The Portable Voltaire (Portable Library)

by Francois Voltaire

  I am unacquainted with the result of this process, but I suspect that her husband was non-suited and lost his cause. What induces me to think so is that the same Parliament of Paris, on January 8, 1665, issued a decree, asserting the necessity of two visible testicles, without which marriage was not to be contracted. Had there been any member in the assembly in the situation described, and reduced to the necessity of being a witness, he might have convinced the assembly that it decided without a due knowledge of circumstances. Pontas may be profitably consulted on testicles, as well as upon any other subject. He was a sub-penitentiary, who decided every sort of case, and who sometimes came near to Sanchez.

  II. A word or two on hermaphrodites. A prejudice has for a long time crept into the Russian Church, that it is not lawful to say mass without testicles; or, at least, they must be hid in the officiator’s pocket. This ancient idea was based on the Council of Nicea which forbade the admission into orders of those who mutilated themselves. The example of Origen, and of certain enthusiasts, was the cause of this prohibition, which was confirmed at the second Council of Aries.

  The Creek Church did not exclude from the altar those who had endured the operation of Origen against their own consent. The patriarchs of Constantinople, Nicetas, Ignatius, Photius, and Methodius, were eunuchs. At present this point of discipline seems undecided in the Catholic Church. The most general opinion, however, is that a recognized eunuch who wishes to be ordained must receive a dispensation.

  The banishment of eunuchs from the service of the altar appears contrary to the purity and chastity which the service exacts; and certainly eunuchs who confessed pretty boys and girls would be exposed to less temptation. But other reasons of convenience and decorum have determined those who make these laws.

  In Leviticus, all corporeal defects are excluded from the service of the altar—the blind, the crooked, the maimed, the lame, the one-eyed, the leper, the scabby, long noses, and short noses. Eunuchs are not spoken of, as there were none among the Jews. Those who acted as eunuchs in the service of their kings were foreigners.

  It has been demanded whether an animal, a man for example, can possess at once testicles and ovaries, or the glands which are taken for ovaries, a penis and a clitoris, a foreskin and a vagina; whether, in a word, nature can form true hermaphrodites, and whether or not a hermaphrodite may beget a child upon a woman or be made pregnant by a man. I answer, as usual, that I know nothing about it, nor the ten-thousandth part of what is within the operation of nature. I believe, however, that Europe has never witnessed a genuine hermaphrodite, nor has it indeed produced elephants, zebras, giraffes, ostriches, and many more of the animals which inhabit Asia, Africa, and America. It is hazardous to assert, that because we never beheld a thing, it does not exist.

  Examine Cheselden’s Anatomy, page 34, and you will behold there a very good delineation of an animal man and woman-a Negro man and woman of Angola, which was brought to London in its infancy, and carefully examined by this celebrated surgeon, as much distinguished for his probity as his wisdom. The plate is entitled “Members of an Hermaphrodite Negro, of both Sexes, Aged Twenty-six Years.” They are not absolutely perfect, but they exhibit an astonishing mixture of the one and the other.

  Cheselden has frequently attested the truth of this prodigy, which, however, may not be so remarkable in some of the countries of Africa. The two sexes are not perfect in this instance; but who can assure us, that other Negroes, or yellow or red natives, are not absolutely male and female? It would be as reasonable to assert that a perfect statue cannot exist, because we have witnessed none without defects. There are insects which possess both sexes, why may there not be human beings similarly endowed? I affirm nothing; God keep me from doing so. I only doubt.

  How many things belong to the animal man, in respect to which he must doubt, from his pineal gland to his spleen, the use of which is unknown; and from the principle of his thoughts and sensations to his animal spirits, of which everybody speaks, and which nobody has ever seen.

  TOLERANCE

  What is tolerance? It is the natural attribute of humanity. We are all formed of weakness and error: let us pardon reciprocally each other’s folly. That is the first law of nature.

  It is clear that the individual who persecutes a man, his brother, because he is not of the same opinion, is a monster. There is no difficulty here. But the governmentl But the magistrates! But the princes! How do they treat those whose religion is other than theirs? If they are powerful foreigners, it is certain that a prince will make an alliance with them. Frangois I, most Christian, will unite with Mussulmans against Charles V, most Catholic. François I will give money to the Lutherans of Germany to support them in their revolt against the Emperor; but, in accordance with custom, he will start by having Lutherans burned at home. For political reasons he pays them in Saxony; for political reasons he bums them in Paris. But what happens? Persecutions make proselytes. Soon France will be full of new Protestants. At first they will let themselves be hanged, later they in their turn will hang. There will be civil wars, then will come St. Bartholomew’s Eve, and this comer of the world will be worse than all that the ancients and moderns have ever told of hell.

  Madmen, who have never been able to worship the God who made you! Miscreants, whom the examples of the learned Chinese, the Parsees, and all the sages have never been able to lead! Monsters, who need superstitions as crows’ gizzards need carrion! It has been said before, and it must be said again: if you have two religions in your land, the two will cut each other’s throats; but if you have thirty religions, they will dwell in peace. Look at the Great Turk. He governs Guebres, Banians, Greek Christians, Nestorians, Romans. The first who tried to stir up tumult would be impaled; and everyone is at peace.

  Of all religions, the Christian is without doubt the one which should inspire tolerance most, although up to now the Christians have been the most intolerant of all men. The Christian Church was divided in its cradle, and was divided even in the persecutions which it sometimes endured under the first emperors. Often the martyr was regarded as an apostate by his brethren, and the Carpocratian Christian expired beneath the sword of the Roman executioners, excommunicated by the Ebionite Christian, while the Ebionite was anathema to the Sabellian.

  This horrible discord, which has lasted for so many centuries, is a very striking lesson that we should pardon each other’s errors. Discord is the great ill of mankind, and tolerance is the only remedy for it.

  There is nobody who does not agree with this truth, whether he meditates soberly in his study, or peaceably examines the truth with his friends. Why then do the same men who in private advocate indulgence, kindness, and justice, rise in public with so much fury against these virtues? Why? Can it be that their own Interest is their god, and that they sacrifice everything to this monster which they worship?

  I possess a dignity and a power founded on ignorance and credulity; I walk on the heads of the men who lie prostrate at my feet; if they should rise and look me in the face, I am lost; I must bind them to the ground, therefore, with iron chains. Thus have reasoned the men whom centuries of bigotry have made powerful. They have other powerful men beneath them, and these have still others, who all enrich themselves with the spoils of the poor, grow fat on their blood, and laugh at their stupidity. They all detest tolerance, as partisans grown rich at the public expense fear to render their accounts, and as tyrants dread the word liberty. And then, to crown everything, they hire fanatics to cry at the top of their voices: “Respect my master’s absurdities, tremble, pay, and keep your mouths shut.”

  It is thus that a great part of the world was long treated; but today when so many sects make a balance of power, what course shall we take with them? Every sect, as one knows, is a ground of error; there are no sects of geometers, algebraists, arithmeticians, because all the propositions of geometry, algebra, and arithmetic are true. In every other field of knoweldge one may be deceived. What Thomist or Scotist theologian would dare sa
y seriously that he is sure of his case?

  If it were permitted to reason consistently in religious matters, it would be clear that we all ought to become Jews, because Jesus Christ our Savior was born a Jew, lived a Jew, died a Jew, and said expressly that he was accomplishing, that he was fulfilling the Jewish religion. But it is clearer still that we ought to be tolerant of one another, because we are all weak, inconsistent, liable to fickleness and error. Shall a reed laid low in the mud by the wind say to a fellow reed fallen in the opposite direction : “Crawl! as I crawl, wretch, or I shall petition that you be torn up by the roots and burned”?

  TRUTH

  “Pilate therefore said unto him, Art thou a king then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Everyone that is of the truth heareth my voice.

  “Pilate saith unto Him, What is truth? And when he had said this he went out, etc.”

  It is a sad thing for the human race that Pilate went out without waiting for the answer; we should know what truth is. Pilate had very little curiosity. The accused led before him says he is king, that he was born to be king; and Pilate does not inquire how these things can be. He is supreme judge in Caesar’s name, he has power of life and death; his duty is to probe the sense of these words. He ought to say: “Tell me what you understand by being king. How were you born to be king and to bear witness to the truth? It is maintained that it is hard for truth to reach the ears of kings. I am a judge, and I have always had great trouble in finding it. While your enemies are howling against you outside, give me some information on the point; you will be doing me the greatest service that has ever been done a judge; and I much prefer to learn to recognize truth, than to accede to the Jews’ clamorous demand to have you hanged.”

  Of course, we cannot dare to imagine what the author of all truth would have been able to reply to Pilate.

  Would he have said: “Truth is an abstract word which most men use indifferently, in their books and judgments, for error and falsehood?” This definition would have been marvelously appropriate to all makers of systems. Similarly the word “wisdom” is often taken for folly, and “wit” for nonsense.

  Humanly speaking, let us define truth, while waiting for a better definition, as a statement of the facts as they are.

  I suppose that if one had given only six months to teaching Pilate the truths of logic, he would assuredly have made this conclusive syllogism: One must not take away a man’s life for simply good morality. Well, the accused man has, even on the showing of his enemies, often preached excellent morality. Therefore he should not be punished with death.

  He might have drawn this further argument. My duty is to disperse the riotous assemblage of a seditious people who demand a man’s death, unreasonably and without legal form. Very well. This is the exact position of the Jews in this instance; therefore I must drive them away and break up their meeting.

  We suppose that Pilate knew arithmetic; hence we will not speak of those forms of truth.

  As regards mathematical truths, I think it would have taken at least three years before he could have learned higher geometry. The truths of physics combined with those of geometry would have demanded more than four years. We spend six, ordinarily, in studying theology ; but I ask twelve for Pilate, seeing that he was pagan; on the ground that six years would not have been too much for eradicating all his old errors, and six years more would be required to fit him to receive a doctor’s hood.

  If Pilate had had a well-balanced mind, I should have asked only two years to teach him metaphysical truth; and as metaphysical truth is necessarily allied to moral truth, I flatter myself that in less than nine years he would have become a real scholar and a perfectly virtuous man.

  I should then have said to Pilate: Historical truths are merely probabilities. If you fought at the battle of Philippi, that is for you a truth which you know by intuition, by perception. But for us who dwell near the Syrian desert, it is merely a very probable thing, which we know by hearsay. How much hearsay is necessary to form a conviction equal to that of a man who, having seen the thing, can flatter himself that he has a sort of certainty?

  He who has heard the thing told by twelve thousand eye-witnesses, has only twelve thousand probabilities, equal to one strong probability, which is not equal to certainty. If you have the thing from only one of these witnesses, you know nothing; you should be skeptical. If the witness is dead, you should be still more skeptical, for you cannot enlighten yourself. If from several witnesses who are dead, you are in the same plight. If from those to whom the witnesses have spoken, your skepticism should increase still more.

  From generation to generation skepticism increases, and probability diminishes; and soon probability is reduced to zero.

  TYRANNY

  One gives the name of tyrant to the sovereign who knows no laws but those of his caprice, who takes his subjects’ property, and then mobilizes them to take the property of his neighbors. There are none of these tyrants in Europe.

  One distinguishes between the tyranny of one man and that of many. The tvrannv of one man is comparable to that of a body which has invaded the rights of other bodies, and which exercises despotism under cover of laws which it has itself corrupted. Nor are there any tyrants of this sort in Europe.

  Under which tyranny would you like to live? Under neither, but if I had to choose, I should detest the tyranny of one man less than that of many. A despot always has his good moments; an assembly of despots never. If a tyrant does me an injustice, I can disarm him through his mistress, his confessor, or his page; but a company of solemn tyrants is inaccessible to all seductions. When it is not unjust, it is at the least harsh, and never does it bestow favors.

  If I have only one despot, I am quit of him by drawing myself up against a wall when I see him pass, or by bowing low, or by striking the ground with my forehead, according to the custom of the country. But if there is a company of a hundred despots, I may have to repeat this ceremony a hundred times a day, which in the long run can be very annoying if one’s hams are not supple. If I have a farm in the neighborhood of one of our nobles, I am wiped out. If I plead against a relation of the relations of one of our noblemen, I am ruined. What is to be done? I fear that in this world one must be either hammer or anvil; for it is indeed a lucky man who escapes these alternatives!

  Miscellany

  One of our great Italian theologians, named Piazza, in his Dissertation on Paradise, informs us that the elect will forever sing and play the guitar. “They will have,” says he, “three privileges, three advantages: gratification without titillation, caresses without laxity, and voluptuousness without excess.” St. Thomas assures us that the smell of the glorified bodies will be perfect, and will not be tainted by perspiration. This question has been profoundly treated by many other doctors.

  The art of versifying is, indeed, prodigiously difficult, especially in our language where alexandrines follow one another two by two, where it is rare to avoid monotony, where it is absolutely necessary to rhyme, where noble and pleasing rhymes are too limited in number, and where a misplaced word or a harsh syllable is sufficient to spoil a happy thought. It is like dancing in fetters on a rope: but the greatest success in this part of the art is, by itself, nothing.

  If none but true and useful things were recorded, our immense historical libraries would be reduced to a very narrow compass; but we should know more and know it better.

  Aristophanes-he whom commentators admire because he was a Greek, forgetting that Socrates was also a Greek-Aristophanes was the first who accustomed the Athenians to regard Socrates as an atheist. This comic poet, who is neither comic nor poetical, would not among us have been permitted to exhibit his farces at St. Lawrence’s fair. He appears to me to be much lower than Plutarch represents him. Let us see what the wise Plutarch says of this buffoon. “The language of Aristophanes bespeaks his miserable quackery; it is made up of
the lowest and most disgusting puns; he is not even pleasing to the people, and to men of judgment and honor he is insupportable; his arrogance is intolerable, and all good men detest his malignity.” This, then, is the jack-pudding whom Madame Dacier, an admirer of Socrates, ventures to admire! Such was the man who, indirectly, prepared the poison by which infamous judges put to death the most virtuous man in Greece.

  Atheism and fanaticism are two monsters which may tear society in pieces; but the atheist preserves his reason, which checks his propensity to mischief, while the fanatic is under the influence of a madness which is constantly goading him on.

  The government of Augustus is still admired, because under him Rome tasted peace, pleasure, and abundance. Seneca says of him: Clementium non voco lassam crudelitatem —I do not call exhausted cruelty clemency.

  Dedications are often only offerings from interested baseness to disdainful vanity.

  Every country where begging, where mendacity, is a profession, is ill-governed.

  An almost infallible means of saving yourself from the desire of self-destruction is always to have something to do. Creech, the commentator on Lucretius, marked upon his manuscripts: “N.B. Must hang myself when I have finished.” He kept his word with himself, that he might have the pleasure of ending like his author. Had he undertaken a commentary upon Ovid, he would have lived longer.