I CHAP. LXXIX. CONTINUATION OF THE VOYAGE TO DELOS. On Religious Opinions. HAVE said, that the discourse of Philocles was interrupted by the arrival of Demophon. We had seen, at a distance, this young man converfing with a philofopher of the Elean fchool. Having informed himself of the subject of our conversation, he exclaimed, We must expect happiness only from ourfelves. I had still some doubts, but they are now removed; I maintain that there are no gods, or that they do not concern themselves with the affairs of men. My fon, replied Philocles, I have known many perfons who, though at your age they were feduced by this new doctrine, abjured it when they had no longer any intereft to maintain it — Demophon protested that he would never alter his opinion; and enlarged on the absurdities of the popular religion, treating with contempt the ignorance of the multitude, and our prejudices with derifion .-Hear me, answered Philocles; as we make no arrogant pretenfions, we deferve not to be mortified. If we are in an error, it is your duty to pity and to instruct us; for true philofophy is mild, compaffionate, and efpecially modeft. Declare to us without referve what is the doctrine which the teaches us by you. I will tell you, replied the young man: Nature and Chance have arranged in order all the parts of the universe; and the policy of legislators has fubjected focieties to laws. These fecrets are now revealed., And have I not reason ? DEMOPHON. PHILOCLES. I should think not; it may indeed alleviate the remorse of the guilty, but it cannot but deject the virtuous man. DEMOPHON. Why, in what can it be detrimental to him? Let us fuppofe that a nation existed which had no idea of the Divine Being; and that a stranger, fuddenly appearing in one of their affemblies, fhould thus addrefs them: You admire the wonders of nature, without afcending to their author: I declare to you that they are the work of an intelligent being, who watches over their preservation, and who views you as his children. You confider all virtues which are known as useless, and all offences which escape punishment as excufable: I proclaim to you that an invifible judge is ever present with us, and that those actions which meet not the reward or the vengeance of men, are not concealed from his fight. You imagine that your existence is confined to the few moments which you pass on earth, and the end of which view with a secret dread: I make known to you, that after death an existence of happiness or misery shall be the lot of the virtuous or vicious man. Tell me, Demophon, can you doubt but that the good and virtuous part of such a people, proftrate at the feet of their new legislator, would receive his doctrine with avidity, and experience the moft cruel disappointment and grief, if ever they should afterward be compelled to renounce it? you DEMOPHON. They would experience that regret which we feel when we are awakened from a pleafing dream. PHILOCLES. So I think. But, in fine, should you difpel this dream, would you not have to reproach yourself with having depriv ed the unhappy mortal of that error which produced a fuf penfion of his fufferings? and would he not himself accufe you of having left him without defence against the affaults of fortune, and the wickedness of men? DEMOPHON. I would elevate his foul by ftrengthening his reafon; I would fhow him that true courage confifts in calmly submitting to neceffity. PHILOCLES. What strange confolation! might he exclaim: I am bound down with bands of iron on the rock of Prometheus; and, while the vulture is tearing my entrails, you coldly advise me to repress my complaints. Alas! if the woes I endure proceed not from a hand which I may at once reverence and love, I can only confider myself as the sport of Fortune, and the fcorn of Nature. The infect, when it fuffers, at least has not cause to blush at the triumph of its enemies, nor at the infult offered to its weakness. But, befides the evils that are common to me and to the reptile, I poffefs that reafon which is more cruel than all these, and which inceffantly renders them more poignant by the forefight of their confequences, and the comparison of my own condition with that of my fellow beings. How much would my affliction have been alleviated by that philofophy which you have treated as grofs and false! and according to which nothing happens in this world but by the direction, or with the permiffion, of a Supreme Being 1. I should have been ignorant why he had ordained me to be unhappy; but fince I should have believed that he beneath whose hand I fuffered was at the fame time the author of my existence, I fhould have found reafon to hope that he would foothe the bitterness of my pains, either during my life or after my death. And how, in fact, could it be poffible, under the d Theogn. Sent. v. 165. Plat. de Rep. lib. 10. t. ü. p. 1â, A. Id. de Leg. lib. 5. p. 732, D. government of the best of masters, at once to be actuated by the most exalted hope, and to be wretched?-Could you, Demophon, have the cruelty to reply to these complaints by an infulting contempt, or by frigid pleasantries? DEMOPHON. I would reply by propofing the example of fome philofophers who have fupported the enmity of men, poverty, exile, and every kind of perfecution, rather than renounce the truth. PHILOCLES. They maintained the contest in the face of the fun, on z spacious theatre, in the presence of the world and of posterity. Such a fituation, and spectators fo numerous, inspire courage. But the man who groans in obfcurity, and whose tears flow unobserved, he it is who needs fupport. DEMOPHON. I confent then to leave to feeble minds that fupport which you would wish to provide for them. PHILOCLES. It will be equally neceffary to them to enable them to refift the violence of their paffions. DEMOPHON. Perhaps fo. But I fhall always maintain that vigorous minds, without the fear of the gods, or the hope of the арprobation of men, may endure with refignation all the perfecutions of fate, and even perform the most painful acts of the most rigid virtue. PHILOCLES. You allow then that our prejudices are neceffary to the greater part of the human race; and on this point you agree with all legiflators . Let us now examine if they would not also be useful to those privileged minds who pretend to pof f Id. ibid. p. 604, A. 3. road. ibid. lib. 42. p. 289. Hermipp. ap. Porphyr. de Abstin. lib. 4. § 224 Hippod. de Rep. ap. Stob. lib. 41. fefs in their virtues alone an invincible ftrength. You are, no doubt, of this number; and, as you can reafon closely, let us begin with comparing our opinions with yours. We say that men owe obedience to laws which existed antecedently to every human inftitution". These laws, proceeding from that Intelligence which formed and still preferves the universe, are the relations which we bear to that exalted being, and to our fellow-creatures. We violate them when we commit an act of injustice, and offend both against fociety and against the first author of the order by which fociety is maintained. You fay, on the contrary, the right of the strongest is the only notion which nature has engraven in my heart. The distinction between justice and injuftice, virtue and vice, originates not from her, but from pofitive laws. My actions, indifferent in themselves, are only transformed into crimes in confequence of the arbitrary conventions of men *. Let us now suppose that we both act conformably to our principles; and that we are placed in one of those situations, in which virtue, furrounded by temptations, has need of her utmost strength. On the one hand, honours, riches, and every kind of influence and distinction invite; and, on the other, we are threatened with the lofs of life, our families must be abandoned to indigence, and our memories ftigmatized with opprobrium. Choose, Demophon; you are only required to commit an act of injuftice. Obferve that you fhall poffefs the ring which rendered Gyges invifible: I mean that the author, the accomplice of your crime, fhall be a thousand times more interested than yourself eternally to conceal it. But, even though it should be discovered, what have you to dread? The laws? they fhall be filenced. The opinion of the h Xenoph. Memor. lib. 4. p. 807. Arift. Magn. Mor. lib. 1. cap. 34. t. ii. p. 106, E. Id. Rhet. li». 1. c. 13. t. ii. p. 541, A. Cudworth. de Etern. Inft. et Honeft. Notion. t. ii. p. 628. i Ap. Plat. de Leg. t. ii. p. 890 Ap. Ariftot. ibid. \k Theod. ap. Laert. lib. 2. § 99. Plat. de Rep. lib. 10. p. 612. 18, |