Page images
PDF
EPUB

to say, that he gave to the Jews "precepts "which were not good." This was the principal reason of the synagogue's prohibiting young ⚫ persons from reading Ezekiel, as it might bring them to doubt of the irrefragability of the Mosaic laws.

The cavillers of our times are still more astonished at the manner of the prophet's describing the wickedness of Jerusalem, in chapter xvi. where he introduces the Lord speaking to a girl; and the Lord said to the girl, "In the day thou wast born, thy navel-string was not cut, thou wast neither salted nor swaddled; I pitied thee; thou art grown up, thy breasts are fashioned, and thine hair is grown; I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, behold thy time was the time of love. I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: thou becamest mine, I washed thee with water, and anointed thee with oil; I cloathed thee and shod thee; I girded thee about with fine linen, and covered thee with silks; I decked thee also with ornaments, and put bracelets on thy hands, and a chain on thy neck; I put a jewel on thy forehead, and ear-rings in thy ears, and a crown on thy head, &c. But thou didst trust in thy beauty, and playedst the harlot because of thy renown, and pouredst out thy fornications on every one that passed by: thou hast built an eminent place, thou hast prostituted thyself in public places, thou hast spread thy legs to every one that passed by and thou hast lain with Egyptians.... and, lastly, thou hast paid thy lovers, and hast made presents to them to lie with thee, ... and in paying instead of being paid, thou hast done the reverse of other girls.

[ocr errors]

there

there is a proverb, Like mother like daughter, and the like is said of thee.”

Still greater clamour is raised against chap. xxiii. A mother had two daughters, who parted with their virginity very early in life; the name of the elder was Aholah, and of the younger Aholibah: .... "Aholah doated on

66

[ocr errors]

young lords, and captains, and rulers; she "committed whoredom with the Egyptians in "her youth.... Aholibah her sister was more corrupt in her whoredoms than she, with cap"tains and rulers cloathed most gorgeously, "horsemen riding upon horses, all of them de"sirable young men; she has discovered her nakedness, she has increased her whoredoms, she has eagerly sought the embraces of those (') whose flesh is as the flesh of asses, and "whose issue is like the issue of horses."

66

46

These descriptions, which scandalize so many weak minds, signify no more than the sins of Jerusalem and Samaria. Expressions to us indelicate and obscure, were not so at that time. The like plainness openly shews itself in other passages of Scripture. It often speaks of "opening "the womb." The terms in which are expressed the junction of Boaz with Ruth, and of Judah with his daughter-in-law, in Hebrew, having nothing unseemly in them; but would be very much so in our language.

He

(1) M. Voltaire translates the above passage thuse "Whose member is like that of an ass, and who "cast their seed like horses." Whether that be more agreeable to the original than ours, is not of great consequence; the idea is the

He who is not ashamed of being naked does not cover himself: where was the shame of naming the genitals in those times, when it was customary, on any important promise, to touch the genitals of him to whom the promise was made? It was a mark of respect, a symbol of fidelity; as formerly among us, the feudal tenants put their hands between those of their pa

ramounts.

[ocr errors]

We have thought fit to render the genitals by thigh; Eliezer puts his hand under Abraham's thigh; the like Joseph does to Jacob. This had been a custom of very great antiquity in Egypt; and so far were that people from annexing shame and turpitude to what we dare neither expose nor name, that they carried in procession a large figure of the virile member called PHALLUM, in thanksgiving to the gods for their goodness in making that member the instrument of human propagation.

All this sufficiently proves, that our ideas of decency and purity do not correspond with those of other nations. At what period of time did politeness prevail among the Romans more than in the Augustan age? Yet Horace, the ornament of that age, and in a moral piece, roundly says,

"Nec metuo, ne dum futuo vir rure recurrat."

Augustus makes use of the same expression in an epigram against Fulvia.

He who, among us, should openly pronounce the word answering to FUTUO, would be looked on with as much contempt as a drunken porter: this word, and several others made use of by Horace and other elegant authors, to us appear

still more indecent than Ezekiel's expressions. Whether we read ancient authors, or travel in distant countries, let us lay aside all our prejudices. Nature is every where the same, and customs every where different.

FABLES.

ARE not the most ancient fables manifestly allegorical? The first we know of, according to our chronology, is it not that related in the 9th chapter of the book of Judges? The trees were about chusing a king; the olive would not quit the care of its oil, nor the fig-tree of its figs, nor the vine-tree of its rich juice; and all the other trees had their fruit no less at heart; so that the thistle being good for nothing, and having prickles which could do hurt, made itself king.

The Pagan fable of Venus, as we have it in Hesiod, is it not an allegory of all nature? The generative parts fell from the sky on the seashore; Venus receives her being from this precious spume her first name signifies "Lover of generation:" can there be a more sensible image? This Venus is the goddess of beauty; beauty is no longer amiable than when accompanied by the graces; beauty gives rise to love, love has shafts which every heart has felt; he is hoodwinked, to conceal the faults of the object beloved.

Wisdom is conceived in the brain of the sovereign of the gods, under the name of Minerva; the soul of man is a divine fire, which Minerva

shews

shews to Prometheus, and he made use of this divine fire to animate man.

Every body must perceive in these fables a lively portraiture of nature. Most of the other fables are either corruptions of ancient histories, or the chimeras of imagination. It is with ancient fables as with modern tales; some are of the moral kind and quite charming, and there are others as insipid.

FALSITY OF HUMAN VIRTUES.

WHEN the Duke de Rochefoucault had published his Thoughts on Self-love, one M. Esprit of the Oratory wrote a captious book, intitled, The Falsity of Human Virtues. This genius says there is no such thing as virtue; but, at the close of every chapter, kindly refers his readers to Christian charity: so that, according to M. Esprit, neither Cato, nor Aristides, nor Marcus Aurelius, nor Epictetus, were good men; and a good reason why, these are only to be found among Christians. Again, among Christians the catholics are the only virtuous; and among the catholics the Jesuits, enemies to the Oratorians, should have been excepted; therefore there is scarce any virtue on earth but among the enemies of the Jesuits.

This Sieur Esprit sets out with saying that prudence is not a virtue; and his reason is, because it is often mistaken: which is as much as to say, Cæsar was nothing of a soldier because he had the worst of it at Dyrachium.

Had this reverend gentleman been a philoso

M

pher,

« PreviousContinue »