instruments of witchcraft were found there--and behold the envoy from heaven condemned to be hanged!
Just as they are going to hang Zoroaster, the king's finest horse falls ill; his four legs enter his body, so as to be no longer visible.
Zoroaster hears of it; he promises to cure the horse, provided they will not hang him. The bargain being made, he causes one leg to issue out of the belly, and says: "Sire, I will not restore you the second leg unless you embrace my religion." "Let it be so," says the monarch. The prophet, after having made the second leg appear, wished the king's children to become Zoroastrians, and they became so. The other legs made proselytes of the whole court. The four envious sages were hanged in place of the prophet, and all Persia received the faith.
The French traveller relates nearly the same miracles, supported and embellished, however, by many others. For instance, the infancy of Zoroaster could not fail to be miraculous; Zoroaster fell to laughing as soon as he was born, at least according to Pliny and Solinus. There were, in those days, as all the world knows, a great number of very powerful magicians; they were well aware that one day Zoroaster would be greater than themselves, and that he would triumph over their magic. The prince of magicians caused the infant to be brought to him, and tried to cut him in two; but his hand instantly withered. They threw him into the fire, which was turned for him into a bath of rose water. They wished to have him trampled on by the feet of wild bulls; but a still more powerful bull protected him. He was cast among the wolves; these wolves went incontinently and sought two ewes, who gave him suck all night. At last, he was restored to his mother Dogdu, or Dodo, or Dodu, a wife excellent above all wives, or a daughter above all daughters.
Such, throughout the world, have been all the histories of ancient times. It proves what we have often remarked, that Fable is the elder sister of History. I could wish that, for our amusement and instruction, all these great prophets of antiquity, the Zoroasters, the Mercurys Trismegistus, the Abarises, and even the Numas, and others, should now return to the earth, and converse with Locke, Newton, Bacon, Shaftesbury, Pascal, Arnaud, Bayle--what do I say?--even with those philosophers of our day who are the least learned, provided they are not the less rational. I ask pardon of antiquity, but I think they would cut a sorry figure.
Alas, poor charlatans! they could not sell their drugs on the Pont-neuf. In the meantime, however, their morality is still good, because morality is not a drug. How could it be that Zoroaster joined so many egregious fooleries to the fine precept of "abstaining when it is doubtful whether one is about to do right or wrong?" It is because men are always compounded of contradictions.
It is added that Zoroaster, having established his religion, became a persecutor. Alas! there is not a sexton, or a sweeper of a church, who would not persecute, if he had the power.
One cannot read two pages of the abominable trash attributed to Zoroaster, without pitying human nature. Nostradamus and the urine doctor are reasonable compared with this inspired personage; and yet he still is and will continue to be talked of.
What appears singular is, that there existed, in the time of the Zoroaster with whom we are acquainted, and probably before, prescribed formulas of public and private prayer. We are indebted to the French traveller for a translation of them. There were such formulas in India; we know of none such in the Pentateuch.
What is still stranger, the magi, as well as the Brahmins, admitted a paradise, a hell, a resurrection, and a devil. It is demonstrated that the law of the Jews knew nothing of all this; they were behindhand with everything--a truth of which we are convinced, however little the progress we have made in Oriental knowledge.
DECLARATION OF THE AMATEURS, INQUIRERS, AND DOUBTERS, WHO HAVE AMUSED THEMSELVES WITH PROPOSING TO THE LEARNED THE PRECEDING QUESTIONS IN THESE VOLUMES.
We declare to the learned that being, like themselves, prodigiously ignorant of the first principles of all things, and of the natural, typical, mystical, allegorical sense of many things, we acquiesce, in regard to them, in the infallible decision of the holy Inquisition of Rome, Milan, Florence, Madrid, Lisbon, and in the decrees of the Sorbonne, the perpetual council of the French.
Our errors not proceeding from malice, but being the natural consequence of human weakness, we hope we shall be pardoned for them both in this world and the next.
We entreat the small number of celestial spirits who are still shut up in the mortal bodies in France, and who thence enlighten the universe at thirty sous per sheet, to communicate their gifts to us for the next volume, which we calculate on publishing at the end of the Lent of 1772, or in the Advent of 1773; and we will pay _forty_ sous per sheet for their lucubrations.
We entreat the few great men who still remain to us, such as the author of the "Ecclesiastical Gazette"; the Abbé Guyon; with the Abbé Caveirac, author of the "Apology for St. Bartholomew"; and he who took the name of Chiniac; and the agreeable Larcher; and the virtuous, wise, and learned Langleviel, called La Beaumelle; the profound and exact Nonnotte; and the moderate, the compassionate, the tender Patouillet--to assist us in our undertaking. We shall profit by their instructive criticisms, and we shall experience a real pleasure in rendering to all these gentlemen the justice which is their due.
The next volume will contain very curious articles, which, under the favor of God, will be likely to give new piquancy to the wit which we shall endeavor to infuse into the thanks we return to all these gentlemen.
Given at Mount Krapak, the 30th of the month of Janus, in the year of the world, according to Scaliger...5,022 According to Les Etrennes Mignonnes...5,776 According to Riccioli...5,956 According to Eusebius...6,972 According to the Alphosine Tables...8,707 According to the Egyptians...370,000 According to the Chaldæans...465,102 According to the Brahmins...780,000 According to the Philosophers...----