38 It is true that among the Jews, Jeptha sacrificed his daughter, and Saul was ready to immolate his son; it is also true that those who were devoted to the Lord by anathema could not be redeemed, as other beasts were, but were doomed to perish. We will now speak of the human victims sacrificed in all religions. To console mankind for the horrible picture of these pious sacrifices, it is important to know, that amongst almost all nations called idolatrous, there have been holy theologies and popular error, secret worship and public ceremonies; the religion of sages, and that of the vulgar. To know that one God alone was taught to those initiated into the mysteries, it is only necessary to look at the hymn attributed to the ancient Orpheus, which was sung in the mysteries of the Eleusinian Ceres, so celebrated in Europe and Asia: 'Contemplate divine nature; illuminate thy mind; govern thy heart; walk in the path of justice, that the God of heaven and earth may be always present to thy eyes he only self-exists, all beings derive their existence from him; he sustains them all; he has never been seen by mortals, and he sees all things." 66 live." All the ideas of Epictetus turn on Marcus Aurelius, perhaps as great on The Stoics and Platonics admitted a divine and universal nature; the Epicureans denied it. The pontiffs spoke only of a single God in their mysteries. Where then were the idolaters? All our declaimers exclaim against idolatry like little dogs, who yelp when they hear a great one bark. As to the rest, it is one of the greatest errors of the Dictionary of Moreri to say, that in the time of Theodosius the younger there remained no idolaters except in the retired countries of Asia and Africa. Even in the seventh century there were many people still heathen in Italy. The north of Germany, from the Weser, was not Christian in the time of Charlemagne. Poland and all the south remained a long time after him in what was called idol We may also read the passage of the philosopher Maximus, whom we have already quoted :-"What man is so gross and stupid as to doubt that there is aatry; the half of Africa, all the kingdoms supreme, eternal, and infinite God, who has engendered nothing like himself, and who is the common father of all things?" beyond the Ganges, Japan, the populace of China, and a hundred hordes of Tartars, have preserved their ancient religion. In Europe there are only a few LaplandThere are a thousand proofs that theers, Samoyedes, and Tartars, who have ancient sages not only abhorred idolatry persevered in the religion of their anbut polytheism. Epictetus, that model of resignation and patience, that man so great in a humble condition, never speaks but of one God. Read over these maxims :-"God has created me, God is within me; I carry him everywhere. Can I defile him by obscene thoughts, unjust actions, or infamous desires? My duty is to thank God for all, to praise him for all; and only to cease blessing him in ceasing to cestors. Let us conclude with remarking, that in the time which we call the middle ages, we denominated the country of the Mahometans Pagan; we treated as idolaters and adorers of images, a people who hold all images in abhorrence. Let us once more avow, that the Turks are more excusable in believing us idolaters, wher they see our altais loaded with images and statues. A gentleman belonging to Prince Ra- men and medicine. He extricates himgotski, assured me upon his honour, that self from his family as easily as he did being in a coffee-house at Constantinople, from the devil, and escapes without knowthe mistress ordered that he should not ing where to go. He meets with a Moor, be served because he was an idolater. and disputes with him about the immaHe was a Protestant, and swore to her culate conception. The Moor, who takes that he adored neither host nor images. him exactly for what he is, quits him as “Ah! if that is the case," said the wo- speedily as possible. The Biscayan hesiman, come to me every day, and you{tates whether he shall kill the Moor or shall be served for nothing." * IGNATIUS LOYOLA. If you are desirous of obtaining a great name, of becoming the founder of a sect or establishment, be completely mad; but, be sure that your madness corresponds with the turn and temper of your age. Have in your madness reason enough to guide your extravagancies; and, forget not to be excessively opinionated and obstinate. It is certainly possible that you may get hanged; but if you escape hanging, you will have altars erected to you. pray to God for his conversion; he leaves the decision to his horse; and the animal, rather wiser than its master, took the road leading to the stable. Our hero, after this adventure, undertakes a pilgrimage to Bethlehem, begging {his bread on the way: his madness increases as he proceeds; the Dominicans take pity on him at Manrosa, and keep him in their establishment for some days, { and then dismiss him uncured. He embarks at Barcelona, and goes to Venice; he returns to Barcelona, still travelling as a mendicant, always experiencing trances and extacies, and frequently visited by the Holy Virgin and Jesus In real truth, was there ever a fitter subject for the Petites-Maisons, or Bed-Christ. lam, than Ignatius, or St. Inigo the Bis- At length, he was given to understand cayan, for that was his true name? His that, in order to go to the holy land with head became deranged in consequence of any fair view of converting the Turks, the his reading the "Golden Legend;" as Christians of the Greek church, the ArDon Quixote's was, afterwards, by read-menians, and the Jews, it was necessary ing the romances of chivalry, Our Bis- to begin with a little study of theology. cayan hero, in the first place, dubs him- Our hero desires nothing better; but, to self a knight of the Holy Virgin, and per- become a theologian, it was requisite to forms the Watch of Arms in honour of know something of grammar and a little his lady. The virgin appears to him and Latin; this gives him no embarrassment accepts his services; she often repeats her whatever he goes to college at the age visit, and introduces to him her son. The of thirty-three; he is there laughed at, devil, who watches his opportunity, and and learns nothing. clearly foresees the injury he must in the course of time suffer from the Jesuits, comes and makes a tremendous noise in the house, and breaks all the windows; the Biscayan drives him away with the sign of the cross; and the devil flies through the wall, leaving in it a large opening, which was shown to the curious fifty years after the happy event. His family, seeing the very disordered state of his mind, is desirous of his being confined and put under a course of regi He was almost broken-hearted at the idea of not being able to go and convert the infidels. The devil, for this once, took pity on him. He appeared to him, and swore to him, on the faith of a Christian, that, if he would deliver himself over to him, he would make him the most learned and able man in the church of God. Ignatius, however, was not to be cajoled to place himself under the discipline of such a master; he went back to his class; he occasionally experienced It is a common observation, that such the rod, but his learning made no pro-sations with the angel Gabriel, began his gress. career with being as much deranged as Expelled from the college of Barcelona, Ignatius; and perhaps Ignatius, in Mapersecuted by the devil, who punished ? homet's circumstances, would have perhim for refusing to submit to his instruc-formed as great achievements as the protions, and abandoned by the Virgin Mary, phet; for he was equally ignorant and who took no pains about assisting her de- quite as visionary and intrepid. voted knight, he, nevertheless, does not give way to despair. He joins the pil-cases occur only once: however, it is not grims of St. James in their wanderings long since an English rustic, more ignoover the country. He preaches in the rant than the Spaniard Ignatius, formed streets and public places, from city to the society of people called "Quakers;" city, and is shut up in the dungeons of a society far superior to that of Ignatius. the Inquisition. Delivered from the In-Count Zinzendorf has, in our own time, quisition, he is put in prison at Alcala. He escapes thence to Salamanca, and is there again imprisoned. At length, perceiving that he is no prophet in his own country, he forms a resolution to go to Paris. He travels thither on foot, driving before him an ass which carried his baggage, money, and manuscripts. Don Quixote had a horse and an esquire, but Ignatius was not provided with either. formed the sect of Moravians; and the Convulsionaries of Paris were very nearly upon the point of effecting a revolution. They were quite mad enough, but they were not sufficiently persevering and obstinate. IGNORANCE. SECTION I. THERE are many kinds of ignorance; He experiences at Paris the same in- but the worst of all is that of critics, who, sults and injuries as he had endured in it is well known, are doubly bound to Spain. He is absolutely flogged, in all possess information and judgment, as the regular form and ceremony of scho-persons who undertake to affirm and to lastic discipline, at the college of St. censure. When they pronounce erroneBarbe. His vocation, at length, calls him ously, therefore, they are doubly culpato Rome. ble. How could it possibly come to pass, that a man of such extravagant character and manners, should at length obtain consideration at the court of Rome, gain over a number of disciples, and become the founder of a powerful order, among whom are to be found men of unquestionable worth and learning? The reason is, that he was opinionated, obstinate, and enthusiastic; and found enthusiasts like himself, with whom he associated. These, having rather a greater share of reason than himself, were instrumental in somewhat restoring and re-establishing his own; he became more prudent and regular towards the close of his life, and occasionally even displayed in his conduct proofs of ability. Perhaps Mahomet, in his first conver A man, for example, composes two large volumes upon a few pages of a valuable book which he has not understood, and in the first place examines the following words :-- "The sea has covered immense tracts. The deep beds of shells which are found in Touraine and elsewhere, could have been deposited there only by the sea." True, if those beds of shells exist in fact; but the critic ought to be aware that the author himself discovered, or thought he had discovered, that those regular beds of shells have no existence. He ought not to have said : "The universal deluge is related by Moses with the agreement of all nations.” 1. Because the Pentateuch was long unknown, not only to the other nations of the world, but to the Jews them selves. 2. Because only a single copy of the law was found at the bottom of an old chest in the time of King Josiah. 3. Because that book was lost during the captivity. 4. Because it was restored by Esdras. 5. Because it was always unknown to every other nation till the time of its being translated by the Seventy. 6. Because, even after the translation ascribed to the Seventy, we have not a single author among the Gentiles who quotes a single passage from this book, down to the time of Longinus, who lived under the Emperor Aurelian. 7. Because no other nation ever admitted a universal deluge before Ovid's Metamorphoses; and even Ovid himself does not make his deluge extend beyond the Mediterranean. 3. Because St. Augustin expressly acknowledges that the universal deluge was unknown to all antiquity. 9 Because the first deluge of which any notice is taken by the Gentiles, is that mentioned by Berosus, and which he fixes at about four thousand four hundred years before our vulgar era; which deluge did not extend beyond the Euxine sea. 10. Finally, because no monument of a universal deluge remains in any nation of the world. In addition to all these reasons, it must be observed, that the critic did not even understand the simple state of the question. The only inquiry is, whether we have any natural proofs that the sea has successively abandoned many tracts of territory? and upon this plain and mere matter of fact subject, M. Abbé François has taken occasion to abuse men whom he certainly neither knows nor understands. It is far better to be silent, than merely to increase the quantity of bad books. The same critic, in order to prop up old ideas now almost universally despised and derided, and which have not the slightest relation to Moses, thinks proper to say "That Berosus perfectly agrees with Moses in the number of generations before the deluge.' Be it known to you, my dear reader, that this same Berosus is the writer who informs us that the fish Oannes came out of the river Euphrates every day, to go and preach to the Chaldeans; and that the same fish wrote with one of its bones a capital book about the origin of things. Such is the writer whom the ingenious abbé brings forward as a voucher for Moses. "Is it not evident," he says, "that a great number of European families, transplanted to the coasts of Africa, have become, without any mixture of African blood, as black as any of the natives of the country?" It is just the contrary of this, M. l'abbé, that is evident. You are ignorant that the "reticulum mucosum" of the negroes is black, although I have mentioned the fact times innumerable. Were you to have ever so large a number of children born to you in Guinea, of an European wife, they would not one of them have that black unctuous skin, those dark and thick lips, those round eyes, or that woolly hair, which form the specific differences of the negro race. In the same manner, were your family established in America, they would have beards, while a native American will have none. Now extricate yourself from the difficulty, with Adam and Eve only, if you can. 6 "Who was this Melchom,' you ask, who had taken possession of the country of God? A pleasant sort of god, certainly, whom the God of Jeremiah would carry off to be dragged into captivity." Ah, ah, M. l'abbé! you are quite smart and lively. You ask, who is this Melchom? I will immediately inform you. Melek or Melkom signified the Lord, as did Adoni or Adonai, Baal or Bel, Adad or Shadai, Eloi or Eloa. Almost all the nations of Syria gave such names to their gods; each had its lord, its protector, its ater without any one's reviling or accusing him. At that time, therefore, every one chose his own local God, his own protector. The same Jews, after the death of Gideon, adore Baal-berith, which means precisely the same as Adonai—the lord, the protector; they change their protector. Adonai, in the time of Joshua, becomes master of the mountains; but he is unable to overcome the inhabitants of the valleys, because they had chariots armed with scythes. Can anything more correctly represent the idea of a local deity, a god who is strong in one place, but not so in another? Jeptha, the son of Gilead and a concubine, says to the Moabites: We well know that God is equally the God, the absolute master, of Egyptians and Jews, of all men and all worlds; but it is not in this light that he is represented when Moses appears before Pharaoh. He never speaks to that monarch but in the name of the God of the Hebrews, as an ambassador delivers the orders of the king his master. He speaks so little in the name of the Master of all Nature, that Pharoah replies to him, “I do not know him." Moses performs prodigies in the name of this God; but the magicians of Pharoah perform precisely the same prodigies in the name of their own. Hitherto both sides are equal; the contest is, who shall be deemed most powerful, not who shall be deemed alone powerful. At length, the God of the Hebrews decidedly carries the day; he manifests a power by far the greater; but not the only power. It is then perfectly proved, that the unThus, speaking after the manner of men, distinguishing Jews, although chosen by Pharoah's incredulity is very excusable. {the God of the universe, regarded him It is the same incredulity as Montezuma notwithstanding as a mere local god, the exhibited before Cortez, and Ataliba be-god of a particular territory or people, fore the Pizarros. like the god of the Amorites, or that of the Moabites, of the mountains or of the valleys. When Joshua called together the Jews, he said to them: "Chuse ye this day whom ye will serve, whether the Gods which your father served, that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land ye dwell; but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." The people, therefore, had already given themselves up to other gods, and might serve whom they pleased. When the family of Micah, in Ephraim, hire a Levitical priest to conduct the service of a strange god; when the whole tribe of Dan serve the same god as the family of Micah; when a grandson of Moses himself becomes a hired priest of the same god-no one murmurs; every one has his own god, undisturbed; and the grandson of Moses becomes an idol "Wilt thou not possess what Chemosh, thy god, giveth thee to possess? So, whomsoever the Lord our God shall drive out from before us, them will we possess." It is unfortunately very evident that it was perfectly indifferent to the grandson of Moses whether he served Micah's god or his grandfather's. It is clear, and cannot but be admitted, that the Jewish religion was not formed, that it was not uniform, till the time of Esdras; and we must, even then, except the Samari tans. You may now, probably, have some idea of the meaning of this lord or god Melkom. I am not a favourer of his cause the Lord deliver me from such folly!--but when you remark, “the god which Jeremiah threatened to carry into slavery must be a curious and pleasant sort of deity," I will answer you, M. l'abbé, with this short piece of advice: |