:00 :LO : CO = 00 CD CO THE SYMBOLISM OF VOLTAIRE'S NOVELS WITH SPECIAL EEFEEENCE TO ZADIG BY WILLIAM RALEIGH PEICE, PH.D. Sotfc THE COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS 1911 II rights referred Copyright, 1911 By THE COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS 1911 Printed from type. Published September, ?76" PRESS OF THE NEW ERA PRINTINS COMPANY LANCASTER. PA. Columbia STUDIES IN ROMANCE PHILOLOGY AND LITERATURE THE BYMBOLISM OF VOLTAIRE'S NOVELS COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS SALES AGENTS NEW YOBK: LEMCKE & BUECHNER 30-32 WEST 27TH STKEHT LONDON : HENRY FROWDE AHEM CORNER, E.C. TORONTO : HENRY FROWDE 25 RICHMOND STREET, WEST The Symbolism of Voltaire's Novels With Special Reference to Zadig CHAPTEK I INTEODUCTION THE purpose of this Introduction is to show, (1) where a real lacuna exists in the study of Voltaire's novels, and (2) how that lacuna is to be filled. In order to show this, I shall give a resume and an analysis of what has been done by my predecessors in the field. RESUME OF THE BIBLIOGRAPHY A. 'No less a scholar than Gaston Paris has treated the episode of the Angel and the Hermit (La Poesie du moyen age, premiere serie, troisieme edition, Paris, 1895, p. 151 ft.) as it has ap- peared in literature from the earliest times down. If he had connected this episode with 1 1 2 SYMBOLISM OF VOLTAIEE'S NOVELS Voltaire's life and informed us just what Vol- *" taire meant by it, there would be nothing more to be said on this topic; but, unfortunately, he neglected to do that. There is a dissertation on the Sources of Zadig, by Mr. W. Seele (Leipzig, 1891), which is largely an elaboration of hints thrown out by Dunlop and others. The author confines him- self strictly to his subject of the sources, giving nothing about Voltaire's purpose in writing the novel. In treating the general topic of the Orient in French, German and English literatures, the following authors have something to say about Zadig: (1) Pierre Martino (L' Orient dans la 6 6 litterature frangaise au XVII et au XVIII A. J. F. siecle, Paris, 1906) ; (2) Remy (The Influence of India and Persia on the poetry of P. Germany, New York, 1901) ; (3) Martha Conant (The Oriental Tale in England in the Eighteenth Century, New York, 1908). M. Pierre Martino gives the impression that he is not at all sure to be just what Zadig purports ; he dismisses the subject of its realism by saying that it is a capricious tale in the style of Crebil- lon fils, in which allusions to modern life crop INTRODUCTION 3 up unexpectedly and by way of contrast (p. out the immediate 277 f.). Dr- Remy points and the ultimate sources of the novel (p. 15), and calls attention to the meaning of the name " " of the hero as Speaker of the truth (follow- ing, in this interpretation, Hammer, Geschichte der schonen Redekiinste Persiens) . But neither Remy nor Hammer attempted to show whether Voltaire was familiar with this meaning, either by citing his possible authorities, or by internal evidence from the novel. Miss Conant says (p. but 135) that Zadig is, "of course," Voltaire, she offers no evidence to substantiate her asser- tion. She probably followed Parton's Life of Voltaire, in which the Duchess of Maine is quoted as authority for that application. Miss Conant also indicates her belief that the other characters, "with their fanciful Oriental names," are Voltaire's court friends and enemies. Desnoiresterres has little to say about Vol- taire's novels. He gives a paragraph of three lines to Candide, and calls attention, in a note, to the perfidious intention, the sly allusions, of Zadig. In his well-known Life of Voltaire, S. G. Tallentyre says that Candide is directed 4 SYMBOLISM OF VOLTAIEE'S NOVELS against Jean Jacques Rousseau, but fails to specify in what way and to what extent. The general histories of the novel are just as meagre, with the exception of Dunlop, for the sources of Zadig. Dunlop contrasts the successful in- vestigation of the sources of Zadig with the fail- ure to discover any literary sources for Candide. There are a few magazine articles about Vol- taire's novels, of which the following may be mentioned: (1) Blackwood's Magazine, IV (1819), p. 155 ff.; (2) Dublin University Magazine, LXVII (1866), p. 64 ff., p. 184 ff.; (3) Modern Language Notes, 1906 (in which Mr. Leon Fraser points out the earliest source of the episode of the Dog and the Horse, in the Talmud) . Louis Moland (whose edition of Voltaire's works will be referred to as M., followed by the volume and the page number), gives excerpts of the more important utterances about Vol- taire's novels (in Vols. I and XXI, the latter of which contains the novels). They deal prin- e. cipally with the moral of the novels (i. f the philosophic thesis, what the Germans call the Tendenz), or they are expressions of personal impressions. Moland's edition also reproduces INTRODUCTION 5 the footnotes of his predecessors, and offers some original ones. They give important indications of the purpose of Voltaire in writing his novels, but no general conclusions are drawn from them. ANALYSIS OF THE BIBLIOGRAPHY The above resume of the Bibliography shows that the three points of view in literary criti- cism: the historical, the psychological, and the impressionistic, are all represented, but in very unequal proportions and by critics of widely different significance. I shall treat them suc- cessively under their proper headings. THE HISTORICAL CRITICISMS The historical criticisms deal, it will be noticed, exclusively with the literary sources. The problem that confronts us here is to deter- mine the significance of such investigations for the interpretation of Voltaire's novels. No attempt is made by me to belittle the im- portance of the investigation of sources per se; the point is, whether such investigations are im- portant for Voltaire's work. I shall attempt to show that they have little or no importance. In the first place, what have we accomplished 6 SYMBOLISM OF VOLTAIEE'S NOVELS when we have shown that every episode in Zadig is imitated from this or that literary source ? We have, at the most, confirmed Fre- ron's charge (M. 21, p. 86, note 1), that Vol- taire was a common plagiarist, lacking in in- vention and devoid of imagination. That would be a remarkable conclusion about the work of a man like Voltaire, whose imagination re- ceived such unstinted praise from his contem- poraries, and which, even to us, sparkles and effervesces through the printed words. In the second place, if Zadig is a literary patch-work, how are we to explain Candide, for which no literary sources have been discovered ? Is it likely that Voltaire's imagination, verve, originality, invention were less in 1747 than in 1759 ? On the contrary, the conclusion is absurd. I consider it demonstrated that, the greater and the better founded the charges of imitation in Zadig seem, the less the significance of such charges is for the interpretation of Voltaire's work. Now, if the significance of Voltaire's novels is not in the sources, wherein does it consist? I shall show that it consists in his symbolism. INTRODUCTION 7 In the first place, what has Voltaire to do with Oriental fiction? or with fiction? or with the Orient ? Is it not clear that the Orient is, for him, but a symbol for the Occident, just as / he speaks of the bonzes and the Magians as symbols of the priests of France ? We must never lose sight of the intensely practical char- acter of Voltaire's work; its very intimate con- nection with his own life and the life of his times. He was not the type of author who shut himself up in his study and thought out or sought out fine themes and situations for artistic remaniment. Even his dramas have an inti- mate connection with the thought, life, and social conditions in which he lived. He was probably inspired to compose (Edipe by the relations of the Kegent and his daughter, the famous Duchess of Berry. He tells us that the persecutions which he suffered during the period of the Voltairomanie turned to tragic sentiments and inspired the composition of Zulime and Mahomet (M. 35, pp. 226-227). If that is true of his dramas, how much more must it be true of his novels! There is an edition of Zadig of the year 1756 (cf. Bengesco, I, p. 438, note) entitled: La destinee ou le theatre de la 8 SYMBOLISM OF VOLTAIEE'S NOVELS vie humaine, ouvrage historique de M. de Vol- taire. The publisher of that edition took liber- ties with Voltaire's title, but the character of Voltaire's work justifies them. Destiny is but the linking of cause and effect in a given en- vironment. If, in Zadig, the Orient is a symbol for the Occident, the characters, the scenes, the incidents and episodes of the novel are also sym- bolic, and the literary sources can have nothing to do with the interpretation of the work. Vol- taire seems to wish to indicate that the sig- nificance of Zadig lies in its symbolism, when he says, in the Epitre dedicatoire (M. 21, p. 32), that I'histoire de Zadig (est un) ouvrage qui dit plus qu'il ne semble dire. The conclusion which we have reached by an analysis of the historical criticisms is fortified by Voltaire's opinions about the novel in gen- eral, and about particular novels.