Candide

by Voltaire

pique

own, that if I were in your place, I should have no scruple in marrying the Governor and in making the fortune of Captain Candide.”

There was not a moment to lose; but how could he part from Cunegonde, and where could he flee for shelter?

Interesting novel style

Cunegonde?” said Candide. “By St. James of Compostella,” said Cacambo, “you were going to fight against the Jesuits; let us go to fight for them;

The kingdom is upwards of three hundred leagues in diameter, and divided into thirty provinces; there the Fathers possess all, and the people nothing; it is a masterpiece of reason and justice. For

certainly I will marry her.” “We shall see that, thou scoundrel!” said the Jesuit Baron de Thunder-ten-Tronckh, and that instant struck him across the face with the flat of his sword. Candide in an instant drew his rapier, and plunged it up to the hilt in the Jesuit’s belly; but in pulling it out reeking hot, he burst into tears. “Good God!” said he, “I have killed my old master, my friend, my brother-in-law! I am the best-natured creature in the world, and yet I have already killed three men, and of these three two were priests.”

Psycho bro

precipitately

inquietude

Cacambo never lost his head. “Do not despair,” said he to the disconsolate Candide, “I understand a little of the jargon of these people, I will speak to them.”

Interestingly in this book, things happen matter of factly and despair does not linger. Fsst moving indeed

a river always leads to some inhabited spot. If we do not find pleasant things we shall at least find new things.” “With all my heart,” said Candide, “let us recommend ourselves to Providence.

quoits

“Where are we?” cried Candide. “The king’s children in this country must be well brought up, since they are taught to despise gold and precious stones.”

They entered a very plain house, for the door was only of silver, and the ceilings were only of gold, but wrought in so elegant a taste as to vie with the richest. The antechamber, indeed, was only encrusted with rubies and emeralds, but the order in which everything was arranged made amends for this great simplicity.

“What! have you no monks who teach, who dispute, who govern, who cabal, and who burn people that are not of their opinion?” “We must be mad, indeed, if that were the case,” said the old man; “here we are all of one opinion, and we know not what you mean by monks.”

but words are wanting to express the materials of which it was built. It is plain such materials must have prodigious superiority over those pebbles and sand which we call gold and precious stones.

bon-mots

This speech was agreeable to Cacambo; mankind are so fond of roving, of making a figure in their own country, and of boasting of what they have seen in their travels, that the two happy ones resolved to be no longer so, but to ask his Majesty’s leave to quit the country.

“we are able to pay the Governor of Buenos Ayres if Miss Cunegonde can be ransomed. Let us journey towards Cayenne. Let us embark, and we will afterwards see what kingdom we shall be able to purchase.”

Absurdity max

We are at the end of all our troubles, and at the beginning of happiness.”

Alas! I know not whether I have made their fortunes; this I know, that they have not made mine.

“Oh, Pangloss!” cried Candide, “thou hadst not guessed at this abomination; it is the end. I must at last renounce thy optimism.” “What is this optimism?” said Cacambo. “Alas!” said Candide, “it is the madness of maintaining that everything is right when it is wrong.”

The skipper seized his opportunity, set sail, and put out to sea, the wind favouring him. Candide, dismayed and stupefied, soon lost sight of the vessel. “Alas!” said he, “this is a trick worthy of the old world!”

Candide on his own is dumb(candid)

indeed, endured misfortunes a thousand times worse; the coolness of the magistrate and of the skipper who had robbed him, roused his choler and flung him into a deep melancholy. The villainy of mankind presented itself before his imagination in all its deformity, and his mind was filled with gloomy ideas.

This behaviour of hisis making me irritated

He dreamed of Pangloss at every adventure told to him. “This Pangloss,” said he, “would be puzzled to demonstrate his system. I wish that he were here. Certainly, if all things are good, it is in El Dorado and not in the rest of the world.”

Candide, however, had one great advantage over Martin, in that he always hoped to see Miss Cunegonde; whereas Martin had nothing at all to hope.

“He is so deeply concerned in the affairs of this world,” answered Martin, “that he may very well be in me, as well as in everybody else; but I own to you that when I cast an eye on this globe, or rather on this little ball, I cannot help thinking that God has abandoned it to some malignant being. I except, always, El Dorado.

execrate

depredation

Candide was more rejoiced at the recovery of this one sheep than he had been grieved at the loss of the hundred laden with the large diamonds of El Dorado.

Interesting. Does this happen too?

“Yes,” said Martin, “I have been in several provinces. In some one-half of the people are fools, in others they are too cunning; in some they are weak and simple, in others they affect to be witty; in all, the principal occupation is love, the next is slander, and the third is talking nonsense.”

“Yes, I have. All these kinds are found there. It is a chaos—a confused multitude, where everybody seeks pleasure and scarcely any one finds it, at least as it appeared to me. I made a short stay there.

who set as a subject for that year’s prize, “to find why this sheep’s wool was red;” and the prize was awarded to a learned man of the North, who demonstrated by A plus B minus C divided by Z, that the sheep must be red, and die of the rot.

officious,

complaisant;

“It is necessary to make distinctions,” said the Abbé. “In the provinces one takes them to the inn; in Paris, one respects them when they are beautiful, and throws them on the highway when they are dead.

“Is it true that they always laugh in Paris?” said Candide. “Yes,” said the Abbé, “but it means nothing, for they complain of everything with great fits of laughter; they even do the most detestable things while laughing.

held each in his hand a little pack of cards; a bad record of his misfortunes.

notified with a covert glance the cheatings of the poor people who tried to repair the cruelties of fate. The

evening.” The supper passed at first like most Parisian suppers, in silence, followed by a noise of words which could not be distinguished, then with pleasantries of which most were insipid, with false news, with bad reasoning, a little politics, and much evil speaking; they also discussed new books. “Have

satiated with the great number of detestable books with which we are inundated that I am reduced to punting at faro.”

The man of taste explained very well how a piece could have some interest, and have almost no merit;

That's today's tv bruh

“The great man!” said Candide. “He is another Pangloss!” Then, turning towards him, he said: “Sir, you think doubtless that all is for the best in the moral and physical world, and that nothing could be otherwise than it is?” “I, sir!” answered the scholar, “I know nothing of all that; I find that all goes awry with me; that no one knows either what is his rank, nor what is his condition, what he does nor what he ought to do; and that except supper, which is always gay, and where there appears to be enough concord, all the rest of the time is passed in impertinent quarrels; Jansenist against Molinist, Parliament against the Church, men of letters against men of letters, courtesans against courtesans, financiers against the people, wives against husbands, relatives against relatives—it is eternal war.” “I have seen the worst,” Candide replied. “But a wise man, who since has had the misfortune to be hanged, taught me that all is marvellously well; these are but the shadows on a beautiful picture.” “Your hanged man mocked the world,” said Martin. “The shadows are horrible blots.” “They are men who make the blots,” said Candide, “and they cannot be dispensed with.”

Imdont understand it a lot

“There,” said he, “are the two suspected foreigners,” and at the same time he ordered them to be seized and carried to prison. “Travellers are not treated thus in El Dorado,” said Candide.

So many misadventures with this frequency is quite irritating

“It is,” the Perigordian Abbé then made answer, “because a poor beggar of the country of Atrébatie28 heard some foolish things said. This induced him to commit a parricide, not such as that of 1610 in the month of May,29 but such as that of 1594 in the month of December,30 and such as others which have been committed in other years and other months by other poor devils who had heard nonsense spoken.”

Huh..?

It is another kind of folly,” said Martin. “You know that these two nations are at war for a few acres of snow in Canada,31 and that they spend over this beautiful war much more than Canada is worth. To tell you exactly, whether there are more people fit to send to a madhouse in one country than the other, is what my imperfect intelligence will not permit. I only know in general that the people we are going to see are

atrabilious.”

“And why kill this Admiral?” “It is because he did not kill a sufficient number of men himself. He gave battle to a French Admiral; and it has been proved that he was not near enough to him.” “But,” replied Candide, “the French Admiral was as far from the English Admiral.

time, to kill one Admiral to encourage the others.

“God be praised!” said Candide, embracing Martin. “It is here that I shall see again my beautiful Cunegonde. I trust Cacambo as myself. All is well, all will be well, all goes as well as possible.”

Europe! You are in the right, my dear Martin: all is misery and illusion.” He fell into a deep melancholy, and neither went to see the opera, nor any of the other diversions of the Carnival; nay, he was proof against the temptations of all the ladies. “You are in truth very simple,” said Martin to him, “if you imagine that a mongrel valet, who has five or six millions in his pocket, will go to the other end of the world to seek your mistress and bring her to you to Venice. If he find her, he will keep her to himself; if he do not find her he will get another. I advise you to forget your valet Cacambo and your mistress Cunegonde.” Martin was not consoling. Candide’s melancholy increased; and Martin continued to prove to him that there was very little virtue or happiness upon earth, except perhaps in El Dorado, where nobody could gain admittance.