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 Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow FANATICISM. * - The Works of Voltaire, Vol. X The Dramatic Works Part 1 (Zaire, Caesar, The Prodigal, Prefaces) and Part II (The Lisbon Earthquake and Other Poems).

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FANATICISM. * - Voltaire, The Works of Voltaire, Vol. X The Dramatic Works Part 1 (Zaire, Caesar, The Prodigal, Prefaces) and Part II (The Lisbon Earthquake and Other Poems). [1901]

Edition used:

From The Works of Voltaire, A Contemporary Version, (New York: E.R. DuMont, 1901), A Critique and Biography by John Morley, notes by Tobias Smollett, trans. William F. Fleming. Vol. X The Dramatic Works Part 1 (Zaire, Caesar, The Prodigal, Prefaces) and Part II (The Lisbon Earthquake and Other Poems).

Part of: The Works of Voltaire. A Contemporary Version, in 21 vols.

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FANATICISM.*

    • Aspasia, whose heroic mind
    • Nobly aspires the truth to find;
    • Who in philosophy profound,
    • The nature of thy God hath found;
    • You know that Being great, supreme,
    • From you His emanations beam;
    • Of all His works the most complete,
    • Your genius shows that He is great;
    • You worthy homage to Him pay,
    • O’er you weak error bears no sway.
    • But as you wisely still reject
    • The errors of the godless sect:
    • Fanaticism’s rage unblest
    • You fly and equally detest;
    • You worship the eternal power
    • Without false zeal, austerely sour;
    • False zeal, which bigot souls inspires,
    • And oft with rage destructive fires.
    • A subject thus sincere and just,
    • Before his monarch’s throne august,
    • Free from all servile awe can stand,
    • Nor flatter like the courtly band.
    • Fanaticism’s frantic flame
    • First from religion’s altars came;
    • That fiend profanes her rights divine,
    • And men with horror fly the shrine.
    • Religion, he profanes thy name,
    • Thy kindred he presumes to claim;
    • From you, that horrid pest of earth
    • Pretends that he derives his birth.
    • Could such a mother e’er be cursed
    • With such a son of fiends the worst?
    • Sometimes we in an atheist’s mind
    • Humanity’s fairest virtues find;
    • Their error always to their heart
    • Does not contagion vile impart.
    • Desbarreaux* was with mildness blest,
    • Justice and candor filled his breast:
    • The God, with whom he strove in vain
    • A senseless combat to maintain,
    • His weakness with compassion viewed,
    • And with some worth his soul endued.
    • I own, I should be much inclined
    • To pity him as mad and blind,
    • Who in his folly should deny
    • That the sun’s rays pervade the sky.
    • A man does not so much blaspheme
    • Denying God, the judge supreme,
    • As when he paints Him to mankind
    • As cruel, and to wrath inclined,
    • Taking delight in human woes,
    • His creatures treating as His foes.
    • When man by error is misled,
    • When superstition turns his head,
    • When that chimera’s baleful force
    • Has poisoned pure religion’s source,
    • His heart relentless grows, and hard,
    • Access to reason is debarred;
    • His fury nothing can assuage,
    • His justice then is turned to rage;
    • No more compunction he can feel,
    • But sacrilege commits through zeal.
    • In that court, by the French proscribed,
    • Whose horrors scarce can be described,
    • In that cursed court where truth’s profaned,
    • Reason by ignorance enchained;
    • The reverend tyrants without shame
    • Made Galileo truth disclaim;
    • Thy system, oh! illustrious sage,
    • Abjure, to calm their barbarous rage.
    • In the most silent hour of night
    • See Paris filled with dire affright;
    • See carnage raging all around,
    • Thousands expiring on the ground;
    • Brothers by brothers slain, expire,
    • The son assassinates the sire;
    • Against the husband see the wife
    • In frenzy turn the murderous knife;
    • Inhuman priests their rage excite,
    • In blood and slaughter they delight.
    • Noted for manners mild, and mirth,
    • Can the French owe to these their birth?
    • You Jansenists and Molinists, who
    • Each other with such hate pursue;
    • Who fierce disputes and contests hold,
    • As Grecian sophists did of old;
    • Fear lest your quarrels should once more
    • Occasion bloodshed as before.
    • With less of furious rage contend,
    • You know not where your jars may end.
    • The Grecian sages you despise,
    • Though by the world reputed wise;
    • Their ignorance dark as shades of night,
    • Is dissipated by your light:
    • But though such guides were weak and blind,
    • Though oft they might mislead mankind,
    • They ne’er made persecution rage;
    • Copy their moderation sage.
    • Their various errors you may blame,
    • But let your mildness be the same.
    • Ye wretches, would you comprehend
    • Religion’s nature and its end,
    • Behold Marseilles, when every gale
    • Did pestilence and death exhale,
    • When the tomb swallowed up the dead,
    • The land when ruin overspread
    • The towns of citizens, the plains
    • Deprived of the industrious swains,
    • And Terror filled each neighboring state,
    • Lest they should share its hapless fate.
    • The good Belzuns* then strove to save
    • His flock from the devouring grave:
    • Langeron prodigal of breath,
    • Braved all the fierce attacks of death;
    • While you strained hard with labor vain
    • Your trivial dogmas to sustain;
    • And all your conferences were full
    • Of Father Quesnel, and the bull;
    • Points, by the knowing valued not,
    • And which will shortly be forgot.
    • Must we, to instruct the human race,
    • Humanity itself deface?
    • Must hatred’s torch light on the way,
    • Lest we from sacred truth should stray?
    • The man who can compassion show,
    • Whose heart can feel another’s woe,
    • Can by example virtue teach,
    • Seems most persuasively to preach.
    • The pedant, with o’erweening pride,
    • Intent to argue and decide,
    • Who blows up persecution’s flame,
    • A vile impostor we should name.

[* ] This ode was written in the year 1732.

[* ] Desbarreaux was a counsellor of parliament; when he made his clients wait any considerable time, he paid the suit costs.

[* ] M. de Belzuns, bishop of Marseilles, and M. de Langeron, the governor, in person, administered remedies to the infected; though the priests and physicians would not venture to come near them.