A Philosophical Dictionary, Volume 05. Voltaire

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СКАЧАТЬ fifty-six up to the patriarch Abraham, and twenty-one from Abraham up to God himself. It is true that, according to the Hebrew text, there would be but seventy-six; for the Hebrew does not reckon a Cainan, who is interpolated in the Greek translation called "The Septuagint."

      Thus said Augustine: "The number seventy-seven figures the abolition of all sins by baptism… the number ten signifies justice and beatitude, resulting from, the creature, which makes seven with the Trinity, which is three: therefore it is that God's commandments are ten in number. The number eleven denotes sin, because it transgresses ten… This number seventy-seven is the product of eleven, figuring sin, multiplied by seven, and not by ten, for seven is the symbol of the creature. Three represents the soul, which is in some sort an image of the Divinity; and four represents the body, on account of its four qualities." In these explanations, we find some trace of the cabalistic mysteries and the quaternary of Pythagoras. This taste was very long in vogue.

      St. Augustine goes much further, concerning the dimensions of matter. Breadth is the dilatation of the heart, which performs good works; length is perseverance; depth is the hope of reward. He carries the allegory very far, applying it to the cross, and drawing great consequences therefrom. The use of these figures had passed from the Jews to the Christians long before St. Augustine's time. It is not for us to know within what bounds it was right to stop.

      The examples of this fault are innumerable. No one who has studied to advantage will hazard the introduction of such figures, either in the pulpit or in the school. We find no such instances among the Romans or the Greeks, not even in their poets.

      In Ovid's "Metamorphoses" themselves, we find only ingenious deductions drawn from fables which are given as fables. Deucalion and Pyrrha threw stones behind them between their legs, and men were produced therefrom. Ovid says:

      Inde genus durum sumus, experiensque laborum,

      Et documenta damus qua simus origine nati.

      Thence we are a hardened and laborious race,

      Proving full well our stony origin.

      Apollo loves Daphne, but Daphne does not love Apollo. This is because love has two kinds of arrows; the one golden and piercing, the other leaden and blunt. Apollo has received in his heart a golden arrow, Daphne a leaden one.

      Ecce sagittifera prompsit duo tela pharetra

      Diversorum operum; fugat hoc, facit illud amorem

      Quod facit auratum est, et cuspide fulget acuta;

      Quod fugat obtusum est, et habet sub arundine plumbum…

      Two different shafts he from his quiver draws;

      One to repel desire, and one to cause.

      One shaft is pointed with refulgent gold,

      To bribe the love, and make the lover bold;

      One blunt and tipped with lead, whose base allay

      Provokes disdain, and drives desire away.

– DRYDEN.

      These figures are all ingenious, and deceive no one.

      That Venus, the goddess of beauty, should not go unattended by the Graces, is a charming truth. These fables, which were in the mouths of all – these allegories, so natural and attractive – had so much sway over the minds of men, that perhaps the first Christians imitated while they opposed them.

      They took up the weapons of mythology to destroy it, but they could not wield them with the same address. They did not reflect that the sacred austerity of our holy religion placed these resources out of their power, and that a Christian hand would have dealt but awkwardly with the lyre of Apollo.

      However, the taste for these typical and prophetic figures was so firmly rooted that every prince, every statesman, every pope, every founder of an order, had allegories or allusions taken from the Holy Scriptures applied to him. Satire and flattery rivalled each other in drawing from this source.

      When Pope Innocent III. made a bloody crusade against the court of Toulouse, he was told, "Innocens eris a maledictione." When the order of the Minimes was established, it appeared that their founder had been foretold in Genesis: "Minimus cum patre nostro."

      The preacher who preached before John of Austria after the celebrated battle of Lepanto, took for his text, "Fuit homo missus a Deo, cui nomen erat Johannes;" A man sent from God, whose name was John; and this allusion was very fine, if all the rest were ridiculous. It is said to have been repeated for John Sobieski, after the deliverance of Vienna; but this latter preacher was nothing more than a plagiarist.

      In short, so constant has been this custom that no preacher of the present day has ever failed to take an allegory for his text. One of the most happy instances is the text of the funeral oration over the duke of Candale, delivered before his sister, who was considered a pattern of virtue: "Die, quia soror, mea es, ut mihi bene eveniat propter, te." – "Say, I pray thee, that thou art my sister, that it may be well with me for thy sake."

      It is not to be wondered at that the Cordeliers carried these figures rather too far in favor of St. Francis of Assisi, in the famous but little-known book, entitled, "Conformities of St. Francis of Assisi with Jesus Christ." We find in it sixty-four predictions of the coming of St. Francis, some in the Old Testament, others in the New; and each prediction contains three figures, which signify the founding of the Cordeliers. So that these fathers find themselves foretold in the Bible a hundred and ninety-two times.

      From Adam down to St. Paul, everything prefigured the blessed Francis of Assisi. The Scriptures were given to announce to the universe the sermons of Francis to the quadrupeds, the fishes, and the birds, the sport he had with a woman of snow, his frolics with the devil, his adventures with brother Elias and brother Pacificus.

      These pious reveries, which amounted even to blasphemy, have been condemned. But the Order of St. Francis has not suffered by them, having renounced these extravagancies so common to the barbarous ages.

      FINAL CAUSES

SECTION I

      Virgil says ("Æneid," book vi. 727):

      Mens agitat molem et magno se corpore miscet.

      This active mind infused, through all the space

      Unites and mingles with the mighty mass.

– DRYDEN.

      Virgil said well: and Benedict Spinoza, who has not the brilliancy of Virgil, nor his merit, is compelled to acknowledge an intelligence presiding over all. Had he denied this, I should have said to him: Benedict, you are a fool; you possess intelligence, and you deny it, and to whom do you deny it?

      In the year 1770, there appeared a man, in some respects far superior to Spinoza, as eloquent as the Jewish Hollander is dry, less methodical, but infinitely more perspicuous; perhaps equal to him in mathematical science; but without the ridiculous affectation of applying mathematical reasonings to metaphysical and moral subjects. The man I mean is the author of the "System of Nature." He assumed the name of Mirabaud, the secretary of the French Academy. Alas! the worthy secretary was incapable of writing a single page of the book of our formidable opponent. I would recommend all you who are disposed to avail yourselves of your reason and acquire instruction, to read the following eloquent though dangerous passage from the "System of Nature." (Part II. v. 153.)

      It is contended that animals furnish us with a convincing evidence that there is some powerful cause of their existence; the admirable adaptation of their different parts, mutually receiving and conferring aid towards accomplishing their functions, and maintaining in health and vigor the entire being, announce to us an artificer uniting power to wisdom. СКАЧАТЬ