to borrow the gay clothes we wear; to be robbed by one gallant of what we get from another ; to be subject to the extortions of civil magistrates; and to have for ever before one's eyes the prospect of old age, an hospital, or a dunghill, you would conclude that I am one of the most unhappy wretches breathing." Thus did Pacquette unbosom herself to honest Candide in his closet, in the presence of Martin, who took occasion to say to him, " You see I have won the wager already." Friar Giroflee was all this time in the parlour refreshing himself with a glass or two of wine till dinner was ready. " But," said Candide to Pacquette, " you looked so gay and content when I met you, you sang and caressed the Theatin with so much fondness, that I absolutely thought you as happy as you say you are now miserable." " Ah ! dear sir," said Pacquette, " this is one of the miseries of the trade ; yesterday I was stripped and beaten by an officer, yet to- day I must appear good-humoured and gay to please a friar. 96 CANDIDE. Candide was convinced, and acknowledged that Martin was in the right. They sat down to table with Pacquette and the Theatin ; the entertainment was very agreeable, and towards the end they began to converse together with some freedom. " Father," said Candide to the friar, " you seem to me to enjoy a state of happiness that even kings might envy ; joy and health are painted in your countenance. You have a beautiful friend to divert you ; and you seem to be perfectly well contented with your condition as a Theatin." " Faith, sir," said Friar Giroflee, " I wish with all my soul the Theatins were every one of them a t the bottom of the sea. I have been tempted a thousand times to set fire to the convent and go and turn Turk. My parents obliged me at the age of fifteen to put on this detestable habit, only to increase the fortune of an elder brother of mine, whom God confound ! Jealousy, discord, and fury reside in our convent. It is true I have preached often paltry sermons by which I have got a little money, part of which the prior robs me of, and the remainder helps to buy my joys ; but at night when I go hence to my convent, I am ready to dash my brains against the walls of the dormitory ; and this is the case with all the rest of our fraternity." Martin, turning towards Candide with his usual indiffer- ence, said, "Well, what think you now? Have I won the wager entirely ? " Candide gave two thousand piastres to Pacquette and a thousand to Friar Girofle'e, saying, " I will answer that this will make them happy." " I am not of your opinion," said Martin ; " perhaps this money will only make them wretched." " Be that as it may," said Candide, " one thing comforts me ; I see that one often meets with those whom we expected never to see again ; so that perhaps, as I have found my red sheep and Pacquette, I may be lucky enough to find Miss Cunegund also." " I wish," said Martin, " she one day may make you happy ; C AND IDE. 97 but I doubt it much." " You are very hard of belief," said Candide. " It is because," said Martin, " I have seen the world." " Observe those gondoliers," said Candide ; " are they not perpetually singing ? " " You do not see them," answered Martin, " at home with their wives and brats. The dog has his chagrin, gondoliers theirs. Nevertheless, in the main I look upon the gondolier's life as preferable to that of the dog ; but the difference is so trifling that it is not worth the trouble of examining into." I have heard great talk," said Candide, " of the Senator Pococurante, who lives in that fine house at the Brenta, where they say he entertains foreigners in the most polite manner. They pretend this man is a perfect stranger to uneasiness." " I should be glad to see so extraordinary a being," said Martin. Candide thereupon sent a messenger to Signer Pococurante, desiring permission to wait on him the next day. CHAPTER XXV. Candide and Martin pay a visit to Signor Pococurante, a noble Venetian. CANDIDE and his friend Martin went into a gondola on the Brenta, and arrived at the palace of the noble Pococurante" : the gardens were laid out in elegant taste, and adorned with fine marble statues ; his palace was built after the most approved rules of architecture. The master of the house, who was a man of sixty, and very rich, received our two travellers with great politeness, but without much ceremony, which somewhat disconcerted Candide, but was not at all displeasing to Martin. As soon as they were seated, two very pretty girls, neatly dressed, brought in chocolate, which was extremely well frothed. Candide could not help making encomiums upon D 98 CANDIDE. their beauty and graceful carriage. " The creatures are well enough," said the senator. " I make them my companions, for I am heartily tired of the ladies of the town, their coquetry, their jealousy, their quarrels, their humours, their meannesses, their pride, and their folly. I am weary of making sonnets, or of paying for sonnets to be made on them ; but after all, these two girls begin to grow very indifferent to me." After having refreshed himself, Candide walked into a large gallery, where he was struck with the sight of a fine collec- tion of paintings. " Pray," said Candide, " by what master are the two first of these ? " " They are Raphael's," answered the senator. " I gave a great deal of money for them seven years ago, purely out of curiosity, as they were said to be the finest pieces in Italy ; but I cannot say they please me : the colouring is dark and heavy ; the figures do not swell nor come out enough ; and the drapery is very bad. In short, notwithstanding the encomiums lavished upon them, they are not, in my opinion, a true representation of nature. I approve of no paintings but where I think I behold Nature herself ; and there are very few, if any, of that kind to be met with. I have what is called a fine collection, but I take no manner of delight in them." While dinner was getting ready Pococurante ordered a concert Candide praised the music to the skies. " This noise," said the noble Venetian, " may amuse one for a little time, but if it was to last above half-an-hour, it would grow tiresome to everybody, though perhaps no one would care to own it. Music is become the art of executing what is difficult ; now, whatever is difficult cannot be long pleasing. " I believe I might take more pleasure in an opera, if they had not made such a monster of that species of dramatic entertainment as perfectly shocks me ; and I am amazed how people can bear to see wretched tragedies set to music ; where the scenes are contrived for no other purpose than to lug in, C AND IDE. 99 as it were by the ears, three or four ridiculous songs, to give a favourite actress an opportunity of exhibiting her pipe. Let who will or can die away in raptures at the trills of a eunuch quavering the majestic part of Caesar or Cato, and strutting in a foolish manner upon the stage. For my part, I have long ago renounced these paltry entertainments, which constitute the glory of modern Italy, and are so dearly purchased by crowned heads." Candide opposed these sentiments ; but he did it in a discreet manner. As for Martin, he was entirely of the old senator's opinion. Dinner being served up, they sat down to table, and after a very hearty repast, returned to the library. Candide observing Homer richly bound, commended the noble Venetian's taste. " This," said he, " is a book that was once the delight of the great Pangloss, the best philosopher in Germany." " Homer is no favourite of mine," answered Pococurante" very coolly. " I was made to believe once that I took a pleasure in reading him ; but his continual repetitions of battles must have all such a resemblance with each other ; his gods that are for ever in a hurry and bustle, without ever doing anything ; his Helen, that is the cause of the war, and yet hardly acts in the whole performance ; his Troy, that holds out so long without being taken ; in short, all these things together make the poem very insipid to me. I have asked some learned men whether they are not in reality as much tired as myself with reading this poet. Those who spoke ingenuously assured me that he had made them fall asleep, and yet that they could not well avoid giving him a place in their libraries ; but that it was merely as they would do an antique, or those rusty medals which are kept only for curiosity, and are of no manner of use in commerce." the only season of diversion and entertainment, and it was therefore midnight before the music ceased and the princesses retired. Rasselas then called for his companion, and required him to begin the story of his life. " Sir," said Imlac, " my history will not be long : the life that is devoted to knowledge passes silently away, and is very little diversified by events. To talk in public, to think in solitude, to read and to hear, to inquire and answer in- quiries, is the business of a scholar. He wanders about the world without pomp or terror, and is neither known nor valued but by men like himself. " I was born in the kingdom of Goiama, at no great dis- 192 RASSELAS. tance from the fountain of the Nile. My father was a wealthy merchant, who traded between the inland countries of Africa and the ports of the Red Sea. He was honest, frugal, and diligent, but of mean sentiments and narrow comprehension ; he desired only to be rich, and to conceal his riches, lest he should be spoiled by the governors of the province." " Surely," said the Prince, " my father must be negligent of his charge if any man in his dominions dares take that which belongs to another. Does he not know that kings are accountable for injustice permitted as well as done ? If I were emperor, not the meanest of my subjects should be oppressed with impunity. My blood boils when I am told that a merchant durst not enjoy his honest gains for fear of losing them by the rapacity of power. Name the governor who robbed the people, that I may declare his crimes to the Emperor ! " " Sir," said Imlac, " your ardour is the natural effect of virtue animated by youth. The time will come when you will acquit your father, and perhaps hear with less impatience of the governor. Oppression is, in the Abyssinian dominions, neither frequent nor tolerated ; but no form of government has been yet discovered by which cruelty can be wholly prevented. Subordination supposes power on one part and subjection on the other ; and if power be in the hands of men it will sometimes be abused. The vigilance of the supreme magistrate may do much, but much will still remain undone. He can never know all the crimes that are com- mitted, and can seldom punish all that he knows." " This," said the Prince, " I do not understand ; but I had rather hear thee than dispute. Continue thy narra- tion." " My father," proceeded Imlac, " originally intended that I should have no other education than such as might qualify me for commerce ; and discovering in me great strength of memory and quickness of apprehension, often declared RASSELAS. 193 his hope that I should be some time the richest man in Abyssinia." "Why," said the Prince, "did thy father desire the in- crease of his wealth when it was already greater than he durst discover or enjoy ? I am unwilling to doubt thy veracity, yet inconsistencies cannot both be true." " Inconsistencies," answered Imlac, " cannot both be right ; but, imputed to man, they may both be true. Yet diversity is not inconsistency. My father might expect a time of greater security. However, some desire is necessary to keep life in motion ; and he whose real wants are supplied must admit those of fancy." " This," ssid the Prince, " I can in some measure conceive. I repent that I interrupted thee." " With this hope," proceeded Imlac, " he sent me to school. But when I had once found the delight of know- ledge, and felt the pleasure of intelligence and the pride of invention, I began silently to despise riches, and determined to disappoint the purposes of my father, whose grossness of conception raised my pity. I was twenty years old before his tenderness would expose me to the fatigue of travel ; in which time I had been instructed, by successive masters, in all the literature of my native country. As every hour taught me something new, I lived in a continual course of gratifi- cation ; but as I advanced towards manhood, I lost much of the reverence with which I had been used to look on my instructors ; because when the lessons were ended I did not find them wiser or better than common men. " At length my father resolved to initiate me in commerce ; and, opening one of his subterranean treasuries, counted out ten thousand pieces of gold. ' This, young man,' said he, ' is the stock with which you must negotiate. I began with less than a fifth part, and you see how diligence and parsi- mony have increased it. This is your own, to waste or to improve. If you squander it by negligence or caprice, you must wait for my death before you will be rich ; if in four G 194 RASSELAS. years you double your stock, we will thenceforward let sub- ordination cease, and live together as friends and partners, for he shall be always equal with me who is equally skilled in the art of growing rich.' " We laid out our money upon camels, concealed in bales of cheap goods, and travelled to the shore of the Red Sea. When I cast my eye on the expanse of waters, my heart bounded like that of a prisoner escaped. I felt an inex- tinguishable curiosity kindle in my mind, and resolved to snatch this opportunity of seeing the manners of other nations, and of learning sciences unknown in Abyssinia. " I remembered that my father had obliged me to the improvement of my stock, not by a promise, which I ought not to violate, but by a penalty, which I was at liberty to incur ; and therefore determined to gratify my predominant desire, and, by drinking at the fountain of knowledge, to quench the thirst of curiosity. " As I was supposed to trade without connection with my father, it was easy for me to become acquainted with the master of a ship, and procure a passage to some other country. I had no motives of choice to regulate my voyage. It was sufficient for me that, wherever I wandered, I should see a country which I had not seen before. I therefore entered a ship bound for Surat, having left a letter for my father declaring my intention." CHAPTER IX. The History of Inilac (continued}. " WHEN I first entered upon the world of waters, and lost sight of land, I looked round about me in pleasing terror, and thinking my soul enlarged by the boundless prospect, imagined that I could gaze around me for ever without satiety ; but in a short time I grew weary of looking on barren uniformity, where I could only see again what I had already seen. I RASSELAS 195 then descended into the ship, and doubted for a while whether all my future pleasures would not end, like this, in disgust and disappointment. ' Yet surely/ said I, l the ocean and the land are very different. The only variety of water is rest and motion. But the earth has mountains and valleys, deserts and cities ; it is inhabited by men of different customs and contrary opinions ; and I may hope to find variety in life, though I should miss it in nature.' . " With this thought I quieted my mind : and amused my- self during the voyage, sometimes by learning from the sailors the art of navigation, which I have never practised, and sometimes by forming schemes for my conduct in dif- ferent situations, in not one of which I have been ever placed. " I was almost weary of my naval amusements when we safely landed at Surat. I secured my money, and pur- chasing some commodities for show, joined myself to a caravan that was passing into the inland country. My companions, for some reason or other, conjecturing that I was rich, and, by my inquiries and admiration, finding that I was ignorant, considered me as a novice whom they had a right to cheat, and who was to learn, at the usual expense, the art of fraud. They exposed me to the theft of ser- vants and the exaction of officers, and saw me plundered upon false pretences, without any advantage to themselves but that of rejoicing in the superiority of their own knowledge." " Stop a moment," said the Prince ; " is there such de- pravity in man as that he should injure another without benefit to himself? I can easily conceive that all are pleased with superiority; but your ignorance was merely accidental, which, being neither your crime nor your folly, could afford them no reason to applaud themselves ; and the knowledge which they had, anfl which you wanted, they might as effectually have shown by warning as betraying you." " Pride," said Imlac, " is seldom delicate ; it will please 196 RASSELAS. itself with very mean advantages ; and envy feels not its own happiness but when it may be compared with the misery of others. They were my enemies because they grieved to think me rich, and my oppressors because they delighted to find me weak." "Proceed," said the Prince: "I doubt not of the facts which you relate, but imagine that you impute them to mis- taken motives." " In this company," said Imlac, " I arrived at Agra, the capital of Hindostan, the city in which the Great Mogul com- monly resides. I applied myself to the language of the country, and in a few months was able to converse with the learned men ; some of whom I found morose and reserved, and others easy and communicative : some were unwilling to teach another what they had with difficulty learned them- selves ; and some showed that the end of their studies was to gain the dignity of instructing. ' To the tutor of the young princes I recommended my- self so much that I was presented to the Emperor as a man of uncommon knowledge. The Emperor asked me many questions concerning my country and my travels; and though I cannot now recollect anything that he uttered above the power of a common man, he dismissed me, astonished at his wisdom and enamoured of his goodness. " My credit was now so high that the merchants with whom I had travelled applied to me for recommendations to the ladies of the Court. I was surprised at their confidence of solicitation, and greatly reproached them with their practices on the road. They heard me with cold indifference, and showed no tokens of shame or sorrow. " They then urged their request with the offer of a bribe ; but what I would not do for kindness, I would not do for money, and refused them ; not because they had injured me, but because I would not enable them to injure others ; for I knew they would have made use of my credit to cheat those who should buy their wares; RASSELAS. ! 9 y " Having resided at Agra till there was no more to be learned, I travelled into Persia, where I saw many remains of ancient magnificence, and observed many new accommo- dations of life. The Persians are a nation eminently social, and their assemblies afforded me daily opportunities of remarking characters and manners, and of tracing human nature through all its variations. ' From Persia I passed into Arabia, where I saw a nation pastoral and warlike, who lived without any settled habita- tion, whose wealth is their flocks and herds, and who have carried on through ages an hereditary war with mankind* though they neither covet nor envy their possessions. " CHAPTER X. Iftilac's History {continued). A Dissertation upon Poetry, " WHEREVER I went I found that poetry was considered as the highest learning, and regarded with a veneration some- what approaching to that which man would pay to angelic nature. And yet it fills me with wonder, that in almost all countries the most ancient poets are considered as the best ; whether it be that every other kind of knowledge is an acquisition gradually attained, and poetry is a gift conferred at once ; or that the first poetry of every nation surprised them as a novelty, and retained the credit by consent which it received by accident at first ; or whether, as the province of poetry is to describe nature and passion, which are always the same, the first writers took possession of the most striking objects for description and the most probable occur- rences for fiction, and left nothing to those that followed them but transcription of the same events and new combi- nations of the same images. Whatever be the reason, it is commonly observed that the early writers are in possession of nature, and their followers of art ; that the first excel in strength and invention, and the latter in elegance and refinement. 198 RASSELAS. " I was desirous to add my name to this illustrious frater- nity. I read all the poets of Persia and Arabia, and was able to repeat by memory the volumes that are suspended in the mosque of Mecca. But I soon found that no man was ever great by imitation. My desire of excellence impelled me to transfer my attention to nature and to life. Nature was to be my subject, and men to be my auditors. I could never describe what I had not seen. I could not hope to move those with delight or terror whose interests and opinions I did not understand. " Being now resolved to be a poet, I saw everything with a new purpose ; my sphere of attention was suddenly mag- nified ; no kind of knowledge was to be overlooked. I ranged mountains and deserts for images and resemblances, and pictured upon my mind every tree of the forest and flower of the valley. I observed with equal care the crags of the rock and the pinnacles of the palace. Some- times I wandered along the mazes of the rivulet, and some- times watched the changes of the summer clouds. To a poet nothing can be useless. Whatever is beautiful and whatever is dreadful must be familiar to his imagination ; he must be conversant with all that is awfully vast or elegantly little. The plants of the garden, the animals of the wood, the minerals of the earth, and meteors of the sky, must all concur to store his mind with inexhaustible variety; for every idea is useful for the enforcement or decoration of moral or religious truth, and he who knows most will have most power of diversifying his scenes and of gra- tifying his reader with remote allusions and unexpected instruction. " All the appearances of nature I was therefore careful to study, and every country which I have surveyed has contri- buted something to my poetical powers." " In so wide a survey," said the Prince, " you must surely have left much unobserved. I have lived till now within the circuit of the mountains, and yet cannot walk RASSELAS. 199 abroad without the sight of something which I had never beheld before, or never heeded." " This business of a poet," said Imlac, " is to examine, not the individual, but the species ; to remark general pro- perties and large appearances. He does not number the streaks of the tulip, or describe the different shades of the verdure of the forest. He is to exhibit in his portraits of nature such prominent and striking features as recall the original to every mind, and must neglect the minuter discri- minations, which one may have remarked and another have neglected, for those characteristics which are alike obvious to vigilance and carelessness. " But the knowledge of nature is only half the task of a poet ; he must be acquainted likewise with all the modes of life. His character requires that he estimate the happiness and misery of every condition, observe the power of all the passions in all their combinations, and trace the changes of the human mind, as they are modified by various institutions and accidental influences of climate or custom, from the sprightlin ess of infancy to the despondence of decrepitude. He must divest himself of the prejudices of his age and country ; he must consider right and wrong in their abstracted and invariable state ; he must disregard present laws and opinions, and rise to general and transcendental truths, which will always be the same. He must, therefore, content himself with the slow progress of his name, contemn the praise of his own time, and commit his claims to the justice of posterity. He must write as the interpreter of nature and the legislator of mankind, and consider himself as presiding over the thoughts and manners of future generations, as a being superior to time and place. " His labour is not yet at an end. He must know many languages and many sciences, and, that his style may be worthy of his thoughts, must by incessant practice fami- liarize to himself every delicacy of speech and grace of harmony." 200 RASSELAS. CHAPTER XI. Imlac 1 s Narrative (continued], A Hint on Pilgrimage. IMLAC now felt the enthusiastic fit, and was proceeding to aggrandize his own profession, when the Prince cried out : " Enough ! thou hast convinced me that no human being can ever be a poet. Proceed with thy narration." " To be a poet," said Imlac, " is indeed very difficult." "So difficult," returned the Prince, " that I will at present hear no more of his labours. Tell me whither you went when you had seen Persia." "From Persia," said the poet, " I travelled through Syria, and for three years resided in Palestine, where I conversed with great numbers of the northern and western nations of Europe; the nations which are now in possession of all power and all knowledge, whose armies are irresistible, and whose fleets command theremotest parts of the globe. When I compared these men with the natives of our own kingdom and those that surround us, they appeared almost another order of beings. In their countries it is difficult to wish for anything that may not be obtained : a thousand arts, of which we never heard, are continually labouring for their convenience and pleasure ; and whatever their own climate has denied them is supplied by their commerce." " By what means," said the Prince, " are the Europeans thus powerful ? or why, since they can so easily visit Asia and Africa for trade or conquest, cannot the Asiatics and Africans invade their coast, plant colonies in their ports, and give laws to their natural princes ? The same wind that carries them back would bring us thither." " They are more powerful, sir, than we," answered Imlac, "because they are wiser ; knowledge will always predominate over ignorance, as man governs the other animals. But why their knowledge is more than ours, I know not what reason RASSELAS. 201 can be given but the unsearchable will of the Supreme Being." " When," said the Prince with a sigh, " shall I be able to visit Palestine, and mingle with this mighty confluence of nations? Till that happy moment shall arrive, let rne fill up the time with such representations as thou canst give me. I am not ignorant of the motive that assembles such numbers in that place, and cannot but consider it as the centre of wisdom and piety, to which the best and wisest men of every land must be continually resorting." " There are some nations," said Imlac, " that send few visitants to Palestine : for many numerous and learned sects in Europe concur to censure pilgrimage as superstitious, or deride it as ridiculous." " You know," said the Prince, "how little my life has made me acquainted with diversity of opinions ; it will be too long to hear the arguments on both sides ; you, that have con- sidered them, tell me the result." "Pilgrimage," said Imlac, " like many other acts of piety, may be reasonable or superstitious, according to the principles upon which it is performed. Long journeys in search of truth are not commanded. Truth, such as is necessary to the regulation of life, is always found where it is honestly sought. Change of place is no natural cause of the increase of piety, for it inevitably produces dissipation of mind. Yet, since men go every day to view the fields where great actions have been performed, and return with stronger impressions of the event, curiosity of the same kind may naturally dispose us to view that country whence our religion had its beginning, and I believe no man surveys those awful scenes without some con- firmation of holy resolutions. That the Supreme Being may be more easily propitiated in one place than in another, is the dream of idle superstition ; but that some places may operate upon our own minds in an uncommon manner, is an opinion which hourly experience will justify. He who supposes that his vices may be more successfully combated 202 R ASS EL AS. in Palestine will perhaps find himself mistaken; yet he may go thither without folly : he who thinks they will be more freely pardoned, dishonours at once his reason and religion." "These," said the Prince, "are European distinctions. I will consider them another time. What have you found to be the effect of knowledge ? Are those nations happier than we?" " There is so much infelicity," said the poet, " in the world, that scarce any man has leisure from his own distresses to estimate the comparative happiness of others. Knowledge is certainly one of the means of pleasure, as is confessed by the natural desire which every mind feels of increasing its ideas. Ignorance is mere privation, by which nothing can be produced ; it is a vacuity in which the soul sits motion- less and torpid for want of attraction ; and, without knowing why, we always rejoice when we learn, and grieve when we forget. I am therefore inclined to conclude that if nothing counteracts the natural consequence of learning, we grow more happy as our minds take a wider range. " In enumerating the particular comforts of life we shall find many advantages on the side of the Europeans. They cure wounds and diseases with which we languish and perish. We suffer inclemencies of weather which they can obviate. They have engines for the despatch of many laborious works, which we must perform by manual industry. There is such communication between distant places, that one friend can hardly be said to be absent from another. Their policy removes ail public inconveniences : they have roads cut through the mountains, and bridges laid over their rivers. And, if we descend to the privacies of life, their habitations are more commodious, and their possessions are more secure." " They are surely happy," said the Prince, " who have all these conveniences, of which I envy none so much as the facility with which separated friends interchange their thoughts." " The Europeans," answered Imlac, " are less unhappy RASSELAS. 203 than we, but they are not happy. Human life is every- where a state in which much is to be endured and little to be enjoyed." CHAPTER XII. The Story of Imlac (continued}. "I AM not willing," said the Prince, "to suppose that happiness is so parsimoniously distributed to mortals ; nor can I believe but that, if I had the choice of life, I should be able to fill every day with pleasure. I would injure no man, and should provoke no resentments : I would relieve every distress, and should enjoy the benedictions of grati- tude. I would choose my friends among the wise, and my wife among the virtuous; and therefore should be in no danger from treachery or unkindness. My children should by my care be learned and pious, and would repay to my age what their childhood had received. What would dare to molest him who might call on every side to thousands enriched by his bounty or assisted by his power ? And why should not life glide away in the soft reciprocation of protection and reverence ? All this may be done without the help of European refinements, which appear by their effects to be rather specious than useful. Let us leave them, and pursue our journey." " From Palestine," said Imlac, " I passed through many regions of Asia ; in the more civilized kingdoms as a trader, and among the barbarians of the mountains as a pilgrim. At last I began to long for my native country, that I might repose, after my travels and fatigues, in the places where I had spent my earliest years, and gladden my old companions with the recital of my adventures. Often did I figure to myself those with whom I had sported away the gay hours of dawning life, sitting round me in its evening, wondering at my tales and listening to my counsels. '' When this thought had taken possession of my mind I 204 RASSELAS. considered every moment as wasted which did not bring me nearer to Abyssinia. I hastened into Egypt, and, notwith- standing my impatience, was detained ten months in the contemplation of its ancient magnificence, and in inquiries after the remains of its ancient learning. I found in Cairo a mixture of all nations ; some brought thither by the love of knowledge, some by the hope of gain, many by the desire of living after their own manner without observation, and of lying hid in the obscurity of multitudes : for in a city populous as Cairo it is possible to obtain at the same time the gratifications of society and the secrecy of solitude. " From Cairo I travelled to Suez, and embarked on the Red Sea, passing along the coast till I arrived at the port from which I had departed twenty years before. Here I joined myself to a caravan, and re-entered my native country. " I now expected the caresses of my kinsmen and the congratulations of my friends ; and was not without hope that my father, whatever value he had set upon riches, would own with gladness and pride a son who was able to add to the felicity and honour of the nation. But I was soon convinced that my thoughts were vain. My father had been dead fourteen years, having divided his wealth among my brothers, who were removed to some other provinces. Of my companions, the greater part was in the grave ; of the rest, some could with difficulty remember me, and some considered me as one corrupted by foreign manners. "A man used to vicissitudes is not easily dejected. I forgot, after a time, my disappointment, and endeavoured to recommend myself to the nobles of the kingdom : they admitted me to their tables, heard my story, and dismissed me. I opened a school, and was prohibited to teach. I then resolved to sit down in the quiet of domestic life, and addressed a lady that was fond of my conversation, but rejected my suit because my father was a merchant. RASSELAS. 205 " Wearied at last with solicitation and repulses, I resolved to hide myself for ever from the world, and depend no longer on the opinion or caprice of others. I waited for the time when the gate of the Happy Valley should open, that I might bid farewell to hope and fear : the day came ; my performance was distinguished with favour, and I resigned myself with joy to perpetual confinement." " Hast thou here found happiness at last ? " said Rasselas. " Tell me without reserve : art thou content with thy con- dition ? or dost thou wish to be again wandering and inquiring? All the inhabitants of this valley celebrate their lot, and at the annual visit of the Emperor invite others to partake of their felicity." " Great Prince," said Imlac, ll I shall speak the truth : I know not one of all your attendants who does not lament the hour when he entered this retreat. I am less unhappy than the rest, because I have a mind replete with images, which I can vary and combine at pleasure. I can amuse my solitude by the renovation of the knowledge which begins to fade from my memory, and by recollection of the accidents of my past life. Yet all this ends in the sorrowful consideration that my acquirements are now useless, and that none of my pleasures can be again enjoyed. The rest, whose minds have no impression but of the present moment, are either corroded by malignant passions, or sit stupid in the gloom of perpetual vacancy." "What passions can infest those," said the Prince, " who have no rivals ? We are in a place where impotence precludes malice, and where all envy is repressed by com- munity of enjoyments." " There may be community," said Imlac, " of material possessions, but there can never be community of love or of esteem. It must happen that one will please more than another : he that knows himself despised will always be envious ; and still more envious and malevolent if he is condemned to live in the presence of those who despise him. 206 RASSELAS. The invitations by which they allure others to a state which they feel to be wretched proceed from the natural malignity of hopeless misery. They are weary of themselves and of each other, and expect to find relief in new companions. They envy the liberty which their folly has forfeited, and would gladly see all mankind imprisoned like themselves. " From this crime, however, I am wholly free. No man can say that he is wretched by my persuasion. I look with pity on the crowds who are annually soliciting admission to captivity, and wish that it were lawful for me to warn them of their danger." " My dear Imlac," said the Prince, " I will open to thee my whole heart. I have long meditated an escape from the Happy Valley. I have examined the mountain on every side, but find myself insuperably barred : teach me the way to break my prison ; thou shalt be the companion of my flight, the guide of my rambles, the partner of my fortune, and my sole director in the choice of life." " Sir," answered the poet, "your escape will be difficult, and perhaps you may soon repent your curiosity. The world, which you figure to yourself smooth and quiet as the lake in the valley, you will find a sea foaming with tempests and boiling with whirlpools ; you will be sometimes overwhelmed by the waves of violence, and sometimes dashed against the rocks of treachery. Amidst wrongs and frauds, competi- tions and anxieties, you will wish a thousand times for these seats of quiet, and willingly quit hope to be free from fear." u Do not seek to deter me from my purpose," said the Prince. " I am impatient to see what thou hast seen ; and since thou art thyself weary of the valley, it is evident that thy former state was better than this. Whatever be the consequence of my experiment, I am resolved to judge with mine own eyes of the various conditions of men, and then to make deliberately my choice of life" " I am afraid," said Imlac, " you are hindered by stronger restraints than my persuasions ; yet, if your determination RASSELAS. 207 is fixed, I do not counsel you to despair. Few things are impossible to diligence and skill." CHAPTER XIII. fiasselas discovers the Means. of Escape. THE Prince now dismissed his favourite to rest j but the narrative of wonders and novelties filled his mind with per- turbation. He revolved all that he had heard, and prepared innumerable questions for the morning. Much of his uneasiness was now removed. He had a friend to whom he could impart his thoughts, and whose experience could assist him in his designs. His heart was no longer condemned to swell with silent vexation. He thought that even the Happy Valley might be endured with such a companion, and that if they could range the world together, he should have nothing further to desire. In a few days the water was discharged, and the ground dried. The Prince and Imlac then walked out together, to converse without the notice of the rest The Prince, whose thoughts were always on the wing, as he passed by the gate said, with a countenance of sorrow, " Why art thou so strong, and why is man so weak ? " a Man is not weak," answered his companion; "know- ledge is more than equivalent to force. The master of mechanics laughs at strength. I can burst the gate, but cannot do it secretly. Some other expedient must be tried." As they were walking on the side of the mountain they observed that the coneys, which the rain had driven from their burrows, had taken shelter among the bushes, and formed holes behind them, tending upwards in an oblique line. " It has been the opinion of antiquity," said Imlac, " that human reason borrowed many arts from the instinct of animals ; let us therefore not think ourselves degraded by learning from the coney. We may escape by piercing the mountain in the same direction. We will besrin where the 2 o8 RASSELAS. summit hangs over the middle part, and labour upward till we shall issue out beyond the prominence." The eyes of the Prince, when he heard this proposal, sparkled with joy. The execution was easy and the success certain. No time was now lost. They hastened early in the morning to choose a place proper for their mine. They clambered with great fatigue among crags and brambles, and returned without having discovered any part that favoured their design. The second and the third day were spent in the same manner, and with the same frustration ; but on the fourth they found a small cavern concealed by a thicket, where they resolved to make their experiment. Imlac procured instruments proper to hew stone and remove earth, and they fell to their work on the next day with more eagerness than vigour. They were presently exhausted by their efforts, and sat down to pant upon the grass. The Prince for a moment appeared to be dis- couraged. " Sir," said his companion, " practice will enable us to continue our labour for a longer time. Mark, however, how far we have advanced, and ye will find that our toil will sometime have an end. Great works are per- formed not by strength, but perseverance ; yonder palace was raised by single stones, yet you see its height and spa- ciousness. He that shall walk with vigour three hours a day will pass in seven years a space equal to the circum- ference of the globe." They returned to their work day after day, and in a short time found a fissure in the rock, which enabled them to pass far with very little obstruction. This Rasselas considered as a good omen. " Do not disturb your mind," said Imlac, <; with other hopes or fears than reason may suggest : if you are pleased with the prognostics of good, you will be terrified likewise with tokens of evil, and your whole life will be a prey to superstition. Whatever facilitates our work is more an pmen ; it is a cause of success, This is one of those RASSELAS. 209 pleasing surprises which often happen to active resolution. Many things difficult to design prove easy to performance." CHAPTER XIV. Rasselas and Imlac receive an Unexpected Visit. THEY had now wrought their way to the middle, and solaced their toil with the approach of liberty, when the Prince, coming down to refresh himself with air, found his sister Nekayah standing at the mouth of the cavity. He started, and stood confused, afraid to tell his design, and yet hope- less to conceal it. A few moments determined him to re- pose on her fidelity, and secure her secrecy by a declaration without reserve. " Do not imagine," said the Princess, " that I came hither as a spy. I had long observed from my window that you and Imlac directed your walk every day towards the same point, but I did not suppose you had any better reason for the preference than a cooler shade or more fragrant bank, nor followed you with any other design than to partake of your conversation. Since, then, not suspicion but fondness has detected you, let me not lose the advantage of my discovery. I am equally weary of confinement with yourself, and not less desirous of knowing what is done or suffered in the world. Permit me to fly with you from this tasteless tranquillity, which will yet grow more loathsome when you have left me. You may deny me to accompany you, but cannot hinder me from following." The Prince, who loved Nekayah above his other sisters, had no inclination to refuse her request, and grieved that he had lost an opportunity of showing his confidence by a voluntary communication. It was therefore agreed that she should leave the valley with them ; and that in the mean- time she should watch, lest any other straggler should, by chance or curiosity, follow them to the mountain. At length their labour was at an end- They saw light 210 RASSELAS. beyond the prominence, and issuing to the top of the moun- tain, beheld the Nile, yet a narrow current, wandering beneath them. The Prince looked round with rapture, anticipated all the pleasures of travel, and in thought was already transported beyond his father's dominions. Imlac, though very joyful at his escape, had less expectation of pleasure in the world, which he had before tried and of which he had been weary. Rasselas was so much delighted with a wider horizon that he could not soon be persuaded to return into the valley. He informed his sister that the way was now open, and that nothing now remained but to prepare for their departure. CHAPTER XV. The Prince and Princess leave the Valley ', and see many Wonders. THE Prince and Princess had jewels sufficient to make them rich whenever they came into a place of commerce, which, by Imlac's direction, they hid in their clothes, and on the night of the next full moon all left the valley. The Prin- cess was followed only by a single favourite, who did not know whither she was going. They clambered through the cavity, and began to go down on the other side. The Princess and her maid turned their eyes toward every part, and seeing nothing to bound their prospect, considered themselves in clanger of being lost in a dreary vacuity. They stopped and trembled. " I am almost afraid," said the Princess, " to begin a journey of which I cannot perceive an end, and to venture into this immense plain, where I may be approached on every side by men whom I never saw." The Prince felt nearly the same emotions, though he thought it more manly to con- ceal them. Imlac smiled at their terrors, and encouraged them to proceed. But the Princess continued irresolute till she had been imperceptibly drawn forward too far to return. RASSELAS. 2ii In the morning they found some shepherds in the field, who set some milk and fruits before them. The Princess wondered that she did not see a palace ready for her recep- tion and a table spread- with delicacies ; but being faint and hungry, she drank the milk and ate the fruits, and thought them of a higher flavour than the products of the valley. They travelled forward by easy journeys, being all un- accustomed to toil and difficulty, and knowing that, though they might be missed, they could not be pursued. In a few days they came into a more populous region, where Imlac was diverted with the admiration which his com- panions expressed at the diversity of manners, stations, and employments. Their dress was such as might not bring upon them the suspicion of having anything to conceal ; yet the Prince, wherever he came, expected to be obeyed, and the Princess was frighted because those who came into her presence did not prostrate themselves. Imlac was forced to observe them with great vigilance, lest they should betray their rank by their unusual behaviour, and detained them several weeks in the first village to accustom them to the sight of common mortals. By degrees the royal wanderers were taught to understand that they had for a time laid aside their dignity, and were to expect only such regard as liberality and courtesy could procure. And Imlac having by many admonitions pre- pared them to endure the tumults of a port and the rugged- ness of the commercial race, brought them down to the sea-coast. The Prince and his sister, to whom everything was new, were gratified equally at all places, and therefore remained for some months at the port without any inclination to pass further. Imlac was content with their stay, because he did not think it safe to expose them, unpractised in the world, to the hazards of a foreign country. At last he began to fear lest they should be discovered, and proposed to fix a day for their departure. They had no 2ia RASSELAS. pretensions to judge for themselves, and referred the whole scheme to his direction. He therefore took passage in a ship to Suez, and, when the time came, with great difficulty prevailed on the Princess to enter the vessel. They had a quick and prosperous voyage, and from Suez travelled by land to Cairo. CHAPTER XVI. They enter Cairo, and find every Man happy. As they approached the city, which filled the strangers with astonishment, " This," said Imlac to the Prince, " is the place where travellers and merchants assemble from all corners of the earth. You will here find men of every cha- racter and every occupation. Commerce is here honour- able. I will act as a merchant, and you shall live as strangers who have no other end of travel than curiosity ; it will soon be observed that we are rich. Our reputation will procure us access to all whom we shall desire to know ; you shall see all the conditions of humanity, and enable yourselves at leisure to make your choice of life" They now entered the town, stunned by the noise and offended by the crowds. Instruction had not yet so pre- vailed over habit but that they wondered to see themselves pass undistinguished along the streets, and met by the lowest of the people without reverence or notice. The Princess could not at first bear the thought of being levelled with the vulgar, and for some time continued in her chamber, where she was served by her favourite Pekuah, as in the palace of the valley. Imlac, who understood traffic, sold part of the jewels the next day, and hired a house, which he adorned with such magnificence that he was immediately considered as a merchant of great wealth. His politeness attracted many acquaintances, and his generosity made him courted by many dependants. His companions, not being able to mix in the conversation, could make no discovery of their R ASS EL AS. 213 ignorance or surprise, and were gradually initialed in the world as they gained knowledge of the language. The Prince had by frequent lectures been taught the use and nature of money ; but the ladies could not for a long time comprehend what the merchants did with small pieces of gold and silver, or why things of so little use should be received as an equivalent to the necessaries of life. They studied the language two years, while Imlac was preparing to set before them the various ranks and conditions of mankind. He grew acquainted with all who had any- thing uncommon in their fortune or conduct. He frequented the voluptuous and the frugal, the idle and the busy, the merchants and the men of learning. The Prince now being able to converse with fluency, and having learned the caution necessary to be observed in his intercourse with strangers, began to accompany Imlac to places of resort, and to enter into all assemblies, that he might make his choice of life. For some time he thought choice needless, because all appeared to him really happy. Wherever he went he met gaiety and kindness, and heard the song of joy or the laugh of carelessness. He began to believe that the world over- flowed with universal plenty, and that nothing was withheld either from want or merit ; that every hand showered libe- rality and every heart melted with benevolence : " And who then," says he, "will be suffered to be wretched?" Imlac permitted the pleasing delusion, and was unwilling to crush the hope of inexperience : till one day, having sat a while silent, " I know not," said the Prince, " what can be the reason that I am more unhappy than any of our friends. I see them perpetually and unalterably cheerful, but feel my own mind restless and uneasy. I am unsatisfied with those pleasures which I seem most to court. I live in the crowds of jollity, not so much to enjoy company as to shun myself, and am only loud and merry to concearmy sadness." " Every man," said Imlac, " may by examining his own 214 RASSELAS. mind guess what passes in the mkids of others. When you feel that your own gaiety is counterfeit, it may justly lead you to suspect that of your companions not to be sincere. Envy is commonly reciprocal. We are long before we are con- vinced that happiness is never to be found, and each believes it possessed by others, to keep alive the hope of obtaining it for himself. In the assembly where you passed the last night there appeared such sprightliness of air and volatility of fancy as might have suited beings of a higher order, formed to inhabit serener regions, inaccessible to care or sorrow ; yet, believe me, Prince, there was not one who did not dread the moment when solitude should deliver him to the tyranny of reflection." " This," said the Prince, " may be true of others since it is true of me ; yet, whatever be the general infelicity of man, one condition is more happy than another, and wisdom surely directs us to take the least evil in the choice of life." "The causes of good and evil," answered Imlac, "are so various and uncertain, so often entangled with each other, so diversified by various relations, and so much subject to accidents which cannot be foreseen, that he who would fix his condition upon incontestible reasons of preference must live and die inquiring and deliberating." " But, surely," said Rasselas, " the wise men, to whom we listen with reverence and wonder, chose that mode of life for themselves which they thought most likely to make them happy." " Very few," said the poet, " live by choice. Every man is placed in the present condition by causes which acted without his foresight, and with which he did not always willingly co-operate ; and therefore you will rarely meet one who does not think the lot of his neighbour better than his own." "I am pleased to think," said the Prince, " that my birth has given me at least one advantage over others by enabling me to determine for myself. I have here the world before RASSELAS. 215 me. I will review it at leisure : surely happiness is some- where to be found." CHAPTER XVII. The Prince associates with. Young Men of Spirit and Gaiety. RASSELAS rose next day, and resolved to begin his experi- ments upon life. " Youth," cried he, " is the time of glad- ness : I will join myself to the young men whose only business is to gratify their desires, and whose time is all spent in a succession of enjoyments." To such societies he was readily admitted, but a few days brought him back weary and disgusted. Their mirth was without images, their laughter without motive; their pleasures were gross and sensual, in which the mind had no part ; their conduct was at once wild and mean they laughed at order and at law, but the frown of power dejected and the eye of wisdom abashed them. The Prince soon concluded that he shonld never be happy in a course of life of which he was ashamed. He thought it unsuitable to a reasonable being to act without a plan, and to be sad or cheerful only by chance. " Happi- ness," said he, " must be something solid and permanent, without fear and without uncertainty." But his young companions had gained so much of his re- gard by their frankness and courtesy that he could not leave them without warning and remonstrance. " My friends," said he, " I have seriously considered our manners and our prospects, and find that we have mistaken our own interest The first years of man must make provision for the last. He that never thinks, never can be wise. Perpetual levity must end in ignorance, and intemperance, though it may fire the spirits for an hour, will make life short or miserable. Let us consider that youth is of no long duration, and that in mature age, when the enchantments of fancy shall cease, and phantoms of delight dance no more about us, we shall have 216 RASSELAS. no comforts but the esteem of wise men and the means of doing good. Let us therefore stop while to stop is in our power : let us live as men who are some time to grow old, and to whom it will be the most dreadful of all evils to count their past years by follies, and to be reminded of their former luxuriance of health only by the maladies which riot has produced." They stared awhile in silence one upon another, and at last drove him away by a general chorus of continued laughter. The consciousness that his sentiments were just and his intention kind was scarcely sufficient to support him against the horror of derision. But he recovered his tranquillity and pursued his search. CHAPTER XVIII. 7"he Prince finds a Wise and Happy Man. As he was one day walking in the street he saw a spacious building which all were by the open doors invited to enter. He followed the stream of people, and found ita hall or school of declamation, in which professors read lectures to their auditory. He fixed his eye upon a sage raised above the rest, who discoursed with great energy on the government of the passions. His look was venerable, his action graceful, his pronunciation clear, and his diction elegant. He showed with great strength of sentiment and variety of illustration that human nature is degraded and debased when the lower faculties predominate over the higher ; that when fancy, the parent of passion, usurps the dominion of the mind, nothing ensues but the natural effect of unlawful government, perturb- ation, and confusion ; that she betrays the fortresses of the intellect to rebels, and excites her children to sedition against their lawful sovereign. He compared reason to the sun, of which the light is constant, uniform, and lasting ; and fancy to a meteor, of bright but transitory lustre, irregular in its motion and delusive in its direction, ZASS2LAS. 217 He then communicated the various precepts given from time to time for the conquest of passion, and displayed the happiness of those who had obtained the important victory, after which man is no longer the slave of fear nor the fool of hope ; is no more emaciated by envy, inflamed by anger, emasculated by tenderness, or depressed by grief; but walks on calmly through the tumults or privacies of life, as the sun pursues alike his course through the calm or the stormy sky. He enumerated many examples of heroes immovable by pain or pleasure, who looked with indifference on those modes or accidents to which the vulgar give the names of good and evil. He exhorted his hearers to lay aside their prejudices, and arm themselves against the shafts of malice or misfortune, by invulnerable patience : concluding that this state only was happiness, and that this happiness was in every one's power. Rasselas listened to him with the veneration due to the instructions of a superior being, and waiting for him at the door, humbly implored the liberty of visiting so great a master of true wisdom. The lecturer hesitated a moment, when Rasselas put a purse of gold into his hand, which he received with a mixture of joy and wonder. " I have found," said the Prince at his return to Imlac, " a man who can teach all that is necessary to be known ; who, from the unshaken throne of rational fortitude, looks down on the scenes of life changing beneath him. He speaks, and attention watches his lips. He reasons, and conviction closes his periods. This man shall be my future guide : I will learn his doctrines and imitate his life." " Be not too hasty," said Imlac, " to trust or to admire the teachers of morality : they discourse like angels, but they live like men." Rasselas, who could not conceive how any man could reason so forcibly without feeling the cogency of his own arguments, paid his visit in a few days, and was denied 218 RASSELAS. admission. He had now learned the power of money, and made his way by a piece of gold to the inner apartment, where he found the philosopher in a room half darkened, with his eyes misty and his face pale. " Sir," said he, "you are come at a time when all human friendship is useless ; what I suffer cannot be remedied, what I have lost cannot be supplied. My daughter, my only daughter, from whose tenderness I expected all the comforts of my age, died last night of a fever. My views, my purposes, my hopes are at an end : I am now a lonely being, disunited from society." "Sir," said the Prince, "mortality is an event by which a wise man can never be surprised : we know that death is always near, and it should therefore always be expected." " Young man/' answered the philosopher, " you speak like one that has never felt the pangs of separation." " Have you then forgot the precepts," said Rasselas, " which you so powerfully enforced ? Has wisdom no strength to arm the heart against calamity ? Consider that external things are naturally variable, but truth and reason are always the same." " What comfort," said the mourner, " can truth and reason afford me ? Of what effect are they now, but to tell me that my daughter will not be restored ? " The Prince, whose humanity would not suffer him to insult misery with reproof, went away, convinced of the emptiness of rhetorical sounds, and the inefficacy of polished periods and studied sentences. CHAPTER XIX. A Glimpse of Pastoral Life. HE was still eager upon the same inquiry ; and having heard of a hermit that lived near the lowest cataract of the Nile, and filled the whole country with the fame of his sanctity, resolved to visit his retreat, and inquire whether that felicity which public life could not afford was to be found in RASSELAS. 219 solitude, and whether a man whose age and virtue made him venerable could teach any peculiar art of shunning evils or enduring them. Imlac and the Princess agreed to accompany him, and after the necessary preparations, they began their journey. Their way lay through the fields, where shepherds tended their flocks and the lambs were playing upon the pasture. " This," said the poet, " is the life which has been often celebrated for its innocence and quiet; let us pass the heat of the day among the shepherds' tents, and know whether all our searches are not to terminate in pastoral simplicity." The proposal pleased them ; and they induced the shep- herds, by small presents and familiar questions, to tell the opinion of their own state. They were so rude and ignorant, so little able to compare the good with the evil of the occu- pation, and so indistinct in their narratives and descriptions, that very little could be learned from them. But it was evident that their hearts were cankered with discontent ; that they considered themselves as condemned to labour for the luxury of the rich, and looked up with stupid malevolence towards those that were placed above them. The Princess pronounced with vehemence that she would never suffer these envious savages to be her companions, and that she should not soon be desirous of seeing any more specimens of rustic happiness ; but could not believe that all the accounts of primeval pleasures were fabulous, and was in doubt whether life had anything that could be justly preferred to the placid gratification of fields and woods. She hoped that the time would come when, with a few virtuous and elegant companions, she should gather flowers planted by her own hands, fondle the lambs of her own ewe, and listen without care, among brooks and breezes, to one of her maidens reading in the shade. 220 RASSELAS. CHAPTER XX. The Danger of Prosperity. ON the next day they continued their journey till the heat compelled them to look round for shelter. At a small dis- tance they saw a thick wood, which they no sooner entered than they perceived that they were approaching the habita- tions of men. The shrubs were diligently cut away to open walks where the shades were darkest ; the boughs of oppo- site trees were artificially interwoven seats of flowery turf were raised in vacant spaces ; and a rivulet that wantoned along the side of a winding path had its banks sometimes opened into small basins, and its stream sometimes obstructed by little mounds of stone heaped together to increase its murmurs. They 'passed slowly through the wood, delighted with such unexpected accommodations, and entertained each other with conjecturing what or who he could be that in those rude and unfrequented regions had leisure and art for such harmless luxury. As they advanced they heard the sound of music, and saw youths and virgins dancing in the grove ; and going still farther beheld a stately palace built upon a hill sur- rounded by woods. The laws of Eastern hospitality allowed them to enter, and the master welcomed them like a man liberal and wealthy. He was skilful enough in appearances soon to discern that they were no common guests, and spread his table with magnificence. The eloquence of Imlac caught his atten- tion, and the lofty courtesy of the Princess excited his respect. When they offered to depart, he entreated their stay, and was the next day more unwilling to dismiss them than before. They were easily persuaded to stop, and civility grew up in time to freedom and confidence. The Prince now saw all the domestics cheerful and all the face of nature smiling round the place, and could not RASSELAS. 221 forbear to hope that he should find here what he was seek- ing ; but when he was congratulating the master upon his possessions he answered with a sigh, " My condition has indeed the appearance of happiness, but appearances are delusive. My prosperity puts my life in danger : the Bassa of Egypt is my enemy, incensed only by my wealth and popularity. I have been hitherto protected against him by the princes of the country ; but as the favour of the great is uncertain, I know not how soon my defenders may be per- suaded to share the plunder with the Bassa. I have sent my treasures into a distant country, and upon the first alarm am prepared to follow them. Then will my enemies riot in my mansion, and enjoy the gardens which I have planted." They all joined in lamenting his danger and deprecating his exile ; and the Princess was so much disturbed with the tumult of grief and indignation that she retired to her apart- ment. They continued with their kind inviter a few days longer, and then went to find the hermit. CHAPTER XXI. The Happiness of Solitude. The Hermits History. THEY came on the third day, by the direction of the peasants, to the hermit's cell. It was a cavern in the side of a mountain, overshadowed with palm trees, at such a distance from the cataract that nothing more was heard than a gentle uniform murmur, such as composes the mind to pensive meditation, especially when it was assisted by the wind whistling among the branches. The first rude essay of nature had been so much improved by human labour that the cave contained several apartments appropriated to dif- ferent uses, and often afforded lodging to travellers whom darkness or tempests happened to overtake. The hermit sat on a bench at the door, to enjoy the coolness of the evening. On one side lay a book with 222 RASSELAS. pens and paper, on the other mechanical instruments of various kinds. As they approached him unregarded, the Princess observed that he had not the countenance of a man that had found or could teach the way to happiness. They saluted him with great respect, which he repaid like a man not unaccustomed to the forms of Courts. " My children," said he, " if you have lost your way, you shall be willingly supplied with such conveniences for the night as this cavern will afford. I have all that nature requires, and you will not expect delicacies in a hermit's cell." They thanked him ; and, entering, were pleased with the neatness and regularity of the place. The hermit set flesh and wine before them, though he fed only upon fruits and water. His discourse was cheerful without levity, and pious without enthusiasm. He soon gained the esteem of his guests, and the Princess repented her hasty censure. At last Imlac began thus : " I do not now wonder that your reputation is so far extended : we have heard at Cairo of your wisdom, and came hither to implore your direction for this young man and maiden in the choice of life" " To him that lives well," answered the hermit, " every form of life is good; nor can I give any other rule for choice than to remove all apparent evil." "He will most certainly remove from evil," said the Prince, " who shall devote himself to that solitude which you have recommended by your example." " I have indeed lived fifteen years in solitude," said the hermit, " but have no desire that my example should gain any imitators. In my youth I professed arms, and was raised by degrees to the highest military rank. I have traversed wide countries at the head of my troops, and seen many battles and sieges. At last, being disgusted by the preferments of a younger officer, and feeling that my vigour was beginning to decay, I resolved to close my life in peace, having found the world full of snares, discord, and misery. I had once escaped from the pursuit of the enemy by the R ASS EL AS. 223 shelter of this cavern, and therefore chose it for my final residence. I employed artificers to form it into chambers, and stored it with all that I was likely to want. "For some time after my retreat I rejoiced like a tempest-beaten sailor at his entrance into the harbour, being delighted with the sudden change of the noise and hurry of war to stillness and repose. When the pleasure of novelty went away, I employed my hours in examining the plants which grow in the valley, and the minerals which I collected from the rocks. But that inquiry is now grown tasteless and irksome. I have been for some time unsettled and distracted : my mind is disturbed with a thousand perplexities of doubt and vanities of imagination, which hourly prevail upon me, because I have no opportunities of relaxation or diversion. I am sometimes ashamed to think that I could not secure myself from vice but by retiring from the exercise of virtue, and begin to suspect that I was rather impelled by resent- ment than led by devotion into solitude. My fancy riots in scenes of folly, and I lament that I have lost so much, and have gained so little. In solitude, if I escape the example of bad men, I want likewise the counsel and conversation of the good. I have been long comparing the evils with the advantages of society, and resolve to return into the world to-morrow. The life of a solitary man will be certainly miserable, but not certainly devout." They heard his resolution with surprise, but after a short pause offered to conduct him to Cairo. He dug up a con- siderable treasure which he had hid among the rocks, and accompanied them to the city, on which, as he approached it, he gazed with rapture. CHAPTER XXIL The Happiness of a Life led according to Nature. RASSELAS went often to an assembly of learned men, who met at stated times to unbend their minds and compare 224 R ASS EL A3. their opinions. Their manners were somewhat coarse, but their conversation was instructive, and their disputations acute, though sometimes too violent, and often continued till neither controvertist remembered upon what question he began. Some faults were almost general among them : every one was pleased to hear the genius or knowledge of another depreciated. In this assembly Rasselas was relating his interview with the hermit, and the wonder with which he heard him cen- sure a course of life which he had so deliberately chosen and so laudably followed. The sentiments of the hearers were various. Some were of opinion that the folly of his choice had been justly punished by condemnation to per- petual perseverance. One of the youngest among them, with great vehemence, pronounced him a hypocrite. Some talked of the right of society to the labour of individuals, and considered retirement as a desertion of duty. Others readily allowed that there was a time when the claims of the public were satisfied, and when a man might properly sequester himself, to review his life and purify his heart. One, who appeared more affected with the narrative thaq the rest, thought it likely that the hermit would in a few years go back to his retreat, and perhaps, if shame did not restrain or death intercept him, return once more from his retreat into the world. " For the hope of happiness," said he, " is so strongly impressed, that the longest experience is not able to efface it. Of the present state, whatever it be, we feel arid are forced to confess the misery ; yet when the same state is again at a distance, imagination paints it as desirable. But the time will surely come when desire will no longer be our torment, and no man shall be wretched but by his own fault. " This," said a philosopher who had heard him with tokens of great impatience, " is the present condition of a wise man. The time is already come when none are wretched but by their own fault. Nothing is more idle than to inquire after RASSELAS. 22 $ happiness which nature has kindly placed within our reach. The way to be happy is to live according to nature, in obedience to that universal and unalterable law with which every heart is originally impressed ; which is not written on it by precept, but engraven by destiny; not instilled by education, but infused at our nativity. He that lives accord- ing to nature will suffer nothing from the delusions of hope or importunities of desire ; he will receive and reject with equability of temper ; and act or suffer as the reason of things shall alternately prescribe. Other men may amuse themselves with subtle definitions or intricate ratiocination. Let them learn to be wise by easier means : let them observe the hind of the forest and the linnet of the grove : let them consider the life of animals, whose motions are regulated by instinct ; they obey their guide, and are happy. Let us therefore at length cease to dispute, and learn to live : throw away the encumbrance of precepts, which they who utter them with so much pride and pomp do not under- stand, and carry with us this simple and intelligible maxim : that deviation from nature is deviation from happiness." When he had spoken he looked round him with a placid air, and enjoyed the consciousness of his own beneficence. "Sir," said the Prince with great modesty, "as I, like all the rest of mankind, am desirous of felicity, my closest attention has been fixed upon your discourse : I doubt not the truth of a position which a man so learned has so con- fidently advanced. Let me only know what it is to live according to nature." " When I find young men so humble and so docile," said the philosopher, " I can deny them no information which my studies have enabled me to afford. To live according to nature is to act always with due regard to the fitness arising from the relations and qualities of causes and effects ; to concur with the great and unchangeable scheme of universal felicity; to co-operate with the general disposition and tendency of the present system of things." 226 RASSELAS. The Prince soon found that this was one of the sages whom he should understand less as he heard him longer. He therefore bowed and was silent ; and the philosopher, supposing him satisfied and the rest vanquished, rose up and departed with the air of a man that had co-operated with the present system. CHAPTER XXIII. The Prince and his Sister divide between them the Work of Observation. RASSELAS returned home full of reflections, doubting how to direct his future steps. Of the way to happiness he found the learned and simple equally ignorant ; but as he was yet young, he flattered himself that he had time remain- ing for more experiments and further inquiries. He com- municated to Imlac his observations and his doubts, but was answered by him with new doubts and remarks that gave him no comfort. He therefore discoursed more fre- quently and freely with his sister, who had yet the same hope with himself, and always assisted him to give some reason why, though he had been hitherto frustrated, he might succeed at last. "We have hitherto," said she, " known but little of the world ; we have never yet been either great or mean. In our own country, though we had royalty, we had no power ; and in this we have not yet seen the private recesses of domestic peace. Imlac favours not our search, lest we should in time find him mistaken. We will divide the task between us ; you shall try what is to be found in the splen- dour of Courts, and I will range the shades of humbler life. Perhaps command and authority may be the supreme blessings, as they afford the most opportunities of doing good ; or perhaps what this world can give may be found in the modest habitations of middle fortune too low for great designs, and too high for penury and distress." RASSELAS. 227 CHAPTER XXIV. The Prince examines the Happiness of high Stations. RASSELAS applauded the design, and appeared next day with a splendid retinue at the Court of the Bassa. He was soon distinguished for his magnificence, and admitted, as a Prince whose curiosity had brought him from distant coun- tries, to an intimacy with the great officers and frequent conversation with the Bassa himself. He was at first inclined to believe that the man must be pleased with his own condition whom all approached with reverence and heard with obedience, and who had the power to extend his edicts to a whole kingdom. " There can be no pleasure," said he, " equal to that of feeling at once the joy of thousands all made happy by wise adminis- tration. Yet, since by the law of subordination this sublime delight can be in one nation but the lot of one, it is surely reasonable to think that there is some satisfaction more popular and accessible, and that millions can hardly be subjected to the will of a single man, only to fill his particular breast with incommunicable content." These thoughts were often in his mind, and he found no solution of the difficulty. But as presents and civilities gained him more familiarity, he found that almost every man who stood high in his employment hated all the rest and was hated by them, and that their lives were a continual succession of plots and detections, stratagems and escapes, faction and treachery. Many of those who surrounded the Bassa were sent only to watch and report his conduct : every tongue was muttering censure, and every eye was searching for a fault. At last the letters of revocation arrived : the Bassa was carried in chains to Constantinople, and his name was men- tioned no more. " What are we now to think of the prerogatives of power ? " said Rasselas to his sister ; " is it without efficacy to good ? 228 RASSZLAS. or is the subordinate degree only dangerous, and the supreme safe and glorious ? Is the Sultan the only happy man in his dominions ? or is the Sultan himself subject to the torments of suspicion and the dread of enemies ? " In a short time the second Bassa was deposed. The Sultan that had advanced him was murdered by the Janis- saries, and his successor had other views or different favourites. CHAPTER XXV. The Princess pursues her Inquiry with more Diligence than Success. THE Princess in the meantime insinuated herself into many families ; for there are few doors through which liberality, joined with good humour, cannot find its way. The daughters of many houses were airy and cheerful ; but Nekayah had been too long accustomed to the conversation of Imlac and her brother to be much pleased with childish levity and prattle which had no meaning. She found their thoughts narrow, their wishes low, and their merriment often artificial. Their pleasures, poor as they were, could not be preserved pure, but were embittered by petty competitions and worthless emulation. They were always jealous of the beauty of each other, of a quality to which solicitude can add nothing, and from which detraction can take nothing away. Many were in love with triflers like themselves, and many fancied that they were in love when in truth they were only idle. Their affection was not fixed on sense or virtue, and therefore seldom ended but in vexation. Their grief, how- ever, like their joy, was transient ; everything floated in their mind unconnected with the past or future, so that one desire easily gave way to another, as a second stone, cast into the water, effaces and confounds the circles of the first/ With these girls she played as with inoffensive animals, and found them proud of her countenance and weary of her company. RASSELAS. 22$ But her purpose was to examine more deeply, and her affability easily persuaded the hearts that were swelling with sorrow to discharge their secrets in her ear, and those whom hope flattered or prosperity delighted often courted her to partake their pleasure. The Princess and her brother commonly met in the evening in a private summer-house on the banks of the Nile, and related to each other the occurrences of the day. As they were sitting together the Princess cast her eyes upon the river that flowed before her. "Answer," said she, " great father of waters, thou that rollest thy floods through eighty nations, to the invocations of the daughter of thy native king. Tell me if thou waterest through all thy course a single habitation from which thou dost not hear the murmurs of complaint." " You are then," said Rasselas, not more successful in private houses than I have been in Courts." "I have, since the last partition of our provinces," said the Princess, " en- abled myself to enter familiarly into many families, where there was the fairest show of prosperity and peace, and know not one house that is not haunted by some fury that de- stroys their quiet. " I did not seek ease among the poor, because I concluded that there it could not be found. But I saw many poor whom I had supposed to live in affluence. Poverty has in large cities very different appearances. It is often concealed iu splendour and often in extravagance. It is the care of a very great part of mankind to conceal their indigence from the rest. They support themselves by temporary expe- dients, and every day is lost in contriving for the morrow. " This, however, was an evil which, though frequent, I saw with less pain, because I could relieve it. Yet some have refused my bounties, more offended with my quickness to detect their wants than pleased with my readiness to succour them ; and others, whose exigences compelled them to admit my kindness, have never been able to forgive their 230 RASSELAS. benefactress. Many, however, have been sincerely grateful without the ostentation of gratitude or the hope of other favours." CHAPTER XXVI. The Princess continues her Remarks iipon Private Life. NEKAYAH, perceiving her brother's attention fixed, proceeded in her narrative. " In families where there is or is not poverty there is com- monly discord. If a kingdom be, as Imlac tells us, a great family, a family likewise is a little kingdom, torn with fac- tions and exposed to revolutions. An unpractised observer expects the love of parents and children to be constant and equal. But this kindness seldom continues beyond the years of infancy ; in a short time the children become rivals to their parents. Benefits are allowed by reproaches, and gratitude debased by envy. " Parents and children seldom act in concert ; each child endeavours to appropriate the esteem or the fondness of the parents ; and the parents, with yet less temptation, betray each other to their children. Thus some place their confidence in the father and some in the mother, and by degrees the house is filled with artifices and feuds. " The opinions of children and parents, of the young and the old, are naturally opposite, by the contrary effects of hope and despondency, of expectation and experience, without crime or folly on either side. The colours of life in youth and age appear different, as the face of nature in spring and winter. And how can children credit the assertions of parents which their own eyes show them to be false ? " Few parents act in such a manner as much to enforce theii maxims' by the credit of their lives. The old man trusts wholly to slow contrivance and gradual progression ; the youth expects to force his way by genius, vigour, and precipitance. The old man pays regard to riches, and the youth reverences virtue. The old man deifies prudence ; RASSELAS. 231 the youth commits himself to magnanimity and chance. The young man, who intends no ill, believes that none is intended, and therefore acts with openness and candour ; but his father, having suffered the injuries of fraud, is im- pelled to suspect and too often allured to practise it. Age looks with anger on the temerity of youth, and youth with contempt on the scrupulosity of age. Thus parents and children for the greatest part live on to love less and less ; and if those whom nature has thus closely united are the torments of each other, where shall we look for tenderness and consolation ? " " Surely," said the Prince, " you must have been unfor- tunate in your choice of acquaintance. I am unwilling to believe that the most tender of all relations is thus impeded in its effects by natural necessity." " Domestic discord," answered she, " is not inevitably and fatally necessary ; but yet it is not easily avoided. We seldom see that a whole family is virtuous : the good and the evil cannot well agree, and the evil can yet less agree with one another. Even the virtuous fall sometimes to variance, when their virtues are of different kinds and tend- ing to extremes. In general, those parents have most re- verence who most deserve it ; for he that lives well cannot be despised. " Many other evils infest private life. Some are the slaves of servants whom they have trusted with their affairs. Some are kept in continual anxiety by the caprice of rich relations, whom they cannot please and dare not offend. Some husbands are imperious, and some wives per- verse ; and, as it is always more easy to do evil than good, though the wisdom or virtue of one can very rarely make many happy, the folly or vice of one makes many miserable." " If such be the general effect of marriage," said the Prince, " I shall for the future think it dangerous to connect rny interest with that of another, lest I should be unhappy by my partner's fault." 232 RASSELAS. " I have met," said the Princess, " with many who live single for that reason ; but I never found that their pru- dence ought to raise envy. They dream away their time without friendship, without fondness, and are driven to rid themselves of the day, for which they have no use, by childish amusements or vicious delights. They act as beings under the constant sense of some known inferiority, that fills their minds with rancour and their tongues with censure. They are peevish at home and malevolent abroad ; and, as the outlaws of human nature, make it their business and their pleasure to disturb that society which debars them from its privileges. To live without feeling or exciting sympathy, to be fortunate without adding to the felicity of others, or afflicted without tasting the balm of pity, is a state more gloomy than solitude ; it is not retreat but exclusion from mankind. Marriage has many pains, but celibacy has no pleasures." " What then is to be done?" said Rasselas. "The more we inquire the less we can resolve. Surely he is most likely to please himself that has no other inclination to regard." CHAPTER XXVII. Disquisition upon Greatness, THE conversation had a short pause. The Prince, having considered his sister's observation, told her that she had surveyed life with prejudice, and supposed misery where she did not find it. " Your narrative," says he, " throws yet a darker gloom upon the prospects of futurity. The predic- tions of Imlac were but faint sketches of the evils painted by Nekayah. I have been lately convinced that quiet is not the daughter of grandeur or of power ; that her presence is not to be bought by wealth nor enforced by conquest. It is evident that as any man acts in a wider compass, he must be more exposed to opposition from enmity, or miscarriage from chance. Whoever has many to please or to govern KASSELAS. 233 must use the ministry of many agents, some of wnom will be wicked and some ignorant ; by some he will be misled and by others betrayed. If he gratifies one, he will offend another ; those that are not favoured will think themselves injured ; and since favours can be conferred but upon few, the greater number will be always discontented." "The discontent/' said the Princess, "which is thus unreasonable, I hope that I shall always have spirit to despise and you power to repress." " Discontent," answered Rasselas, will not always be without reason under the most just and vigilant adminis- tration of public affairs. None, however attentive, can always discover that merit which indigence or faction may happen to obscure ; and none, however powerful, can always reward it. Yet, he that sees inferior desert advanced above him will naturally impute that preference to partiality or caprice, and indeed it can scarcely he hoped that any man, how- ever magnanimous by nature or exalted by condition, will be able to persist for ever in fixed and inexorable justice of distribution ; he will sometimes indulge his own affections, and sometimes those of his favourites ; he will permit some to please him who can never serve him ; he will discover in those whom he loves qualities which in reality they do not possess ; and to those from whom he receives pleasure he will in his turn endeavour to give it. Thus will recom- mendations sometimes prevail which were purchased by money, or by the more destructive bribery of flattery and servility. " He that hath much to do will do something wrong, and of that wrong must suffer the consequences ; and if it were possible that he should always act rightly, yet when such numbers are to judge of his conduct, the bad will censure and obstruct him by malevolence, and the good sometimes by mistake. " The highest stations cannot therefore hope to be the abodes of happiness, which I would willingly believe to have 234 RASSELAS. fled from thrones and palaces to seats of humble privacy and placid obscurity. For what can hinder the satisfaction or intercept the expectations of him whose abilities are adequate to his employments, who sees with his own eyes the whole circuit of his influence, who chooses by his own knowledge all whom he trusts, and whom none are tempted to deceive by hope or fear ? Surely he has nothing to do but to love and to be loved, to be virtuous and to be happy." " Whether perfect happiness would be procured by perfect goodness," said Nekayah, " this world will never afford an opportunity of deciding. But this, at least, may be main- tained, that we do not always find visible happiness in pro- portion to visible virtue. All natural and almost all political evils are incident alike to the bad and good : they are confounded in the misery of a famine, and not much dis- tinguished in the fury of a faction ; they sink together in a tempest, and are driven together from their country by in- vaders. All that virtue can afford is quietness of conscience, and a steady prospect of a happier state : this may enable us to endure calamity with patience, but remember that patience must suppose pain." CHAPTER XXVIII. Rasselas and Nekayah continue their Conversation. " DEAR PRINCESS," said Rasselas, "you fall into the com- mon errors of exaggeratory declamation, by producing in a familiar disquisition examples of national calamities and scenes of extensive misery which are found in books rather than in the world, and which, as they are horrid, are ordained to be rare. Let us not imagine evils which we do not feel, nor injure life by misrepresentations. I cannot bear that querulous eloquence which threatens every city with a siege like that of Jerusalem, that makes famine attend on every flight of locusts, and suspends pestilence on the wing of every blast that issues from the south. RASSELAS. 235 " On necessary and" inevitable evils which overwhelm kingdoms at once, all disputation is vain : when they hap- pen they must be endured. But it is evident that these bursts of universal distress are more dreaded than felt : thousands and tens of thousands flourish in youth and wither in age, without the knowledge of any other than domestic evils, and share the same pleasures and vexations, whether their kings are mild or cruel, whether the armies of their country pursue their enemies or retreat before them. While courts are disturbed with intestine competitions, and ambas- sadors are negotiating in foreign countries, the smith still plies his anvil, and the husbandman drives his plough for- ward ; the necessaries of life are required and obtained, and the successive business of the season continues to make its wonted revolutions. " Let us cease to consider what perhaps may never happen, and what, when it shall happen, will laugh at human speculation. We will not endeavour to modify the motions of the elements or to fix the destiny of kingdoms. It is our business to consider what beings like us may perform, each labouring for his own happiness, by pro- moting within his circle, however narrow, the happiness of others. " Marriage is evidently the dictate of nature ; men and women were made to be the companions of each other ; and therefore I cannot be persuaded but that marriage is one of the means of happiness." " I know not," said the Princess, " whether marriage be more than one of the innumerable modes of human misery. When I see and reckon the various forms of connubial infe- licity, the unexpected causes of lasting discord, the diversi- ties of temper, the oppositions of opinion, the rude collisions of contrary desire where both are urged by violent impulses, the obstinate contest of disagreeing virtues where both are supported by consciousness of good intention, I am some- times disposed to think, with the severer casuists of most 236 RASSELAS. nations, that marriage is rather permitted than approved, and that none, but by the instigation of a passion too much indulged, entangle themselves with indissoluble compact." " You seem to forget," replied Rasselas, " that you have, even now, represented celibacy as less happy than marriage. Both conditions may be bad, but they cannot both be worse. Thus it happens, when wrong opinions are entertained, that they mutually destroy each other, and leave the mind open to truth." " I did not expect," answered the Princess, " to hear that imputed to falsehood which is the consequence only of frailty. To the mind, as to the eye, it is difficult to com- pare with exactness objects vast in their extent and various in their parts. When we see or conceive the whole at once, we readily note the discriminations and decide the prefer- ence ; but of two systems, of which neither can be surveyed by any human being in its full compass of magnitude and multiplicity of complication, where is the wonder that, judging of the whole by parts, I am alternately affected by one and the other as either presses on my memory or fancy ? We differ from ourselves just as we differ from each other when we see only part of the question, as in the multifarious rela- tions of politics and morality ; but when we perceive the whole at once, as in numerical computations, all agree in one judgment, and none ever varies in his opinion." " Let us not add," said the Prince, " to the other evils of life the bitterness of controversy, nor endeavour to vie with each other in subtilties of argument. We are employed in a search of which both are equally to enjoy the success or suffer by the miscarriage ; it is therefore fit that we assist each other. You surely conclude too hastily from the infe- licity of marriage against its institution ; will not the misery of life prove equally that life cannot be the gift of Heaven ? The world must be peopled by marriage or peopled with- out it." " How the world is tp be peopled," returned Nekayah, RASSELAS. 237 " is not my care, and need not be yours. I see no danger that the present generation should omit to leave successors behind them ; we are not now inquiring for the world, but for ourselves." CHAPTER XXIX. The Debate on Marriage (continued). 11 THE good of the whole," says Rasselas, " is the same with the good of all its parts. If marriage be best for mankind, it must be evidently best for individuals ; or a permanent and necessary duty must be the cause of evil, and some must be inevitably sacrificed to the convenience of others. In the estimate which you have made of the two states it appears that the incommodities of a single life are in a great measure necessary and certain, but those of the conjugal state accidental and avoidable. I cannot forbear to flatter myself that prudence and benevolence will make marriage happy. The general folly of mankind is the cause of general complaint. What can be expected but disappointment and repentance from a choice made in the immaturity of youth, in the ardour of desire, without judgment, without foresight, without inquiry after conformity of opinions, similarity of manners, rectitude of judgment, or purity of sentiment? " Such is the common process of marriage. A youth and maiden, meeting by chance or brought together by artifice, exchange glances, reciprocate civilities, go home and dream of one another. Having little to divert attention or diversify thought, they find themselves uneasy when they are apart, and therefore conclude that they shall be happy together. They marry, and discover what nothing but voluntary blind- ness before had concealed ; they wear out life in altercations, and charge nature with cruelty. " From those early marriages proceeds likewise the rivalry of parents and children : the son is eager to enjoy the world before the father is willing to forsake it, and there is hardly 238 RASSELAS. room at once for two generations. The daughter begins to bloom before the mother can be content to fade, and neither can forbear to wish for the absence of the other. " Surely all these evils may be avoided by that delibera- tion and delay which prudence prescribes to irrevocable choice. In the variety and jollity of youthful pleasures, life may be well enough supported without the help of a partner. Longer time will increase experience, and wider views will allow better opportunities of inquiry and selection : one ad- vantage at least will be certain, the parents will be visibly older than their children." " What reason cannot collect," said Nekayah, " and what experiment has not yet taught, can be known only from the report of others. I have been told that late marriages are not eminently happy. This is a question too important to be neglected ; and I have often proposed it to those whose accuracy of remark and comprehensiveness of knowledge made their suffrages worthy of regard. They have generally determined that it is dangerous for a man and woman to suspend their fate upon each other at a time when opinions are fixed and habits are established, when friendships have been contracted on both sides, when life has been planned into method, and the mind has long enjoyed the contempla- tion of its own prospects. "It is scarcely possible that two travelling through the world under the conduct of chance should ha\ e been both directed to the same path, and it will not often happen that either will quit the track which custom has made pleasing. When the desultory levity of youth has settled into regularity, it is soon succeeded by pride ashamed to yield, or obstinacy delighting to contend. And even though mutual esteem produces mutual desire to please, time itself, as it modifies unchangeably the external mien, determines likewise the direction of the passions and gives an inflexible rigidity to the manners. Long customs are not easily broken ; he that attempts to change the course of his own life very often RASSELAS. 239 labours in vain, and how shall we do that for others which we are seldom able to do for ourselves ? " " But surely," interposed the Prince, " you suppose the chief motive of choice forgotten or neglected. Whenever I shall seek a wife, it shall be my first question whether she be willing to be led by reason ? " "Thus it is," said Nekayah, "that philosophers are deceived. There are a thousand familiar disputes which reason never can decide ; questions that elude investiga- tion, and make logic ridiculous ; cases where something must be done, and where little can be said. Consider the state of mankind, and inquire how few can be supposed to act upon any occasions, whether small or great, with all the reasons of action present to their minds. Wretched would be the pair, above all names of wretchedness, who should.be doomed to adjust by reason, every morning, all the minute details of a domestic day. "Those who marry at an advanced age will probably escape the encroachments of their children, but in the diminution of this advantage they will be likely to leave them, ignorant and helpless, to a guardian's mercy ; or if that should not happen, they must at least go out of the world before they see those whom they love best either wise or great. " From their children, if they have less to fear, they have less also to hope ; and they lose without equivalent the joys of early love, and the convenience of uniting with manners pliant and minds susceptible of new impressions, which might wear away their dissimilitudes by long cohabitation, as soft bodies by continual attrition conform their surfaces to each other. " I believe it will be found that those who marry late are best pleased with their children, and those who marry early with their partners." i( The union of these two affections," said Rasselas, " would produce all that could be wished. Perhaps there is 240 RASSELAS. a time when marriage might unite them a time neither too early for the father nor too late for the husband." " Every hour," answered the Princess, " confirms my pre- judice in favour of the position so often uttered by the mouth of Imlac, that ' Nature sets her gifts on the right hand and on the left.' Those conditions which flatter hope and attract desire are so constituted that as we approach one we recede from another. There are goods so opposed that we cannot seize both, but by too much prudence may pass between them at too great a distance to reach either. This is often the fate of long consideration : he does nothing who endeavours to do more than is allowed to humanity. Flatter not yourself with contrarieties of pleasure. Of the blessings set before you make your choice, and be content. No man can taste the fruits of autumn while he is delighting his scent with the flowers of the spring ; no man can at the same time fill his cup from the source and from the mouth of the Nile." CHAPTER XXX. Imlac enters, and changes the Conversation. HERE Imlac entered, and interrupted them. "Imlac," said Rasselas, " I have been taking from the Princess the dismal history of private life, and am almost discouraged from further search." " It seems to me," said Imlac, " that while you are making the choice of life you neglect to live. You wander about a single city, which, however large and diversified, can now afford few novelties, and forget that you are in a country famous among the earliest monarchies for the power and wisdom of its inhabitants ; a country where the sciences first dawned that illuminate the world, and beyond which the arts cannot be traced of civil society or domestic life. " The old Egyptians have left behind them monuments of industry and power before which all European magnificence is confessed to fade away. The ruins of their architecture RASSELAS. 241 are the schools of modern builders, and from the wonders which time has spared we may conjecture, though uncer- tainly, what it has destroyed." " My curiosity," said Rasselas, " does not very strongly lead me to survey piles of stone or mounds of earth. My business is with man. I came hither, not to measure frag- ments of temples or trace choked aqueducts, but to look upon the various scenes of the present world." " The things that are now before us," said the Princess, require attention, and deserve it What have I to do with the heroes or the monuments of ancient times with times which can never return, and heroes whose form of life was different from all that the present condition of mankind requires or allows ? " " To know anything," returned the poet, " we must know its effects ; to see men, we must see their works, that we may learn what reason has dictated or passion has excited, and find what are the most powerful motives of action. To judge rightly of the present, we must oppose it to the past ; for all judgment is comparative, and of the future nothing can be known. The truth is, that no mind is much employed upon the present : recollection and anticipation fill up almost all our moments. Our passions are joy and grief, love and hatred, hope and fear. Of joy and grief the past is the object; and the future, of hope and fear : even love and hatred respect the past, for the cause must have been before the effect " The present state of things is the consequence of the former ; and it is natural to inquire what were the sources of the good that we enjoy, or the evils that we suffer. If we act only for ourselves, to neglect the study of history is not prudent. If we are entrusted with the care of others, it is not just. Ignorance, when it is voluntary, is criminal ; and he may properly be charged with evil who refused to learn how he might prevent it. " There is no part of history so generally useful as that 242 RASSELAS. which relates to the progress of the human mind, the gradual improvement of reason, the successive advances of science, the vicissitudes of learning and ignorance, which are the light and darkness of thinking beings, the extinction and resuscitation of arts, and the revolutions of the intellectual world. If accounts of battles and invasions are peculiarly the business of princes, the useful or elegant arts are not to be neglected ; those who have kingdoms to govern have understandings to cultivate. " Example is always more efficacious than precept. A soldier is formed in war, and a painter must copy pictures. In this, contemplative life has the advantage. Great actions are seldom seen, but the labours of art are always at hand for those who desire to -know what art has been able to perform. "When the eye or the imagination is struck with any uncommon work, the next transition of an active mind is to the means by which it was performed. Here begins the true use of such contemplation. We enlarge our compre- hension by new ideas, and perhaps recover some art lost to mankind, or learn what is less perfectly known in our own country. At least we compare our own with former times, and either rejoice at our improvements, or, what is the first motion towards good, discover our defects." " I am willing," said the Prince, " to see all that can deserve my search." " And I," said the Princess, " shall rejoice to learn something of the manners of antiquity." 11 The most pompous monument of Egyptian greatness, and one of the most bulky works of manual industry," said Imlac, " are the Pyramids : fabrics raised before the time of history, and of which the earliest narratives afford us only uncertain traditions. Of these the greatest is still standing, very little injured by time." " Let us visit them, to-morrow," said Nekayah. " I have often heard of the Pyramids, and shall not rest till I have seen them, within and without, with my own eyes." RASSELAS. 243 CHAPTER XXXI. They visit the Pyramids. THE resolution being thus taken, they set out the next day. Thc'y laid tents upon their camels, being resolved to stay among the Pyramids till their curiosity was fully satisfied. They travelled gently, turned aside to everything remarkable, stopped from time to time and conversed with the inhabi- tants, and observed the various appearances of towns ruined and inhabited, of wild and cultivated nature. When they came to the Great Pyramid they were astonished at the extent of the base and the height of the top. Imlac explained to them the principles upon which the pyramidal form was chosen for a fabric intended to co-extend its dura- tion with that of the world : he showed that its gradual diminution gave it such stability as defeated all the common attacks of the elements, and could scarcely be overthrown by earthquakes themselves,the least resistible of natural violence. A concussion that should shatter the pyramid would threaten the dissolution of the continent. They measured all its dimensions, and pitched their tents at its foot. Next day they prepared to enter its interior apartments, and having hired the common guides, climbed up to the first passage ; when the favourite of the Princess, looking into the cavity, stepped back and trembled. " Pekuah," said the Princess, " of what art thou afraid ? " " Of the narrow entrance," answered the lady, " and of the dreadful gloom. I dare not enter a place which must surely be inhabited by unquiet souls. The original possessors of these dreadful vaults will start up before us, and perhaps shut us in for ever." She spoke, and threw her arms round the neck of her mistress. " If all your fear be of apparitions," said the Prince, " I will promise you safety. There is no danger from the dead : he that is once buried will be seen no more." "That the dead are seen no more," said Imlac, "I will 244 RASSELAS. not undertake to maintain against the concurrent and unvaried testimony of all ages and of all nations. There is no people, rude or learned, among whom apparitions of the dead are not related and believed. This opinion, which perhaps prevails as far as human nature is diffused, could become universal only by its truth : those that never heard of one another would not have agreed in a tale which nothing but experience can make credible. That it is doubted by single cavillers can very little weaken the general evidence, and some who deny it with their tongues confess it by their fears. " Yet I do not mean to add new terrors to those which have already seized upon Pekuah. There can be no reason why spectres should haunt the Pyramid more than other places, or why they should have power or will to hurt innocence and purity. Our entrance is no violation of their privileges : we can take nothing from them ; how, then, can we offend them? " " My dear Pekuah," said the Princess, " I will always go before you, and Imlac shall follow you. Remember that you are the companion of the Princess of Abyssinia." " If the Princess is pleased that her servant should die," returned the lady, " let her command some death less dreadful than enclosure in this horrid cavern. You know I dare not disobey you I must go if you command me ; but if I once enter, I never shall come back." The Princess saw thai her fear was too strong for ex- postulation or reproof, and, embracing her, told her that she should stay in the tent till their return. Pekuah was not yet satisfied, but entreated the Princess not to pursue so dreadful a purpose as that of entering the recesses of the Pyramids. " Though I cannot teach courage," said Ne- kayah, " I must not learn cowardice, nor leave at last undone what I came hither only to do." RASSELAS 245 CHAPTER XXXII. They enter the Pyramid. PEKUAH descended to the tents, and the rest entered the Pyramid. They passed through the galleries, surveyed the vaults of marble, and examined the chest in which the body of the founder is supposed to have been deposited. They then sat down in one of the most spacious chambers to rest awhile, before they attempted to return. " We have now," said Imlac, " gratified our minds with an exact view of the greatest work of man, except the wall of China. " Of the wall it is very easy to assign the motive. It secured a wealthy and timorous nation from the incursions of barbarians, whose unskilfulness in the arts made it easiel for them to supply their wants by rapine than by industry) and who from time to time poured in upon the inhabitants of peaceful commerce as vultures descend upon domestic fowl. Their celerity and fierceness made the wall necessary, and their ignorance made it efficacious. "But for the Pyramids no reason has ever been given adequate to the cost and labour of the work. The narrow- ness of the chambers proves that it could afford no retreat from enemies, and treasures might have been reposited at far less expense with equal security. It seems to have been erected only in compliance with that hunger of imagination which preys incessantly upon life, and must be always appeased by some employment. Those who have already all that they can enjoy must enlarge their desires. He that has built for use till use is supplied, must begin to build for vanity, and extend his plan to the utmost power of human performance that he may not be soon reduced to form another wish. " I consider this mighty structure as a monument of the insufficiency of human enjoyments. A king whose power i unlimited, and whose treasures surmount all real and 246 RASSELAS. imaginary wants, is compelled to solace, by the erection of a pyramid, the satiety of dominion and tastelessness of pleasures, and to amuse the tediousness of declining life by seeing thousands labouring without end, and one stone, for no purpose, laid upon another. Whoever thou art that, not content with a moderate condition, imaginest happiness in royal magnificence, and dreamest that command or riches can feed the appetite of novelty with perpetual gratifications, survey the Pyramids, and confess thy folly ! " CHAPTER XXXIII. 77ie Princess meets -with an iinexpected Misfortune. THEY rose up, and returned through the cavity at which they had entered; and the Princess prepared for her favourite a long narrative of dark labyrinths and costly rooms, and of the different impressions which the varieties of the way had made upon her. But when they came to their train, they found every one silent and dejected: the men discovered shame and fear in their countenances, and the women were weeping in their tents. What had happened they did not try to conjecture, but immediately inquired. "You had scarcely entered into the Pyramid," said one of the attendants, " when a troop of Arabs rushed upon us : we were too few to resist them, and too slow to escape. They were about to search the tents, set us on our camels, and drive us along before them, when the approach of some Turkish horsemen put them to flight : but they seized the Lady Pekuah with her two maids, and carried them away : the Turks are now pursuing them by our instigation, but I fear they will not be able to overtake them." The Princess was overpowered with surprise and grief. Rasselas, in the first heat of his resentment, ordered his servants to follow him, and prepared to pursue the robbers with his sabre in his hand. " Sir," said Imlac, " what can RASSELAS. 247 you hope from violence or valour ? The Arabs are mounted on horses trained to battle and retreat ; we have only beasts of burden. By leaving our present station we may lose the Princess, but cannot hope to regain Pekuah." In a short time the Turks returned, having not been able to reach the enemy. The Princess burst out into new lamentations, and Rasselas could scarcely forbear to reproach them with cowardice ; but Imlac was of opinion that the escape of the Arabs was no addition to their misfortune, for perhaps they would have killed their captives rather than have resigned them. CHAPTER XXXIV. They return to Cairo "without Pekuak, THERE was nothing to be hoped from longer stay. They returned to Cairo, repenting of their curiosity, censuring the negligence of the government, lamenting their own rashness, which had neglected to procure a guard, imagining many expedients by which the loss of Pekuah might have been prevented, and resolving to do something for her recovery, though none could find anything proper to be done. Nekayah retired to her chamber, where her women at- tempted to comfort her by telling her that all had their troubles, and that Lady Pekuah had enjoyed much happiness in the world for a long time, and might reasonably expect a change of fortune. They hoped that some good would befall her wheresoever she was, and that their mistress would find another friend who might supply her place. The Princess made them no answer ; and they continued the form of condolence, not much grieved in their hearts that the favourite Avas lost. Next day the Prince presented to the Bassa a memorial of the wrong which he had suffered, and a petition for redress. The Bassa threatened to punish the robbers, but did not attempt to catch them; nor indeed could any 248 RASSELAS. account or description be given by which he might direct the pursuit. It soon appeared that nothing would be done by authority. Governors being accustomed to hear of more crimes than they can punish, and more wrongs than they can redress, set themselves at ease by indiscriminate negligence, and presently forget the request when they lose sight of the petitioner. Imlac then endeavoured to gain some intelligence by private agents. He found many who pretended to an exact knowledge of all the haunts of the Arabs, and to regular correspondence with their chiefs, and who readily undertook the recovery of Pekuah. Of these, some were furnished with money for their journey, and came back no more; some were liberally paid for accounts which a few days dis- covered to be false. But the Princess would not suffer any means, however improbable, to be left untried. While she was doing something, she kept her hope alive. As one expedient failed, another was suggested ; when one mes- senger returned unsuccessful, another was despatched to a different quarter. Two months had now passed, and of Pekuah nothing had been heard ; the hopes which they had endeavoured to raise in each other grew more languid ; and the Princess, when she saw nothing more to be tried, sunk down inconsolable in hopeless dejection. A thousand times she reproached herself with the easy compliance by which she permitted her favourite to stay behind her. " Had not my fondness," said she, " lessened my authority, Pekuah had not dared to talk of her terrors. She ought to have feared me more than spectres. A severe look would have overpowered her ; a peremptory command would have compelled obedience. Why did foolish indulgence prevail upon me ? Why did I not speak, and refuse to hear ? " " Great Princess," said Imlac, " do not reproach yourself for your virtue, or consider that as blameable by which evil RASSELAS. 249 has accidentally been caused. Your tenderness for the timidity of Pekuah was generous and kind. When we act according to our duty, we commit the events to Him by whose laws our actions are governed, and who will suffer none to be finally punished for obedience. When, in prospect of some good, whether natural or moral, we break the rules prescribed us, we withdraw from the direction of superior wisdom, and take all consequences upon ourselves. Man cannot so far know the connection of causes and events as that he may venture to do wrong in order to do right. When we pursue our end by lawful means, we may always console our miscarriage by the hope of future recompense. When we consult only our own policy, and attempt to find a nearer way to good by overleaping the settled boundaries of right and wrong, we cannot be happy even by success, because we cannot escape the consciousness of our fault ; but if we miscarry, the disappointment is irremediably embittered. How comfortless is the sorrow of him who feels at once the pangs of guilt and the vexation of calamity which guilt has brought upon him. " Consider, Princess, what would have been your condi- tion if the Lady Pekuah had entreated to accompany you, and, being compelled to stay in the tents, had been carried away j or how would you have borne the thought if you had forced her into the Pyramid, and she had died before you in agonies of terror ? " " Had either happened," said Nekayah, " I could not have endured life till now ; I should have been tortured to madness by the remembrance of such cruelty, or must have pined away in abhorrence of myself." "This, at least," said Imlac, "is the present reward of virtuous conduct, that no unlucky consequence can oblige us to repent it." 250 RASSELAS. CHAPTER XXXV. 77ie Princess languishes for want of Pekttah. NEKAYAH, being thus reconciled to herself, found that no evil is insupportable but that which is accompanied with consciousness of wrong. She was from that time delivered from the violence of tempestuous sorrow, and sunk into silent pensiveness and gloomy tranquillity. She sat from morning to evening recollecting all that had been done or said by her Pekuah, treasured up with care every trifle on which Pekuah had set an accidental value, and which might recall to mind any little incident or careless conversation. The sentiments of her whom she now expected to see no more were treasured in her memory as rules of life, and she deliberated to no other end than to conjecture on any occasion what would have been the opinion and counsel of Pekuah. The women by whom she was attended knew nothing of her real condition, and therefore she could not talk to them but with caution and reserve. She began to remit her curiosity, having no great desire to collect notions which she had no convenience of uttering. Rasselas endeavoured first to comfort and afterwards to divert her; he hired musicians, to whom she seemed to listen, but did not hear them ; and procured masters to instruct her in various arts, whose lectures, when they visited her again, were again to be repeated. She had lost her taste of pleasure and her ambition of excellence ; and her mind, though forced into short excursions, always recurred to the image of her friend. Imlac was every morning earnestly enjoined to renew his inquiries, and was asked every night whether he had yet heard of Pekuah ; till, not being able to return the Princess the answer that she desired, he was less and less willing to come into her presence. She observed his backwardness, and commanded him to attend her. " You are not," said she, " to confound impatience with resentment, or to sup- RASSELAS. 25 1 pose that I charge you with negligence because I repine at your unsuccessfulness. I do not much wonder at your absence. I know that the unhappy are never pleasing, and that all naturally avoid the contagion of misery. To hear complaints is wearisome alike to the wretched and the happy ; for who would cloud by adventitious grief the short gleams of gaiety which life allows us ? or who that is struggling under his own evils will add to them the miseries of another ? " The time is at hand when none shall be disturbed any longer by the sighs of Nekayah : my search after happiness is now at an end. I am resolved to retire from the world, with all its flatteries and deceits, and will hide myself in solitude, without any other care than to compose my thoughts and regulate my hours by a constant succession of innocent occupations, till, with a mind purified from earthly desires, I shall enter into that state to which all are hasten- ing, and in which I hope again to enjoy the friendship of Pekuah." " Do not entangle your mind," said Imlac, by irrevocable determinations, nor increase the burden of life by a voluntary accumulation of misery. The weariness of retirement will continue to increase when the loss of Pekuah is forgot. That you have been deprived of one pleasure is no very good reason for rejection of the rest." " Since Pekuah was taken from me," said the Princess, "I have no pleasure to reject or to retain. She that has no one to love or trust has little to hope. She wants the radical principle of happiness. We may perhaps allow that what satisfaction this world can afford must arise from the con- junction of wealth, knowledge, and goodness. Wealth is nothing but as it is bestowed, and knowledge nothing but as it is communicated. They must therefore be imparted to others, and to whom could I now delight to impart them ? Goodness affords the only comfort which can be enjoyed without a partner, and goodness may be practised in retirement. 252 RASSELAS. " How far solitude may admit goodness Or advance it, I shall not/' replied Imlac, "dispute at present. Remember the confession of the pious hermit. You will wish to return into the world when the image of your companion has left your thoughts." " That time." said Nekayah, " will never come. The generous frankness, the modest obsequiousness, and the faithful secrecy of my dear Pekuah will always be more missed as I shall live longer to see vice and folly." " The state of a mind oppressed with a sudden calamity," said Imlac, " is like that of the fabulous inhabitants of the new-created earth, who, when the first night came upon them, supposed that day would never return. When the clouds of sorrow gather over us, we see nothing beyond them, nor can imagine how they will be dispelled ; yet a new day succeeded to the night, and sorrow is never long without a dawn of ease. But they who restrain themselves from receiving comfort do as the savages would have done had they put out their eyes when it was dark. Our minds, like our bodies, are in continual flux ; something is hourly lost, and something acquired. To lose much at once is inconvenient to either, but while the vital power remains uninjured, nature will find the means of reparation. Distance has the same effect on the mind as on the eye : and while we glide along the stream of time, whatever we leave behind us is always lessening, and that which we approach increasing in magnitude. Do not suffer life to stagnate : it will grow muddy for want of motion ; commit yourself again to the current of the world ; Pekuah will vanish by degrees ; you will meet in your way some other favourite, or learn to diffuse yourself in general conversation." "At least," said the Prince, "do not despair before all remedies have been tried. The inquiry after the unfortunate lady is still continued, and shall be carried on with yet greater diligence, on condition that you will promise to wait a year for the event, without any unalterable resolution." Nekayah thought this a reasonable demand, and made the KASSELAS. 253 promise to her brother, who had been obliged by Imlac to require it. Imlac had, indeed, no great hope of regaining Pekuah ; but he supposed that if he could secure the interval of a year, the Princess would be then in no danger of a cloister. CHAPTER XXXVI. Ptkiiak is still remembered. The Progress of Sorrow. N ERA YAH, seeing that nothing was omitted for the recovery of her favourite, and having by her promise set her intention of retirement at a distance, began imperceptibly to return to common cares and common pleasures. She rejoiced without her own consent at the suspension of her sorrows, and sometimes caught herself with indignation in the act of turning away her mind from the remembrance of her whom yet she resolved never to forget. She then appointed a certain hour of the day for medita- tion on the merits and fondness of Pekuah, and for some weeks retired constantly at the time fixed, and returned with her eyes swollen and her countenance clouded. By degrees she grew less scrupulous, and suffered any important and pressing avocation to delay the tribute of daily tears. She then yielded to less occasions, and sometimes forgot what she was indeed afraid to remember, and at last wholly released herself from the duty of periodical affliction. Her real love of Pekuah was not yet diminished. A thousand occurrences brought her back to memory, and a thousand wants, which nothing but the confidence of friend- ship can supply, made her frequently regretted. She there- fore solicited Imlac never to desist from inquiry, and to leave no art of intelligence untried, that at least she might have the comfort of knowing that she did not suffer by negligence or sluggishness. " Yet what," said she, " is to be expected from our pursuit of happiness, when we find the state of life to be such that happiness itself is the cause of misery ? Why should we endeavour to attain that of which 254 R ASS EL AS. the possession cannot be secured? I shall henceforward fear to yield my heart to excellence, however bright, or to fondness, however tender, lest I should lose again what I have lost in Pekuah." CHAPTER XXXVII. The Princess hears News of Pekuah. IN seven months one of the messengers who had been sent away upon the day when the promise was drawn from the Princess, returned, after many unsuccessful rambles, from the borders of Nubia, with an account that Pekuah was in the hands of an Arab chief, who possessed a castle or fortress on the extremity of Egypt. The Arab, whose revenue was plunder, was willing to restore her, with her two attendants, for two hundred ounces of gold. The price was no subject of debate. The Princess was in ecstacies when she heard that her favourite was alive, and might so cheaply be ransomed. She could not think of delaying for a moment Pekuah's happiness or her own, but entreated her brother to send back the messenger with the sum required. Imlac being consulted, was not very con- fident of the veracity of the relater, and was still more doubtful of the Arab's faith, who might, if he were too liberally trusted, detain at once the money and the captives. He thought it dangerous to put themselves in the power of the Arab by going into his district ; and could not expect that the rover would so much expose himself as to come into the lower country, where he might be seized by the forces of the Bassa. It is difficult to negotiate where neither will trust. But Imlac, after some deliberation, directed the messenger to propose that Pekuah should be conducted by ten horsemen to the monastery of St. Anthony, which is situated in the deserts of Upper Egypt, where she should be met by the same number, and her ransom should be paid. RASSELAS. 255 That no time might be lost, as they expected that the proposal would not be refused, they immediately began their journey to the monastery ; and when they arrived, Imlac went forward with the former messenger to the Arab's fortress. Rasselas was desirous to go with them; but neither his sister nor Imlac would consent. The Arab, according to the custom of his nation, observed the laws of hospitality with great exactness to those who put themselves into his power, and in a few days brought Pekuah with her maids, by easy journeys, to the place appointed, where, receiving the stipulated price, he restored her, with great respect, to liberty and her friends, and undertook to conduct them back towards Cairo beyond all danger of robbery or violence. The Princess and her favourite embraced each other with transport too violent to be expressed, and went out together to pour the tears of tenderness in secret, and exchange pro- fessions of kindness and gratitude. After a few hours they returned into the refectory of the convent, where, in the presence of the prior and his brethren, the Prince required of Pekuah the history of her adventures. CHAPTER XXXVIII. The Adventures of the Lady Pekiiah. "Ax what time and in what manner I was forced away," said Pekuah, "your servants have told you. The sudden- ness of the event struck me with surprise, and I was at first rather stupefied than agitated with any passion of either fear or sorrow. My confusion was increased by the speed and tumult of our flight, while we were followed by the Turks, who, as it seemed, soon despaired to overtake us, or were afraid of those whom they made a show of menacing. " When the Arabs saw themselves out of danger, they slackened their course ; and as I was less harassed by ex- ternal violence, I began to feel more uneasiness in my mind. 256 RASSELAS. After some time, we stopped near a spring shaded with trees, in a pleasant meadow, where we were set upon the ground, and offered such refreshments as our masters were partaking. I was suffered to sit with my maids apart from the rest, and none attempted to comfort or insult us. Here I first began to feel the full weight of my misery. The girls sat weeping in silence, and from time to time looked on me for succour. I knew not to what condition we were doomed, nor could conjecture where would be the place of our cap- tivity, or whence to draw any hope of deliverance. I was in the hands of robbers and savages, and had no reason to suppose that their pity was more than their justice, or that they would forbear the gratification of any ardour of desire or caprice of cruelty. I, however, kissed my maids, and endeavoured to pacify them by remarking that we were yet treated with decency, and that since we were now carried beyond pursuit, there was no danger of violence to our lives. " When we were to be set again on horseback, my maids clung round me, and refused to be parted ; but I commanded them not to irritate those who had us in their power. We travelled the remaining part of the day through an unfre- quented and pathless country, and came by moonlight to the side of a hill, where the rest of the troop was stationed. Their tents were pitched and their fires kindled, and our chief was welcomed as a man much beloved by his dependants. "We were received into a large tent, where we found women who had attended their husbands in the expedition. They set before us the supper which they had provided, and I ate it rather to encourage my maids than to comply with any appetite of my own. When the meat was taken away, they spread the carpets for repose. I was weary, and hoped to find in sleep that remission of distress which nature seldom denies. Ordering myself, therefore, to be undressed, I observed that the women looked very earnestly upon me, not expecting, I suppose, to see me so submissively attended. When my upper vest was taken off, they were apparently k ASS E LAS. 257 Struck with the splendour of my clothes, and one of them timorously laid her hand upon the embroidery. She then went out, and in a short time came back with another woman, who seemed to be of higher rank and greater authority. She did, at her entrance, the usual act of reverence, and taking me by the hand placed me in a smaller tent, spread with finer carpets, where I spent the night quietly with my maids. " In the morning, as I was sitting on the grass, the chief of the troop came towards me. I rose up to receive him, and he bowed with great respect. 'Illustrious lady,' said he, ' my fortune is better than I had presumed to hope : I am told by my women that I have a princess in my camp.' ' Sir,' answered I, ' your women have deceived themselves and you ; I am not a princess, but an unhappy stranger who intended soon to have left this country, in which I am now to be imprisoned for ever.' ' Whoever or whencesoever you are,' returned the Arab, ' your dress and that of your servants show your rank to be high and your wealth to be great. Why should you, who can so easily procure your ransom, think yourself in danger of perpetual captivity ? The purpose of my incursions is to increase my riches, or, more properly, to gather tribute. The sons of Ishmael are the natural and hereditary lords of this part of the continent, which is usurped by late invaders and low-born tyrants, from whom we are compelled to take by the sword what is denied to justice. The violence of war admits no distinction : the lance that is lifted at guilt and power will sometimes fall on innocence and gentleness.' " ' How little,' said I, ' did I expect that yesterday it should have fallen upon me.' " ' Misfortunes,' answered the Arab, ' should always be expected. If the eye of hostility could learn reverence or pity, excellence like yours had been exempt from injury. But the angels of affliction spread their toils alike' for the virtuous and the wicked, for the mighty and the mean. Do I 258 RASSELAS. not be disconsolate ; I am not one of the lawless and cruel rovers of the desert ; I know the rules of civil life ; I will fix your ransom, give a passport to your messenger, and perform my stipulation with nice punctuality.' "You will easily believe that I was pleased with his courtesy, and finding that his predominant passion was desire for money, I began now to think my danger less, for I knew that no sum would be thought too great for the release of Pekuah. I told him that he should have no reason to charge me with ingratitude if I was used with kindness, and that any ransom which could be expected for a maid of common rank would be paid, but that he must not persist to rate me as a princess. He said he would consider what he should demand, and then, smiling, bowed and retired. " Soon after the women came about me, each contending to be more officious than the other, and my maids themselves were served with reverence. We travelled onward by short journeys. On the fourth day the chief told me that my ransom must be two hundred ounces of gold, which I not only promised him, but told him that I would add fifty more if I and my maids were honourably treated. " I never knew the power of gold before. From that time I was the leader of the troop. The march of every day was longer or shorter as I commanded, and the tents were pitched where I chose to rest. We now had camels and other conveniences for travel ; my own women were always at my side, and I amused myself with observing the manners of the vagrant nations, and with viewing remains of ancient edifices with which these deserted countries appear to have been in some distant age lavishly embellished. " The chief of the band was a man far from illiterate : he was able to travel by the stars or the compass, and had marked in his erratic expeditions such places as are most worthy the notice of a passenger. He observed to me that buildings are always best preserved in places little frequented and difficult of access ; for when once a country declines R ASS EL AS. 259 from its primitive splendour, the more inhabitants are left, the quicker ruin will be made. Walls supply stones more easily than quarries : and palaces and temples will be demolished to make stables of granite and cottages of porphyry.' " CHAPTER XXXIX. The Adventures of Pekuah (continued). '' WE wandered about in this manner for some weeks, either, as our chief pretended, for my gratification, or, as I rather suspected, for some convenience of his own. I endeavoured to appear contented where sullenness and resentment would have been of no use, and that endeavour conduced much to the calmness of my mind ; but my heart was always with Nekayah, and the troubles of the night much overbalanced the amusements of the day. My women, who threw all their cares upon their mistress, set their minds at ease from the time when they saw me treated with respect, and gave them- selves up to the incidental alleviations of our fatigue without solicitude or sorrow. I was pleased with their pleasure, and animated with their confidence. My condition had lost much of its terror, since I found that the Arab ranged the country merely to get riches. Avarice is a uniform and tractable vice : other intellectual distempers are different in different constitutions of mind ; that which soothes the pride of one will offend the pride of another ; but to the favour of the covetous there is a ready way bring money, and nothing is denied. " At last we came to the dwelling of our chief; a strong and spacious house, built with stone in an island of the Nile, which lies, as I was told, under the tropic. ' Lady, said the Arab, ' you shall rest after your journey a few weeks in this place, where you are to consider yourself as sovereign. My occupation is war : I have therefore chosen this obscure residence, from which I can issue unexpected, and to which I can retire unpursued. You may now repose in security : 2 6o RASSELAS. here are few pleasures, but here is no danger.' He then led me into the inner apartments, and seating me on the richest couch, bowed to the ground. " His women, who considered me as a rival, looked on me with malignity ; but being soon informed that I was a great lady detained only for my ransom, they began to vie with each other in obsequiousness and reverence. " Being again comforted with new assurances of speedy liberty, I was for some days diverted from impatience by the novelty of the place. The turrets overlooked the country to a great distance, and afforded a view of many windings of the stream. In the day I wandered from one place to another, as the course of the sun varied the splendour of the prospect, and saw many things which I had never seen before. The crocodiles and river horses are common in this unpeopled region ; and I often looked upon them with terror, though I knew they could not hurt me. For some time I expected to see mermaids and tritons, which, as Imlac has told me, the European travellers have stationed in the Nile ; but no such beings ever appeared, and the Arab, when I inquired after them, laughed at my credulity. " At night the Arab always attended me to a tower set apart for celestial observations, where , he endeavoured to teach me the names and courses of the stars. I had no great inclination to this study ; but an appearance of atten- tion was necessary to please my instructor, who valued himself for his skill, and in a little while I found some employment requisite to beguile the tediousness of time, which was to be passed always amidst the same objects. I was weary of looking in the morning on things from which I had turned away weary in the evening : I therefore was at last willing to observe the stars rather than do nothing, but could not always compose my thoughts, and was very often thinking on Nekayah when others imagined me con- templating the sky. Soon after the Arab went upon another expedition, and then my only pleasure was to talk with my RASSELAS. 261 maids about the accident by which we were carried away, and the happiness we should all enjoy at the end of our captivity." " There were women in your Arab's fortress," said the Princess ; " why did you not make them your companions, enjoy their conversation, and partake their diversions ? In a place where they found business or amusement, why should you alone sit corroded with idle melancholy ? or why could not you bear for a few months that condition to which they were condemned for life ? " " The diversions of the women," answered Pekuah, " were only childish play, by which the mind, accustomed to stronger operations, could not be kept busy. I could do all which they delighted in doing by powers merely sensi- tive, while my intellectual faculties were flown to Cairo. They ran from room to room, as a bird hops from wire to wire in his cage. They danced for the sake of motion, as lambs frisk in a meadow. One sometimes pretended to be hurt that the rest might be alarmed, or hid herself that another might seek her. Part of their time passed in watching the progress of light bodies that floated on the river, and part in marking the various forms into which clouds broke in the sky. "Their business was only needlework, in which I and my maids sometimes helped them ; but you know that the mind will easily straggle from the fingers, nor will you suspect that captivity and absence from Nekayah could receive solace from silken flowers. " Nor v/as much satisfaction to be hoped from their con- versation : for of what could they be expected to talk ? They had seen nothing, for they had lived from early youth in that narrow spot : of what they had not seen they could have no knowledge, for they could not read. They had no idea but of the few things that were within their view, and had hardly names for anything but their clothes and their food. As I bore a superior character, I was often called to 262 RASSELAS. terminate their quarrels, which I decided as equitably as I could. If it could have amused me to hear the complaints of each against the rest, I might have been often detained by long stories ; but the motives of their animosity were so small that I could not listen without interrupting the tale." " How," said Rasselas, " can the Arab, whom you repre- sented as a man of more than common accomplishments, take any pleasure in his seraglio, when it is filled only with women like these? Are they exquisitely beautiful?" "They do not,"' said Pekuah, "want that unaffecting and ignoble beauty which may subsist without sprightliness or sublimity, without energy of thought or dignity of virtue. But to a man like the Arab such beauty was only a flower casually plucked and carelessly thrown away. Whatever pleasures he might find among them, they were not those of friendship or society. When they were playing about him, he looked on them with inattentive superiority : when they vied for his regard, he sometimes turned away disgusted. As they had no knowledge, their talk could take nothing from the tediousness of life : as they had no choice, their fondness, or appearance of fondness, excited in him neither pride nor gratitude. He was not exalted in his own esteem by the smiles of a woman who saw no other man, nor was much obliged by that regard of which he could never know the sincerity, and which he might often perceive to be exerted not so much to delight him as to pain a rival. That which he gave, and they received, as love, was only a careless distribution of superfluous time ; such love as man can bestow upon that which he despises, such as has neither hope nor fear, neither joy nor sorrow." " You have reason, lady, to think yourself happy," said Imlac, " that you have been thus easily dismissed. How could a mind, hungry for knowledge, be willing, in an intellectual famine, to lose such a banquet as Pekuah's conversation ? " " I am inclined to believe," answered Pekuah, "that he &4SSELAS. 263 was for some time in suspense; for notwithstanding Ki c promise, whenever I proposed to despatch a messenger to Cairo he found some excuse for delay. While I was detained in his house he made many incursions into the neighbouring countries, and perhaps he would have refused to discharge me had his plunder been equal to his wishes. He returned always courteous, related his adventures, delighted to hear my observations, and endeavoured to advance my acquaintance with the stars. When I impor- tuned him to send away my letters, he soothed me with professions of honour and sincerity ; and when I could be no longer decently denied, put his troop again in motion, and left me to govern in his absence. I was much afflicted by this studied procrastination, and was sometimes afraid that I should be forgotten ; that you would leave Cairo, and I must end my days in an island of the Nile. "I grew at last hopeless and dejected, and cared so little to entertain him, that he for a while more frequently talked with my maids. That he should fall in love with them, or with me, might have been equally fatal ; and I was not much pleased with the growing friendship. My anxiety was not long ; for, as I recovered some degree of cheerfulness, he returned to me, and I could not forbear to despise my former uneasiness. " He still delayed to send for my ransom, and would per- haps never have determined had not your agent found his way to him. The gold, which he would not fetch, he could not reject when it was offered. He hastened to prepare for our journey hither, like a man delivered from the pain of an intestine conflict. I took leave of my companions in the house, who dismissed me with cold indifference." Nekayah having heard her favourite's relation, rose and embraced her; and Rasselas gave her a hundred ounces of gold, which she presented to the Arab for the fifty that were promised. CHAPTER XL. The History of a Man of Learning. THEY returned to Cairo, and were so well pleased at finding themselves together, that none of them went much abroad. The Prince began to love learning, and one day declared to Imlac that he intended to devote himself to science, and pass the rest of his days in literary solitude. " Before you make your final choice," answered Imlac, "you ought to examine its hazards, and converse with some of those who are grown old in the company of themselves. I have just left the observatory of one of the most learned astronomers in the world, who has spent forty years in unwearied attention to the motion and appearances of the celestial bodies, and has drawn out his soul in endless calculations. He admits a few friends once a month to hear his deductions and enjoy his discoveries. I was introduced as a man of knowledge worthy of his notice. Men of various ideas and fluent conversation are commonly welcome to those whose thoughts have been long fixed upon a single point, and who find the images of other things stealing away. I delighted him with my remarks. He smiled at the narrative of my travels, and was glad to forget the con- stellations, and descend fo ra moment into the lower world. " On the next day of vacation I renewed my visit, and was so fortunate as to please him again. He relaxed from that time the severity of his rule and permitted me to enter at my own choice. I found him always busy, and always glad to be relieved. As each -knew much which the other was desirous of learning, we exchanged our notions with great delight. I perceived that I had every day more of his confidence, and always found new cause of admiration in the profundity of his mind. His comprehension is vast, his memory capacious and retentive, his discourse is methodical, and his expression clear. RASSELAS. 265 " His integrity and benevolence are equal to his learning. His deepest researches and most favourite studies are willingly interrupted for any opportunity of doing good by his counsel or his riches. To his closest retreat, at his most busy moments, all are admitted that want his assist- ance : ' For though I exclude idleness and pleasure, I will never,' says he, ' bar my doors against charity. To man is permitted the contemplation of the skies, but the practice of virtue is commanded.' " " Surely," said the Princess, " this man is happy." "I visited him," said Imlac, "with more and more frequency, and was every time more enamoured of his conversation : he was sublime without haughtiness, courteous without formality, and communicative without ostentation. I was at first, great Princess, of your opinion, thought him the happiest of mankind, and often congratulated him on the blessing that he enjoyed. He seemed to hear nothing with indifference but the praises of his condition, to which he always returned a general answer, and diverted the con- versation to some other topic. " Amidst this willingness to be pleased and labour to please, I had quickly reason to imagine that some painful sentiment pressed upon his mind. He often looked up earnestly towards the sun, and let his voice fall in the midst of his discourse. He would sometimes, when we were alone, gaze upon me in silence with the air of a man who longed to speak what he was yet resolved to suppress. He would often send for me with vehement injunction of haste, though when I came to him he had nothing extraordinary to say. And sometimes, when I was leaving him, would call me back, pause a few moments, and then dismiss me." 266 PASSELAS. CHAPTER XLL The Astronomer discovers the Cause of his Uneasiness. " AT last the time came when the secret burst his reserve. We were sitting together last night in the turret of his house watching the immersion of a satellite of Jupiter. A sudden tempest clouded the sky and disappointed our observation. We sat awhile silent in the dark, and then he addressed himself to me in these words : ' Imlac, I have long con- sidered thy friendship as the greatest blessing of my life. Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and know- ledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful. I have found in thee all the qualities requisite for trust : benevo- lence, experience, and fortitude. I have long discharged an office which I must soon quit at the call of nature, and shall rejoice in the hour of imbecility and pain to devolve it upon thee.' "I thought myself honoured by this testimony, and pro- tested that whatever could conduce to his happiness would add likewise to mine. " ' Hear, Imlac, what thou wilt not without difficulty credit. I have possessed for five years the regulation of the weather and the distribution of the seasons. The sun has listened to my dictates, and passed from tropic to tropic by my direction ; the clouds at my call have poured their waters, and the Nile has overflowed at my command. I have re- strained the rage of the dog-star, and mitigated the fervours of the crab. The winds alone, of all the elemental powers, have hitherto refused my authority, and multitudes have perished by equinoctial tempests which I found myself unable to prohibit or restrain. I have administered this great office .with exact justice, and made to the different nations of the earth an impartial dividend of rain and sun- shine. What must have been the misery of half the globe RASSELAS. 267 if I had limited the clouds to particular regions, or confined the sun to either side of the equator ? ' " CHAPTER XLII. T7ie Opinion of the Astronomer is explained and justified. " I SUPPOSE he discovered in me, through the obscurity of the room, some tokens of amazement and doubt ; for after a short pause he proceeded thus : " ' Not to be easily credited will neither surprise nor offend me, for I am probably the first of human beings to whom this trust has been imparted. Nor do I know whether to deem this distinction a reward or punishment. Since I have possessed it I have been far less happy than before, and nothing but the consciousness of good intention could have enabled me to support the weariness of unremitted vigilance.' " ' How long, sir/ said I, ' has this great office been in your hands ? ' " ' About ten years ago,' said he, ' my daily observations of the changes of the sky led me to consider whether, if I had the power of the seasons, I could confer greater plenty upon the inhabitants of the earth. This contemplation fastened on my mind, and I sat days and nights in imaginary dominion, pouring upon this country and that the showers of fertility, and seconding every fall of rain with a due pro- portion of sunshine. I had yet only the will to do good, and did not imagine that I should ever have the power. " ' One day as I was looking on the fields withering with heat, I felt in my mind a sudden wish that I could send rain on the southern mountains, and raise the Nile to an inunda- tion. In the hurry of my imagination I commanded rain to fall ; and by comparing the time of my command with that of the inundation, I found that the clouds had listened io my lips. " ' Might not some other cause,' said I, ' produce this 268 RASSELAS. concurrence ? The Nile does not always rise on the same day.' " ' Do not believe,' said he with impatience, ' that such ob- jections could escape me : I reasoned long against my own conviction, and laboured against truth with the utmost obstinacy. I sometimes suspected myself of madness, and should not have dared to impart this secret but to a man like you, capable of distinguishing the wonderful from the impossible, and the incredible from the false." " ' Why, sir,' said I, ' do you call that incredible which you know, or think you know, to be true ? ' " ' Because,' said he, ' I cannot prove it by any external evidence : and I know too well the laws of demonstration to think that my conviction ought to influence another, who cannot, like me, be conscious of its force. I therefore shall not attempt to gain credit by disputation. It is suf- ficient that I feel this power that I have long possessed, and every day exerted it. But the life of man is short : the infirmities of age increase upon me, and the time will soon come when the regulator of the year must mingle with the dust. The care of appointing a successor has long disturbed me : the night and the day have been spent in comparisons of all the characters which have come to my knowledge, and I have yet found none so worthy as thyself.' " CHAPTER XLIII. The Astronomer leaves Imlac his Directions, " ( HEAR, therefore, what I shall impart with attention, such as the welfare of a world requires. If the task of a king be considered as difficult, who has the care only of a few millions, to whom he cannot do much good or harm, what must be the anxiety of him on whom depends the action of the elements and the great gifts of light and heat ? Hear me, therefore, with attention. R ASS EL AS. 269 t( I have diligently considered the position of the earth and sun, and formed innumerable schemes, in which I changed their situation. I have sometimes turned aside the axis of the earth, and sometimes varied the ecliptic of the sun ; but I have found it impossible to make a disposition by which the world may be advantaged : what one region gains, another loses by an imaginable alteration, even with- out considering the distant parts of the solar system with which we are acquainted. Do not, therefore, in thy ad- ministration of the year, indulge thy pride by innovation ; do not please thyself with thinking that thou canst make thyself renowned to all future ages by disordering the sea- sons. The memory of mischief is no desirable fame. Much less will it become thee to let kindness or interest prevail. Never rob other countries of rain to pour it on thine own. For us the Nile is sufficient.' " I promised that when I possessed the power, I would use it with inflexible integrity ; and he dismissed me, press^ ing my hand. ' My heart,' said he, ' will be now at rest, and my benevolence will no more destroy my quiet : I have found a man of wisdom and virtue, to whom I can cheer- fully bequeath the inheritance of the sun.' " The Prince heard this narration with very serious regard ; but the Princess smiled, and Pekuah convulsed herself with laughter. " Ladies," said Imlac, " to mock the heaviest of human afflictions is neither charitable nor wise. Few can attain this man's knowledge, and few practise his virtues ; but all may suffer his calamity. Of the uncertainties of our present state, the most dreadful and alarming is the uncertain continuance of reason." The Princess was recollected, and the favourite was abashed. Rasselas, more deeply affected, inquired of Imlac whether he thought such maladies of the mind frequent, and how they were contracted. 270 RASSELAS. CHAPTER XLIV. The dangerous Prevalence of Imagination. " DISORDERS of intellect," answered Imlac, " happen much more often than superficial observers will easily believe. Perhaps if we speak with rigorous exactness, no human mind is in its right state. There is no man whose imagination does not sometimes predominate over his reason, who can regulate his attention wholly by his will, and whose ideas will come and go at his command. No man will be found in whose mind airy notions do not sometimes tyrannize, and force him to hope or fear beyond the limits of sober pro- bability. All power of fancy over reason is a degree of in- sanity ; but while this power is such as we can control and repress, it is not visible to others, nor considered as any deprivation of the mental faculties : it is not pronounced madness but when it becomes ungovernable, and apparently influences speech or action. " To indulge the power of fiction and send imagination out upon the wing is often the sport of those who delight too much in silent speculation. When we are alone we are not always busy ; the labour of excogitation is too violent to last long; the ardour of inquiry will sometimes give way to idleness or satiety. He who has nothing external that can divert him must find pleasure in his own thoughts, and must conceive himself what he is not ; for who is pleased with what he is ? He then expatiates in boundless futurity, and culls from all imaginable conditions that which for the present moment he should most desire, amuses his desires with impossible enjoyments, and confers upon his pride unattainable dominion. The mind dances from scene to scene, unites all pleasures in all combinations, and riots in delights which nature and fortune, with all their bounty, cannot bestow. RASSELAS. 271 " In time some particular train of ideas fixes the atten- tion ; all other intellectual gratifications are rejected ; the mind, in weariness or leisure, recurs constantly to the favourite conception, and feasts on the luscious falsehood whenever she is offended with the bitterness of truth. By degrees the reign of fancy is confirmed ; she grows first impe- rious and in time despotic. Then fictions begin to operate as realities, false opinions fasten upon the mind, and life passes in dreams of rapture or of anguish. " This, sir, is one of the dangers of solitude, which the hermit has confessed not always to promote goodness, and the astronomer's misery has proved to be not always propitious to wisdom." " I will no more," said the favourite, " imagine myself the Queen of Abyssinia. I have often spent the hours which the Princess gave to my own disposal in adjusting ceremonies and regulating the Court ; I have repressed the pride of the powerful and granted the petitions of the poor ; I have built new palaces in more happy situations, planted groves upon the tops of mountains, and have exulted in the beneficence of royalty, till, when the Princess entered, I had almost forgotten to bow down before her." " And I," said the Princess, " will not allow myself any more to play the shepherdess in my waking dreams. I have often soothed my thoughts with the quiet and innocence of pastoral employments, till I have in my chamber heard the winds whistle and the sheep bleat ; sometimes freed the lamb entangled in the thicket, and sometimes with my crook encountered the wolf. I have a dress like that of the village maids, which I put on to help my imagination, and a pipe on which I play softly, and suppose myself followed by my flocks." " I will confess," said the Prince, " an indulgence of fantastic delight more dangerous than yours. I have fre- quently endeavoured to imagine the possibility of a perfect government, by which all wrong should be lestrained, all 272 RASSELAS. vice reformed, and all the subjects preserved in tranquillity and innocence. This thought produced innumerable schemes of reformation, and dictated many useful regulations and salutary effects. This has been the sport and sometimes the labour of my solitude, and I start when I think with how little anguish I once supposed the death of my father and my brothers." ". Such," said Imlac, " are the effects of visionary schemes. When we first form them, we know them to be absurd, but familiarize them by degrees, and in time lose sight of their folly." . CHAPTER XLV. They discourse -with an Old Man. THE evening was now far past, and they rose to return home. As they walked along the banks of the Nile, delighted with the beams of the moon quivering on the water, they saw at a small distance an old man whom the Prince had often heard in the assembly of the sages. " Yonder," said he, " is one whose years have calmed his passions, but not clouded his reason. Let us close the disquisitions of the night by inquiring what are his senti- ments of his own state, that we may know whether youth alone is to struggle with vexation, and whether any better hope remains for the latter part of life." Here the sage approached and saluted them. They invited him to join their walk, and prattled awhile as acquaintance that had unexpectedly met one another. The old man was cheerful and talkative, and the way seemed short in his company. He was pleased to find himself not disregarded, accompanied them to their house, and, at the Prince's request, entered with them. They placed him in the seat of honour, and set wine and conserves before him. " Sir," said the Princess, " an evening walk must give to a man of learning like you pleasures which ignorance and RASSELAS. 273 youth can hardly conceive. You know the qualities and the causes of all that you behold the laws by which the river flows, the periods in which the planets perform their revolu- tions. Everything must supply you with contemplation, and renew the consciousness of your own dignity." " Lady," answered he, " let the gay and the vigorous expect pleasure in their excursions : it is enough that age can attain ease. To me the world has lost its novelty. I look round, and see what I remember to have seen in happier days. I rest against a tree, and consider that in the same shade I once disputed upon the annual overflow of the Nile with a friend who is now silent in the grave. I cast my eyes upwards, fix them on the changing moon, and think with pain on the vicissitudes of life. I have ceased to take much delight in physical truth ; for what have I to do with those things which I am soon to leave ? " " You may at least recreate yourself," said Imlac, " with the recollection of an honourable and useful life, and enjoy the praise which all agree to give you." " Praise," said the sage with a sigh " is to an old man an empty sound. I have neither mother to be delighted with the reputation of her son, nor wife to partake the honours of her husband. I have outlived my friends and my rivals. Nothing is now of much importance ; for I cannot extend my interest beyond myself. Youth is delighted with applause, because it is considered as the earnest of some future good, and because the prospect of life is far extended; but to me, who am now declining to decrepitude, there is little to be feared from the malevolence of men, and yet less to be hoped from their affection or esteem. Something they may yet take away, but they can give me nothing. Riches would now be useless, and high employment would be pain. My retrospect of life recalls to my view many opportunities of good neglected, much time squandered upon trifles, and more lost in idleness and vacancy. I leave many great designs unattempted, and many great attempts 274 RASSELAS. unfinished. My mind is burdened with no heavy crime, and therefore I compose myself to tranquillity ; endeavour to abstract my thoughts from hopes and cares which, though reason knows them to be vain, still try to keep their old possession of the heart ; expect, with serene humility, that hour which nature cannot long delay, and hope to possess in a better state that happiness which here I could not find, and that virtue which here I have not attained." He arose and went away, leaving his audience not much elated with the hope of long life. The Prince consoled himself with remarking that it was not reasonable to be disappointed by this account ; for age had never been con- sidered as the season of felicity, and if it was possible to be easy in decline and weakness, it was likely that the days of vigour and alacrity might be happy ; that the noon of life might be bright, if the evening could be calm. The Princess suspected that age was querulous and malignant, and delighted to repress the expectations of those who had newly entered the world. She had seen the pos- sessors of estates look with envy on their heirs, and known many who enjoyed pleasures no longer than they could con- fine it to themselves. Pekuah conjectured that the man was older than he appeared, and was willing to impute his complaints to delirious dejection ; or else supposed that he had been unfortunate, and was therefore discontented. " For nothing," said she, " is more common than to call our own condition the condition of life." Imlac, who had no desire to see them depressed, smiled at the comforts which they could so readily procure to themselves ; and remembered that at the same age he was equally confident of unmingled prosperity, and equally fertile of consolatory expedients. He forbore to force upon them unwelcome knowledge, which time itself would too soon impress. The Princess and her lady retired ; the madness of the astronomer hung upon their minds ; and RASSELAS. 275 they desired Imlac to enter upon his office, and delay next morning the rising of the sun. CHAPTER XLVI. The Princess attd Pekuah visit the Astronomer. THE Princess and Pekuah, having talked in private of Imlac's astronomer, thought his character at once so amiable and so strange that they could not be satisfied without a nearer knowledge, and Imlac was requested to find the means of bringing them together. This was somewhat difficult. The philosopher had never received any visits from women, though he lived in a city that had in it many Europeans, who followed the manners of their own countries, and many from other parts of the world, that lived there with European liberty. The ladies would not be refused, and several schemes were proposed for the accomplishment of their design. It was proposed to intro- duce them as strangers in distress, to whom the sage was always accessible ; but after some deliberation it appeared that by this artifice no acquaintance could be formed, for their conversation would be short, and they could not decently importune him often. " This," said Rasselas, " is true ; but I have yet a stronger objection against the mis- representation of your state. I have always considered it as treason against the great republic of human nature to make any man's virtues the means of deceiving him, whether on great or little occasions. All imposture weakens con- fidence and chills benevolence. When the sage finds that you are not what you seemed, he will feel the resentment natural to a man who, conscious of great abilities, discovers that he has been tricked by understandings meaner than his own, and perhaps the distrust which he can never after- wards wholly lay aside may stop the voice of counsel and close the hand of charity; and where will you find the 276 RASSELAS. power of restoring his benefactions to mankind, or his peace to himself?" To this no reply was attempted, and Imlac began to hope that their curiosity would subside ; but next day Pekuah told him she had now found an honest pretence for a visit to the astronomer, for she would solicit permission to continue under him the studies in which she had been initiated by the Arab, and the Princess might go with her, either as a fellow- student, or because a woman could not decently come alone. " I am afraid," said Imlac, " that he will soon be weary of your company. Men advanced far in knowledge do not love to repeat the elements of their art, and I am not certain that even of the elements, as he will deliver them, connected with inferences and mingled with reflections, you are a very capable auditress." " That," said Pekuah, " must be my care. I ask of you only to take me thither. My knowledge is perhaps more than you imagine it, and by concurring always with his opinions I shall make him think it greater than it is." The astronomer, in pursuance of this resolution, was told that a foreign lady, travelling in search of knowledge, had heard of his reputation, and was desirous to become his scholar. The uncommonness of the proposal raised at once his surprise and curiosity, and when after a short delibera- tion he consented to admit her, he could not stay without impatience till the next day. The ladies dressed themselves magnificently, and were attended by Imlac to the astronomer, who was pleased to see himself approached with respect by persons of so splendid an appearance. In the exchange of the first civili- ties he was timorous and bashful ; but when the talk became regular, he recollected his powers, and justified the character which Imlac had given. Inquiring of Pekuah what could have turned her inclination towards astronomy, he received from her a history of her adventure at the Pyramid, and of the time passed in the Arab's island. She &ASSELAS. 4 7 7 told her tale with ease and elegance, and her conversation took possession of his heart. The discourse was then turned to astronomy. Pekuah displayed what she knew. He looked upon her as a prodigy of genius, and entreated her not to desist from a study which she had so happily begun. They came again and again, and were every time more welcome than before. The sage endeavoured to amuse them, that they might prolong their visits, for he found his thoughts grow brighter in their company ; the clouds of solicitude vanished by degrees as he forced himself to entertain them, and he grieved when he was left, at their departure, to his old employment of regulating the seasons. The Princess and her favourite had now watched his lips for several months, and could not catch a single word from which they could judge whether he continued or not in the opinion of his preternatural commission. They often con- trived to bring him to an open declaration ; but he easily eluded all their attacks, and, on which side soever they pressed him, escaped from them to some other topic. As their familiarity increased, they invited him often to the house of Imlac, where they distinguished him by extraordinary respect. He began gradually to delight in sublunary pleasures. He came early and departed late ; laboured to recommend himself by assiduity and compliance ; excited their curiosity after new arts, that they might still want his assistance ; and when they made any excursion of pleasure or inquiry, entreated to attend them. By long experience of his integrity and wisdom, the Prince and his sister were convinced that he might be trusted without danger; and lest he should draw any false hopes from the civilities which he received, discovered to him their condition, with the motives of their journey, and required his opinion on the choice of life. "Of the various conditions which the world spreads before you which you shall prefer," said the sage, " I am not able to instruct you. I can only tell that I have chosen 278 RASSELAS. wrong. I have passed my time in study without experience : in the attainment of sciences which can for the most part be but remotely useful to mankind. I have purchased knowledge at the expense of all the common comforts of life : I have missed the endearing elegance of female friend- ship, and the happy commerce of domestic tenderness. If I have obtained any prerogatives above other students, they have been accompanied with fear, disquiet, and scrupulosity ; but even of these prerogatives, whatever they were, I have, since my thoughts have been diversified by more intercourse with the world, begun to question the reality. When I have been for a few days lost in pleasing dissipation, I am always tempted to think that my inquiries have ended in error, and that I have suffered much, and suffered it in vain." Imlac was delighted to find that the sage's understanding was breaking through its mists, and resolved to detain him from the planets till he should forget his task of ruling them, and reason should recover its original influence. From this time the astronomer was received into familiar friendship, and partook of all their projects and pleasures : his respect kept him attentive, and the activity of Rasselas did not leave much time unengaged, Something was always to be done : the day was spent in making observations, which furnished talk for the evening, and the evening was closed with a scheme for the morrow. The sage confessed to Imlac that since he had mingled in the gay tumults of life, and divided his hours by a succes- sion of amusements, he found the conviction of his authority over the skies fade gradually from his mind, and began to trust less to an opinion which he never could prove to others, and which he now found subject to variation, from causes in which reason had no part. " If I am accidentally left alone for a few hours," said he, "my inveterate persuasion rushes upon my soul, and my thoughts are chained down by some irresistible violence ; but they are soon disentangled by the Prince's conversation, and instantaneously released at the RASSELAS. 279 entrance of Pekuah. I am like a man habitually afraid of spectres, who is set at ease by a lamp, and wonders at the dread which harassed him in the dark ; yet, if his lamp be extinguished, feels again the terrors which he knows that when it is light he shall feel no more. But I am sometimes afraid, lest I indulge my quiet by criminal negligence, and voluntarily forget the great charge with which I am entrusted. If I favour myself in a known error, or am determined by my own ease in a doubtful question of this importance, how dreadful is my crime ! " " No disease of the imagination/' answered Imlac, " is so difficult of cure as that which is complicated with the dread of guilt; fancy and conscience then act interchangeably upon us, and so often shift their places that the illusions of one are not distinguished from the dictates of the other. If fancy presents images not moral or religious, the mind drives them away when they give it pain ; but when melancholy notions take the form of duty, they lay hold on the faculties without opposition, because we are afraid to exclude or banish them. For this reason the superstitious are often melancholy, and the melancholy almost always superstitious. "But do not let the suggestions of timidity overpower your better reason : the danger of neglect can be but as the probability of the obligation, which, when you consider it with freedom, you find very little, and that little growing every day less. Open your heart to the influence of the light, which from time to time breaks in upon you : when scruples importune you, which you in your lucid moments know to be vain, do not stand to parley, but fly to business or to Pekuah ; and keep this thought always prevalent, that you are only one atom of the mass of humanity, and have neither such virtue nor vice as that you should be singled out for supernatural favours or afflictions." 2 8o RASSELAS. CHAPTER XLVII. The Prince enters, and brings a new Topic, "ALL this," said the astronomer, "I have often thought; but my reason has been so long subjugated by an uncon- trollable and overwhelming idea, that it durst not confide in its own decisions. I now see how fatally I betrayed my quiet, by suffering chimeras to prey upon me in secret ; but melancholy shrinks from communication, and I never found a man before to whom I could impart my troubles, though I had been certain of relief. I rejoice to find my own senti- ments confirmed by yours, who are not easily deceived, and can have no motive or purpose to deceive. I hope that time and variety will dissipate the gloom that has so long surrounded me, and the latter part of my days will be spent in peace." " Your learning and virtue," said Imlac, "may justly give you hopes." Rasselas then entered, with the Princess and Pekuah, and inquired whether they had contrived any new diversion for the next day. " Such," said Nekayah, " is the state of life, that none are happy but by the anticipation of change : the change itself is nothing ; when we have made it, the next wish is to change again. The world is not yet exhausted ; let me see something to-morrow which I never saw before." " Variety," said Rasselas, " is so necessary to content, that even the Happy Valley disgusted me by the recurrence of its luxuries ; yet I could not forbear to reproach myself with impatience when I saw the monks of St. Anthony support, without complaint, a life, not of uniform delight, but uniform hardship." " Those men," answered Imlac, " are less wretched in their silent convent than the Abyssinian princes in their prison of pleasure. Whatever is done by the monks is in- RASSELAS. 2^1 cited by an adequate and reasonable motive. Their labour supplies them with necessaries ; it therefore cannot be omitted, and is certainly rewarded. Their devotion prepares them for another state, and reminds them of its approach, while it fits them for it. Their time is regularly distributed ; one duty succeeds another ; so that they are not left open to the distraction of unguided choice, nor lost in the shades of listless inactivity. There is a certain task to be per- formed at an appropriated hour ; and their toils are cheerful, because they consider them as acts of piety, by which they are always advancing towards endless felicity." " Do you think," said Nekayah, " that the monastic rule is a more holy and less imperfect state than any other? May not he equally hope for future happiness who converses openly with mankind, who succours the distressed by his charity, instructs the ignorant by his learning, and contri- butes by his industry to the general system of life ; even though he should omit some of the mortifications which are practised in the cloister, and allow himself such harmless delights as his condition may place within his reach ? " " This," said Imlac, " is a question which has long divided the wise and perplexed the good. I am afraid to decide on either part. He that lives well in the world is better than he that lives well in a monastery. But perhaps every one is not able to stem the temptations of public life ; and if he cannot conquer, he may properly retreat. Some have little power to do good, and have likewise little strength to resist evil. Many are weary of the conflicts with adversity, and are willing to eject those passions which have long busied them in vain. And many are dismissed by age and diseases from the more laborious duties of society. In monasteries the weak and timorous may be happily sheltered, the weary may repose, and the penitent may meditate. Those retreats of prayer and contemplation have something so congenial to the mind of man, that perhaps there is scarcely one that does not purpose to 282 RASSELAS. close his life in pious abstraction, with a few associates serious as himself." " Such," said Pekuah, " has often been my wish ; and I have heard the Princess declare that she should not willingly die in a crowd." " The liberty of using harmless pleasures," proceeded Imlac, " will not be disputed ; but it is still to be examined what pleasuies are harmless. The evil of any pleasure that Nekayah can image is not in the act itself, but in its con- sequences. Pleasure in itself harmless may become mischievous by endearing to us a state which we know to be transient and probatory, and withdrawing our thoughts from that of which every hour brings us nearer to the beginning, and of which no length of time will bring us to the end. Mortification is not virtuous in itself, nor has any other use but that it disengages us from the allurements of sense. In the state of future perfection to which we all aspire there will be pleasure without danger, and security without restraint" The Princess was silent, and Rasselas, turning to the astronomer, asked him whether he could not delay her retreat by showing her something which she had not seen before. "Your curiosity," said the sage, "has been so general, and your pursuit of knowledge so vigorous, that novelties are not now very easily to be found ; but what you can no longer procure from the living may be given by the dead. Among the wonders of this country are the catacombs, or the ancient repositories in which the bodies of the earliest generations were lodged, and where, by the virtue of the gums which embalmed them, they yet remain without corruption." " I know not," said Rasselas, " what pleasure the sight of the catacombs can afford; but, since nothing else is offered, I am resolved to view them, and shall place this with my other things which I have done, because I would do something." RASSELAS. 283 They hired a guard of horsemen, and the next day visited the catacombs. When they were about to- descend into the sepulchral caves, "Pekuah," said the Princess, "*we are now again invading the habitations of the dead ; I know that you will stay behind. Let me find you safe when I return." " No, I will not be left," answered Pekuah ; " I will go down between you and the Prince." They then all descended, and roved with wonder through the labyrinth of subterraneous passages, where the bodies were laid in rows on either side. CHAPTER XLVIIL Inilac discourses on the Nature of the Soul. "WHAT reason," said the Prince, "can be given why the Egyptians should thus expensively preserve those carcases which some nations consume with fire, others lay to mingle with the earth, and all agree to remove from their sight as soon as decent rites can be performed." " The original of ancient customs," said Imlac, " is com- monly unknown, for the practice often continues when the cause has ceased; and concerning superstitious ceremo- nies it is vain to conjecture ; for what reason did not dictate, reason cannot explain. I have long believed that the prac- tice of embalming arose only from tenderness to the remains of relations or friends ; and to this opinion I am more in- clined because it seems impossible that this care should have been general ; had all the dead been embalmed, their repositories must in time have been more spacious than the dwellings of the living, I suppose only the rich or honour- able were secured from corruption, and the rest left to the course of nature. " But it is commonly supposed that the Egyptians believed the soul to live as long as the body continued undissolved, and therefore tried this method of eluding death." 284 KASSELAS. " Could the wise Egyptians," said Nekayah, " think so grossly of the soul? If the soul could once survive its separation, what could it afterwards receive or suffer from the body?" " The Egyptians would doubtless think erroneously," said the astronomer, " in the darkness of heathenism and the first dawn of philosophy. The nature of the soul is still disputed amidst all our opportunities of clearer knowledge ; some yet say that it may be material, who, nevertheless, believe it to be immortal." " Some," answered Imlac, " have indeed said that the soul is material, but I can scarcely believe that any man has thought it who knew how to think ; for all the conclusions of reason enforce the immaterality of mind, and all the notices of sense and investigations of science concur to prove the unconsciousness of matter. " It was never supposed that cogitation is inherent in matter, or that every particle is a thinking being. Yet if any part of matter be devoid of thought, what part can we suppose to think ? Matter can differ from matter only in form, density, bulk, motion, and direction of motion. To which of these, however varied or combined, can conscious- ness be annexed ? To be round or square, to be solid or fluid, to be great or little, to be moved slowly or swiftly, one way or another, are modes of material existence all equally alien from the nature of cogitation. If matter be once without thought, it can only be made to think by some new modification ; but all the modifications which it can admit are equally unconnected with cogitative powers." " But the materialists," said the astronomer, " urge that matter may have qualities with which we are unacquainted." " He who will determine," returned Imlac, " against that which he knows because there may be something which he knows not, he that can set hypothetical possibility against acknowledged certainty, is not to be admitted among reasonable beings. All that we know of matter is, that RASSELAS. 28 - matter is inert, senseless, and lifeless ; and if this conviction cannot be opposed but by referring us to something that we know not, we have all the evidence that human intellect can admit. If that which is known may be overruled by that which is unknown, no being, not omniscient, can arrive at certainty." " Yet let us not," said the astronomer, " too arrogantly limit the Creator's power." " It is no limitation of Omnipotence," replied the poet, "to suppose that one thing is not consistent with another, that the same proposition cannot be at once true and false, that the same number cannot be even and odd, that cogitation cannot be conferred on that which is created in- capable of cogitation." " I know not," said Nekayah, " any great use of this question. Does that immateriality, which in my opinion you have sufficiently proved, necessarily include eternal duration." " Of immateriality," said Imlac, " our ideas are negative, and therefore obscure. Immateriality seems to imply a natural power of perpetual duration as a consequence of exemption from all causes of decay : whatever perishes is destroyed by the solution of its contexture and separation of its parts ; nor can we conceive how that which has no parts, and therefore admits no solution, can be naturally corrupted or impaired." " I know not," said Rasselas, " how to conceive anything without extension : what is extended must have parts, and you allow that whatever has parts may be destroyed." " Consider your own conceptions," replied Imlac, " and the difficulty will be less. You will find substance without extension. An ideal form is no less real than material bulk ; yet an ideal form has no extension. It is no less certain, when you think on a pyramid, that your mind possesses the idea of a pyramid, than that the pyramid it- self is standing. What space does the idea of a pyramid 286 RASSELAS. occupy more than the idea of a grain of corn ? or how can either idea suffer laceration ? As is the effect, such is the cause ; as thought, such is the power that thinks, a power impassive and indiscerptible." " But the Being," said Nekayah, " whom I fear to name, the Being which made the soul, can destroy it." "He surely can destroy it," answered Imlac, " since, how- ever imperishable, it receives from a superior nature its power of duration. That it will not perish by any inherent cause of decay or principle of corruption, may be shown by philosophy ; but philosophy can tell no more. That it will not be annihilated by Him that made it, we must humbly learn from higher authority." The whole assembly stood awhile silent and collected. " Let us return," said Rasselas, "from this scene of mor- tality. How gloomy would be these mansions of the dead to him who did not know that he should never die ; that what now acts shall continue its agency, and what now thinks shall think on for ever. Those that lie here stretched before us, the wise and the powerful of ancient times, warn us to remember the shortness of our present state; they were perhaps snatched away while they were busy, like us, in the choice of life." " To me/' said the Princess, " the choice of life is become less important ; I hope hereafter to think only on the choice of eternity." They then hastened out of the caverns, and under the protection of their guard returned to Cairo. CHAPTER XLIX. The Conclusion, in which frothing is Concluded, IT was now the time of the inundation of the Nile. A few days after their visit to the catacombs the river began to rise. They were confined to their house. The whole region being under water, gave then; r.o invitnlicn to any cxcur- RASSELAS. 287 sions ; and being well supplied with materials for talk, they diverted themselves with comparisons of the different forms of life which they had observed, and with various schemes of happiness which each of them had formed. Pekuah was never so much charmed with any place as the Convent of St Anthony, where the Arab restored her to the Princess, and wished only to fill it with pious maidens and to be made prioress of the order. She was weary of expec- tation and disgust, and would gladly be fixed in some unvariable state. The Princess thought that, of all sublunary things, know- ledge was the best. She desired first to learn all sciences, and then proposed to found a college of learned women, in which she would preside, that, by conversing with the old and educating the young, she might divide her time between the acquisition and communication of wisdom, and raise up for the next age models of prudence and patterns of pljty. The Prince desired a little kingdom in which "ne might administer justice in his own person and see all the parts of government with his own eyes ; but he could never fix the limits of his dominion, and was always, adding to the number of his subjects. Imlac and the astronomer were contented to be driven along the stream of life without directing their course to any particular port. Of those wishes that they had formed they well knew that none could be obtained. They deliberated awhile what was to be done, and resolved, when the inundation should cease, to return to Abyssinia. 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