A Philosophical Dictionary, Volume 07

"Great God, how many masters! If I had as many souls and bodies as I have duties to fulfil, I could not bear it. Oh Allah! why hast thou not made me an owl? I should live free in my hole and eat mice at my ease, without masters or servants. This is assuredly the true destiny of man; there were no masters until it was perverted; no man was made to serve another continually. If things were in order, each should charitably help his neighbor. The quick-sighted would conduct the blind, the active would be crutches to the lame. This would be the paradise of Mahomet, instead of the hell which is formed precisely under the inconceivably narrow bridge."

Thus spoke Ardassan Ougli, after being bastinadoed by one of his masters.

Some years afterwards, Ardassan Ougli became a pasha with three tails. He made a prodigious fortune, and firmly believed that all men except the grand Turk and the grand vizier were born to serve him, and all women to give him pleasure according to his wishes.

SECTION II

How can one man become the master of another? And by what kind of incomprehensible magic has he been able to become the master of several other men? A great number of good volumes have been written on this subject, but I give the preference to an Indian fable, because it is short, and fables explain everything.

Adimo, the father of all the Indians, had two sons and two daughters by his wife Pocriti. The eldest was a vigorous giant, the youngest was a little hunchback, the two girls were pretty. As soon as the giant was strong enough, he lay with his two sisters, and caused the little hunchback to serve him. Of his two sisters, the one was his cook, the other his gardener. When the giant would sleep, he began by chaining his little brother to a tree; and when the latter fled from him, he caught him in four strides, and gave him twenty blows with the strength of an ox.

The dwarf submitted and became the best subject in the world. The giant, satisfied with seeing him fulfil the duties of a subject, permitted him to sleep with one of his sisters, with whom he was disgusted. The children who sprang from this marriage were not quite hunchbacks, but they were sufficiently deformed. They were brought up in the fear of God and of the giant. They received an excellent education; they were taught that their uncle was a giant by divine right, who could do what he pleased with all his family; that if he had some pretty niece or grand-niece, he should have her without difficulty, and not one should marry her unless he permitted it.

The giant dying, his son, who was neither so strong or so great as he was, believed himself to be like his father, a giant by divine right. He pretended to make all the men work for him, and slept with all the girls. The family lagued against him: he was killed, and they became a republic.

The Siamese pretend, that on the contrary the family commenced by being republican; and that the giant existed not until after a great many years and dissensions: but all the authors of Benares and Siam agree that men lived an infinity of ages before they had the wit to make laws, and they prove it by an unanswerable argument, which is that even at present, when all the world piques itself upon having wit, we have not yet found the means of making a score of laws passably good.

It is still, for example, an insoluble question in India, whether republics were established before or after monarchies; if confusion has appeared more horrible to men than despotism! I am ignorant how it happened in order of time, but in that of nature we must agree that men are all born equal: violence and ability made the first masters; laws have made the present.

MATTER

SECTION IA Polite Dialogue Between A Demoniac And A PhilosopherDEMONIAC

Yes, thou enemy of God and man, who believest that God is all-powerful, and is at liberty to confer the gift of thought on every being whom He shall vouchsafe to choose, I will go and denounce thee to the inquisitor; I will have thee burned. Beware, I warn thee for the last time.

PHILOSOPHER

Are these your arguments? Is it thus you teach mankind? I admire your mildness.

DEMONIAC

Come, I will be patient for a moment while the fagots are preparing. Answer me: What is spirit?

PHILOSOPHER

I know not.

DEMONIAC

What is matter?

PHILOSOPHER

I scarcely know. I believe it to have extent, solidity, resistance, gravity, divisibility, mobility. God may have given it a thousand other qualities of which I am ignorant.

DEMONIAC

A thousand other qualities, traitor! I see what thou wouldst be at; thou wouldst tell me that God can animate matter, that He has given instinct to animals, that He is the Master of all.

PHILOSOPHER

But it may very well be, that He has granted to this matter many properties which you cannot comprehend.

DEMONIAC

Which I cannot comprehend, villain!

PHILOSOPHER

Yes. His power goes much further than your understanding.

DEMONIAC

His power! His power! thou talkest like a true atheist.

PHILOSOPHER

However, I have the testimony of many holy fathers on my side.

DEMONIAC

Go to, go to: neither God nor they shall prevent us from burning thee alive – the death inflicted on parricides and on philosophers who are not of our opinion.

PHILOSOPHER

Was it the devil or yourself that invented this method of arguing?

DEMONIAC

Vile wretch! darest thou to couple my name with the devil's?

(Here the demoniac strikes the philosopher, who returns him the blow with interest.)

PHILOSOPHER

Help! philosophers!

DEMONIAC

Holy brotherhood! help!

(Here half a dozen philosophers arrive on one side, and on the other rush in a hundred Dominicans, with a hundred Familiars of the Inquisition, and a hundred alguazils. The contest is too unequal.)

SECTION II

When wise men are asked what is the soul they answer that they know not. If they are asked what matter is, they make the same reply. It is true that there are professors, and particularly scholars, who know all this perfectly; and when they have repeated that matter has extent and divisibility, they think they have said all; being pressed, however, to say what this thing is which is extended, they find themselves considerably embarrassed. It is composed of parts, say they. And of what are these parts composed? Are the elements of the parts divisible? Then they are mute, or they talk a great deal; which are equally suspicious. Is this almost unknown being called matter, eternal? Such was the belief of all antiquity. Has it of itself force? Many philosophers have thought so. Have those who deny it a right to deny it? You conceive not that matter can have anything of itself; but how can you be assured that it has not of itself the properties necessary to it? You are ignorant of its nature, and you refuse it the modes which nevertheless are in its nature: for it can no sooner have been, than it has been in a certain fashion – it has had figure, and having necessarily figure, is it impossible that it should not have had other modes attached to its configuration? Matter exists, but you know it only by your sensations. Alas! of what avail have been all the subtleties of the mind since man first reasoned? Geometry has taught us many truths, metaphysics very few. We weigh matter, we measure it, we decompose it; and if we seek to advance one step beyond these gross operations, we find ourselves powerless, and before us an immeasurable abyss.

Pray forgive all mankind who were deceived in thinking that matter existed by itself. Could they do otherwise? How are we to imagine that what is without succession has not always been? If it were not necessary for matter to exist, why should it exist? And if it were necessary that it should be, why should it not have been forever? No axiom has ever been more universally received than this: Of nothing, nothing comes. Indeed the contrary is incomprehensible. With every nation, chaos preceded the arrangement which a divine hand made of the whole world. The eternity of matter has with no people been injurious to the worship of the Divinity. Religion was never startled at the recognition of an eternal God as the master of an eternal matter. We of the present day are so happy as to know by faith that God brought matter out of nothing; but no nation has ever been instructed in this dogma; even the Jews were ignorant of it. The first verse of Genesis says, that the Gods —Eloïm, not Eloi– made heaven and earth. It does not say, that heaven and earth were created out of nothing.

Philo, who lived at the only time when the Jews had any erudition, says, in his "Chapter on the Creation", "God, being good by nature, bore no envy against substance, matter; which of itself had nothing good, having by nature only inertness, confusion, and disorder; it was bad, and He vouchsafed to make it good."

The idea of chaos put into order by a God, is to be found in all ancient theogonies. Hesiod repeated the opinion of the Orientals, when he said in his "Theogony," "Chaos was that which first existed." The whole Roman Empire spoke in these words of Ovid: "Sic ubi dispositam quisquis fuit ille Deorum Congeriem secuit."

Matter then, in the hands of God, was considered like clay under the potter's wheel, if these feeble images may be used to express His divine power.

Matter, being eternal, must have had eternal properties – as configuration, the vis inertiæ, motion, and divisibility. But this divisibility is only a consequence of motion; for without motion nothing is divided, nor separated, nor arranged. Motion therefore was regarded as essential to matter. Chaos had been a confused motion, and the arrangement of the universe was a regular motion, communicated to all bodies by the Master of the world. But how can matter have motion by itself, as it has, according to all the ancients, extent and divisibility?

But it cannot be conceived to be without extent, and it may be conceived to be without motion. To this it was answered: It is impossible that matter should not be permeable; and being permeable, something must be continually passing through its pores. Why should there be passages, if nothing passes?

Reply and rejoinder might thus be continued forever. The system of the eternity of matter, like all other systems, has very great difficulties. That of the formation of matter out of nothing is no less incomprehensible. We must admit it, and not flatter ourselves with accounting for it; philosophy does not account for everything. How many incomprehensible things are we not obliged to admit, even in geometry! Can any one conceive two lines constantly approaching each other, yet never meeting?

Geometricians indeed will tell you, the properties of asymptotes are demonstrated; you cannot help admitting them – but creation is not; why then admit it? Why is it hard for you to believe, like all the ancients, in the eternity of matter? The theologian will press you on the other side, and say: If you believe in the eternity of matter then you acknowledge two principles – God and matter; you fall into the error of Zoroaster and of Manes.

No answer can be given to the geometricians, for those folks know of nothing but their lines, their superficies, and their solids; but you may say to the theologians: "Wherein am I a Manichæan? Here are stones which an architect has not made, but of which he has erected an immense building. I do not admit two architects; the rough stones have obeyed power and genius."

Happily, whatever system a man embraces, it is in no way hurtful to morality; for what imports it whether matter is made or arranged? God is still an absolute master. Whether chaos was created out of nothing, or only reduced to order, it is still our duty to be virtuous; scarcely any of these metaphysical questions affect the conduct of life. It is with disputes as with table talk; each one forgets after dinner what he has said, and goes whithersoever his interest or his inclination calls him.

MEETINGS (PUBLIC)

Meeting, "assemblée," is a general term applicable to any collection of people for secular, sacred, political, conversational, festive, or corporate purposes; in short, to all occasions on which numbers meet together.

It is a term which prevents all verbal disputes, and all abusive and injurious implications by which men are in the habit of stigmatizing societies to which they do not themselves belong.

The legal meeting or assembly of the Athenians was called the "church". This word "church", being peculiarly appropriated among us to express a convocation of Catholics in one place, we did not in the first instance apply it to the public assembly of Protestants; but used indeed the expression – "a flock of Huguenots." Politeness however, which in time explodes all noxious terms, at length employed for the purpose the term "assembly" or "meeting", which offends no one. In England the dominant Church applies the name of "meeting" to the churches of all the non-conformists.

The word "assembly" is particularly suitable to a collection of persons invited to go and pass their evening at a house where the host receives them with courtesy and kindness, and where play, conversation, supper, and dancing, constitute their amusements. If the number invited be small, it is not called an "assembly", but a "rendezvous of friends"; and friends are never very numerous.

Assemblies are called, in Italian, "conversazione," "ridotto". The word "ridotto" is properly what we once signified by the word "reduit," intrenchment; but "reduit" having sunk into a term of contempt among us, our editors translated "ridout" by "redoubt." The papers informed us, among the important intelligence contained in them relating to Europe, that many noblemen of the highest consideration went to take chocolate at the house of the princess Borghese; and that there was a "redoubt" there. It was announced to Europe, in another paragraph, that there would be a "redoubt" on the following Tuesday at the house of her excellency the marchioness of Santafior.

It was found, however, that in relating the events of war, it was necessary to speak of real redoubts, which in fact implied things actually redoubtable and formidable, from which cannon were discharged. The word was, therefore, in such circumstances, obviously unsuitable to the "ridotti pacifici," the pacific redoubts of mere amusement; and the old term "assembly" was restored, which is indeed the only proper one. "Rendezvous" is occasionally used, but it is more adapted to a small company, and most of all for two individuals.

MESSIAH

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This article is by M. Polier de Bottens, of an old French family, settled for two hundred years in Switzerland. He is first pastor of Lausanne, and his knowledge is equal to his piety. He composed this article for the great Encyclopædia, in which it was inserted. Only those passages were suppressed which the examiners thought might be abused by the Catholics, less learned and less pious than the author. It was received with applause by all the wise.

It was printed at the same time in another small dictionary, and was attributed in France to a man whom there was no reluctance to molest. The article was supposed to be impious, because it was supposed to be by a layman; and the work and its pretended author were violently attacked. The man thus accused contented himself with laughing at the mistake. He beheld with compassion this instance of the errors and injustices which men are every day committing in their judgments; for he had the wise and learned priest's manuscript, written by his own hand. It is still in his possession, and will be shown to whoever may choose to examine it. In it will be found the very erasures made by this layman himself, to prevent malignant interpretations.

Now we reprint this article in all the integrity of the original. We have contracted it only to prevent repeating what we have printed elsewhere; but we have not added a single word.

The best of this affair is, that one of the venerable author's brethren wrote the most ridiculous things in the world against this article of his reverend brother's, thinking that he was writing against a common enemy. This is like fighting in the dark, when one is attacked by one's own party.

It has a thousand times happened that controversialists have condemned passages in St. Augustine and St. Jerome, not knowing that they were by those fathers. They would anathematize a part of the New Testament if they had not heard by whom it was written. Thus it is that men too often judge.

Messiah, "Messias." This word comes from the Hebrew, and is synonymous with the Greek word "Christ." Both are terms consecrated in religion, which are now no longer given to any but the anointed by eminence – the Sovereign Deliverer whom the ancient Jewish people expected, for whose coming they still sigh, and whom the Christians find in the person of Jesus the Son of Mary, whom they consider as the anointed of the Lord, the Messiah promised to humanity. The Greeks also use the word "Elcimmeros", meaning the same thing as "Christos."

In the Old Testament we see that the word "Messiah," far from being peculiar to the Deliverer, for whose coming the people of Israel sighed, was not even so to the true and faithful servants of God, but that this name was often given to idolatrous kings and princes, who were, in the hands of the Eternal, the ministers of His vengeance, or instruments for executing the counsels of His wisdom. So the author of "Ecclesiasticus" says of Elisha: "Qui ungis reges ad penitentiam;" or, as it is rendered by the "Septuagint," "ad vindictam" – "You anoint kings to execute the vengeance of the Lord". Therefore He sent a prophet to anoint Jehu, king of Israel, and announced sacred unction to Hazael, king of Damascus and Syria; those two princes being the Messiahs of the Most High, to revenge the crimes and abominations of the house of Ahab.

But in Isaiah, xlv., 1, the name of Messiah is expressly given to Cyrus: "Thus saith the Lord to Cyrus, His anointed, His Messiah, whose right hand I have holden to subdue nations before him." etc.

Ezekiel, in his Revelations, xxviii., 14, gives the name of Messiah to the king of Tyre, whom he also calls Cherubin, and speaks of him and his glory in terms full of an emphasis of which it is easier to feel the beauties than to catch the sense. "Son of man," says the Eternal to the prophet, "take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyre, and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord God; thou sealest up the sun, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty. Thou hast been the Lord's Garden of Eden" – or, according to other versions, "Thou wast all the Lord's delight" – "every precious stone was thy covering; the sardius, topaz, and the diamond; the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper; the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. Thou wast a Cherubin, a Messiah, for protection, and I set thee up; thou hast been upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou was created till iniquity was found in thee."

And the name of Messiah, in Greek, Christ, was given to the king, prophets, and high priests of the Hebrews. We read, in I. Kings, xii., 5: "The Lord is witness against you, and his Messiah is witness"; that is, the king whom he has set up. And elsewhere: "Touch not my Anointed; do no evil to my prophets…" David, animated by the Spirit of God, repeatedly gives to his father-in-law Saul, whom he had no cause to love – he gives, I say, to this reprobate king, from whom the Spirit of the Eternal was withdrawn, the name and title of Anointed, or Messiah of the Lord. "God preserve me," says he frequently, "from laying my hand upon the Lord's Anointed, upon God's Messiah."

If the fine title of Messiah, or Anointed of the Eternal, was given to idolatrous kings, to cruel and tyrannical princes, it very often indeed, in our ancient oracles, designated the real Anointed of the Lord, the Messiah by eminence; the object of the desire and expectation of all the faithful of Israel. Thus Hannah, the mother of Samuel, concluded her canticle with these remarkable words, which cannot apply to any king, for we know that at that time the Jews had not one: "The Lord shall judge the ends of the earth; and He shall give strength unto His king, and exalt the horn of His Messiah." We find the same word in the following oracles: Psalm ii, 2; Jeremiah, Lamentations, iv, 20; Daniel, ix, 25; Habakkuk, iii, 13.

If we compare all these different oracles, and in general all those ordinarily applied to the Messiah, there will result contradictions, almost irreconcilable, justifying to a certain point the obstinacy of the people to whom these oracles were given.

How indeed could these be conceived, before the event had so well justified it in the person of Jesus, Son of Mary? How, I say, could there be conceived an intelligence in some sort divine and human together; a being both great and lovely, triumphing over the devil, yet tempted and carried away by that infernal spirit, that prince of the powers of the air, and made to travel in spite of himself; at once master and servant, king and subject, sacrificer and victim, mortal and immortal, rich and poor, a glorious conqueror, whose reign shall have no end, who is to subdue all nature by prodigies, and yet a man of sorrows, without the conveniences, often without the absolute necessaries of this life, of which he calls himself king; and that he comes, covered with glory and honor, terminating a life of innocence and wretchedness, of incessant crosses and contradictions, by a death alike shameful and cruel, finding in this very humiliation, this extraordinary abasement, the source of an unparalleled elevation, which raises him to the summit of glory, power, and felicity; that is, to the rank of the first of creatures?

All Christians agree in finding these characteristics, apparently so incompatible, in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, whom they call the "Christ"; His followers gave Him this title by eminence, not that He had been anointed in a sensible and material manner, as some kings, prophets, and sacrificers anciently were, but because the Divine Spirit had designated Him for those great offices, and He had received the spiritual unction necessary thereunto.

We had proceeded thus far on so competent an article, when a Dutch preacher, more celebrated for this discovery than for the indifferent productions of a genius otherwise feeble and ill-formed, showed to us that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Messiah of God, was anointed at the three grand periods of His life, as our King, our Prophet, and our Sacrificer.

At the time of His baptism, the voice of the Sovereign Master of nature declared Him to be His Son, His only, His well-beloved Son, and for that very reason His representative.

When on Mount Tabor He was transfigured and associated with Moses and Elias, the same supernatural voice announces Him to humanity as the Son of Him who loves and who sends the prophets; as He who is to be hearkened to in preference to all others.

In Gethsemane, an angel comes down from heaven to support Him in the extreme anguish occasioned by the approach of His torments, and strengthen Him against the terrible apprehensions of a death which He cannot avoid, and enable Him to become a sacrificer the more excellent, as Himself is the pure and innocent victim that He is about to offer.

The judicious Dutch preacher, a disciple of the illustrious Cocceius, finds the sacramental oil of these different celestial unctions in the visible signs which the power of God caused to appear on His anointed; in His baptism, "the shadow of the dove," representing the Holy Ghost coming down from Him; on Tabor, the "miraculous cloud," which enveloped Him; in Gethsemane, the "bloody sweat," which covered His whole body.

After this, it would indeed be the height of incredulity not to recognize by these marks the Lord's Anointed by eminence – the promised Messiah; nor doubtless could we sufficiently deplore the inconceivable blindness of the Jewish people, but that it was part of the plan of God's infinite wisdom, and was, in His merciful views, essential to the accomplishment of His work and the salvation of humanity.