Candide

by Voltaire

  But all the travelers with whom Candide talked in the roadside inns told him:—We are going to Paris.

  This general consensus finally inspired in him too a desire to see the capital; it was not much out of his road to Venice.

  He entered through the Faubourg Saint-Marceau,70 and thought he was in the meanest village of Westphalia.

  Scarcely was Candide in his hotel, when he came down with a mild illness caused by exhaustion. As he was wearing an enormous diamond ring, and people had noticed among his luggage a tremendously heavy safe, he soon found at his bedside two doctors whom he had not called, several intimate friends who never left him alone, and two pious ladies who helped to warm his broth. Martin said: —I remember that I too was ill on my first trip to Paris; I was very poor; and as I had neither friends, pious ladies, nor doctors, I got well.

  However, as a result of medicines and bleedings, Candide’s illness became serious. A resident of the neighborhood came to ask him politely to fill out a ticket, to be delivered to the porter of the other world.71 Candide wanted nothing to do with it. The pious ladies assured him it was a new fashion; Candide replied that he wasn’t a man of fashion. Martin wanted to throw the resident out the window. The cleric swore that without the ticket they wouldn’t bury Candide. Martin swore that he would bury the cleric if he continued to be a nuisance. The quarrel grew heated; Martin took him by the shoulders and threw him bodily out the door; all of which caused a great scandal, from which developed a legal case.

  Candide got better; and during his convalescence he had very good company in to dine. They played cards for money; and Candide was quite surprised that none of the aces were ever dealt to him, and Martin was not surprised at all.

  Among those who did the honors of the town for Candide there was a little abbé from Perigord, one of those busy fellows, always bright, always useful, assured, obsequious, and obliging, who waylay passing strangers, tell them the scandal of the town, and offer them pleasures at any price they want to pay. This fellow first took Candide and Martin to the theatre. A new tragedy was being played. Candide found himself seated next to a group of wits. That did not keep him from shedding a few tears in the course of some perfectly played scenes. One of the commentators beside him remarked during the intermission: —You are quite mistaken to weep, this actress is very bad indeed; the actor who plays with her is even worse; and the play is even worse than the actors in it. The author knows not a word of Arabic, though the action takes place in Arabia; and besides, he is a man who doesn’t believe in innate ideas.72 Tomorrow I will show you twenty pamphlets written against him.73

  —Tell me, sir, said Candide to the abbé, how many plays are there for performance in France?

  —Five or six thousand, replied the other.

  —That’s a lot, said Candide; how many of them are any good?

  —Fifteen or sixteen, was the answer.

  —That’s a lot, said Martin.

  Candide was very pleased with an actress who took the part of Queen Elizabeth in a rather dull tragedy74 that still gets played from time to time.

  —I like this actress very much, he said to Martin, she bears a slight resemblance to Miss Cunégonde; I should like to meet her.

  The abbé from Perigord offered to introduce him. Candide, raised in Germany, asked what was the protocol, how one behaved in France with queens of England.

  —You must distinguish, said the abbé; in the provinces, you take them to an inn; at Paris they are respected while still attractive, and thrown on the dunghill when they are dead.75

  —Queens on the dunghill! said Candide.

  —Yes indeed, said Martin, the abbé is right; I was in Paris when Miss Monime herself passed, as they say, from this life to the other; she was refused what these folk call ‘the honors of burial,’ that is, the right to rot with all the beggars of the district in a dirty cemetery; she was buried all alone by her troupe at the corner of the Rue de Bourgogne; this must have been very disagreeable to her, for she had a noble character.76

  —That was extremely rude, said Candide.

  —What do you expect? said Martin; that is how these folk are. Imagine all the contradictions, all the incompatibilities you can, and you will see them in the government, the courts, the churches, and the plays of this crazy nation.

  —Is it true that they are always laughing in Paris? asked Candide.

  —Yes, said the abbé, but with a kind of rage too; when people complain of things, they do so amid explosions of laughter; they even laugh as they perform the most detestable actions.

  —Who was that fat swine, said Candide, who spoke so nastily about the play over which I was weeping, and the actors who gave me so much pleasure?

  —He is a living illness, answered the abbé, who makes a business of slandering all the plays and books; he hates the successful ones, as eunuchs hate successful lovers; he’s one of those literary snakes who live on filth and venom; he’s a folliculator …

  —What’s this word folliculator? asked Candide.

  —It’s a folio filler, said the abbé, a Fréron.77

  It was after this fashion that Candide, Martin, and the abbé from Perigord chatted on the stairway as they watched the crowd leaving the theatre.

  —Although I’m in a great hurry to see Miss Cunégonde again, said Candide, I would very much like to dine with Miss Clairon,78 for she seemed to me admirable.

  The abbé was not the man to approach Miss Clairon, who saw only good company.

  —She has an engagement tonight, he said; but I shall have the honor of introducing you to a lady of quality, and there you will get to know Paris as if you had lived here four years.

  Candide, who was curious by nature, allowed himself to be brought to the lady’s house, in the depths of the Faubourg St.-Honoré; they were playing faro;79 twelve melancholy punters held in their hands a little sheaf of cards, blank summaries of their bad luck. Silence reigned supreme, the punters were pallid, the banker uneasy; and the lady of the house, seated beside the pitiless banker, watched with the eyes of a lynx for the various illegal redoublings and bets at long odds which the players tried to signal by folding the corners of their cards; she had them unfolded with a determination which was severe but polite, and concealed her anger lest she lose her customers. The lady caused herself to be known as the Marquise of Parolignac.80 Her daughter, fifteen years old, sat among the punters and tipped off her mother with a wink to the sharp practices of these unhappy players when they tried to recoup their losses. The abbé from Perigord, Candide, and Martin came in; nobody arose or greeted them or looked at them; all were lost in the study of their cards.

  —My Lady the Baroness of Thunder-Ten-Tronckh was more civil, thought Candide.

  However, the abbé whispered in the ear of the marquise, who, half rising, honored Candide with a gracious smile and Martin with a truly noble nod; she gave a seat and dealt a hand of cards to Candide, who lost fifty thousand francs in two turns; after which they had a very merry supper. Everyone was amazed that Candide was not upset over his losses; the lackeys, talking together in their usual lackey language, said: —He must be some English milord.

  The supper was like most Parisian suppers: first silence, then an indistinguishable rush of words; then jokes, mostly insipid, false news, bad logic, a little politics, a great deal of malice. They even talked of new books.

  —Have you seen the new novel by Dr. Gauchat,81 the theologian? asked the abbé from Perigord.

  —Oh yes, answered one of the guests; but I couldn’t finish it. We have a horde of impudent scribblers nowadays, but all of them put together don’t match the impudence of this Gauchat, this doctor of theology. I have been so struck by the enormous number of detestable books which are swamping us that I have taken up punting at faro.

  —And the Collected Essays of Archdeacon T82— asked the abbé, what do you think of them?

  —Ah, said Madame de Parolignac, what a frightful bore he is! He takes such pains to tell you what ever
yone knows; he discourses so learnedly on matters which aren’t worth a casual remark! He plunders, and not even wittily, the wit of other people! He spoils what he plunders, he’s disgusting! But he’ll never disgust me again; a couple of pages of the archdeacon have been enough for me.

  There was at table a man of learning and taste, who supported the marquise on this point. They talked next of tragedies; the lady asked why there were tragedies which played well enough but which were wholly unreadable. The man of taste explained very clearly how a play could have a certain interest and yet little merit otherwise; he showed succinctly that it was not enough to conduct a couple of intrigues, such as one can find in any novel, and which never fail to excite the spectator’s interest; but that one must be new without being grotesque, frequently touch the sublime but never depart from the natural; that one must know the human heart and give it words; that one must be a great poet without allowing any character in the play to sound like a poet; and that one must know the language perfectly, speak it purely, and maintain a continual harmony without ever sacrificing sense to mere sound.

  —Whoever, he added, does not observe all these rules may write one or two tragedies which succeed in the theatre, but he will never be ranked among the good writers; there are very few good tragedies; some are idylls in well-written, well-rhymed dialogue, others are political arguments which put the audience to sleep, or revolting pomposities; still others are the fantasies of enthusiasts, barbarous in style, incoherent in logic, full of long speeches to the gods because the author does not know how to address men, full of false maxims and emphatic commonplaces.

  Candide listened attentively to this speech and conceived a high opinion of the speaker; and as the marquise had placed him by her side, he turned to ask her who was this man who spoke so well.

  —He is a scholar, said the lady, who never plays cards and whom the abbé sometimes brings to my house for supper; he knows all about tragedies and books, and has himself written a tragedy that was hissed from the stage and a book, the only copy of which ever seen outside his publisher’s office was dedicated to me.

  —What a great man, said Candide, he’s Pangloss all over.

  Then, turning to him, he said: —Sir, you doubtless think everything is for the best in the physical as well as the moral universe, and that nothing could be otherwise than as it is?

  —Not at all, sir, replied the scholar, I believe nothing of the sort. I find that everything goes wrong in our world; that nobody knows his place in society or his duty, what he’s doing or what he ought to be doing, and that outside of mealtimes, which are cheerful and congenial enough, all the rest of the day is spent in useless quarrels, as of Jansenists against Molinists,83 parliament-men against churchmen, literary men against literary men, courtiers against courtiers, financiers against the plebs, wives against husbands, relatives against relatives—it’s one unending warfare.

  Candide answered: —I have seen worse; but a wise man, who has since had the misfortune to be hanged, taught me that everything was marvelously well arranged. Troubles are just the shadows in a beautiful picture.

  —Your hanged philosopher was joking, said Martin; the shadows are horrible ugly blots.

  —It is human beings who make the blots, said Candide, and they can’t do otherwise.

  —Then it isn’t their fault, said Martin.

  Most of the faro players, who understood this sort of talk not at all, kept on drinking; Martin disputed with the scholar, and Candide told part of his story to the lady of the house.

  After supper, the marquise brought Candide into her room and sat him down on a divan.

  —Well, she said to him, are you still madly in love with Miss Cunégonde of Thunder-Ten-Tronckh?

  —Yes, ma’am, replied Candide. The marquise turned upon him a tender smile.

  —You answer like a young man of Westphalia, said she; a Frenchman would have told me: ‘It is true that I have been in love with Miss Cunégonde; but since seeing you, madame, I fear that I love her no longer.’

  —Alas, ma’am, said Candide, I will answer any way you want.

  —Your passion for her, said the marquise, began when you picked up her handkerchief; I prefer that you should pick up my garter.

  —Gladly, said Candide, and picked it up.

  —But I also want you to put it back on, said the lady; and Candide put it on again.

  —Look you now, said the lady, you are a foreigner; my Paris lovers I sometimes cause to languish for two weeks or so, but to you I surrender the very first night, because we must render the honors of the country to a young man from Westphalia.

  The beauty, who had seen two enormous diamonds on the two hands of her young friend, praised them so sincerely that from the fingers of Candide they passed over to the fingers of the marquise.

  As he returned home with his Perigord abbé, Candide felt some remorse at having been unfaithful to Miss Cunégonde; the abbé sympathized with his grief; he had only a small share in the fifty thousand francs which Candide lost at cards, and in the proceeds of the two diamonds which had been half-given, half-extorted. His scheme was to profit, as much as he could, from the advantage of knowing Candide. He spoke at length of Cunégonde, and Candide told him that he would beg forgiveness from his beloved for his infidelity when he met her at Venice.

  The Perigordian overflowed with politeness and unction, taking a tender interest in everything Candide said, everything he did, and everything he wanted to do.84

  —Well, sir, said he, so you have an assignation at Venice?

  —Yes indeed, sir, I do, said Candide; it is absolutely imperative that I go there to find Miss Cunégonde.

  And then, carried away by the pleasure of talking about his love, he recounted, as he often did, a part of his adventures with that illustrious lady of Westphalia.

  —I suppose, said the abbé, that Miss Cunégonde has a fine wit and writes charming letters.

  —I never received a single letter from her, said Candide; for, as you can imagine, after being driven out of the castle for love of her, I couldn’t write; shortly I learned that she was dead; then I rediscovered her; then I lost her again, and I have now sent, to a place more than twenty-five hundred leagues from here, a special agent whose return I am expecting.

  The abbé listened carefully, and looked a bit dreamy. He soon took his leave of the two strangers, after embracing them tenderly. Next day Candide, when he woke up, received a letter, to the following effect:

  —Dear sir, my very dear lover, I have been lying sick in this town for a week, I have just learned that you are here. I would fly to your arms if I could move. I heard that you had passed through Bordeaux; that was where I left the faithful Cacambo and the old woman, who are soon to follow me here. The governor of Buenos Aires took everything, but left me your heart. Come; your presence will either return me to life or cause me to die of joy.

  This charming letter, coming so unexpectedly, filled Candide with inexpressible delight, while the illness of his dear Cunégonde covered him with grief. Torn between these two feelings, he took gold and diamonds, and had himself brought, with Martin, to the hotel where Miss Cunégonde was lodging. Trembling with emotion, he enters the room; his heart thumps, his voice breaks. He tries to open the curtains of the bed, he asks to have some lights.

  —Absolutely forbidden, says the serving girl; light will be the death of her.

  And abruptly she pulls shut the curtain.

  —My dear Cunégonde, says Candide in tears, how are you feeling? If you can’t see me, won’t you at least speak to me?

  —She can’t talk, says the servant.

  But then she draws forth from the bed a plump hand, over which Candide weeps a long time, and which he fills with diamonds, meanwhile leaving a bag of gold on the chair.

  Amid his transports, there arrives a bailiff followed by the abbé from Perigord and a strong-arm squad.

  —These here are the suspicious foreigners? says the officer; and he has them seiz
ed and orders his bullies to drag them off to jail.

  —They don’t treat visitors like this in Eldorado, says Candide.

  —I am more a Manichee than ever, says Martin.

  —But, please sir, where are you taking us? says Candide.

  —To the lowest hole in the dungeons, says the bailiff.

  Martin, having regained his self-possession, decided that the lady who pretended to be Cunégonde was a cheat, the abbé from Perigord was another cheat who had imposed on Candide’s innocence, and the bailiff still another cheat, of whom it would be easy to get rid.

  Rather than submit to the forms of justice, Candide, enlightened by Martin’s advice and eager for his own part to see the real Cunégonde again, offered the bailiff three little diamonds worth about three thousand pistoles apiece.

  —Ah, my dear sir! cried the man with the ivory staff, even if you have committed every crime imaginable, you are the most honest man in the world. Three diamonds! each one worth three thousand pistoles! My dear sir! I would gladly die for you, rather than take you to jail. All foreigners get arrested here; but let me manage it; I have a brother at Dieppe in Normandy; I’ll take you to him; and if you have a bit of a diamond to give him, he’ll take care of you, just like me.

  —And why do they arrest all foreigners? asked Candide.

  The abbé from Perigord spoke up and said: —It’s because a beggar from Atrebatum listened to some stupidities; that made him commit a parricide, not like the one of May, 1610, but like the one of December, 1594, much on the order of several other crimes committed in other years and other months by other beggars who had listened to stupidities.85

  The bailiff then explained what it was all about.86

  —Foh! what beasts! cried Candide. What! monstrous behavior of this sort from a people who sing and dance? As soon as I can, let me get out of this country, where the monkeys provoke the tigers. In my own country I’ve lived with bears; only in Eldorado are there proper men. In the name of God, sir bailiff, get me to Venice where I can wait for Miss Cunégonde.