61–80. Letters LXI–LXXX

I went the other day into a famous church called Notre Dame. While I was admiring this magnificent building I had an opportunity of conversing with an ecclesiastic, led there, like myself, by curiosity. The conversation turned upon the peaceful life enjoyed by those of his profession. “Most people,” said he, “envy the happiness of our condition, and they are right. However, it has its disadvantages: although we are in a measure separated from the world, yet a thousand things require our presence in it; and in this way we have a very difficult part to fill.

“Worldly people are truly astonishing: they can endure neither our praise nor our blame: if we desire to admonish them, they think us ridiculous; if to commend them, they regard us as undignified. Nothing can be more humiliating than the thought that one has offended even the wicked. We are therefore compelled to adopt an ambiguous method, and to influence libertines, not by a direct appeal, but by the uncertainty in which our manner of receiving their remarks leaves them. This requires abundance of talent, it is so difficult to maintain a neutral attitude: men of the world who risk everything, who give themselves up to all their fancies, dropping them or pursuing them, according to their felicity, succeed much better.

“This is not all. We cannot preserve in the world that happy peaceful state which is so loudly praised. As soon as we appear there, we are forced into argument: for example, we have to undertake to prove to a man who does not believe in God, the efficacy of prayer; or the necessity of fasting, to another who all his life has denied the immortality of the soul: the task is heavy, and the laughter is not on our side. Besides this, a desire to convert others to our own opinions, which belongs, as it were, to our profession, torments us endlessly; and is as ridiculous as if Europeans, anxious to improve human nature, were to try to change the Ethiopian’s skin. We disturb the state, and torment ourselves to enforce points of religion which are not fundamental: we are like that conqueror of China, who drove his subjects to a general revolt, by insisting that they should cut their hair or their nails. The zeal which we have to secure the fulfilment of the duties of our holy religion on the part of those over whom we are placed, is often dangerous, and cannot be accompanied by too much prudence. An emperor, called Theodosius, put to the sword all the inhabitants of a certain town, even to the women and children. Immediately afterwards, as he was about to enter a church, a bishop, Ambrose by name, shut the doors against him as a sacrilegious murderer: in doing so he performed an heroic action. This emperor, having shortly done the penance which such a crime required, and being admitted into the church, the same bishop made him come from among the priests with whom he had seated himself: that was the action of a fanatic. Thus you see how true it is, that one should not be over-zealous. Of what importance was it to religion or to the state, whether this prince had, or had not, a place among the priests?”

Paris, the 1st of the first moon of Rebiab, 1714.

Your daughter having attained her seventh year, I have judged it time to remove her to the inner apartments of the seraglio, and not to wait till she should be ten to entrust her to the care of the black eunuchs. It is impossible to deprive a young girl too soon of the liberty of childhood, and to give her a holy upbringing within those walls sacred to modesty.

For I am not of the opinion of those mothers who only sequester their daughters when they are about to bestow them in marriage, who sentence, rather than consecrate them, to the seraglio, and force them to embrace a manner of life which they ought to have taught them to love. Must we expect everything from the compulsion of reason, and leave nothing to the gentle influences of habit?

We are in vain told of the state of subjection in which nature has placed us. It is not enough to make us realise this; we must be made to practise submission, in order that we may be upheld at that critical time when the passions begin to awaken, and that we may learn voluntary subordination.

Were we only attached to you by duty, we might sometimes forget it; or if it were inclination alone that bound us, a more potent feeling might perhaps weaken it. But, when the laws bestow us on one man they withdraw us from all others, and place us as far from them as if a hundred thousand leagues intervened.

Nature, diligent in the service of men, has been no niggard in her dowry of desire; to women also she has not been unkind, and has destined us to be the living instruments of the enjoyment of our masters; she has set us on fire with passion in order that they may live at ease; should they quit their insensibility, she has provided us to restore them to it, without our ever being able to taste the happiness of the condition into which we put them.

Yet, Usbek, do not think that your situation is happier than mine; I have experienced here a thousand pleasures unknown to you. My imagination has laboured without ceasing to make me conscious of their worth; I have lived, and you have only languished.

Even in this prison where you keep me I am freer than you. You can only redouble your care in guarding me, that I may rejoice at your uneasiness; and your suspicions, your jealousy, your annoyance, are so many marks of your dependence.

Continue, dear Usbek, to have me watched night and day; take no ordinary precautions; increase my happiness in assuring your own; and know, that I dread nothing except your indifference.

The Seraglio at Ispahan, the 2nd of the first moon of Rebiab, 1714.

Do you mean to spend your whole life in the country? At first I was to lose you only for a day or two, but now fifteen have passed since I last saw you. I know that you are living in a delightful house where the company suits you, where you can speculate at your ease: nothing more is required to make you forget the whole universe.

For myself, my life moves on pretty much as it did when we were together. I go into society and try to understand it; my thought loses gradually all that remained of its Asiatic cast, and conforms without effort to European manners. I am no longer amazed to find in one house half-a-dozen women with as many men; indeed, I begin to think it not altogether a bad idea.

This I will say: I knew nothing of women until I came here; I have learnt more about them in one month of Paris, than I could have done in thirty years of a seraglio.

With us, character is uniform, because it is constrained; we do not see people as they are, but as they are obliged to be; in that slavery of heart and mind, it is only fear that utters a dull routine of words, very different from the language of nature which expresses itself so variously.

Dissimulation, that art so practised and so necessary with us, is here unknown: they say everything, see everything, and hear everything; hearts are as open as faces; in manners, in virtue, even in vice, one detects always a certain artlessness.

In order to gratify women a talent is necessary different from that other gift which pleases them still more; it consists in a sort of playfulness of mind, which entertains them, as it seems to promise them every moment what one cannot perform except occasionally.

This gaiety of mind naturally adapted to the dressing-room seems to be forming the general character of the nation: they trifle in council, at the head of an army, with an ambassador. Professions appear ridiculous only in proportion to the professional gravity adopted: a doctor would be less absurd if his dress were more cheerful, and if, while killing his patients, he jested pleasantly.

Paris, the 10th of the first moon of Rebiab, 1714.

I cannot tell you, magnificent lord, how deeply perplexed I am. Appalling disorder and confusion prevail in the seraglio: war reigns among your wives; your eunuchs are divided; nothing is heard but murmurs, complaints, reproaches; my remonstrances are despised: everything seems to be permitted in this time of licence, and I am nothing but a name in the seraglio.

There is not one of your wives who does not deem herself superior to the others by her birth, her beauty, her wealth, her intellect, or her love; and who does not claim every preference on the score of the value she sets upon one or other of these titles to respect. I lose every moment that long-suffering patience, with which, nevertheless, I have had the misfortune to displease them all: my prudence, even my kindness, so rare and strange a virtue in the post which I occupy, have been useless.

Is it your pleasure that I should disclose to you, magnificent lord, the cause of all these disorders? It is in your heart alone, in the tender affection which you have for them. If you did not withhold my hand; if, instead of remonstrating, you would allow me to punish; if, rather than suffer them to soften you by their complaints and tears, you would send them to weep before me, whom nothing can move, I would soon fashion them to the yoke they ought to bear, and weary out this proud and independent temper.

Stolen, at the age of fifteen years, out of the heart of Africa, my native country, I was at first sold to a master, who had more than twenty wives, or concubines. Judging from my grave and taciturn air, that I would be an acquisition in the seraglio, he ordered that I should be prepared for it, and made me undergo an operation, painful at first, but fortunate in its results, because it has given me the ear and the confidence of my masters. I entered the seraglio, to me a new world. The first eunuch, the sternest man I have ever known, governed there with undisputed sway. Nothing was ever heard of divisions or of quarrels: profound silence reigned everywhere: all these women were put to bed at the same hour, and wakened at the same hour, from one year’s end to the other: they entered the bath in turn, and left it at the slightest sign made by us: the rest of the time they were almost always shut up in their rooms. He had one rule, which exacted the observance of the greatest neatness, and he was in this matter inexpressibly careful: the least refusal of obedience was punished without mercy. “I am,” said he, “a slave; but the slave of a man who is your master and mine; and I use the power which he has given me over you: it is he who chastises you, not I; I only lend my hand.” These women never entered my master’s chamber but when they were summoned; that favour they welcomed gladly, and saw themselves deprived of it without a murmur. As for myself, the least of the blacks in that peaceful seraglio, I was a thousand times more respected than I am in yours, where I command all.

As soon as the chief eunuch had recognised my genius, he regarded me with favour, and spoke of me to his master as of one able to carry out his views, and to succeed him in the post which he filled: he was not afraid of my great youth, believing that my application would make up for my want of experience. Shall I tell you? I advanced so rapidly in his confidence that he went the length of entrusting me with the keys of those dreadful places, which he had guarded for so long a time. It was under this great master that I learnt the difficult art of commanding, and that I was formed according to the maxims of an inflexible government: I studied under him the heart of women: he taught me to take advantage of their weaknesses, and not to be dismayed by their arrogance. Often he amused himself by watching me drive their obedience to the very last verge; he then made them return gradually, and required that I for some time should appear to yield. But he should have been seen at those times when, now beseeching, now reproaching, they were driven almost to despair: he beheld their tears unmoved, rejoicing in his triumph. “See,” said he, with a satisfied air, “how women must be governed: their number does not trouble me; I could manage in the same way all those of our great king. How can a man hope to win their hearts, if his faithful eunuchs have not begun by breaking their spirits?”

He was not only a man of resolution, but also of penetration. He read their thoughts and their dissemblings: their studied gestures, their made-up looks, concealed nothing from him. He knew all their most hidden actions, their most secret words. He obtained his information by making them tell on each other; and it was his pleasure to reward the most insignificant confidence. As they never approached their husband except when they were ordered, the eunuch summoned whom he liked, and directed the attention of his master to those whom he wished to please; and this distinction was the reward for the revelation of some secret. He had persuaded his master that it was of the first importance that the choice should be left to him, as it would give his authority much greater weight. That was the method of government, magnificent lord, in a seraglio, which was, I believe, the best regulated in all Persia.

Give me a free hand, allow me to make myself obeyed, and eight days will see order take the place of confusion: this, your glory demands and your safety requires.

Your Seraglio at Ispahan, the 9th of the first moon of Rebiab, 1714.

I understand that the seraglio at Ispahan is in disorder, that it is full of quarrels, and intestine divisions. At my departure did I not recommend you to be at peace and maintain a good understanding?

You promised this; was it to deceive me?

It is you who will be deceived, if I choose to follow the counsels of the chief eunuch; if I choose to employ my authority to make you live as I exhorted you to do.

I do not, however, see why I should make use of those violent means until I have tried all others. Do, then, for your own sakes, what you have not cared to do for mine.

The first eunuch has a great subject of complaint: he says that you pay no attention to him. How can you harmonise that behaviour with the modesty which should belong to your condition? Is not your virtue confided to him during my absence? It is a sacred treasure, of which he is the guardian. But the contempt with which you treat him, makes it apparent that those who are charged to lead you in the paths of honour are irksome to you.

Change your behaviour then, I beg you; and see to it that I may be able still to reject the proposals which have been made to me against your freedom and your tranquillity.

For I wish you to forget that I am your master, and to be remembered only as your husband.

Paris, the 5th of the moon of Chahban, 1714.

People are very much devoted to the sciences here, but I question if they are very learned. He who, as a philosopher, doubts of all, dare deny nothing as a theologian: the inconsistent man is always well pleased with himself provided you agree with him.

The passion of nearly every Frenchman is to pass for a wit; and the passion of those who wish to be thought wits, is to write books.

There never was such an erroneous idea: it seems to be a wise provision of nature that the follies of men should be short-lived; but books interfere and immortalise them. A fool, not content with having bored all those who have lived with him, insists on tormenting generations to come; he would have his folly triumph over oblivion, which should have been as welcome to him as death; he wishes posterity to be informed of his existence, and he would have it remember for ever that he was a fool.

Of all authors, there are none whom I despise more than compilers. They crowd from all quarters to pick up the shreds of other men’s works; these they fit into their own, as one would patch the turf of a lawn: they are not one whit superior to the compositor, whose type-setting may be called book-making if manual labour is all. I would have original books respected; and it seems to me a species of profanation, to take from them the matter of which they are composed, as if from a sanctuary, and expose it to an undeserved contempt.

When a man has nothing new to say, why can’t he be quiet? Why should one be troubled with these useless repetitions? But I will give you a new illustration. You are a man of ability! You come into my library; and you shift the books from the lower shelves to the upper ones, and from the upper to the lower: you have produced a masterpiece!

I write you, * * *, because I am exasperated with a book which I have just laid down—a book so big that it seems to contain all science: but it has only split my head without putting anything into it. Farewell.

Paris, the 8th of the moon of Chahban, 1714.

Three vessels have arrived here without bringing any news from you. Are you ill, or does it amuse you to make me uneasy?

If you do not love me in a country where you are quite unfettered, how will it be in the middle of Persia, and in the bosom of your family? But perhaps I am wrong: you are charming enough to find friends everywhere; the heart is a native of all lands: what should hinder a generous nature from forming attachments? I confess, I respect old friendships; but I am quite well pleased to make new ones everywhere.

In whatever country I have been, I have lived as if I were to spend the rest of my days there: I have had the same strong liking for virtuous people, the same pity, or I should say the same love, for the wretched, and the same esteem for those whom prosperity has not blinded. That is my character, Usbek: wherever I find men, I choose friends.

There is here a Guebre who I believe, after you, holds the chief place in my heart: he is the very soul of honour. Special reasons have obliged him to retire to this town, where, with his beloved wife, he lives peacefully on the earnings of an honest trade. A generous temper has distinguished him all his life; and although he prefers obscurity, there is more of true heroism in him than in many of the greatest monarchs.

I have often spoken to him of you, and I show him all your letters. I note that this gives him great pleasure, and I perceive already that you have a friend, who is unknown to you.

Here you will find his principal adventures. Although he was very reluctant to write them, he can refuse nothing to my friendship, and I confide them to yours.

THE HISTORY OF APHERIDON AND ASTARTE.

I was born among the Guebres, whose religion is perhaps the oldest in the world. My misfortunes began, when, at the age of six, love dawned in me before reason, and I could not live without my sister. My eyes were always fixed on her, and if she left me for a moment, she found me, on returning, bathed in tears: each new day added not more to my age than to my love. My father, astonished at such strength of feeling, was quite willing that we should be married, according to the ancient custom of the Guebres, introduced by Cambyses; but fear of the Mohammedans, under whose yoke we lived prevented our people from thinking of those holy alliances, which our religion orders rather than permits, and which are such innocent reflections of a union already formed by nature.

My father, seeing how dangerous it would be to follow my inclination, which was also his, determined to extinguish a flame, believed by him to be newly lit, but which was already at its height. Under pretext of a voyage, he took me away, leaving my sister in the hands of a relative; for my mother had been dead for two years. I cannot describe the misery of that separation: I embraced my sister, she all bathed in tears, but I, dry-eyed; for grief had made me callous. We arrived at Tiflis; my father, having entrusted my education to one of our relatives, left me, and returned home.

Some time after, I learned that, through the influence of one of his friends, he had placed my sister in the harem of the king to wait upon a sultana. Had I been told of her death, I could not have been more overcome; for, apart from the fact that I could never hope to see her again, her entrance into the harem had made her a Mohammedan, and according to the superstition of that religion she could only regard me with horror. Nevertheless, unable to live longer at Tiflis, tired of myself and of life, I returned to Ispahan. My first words to my father were acrimonious; I reproached him with having placed his daughter in a place which could not be entered without a change in religion. “You have drawn upon your family,” said I to him, “the anger of God and of the Sun which lights you: you have done more wrong than if you had polluted the elements, inasmuch as you have polluted the soul of your daughter, which is not less pure: I shall die of grief and of love; and may my death be the only calamity which God will make you suffer!” With these words I went away; and for two years I spent my life staring at the walls of the harem, and wondering in which part of it my sister might be, in danger every day of having my throat cut by the eunuchs, who walk their rounds about that dread place.

At last my father died; and the sultana whom my sister served, seeing that she grew in beauty every day, became jealous, and married her to a eunuch who was passionately in love with her. In this way my sister left the seraglio, and occupied with her eunuch a house in Ispahan.

It was three months before I was able to get speech of her, the eunuch, the most jealous of men, always putting me off with various excuses. But at last I was admitted to his harem, where I had to talk to my sister through a lattice. She was so closely wrapped in robes and veils that the eyes of a lynx could not have discovered anything, and I could recognise her only by the sound of her voice. My emotion was overpowering when I found myself so close to her, and yet so far away. I restrained myself, however, for I was watched. As for her, she seemed to shed a few tears. Her husband offered some kind of halting apology; but I treated him like the least of his slaves. He was very much annoyed when he heard me speak to my sister in a tongue unknown to him. It was ancient Persian I used, the language of our religion. “What, my sister!” cried I, “is it true that you have renounced the worship of your fathers? I know that, in entering a harem, you must perforce profess Mohammedanism; but, tell me, did your heart agree with your lips in renouncing the religion which permits me to love you? And for whom have you renounced that religion which should be so dear to us? For a wretch still branded with the marks of slavery; who, if he were a man, would be the basest of his kind.” “Brother,” said she, “this man of whom you speak is my husband; it is my duty to honour him, all unworthy as he may appear to you; and it is I who would be the basest of women, if. . .” “Ah! my sister,” said I, “you are a Guebre: this man is not, and can never be, your husband. Had you kept the faith like your fathers, you would regard him only as a monster.” “Alas!” said she, “how far removed from me that religion seems now! I had hardly learned its precepts when I was obliged to forget them. You hear that this language which I speak to you is no longer familiar to me, and that I have the greatest difficulty in expressing myself. But remember that I cherish always the exquisite memory of our childhood; that since then I have known only the mockery of happiness; that not a day has passed in which I have not thought of you; that you have had a greater share in my marriage than you imagine, for it was the hope of seeing you again that won my consent to it. But this day, which has cost me so much, will cost me more yet! I see you beside yourself with passion, and my husband quivers with rage and jealousy. I will never see you more; I speak to you without a doubt for the last time in my life; and if that be so, my brother, I know it will not be a long one.” She melted at these words; and finding herself unable to continue the conversation, she left me, the most disconsolate of men.

Three or four days afterwards I asked to see my sister. The brutish eunuch would have been very glad to prevent me; but, besides the fact that husbands of that kind have not so much power over their wives as others, he loved my sister so frantically, that he could refuse her nothing. I saw her again in the same place, veiled as before, and accompanied by two slaves, and was compelled to resort to our own language. “My sister,” said I, “how is it that I cannot see you except in these horrible circumstances? The walls which keep you imprisoned, these bolts and gratings, these miserable guards who watch you, drive me mad. How have you lost the sweet freedom in which your ancestors rejoiced? Your mother, who was so chaste, gave to her husband, as the sole pledge of her virtue, that virtue itself: they lived happy in each other, and in their mutual confidence; and the simplicity of their manners was to them a thousand times more precious than the false splendour which you seem to enjoy in this sumptuous house. In losing your religion, you have lost your liberty, your happiness, and that precious equality which is the honour of your sex. But there is something much worse behind; and that is, the thing which you are not the wife, for that you cannot be, but the slave of a slave, who has been degraded from humanity.” “Ah, my brother!” said she, “have respect for my husband, for the religion which I have embraced: according to that religion, I cannot listen, I cannot speak, to you without sin.” “What, my sister!” said I, trembling with emotion, “then you believe that religion, you think it true!” “Ah!” said she, “how much better it would be for me if it were not true! I have made too great a sacrifice for it, not to believe in it; and if my doubts. . .” At these words she became silent. “Yes, my sister, your doubts! They are well founded, whatever they may be. What can you expect from a religion which makes you miserable in this world, and leaves you no hope for the next? Remember that our religion is the most ancient in the world; that it has always flourished in Persia, and that it originated with the Persian empire, the beginnings of which are beyond human ken; that it is only chance that has introduced Mohammedanism here; that that sect has been established, not by the power of persuasion, but by conquest. If our native princes had not been weak, you would have beheld the worship of these ancient Magi reigning still. Transport yourself into those remote ages: everything will speak to you of Magism, and nothing of the Mohammedan sect which, many thousands of years after, was not even in its infancy.” “But,” said she, “although my religion may be more modern than yours, it is at least purer, since it adores but one God; while you still worship the sun, the stars, fire, and even the elements.” “I perceive, my sister, that you have learned among the Mussulmans to slander our holy religion. We adore neither the stars nor the elements; and our fathers did not adore them: they never built temples to them, nor offered sacrifices in their honour: they yielded only such inferior reverence as is due to the works and manifestations of the Deity. But, my sister, in the name of God who is our light, accept this sacred volume which I have brought you: it is the book of our lawgiver, Zoroaster: read it without prejudice, and receive into your heart the light which will shine upon you: remember your fathers, who for so long a time honoured the sun in the holy city of Balk; and, finally, do not forget me, whose hopes of peace, of fortune, and of life, depend upon your conversion.” Transported by my feelings, I went away, and left her to decide alone the most momentous event of my life.

I returned to her in two days. I did not speak; I waited in silence the sentence of life or death. “You are loved, my brother,” she said, “and by a Guebre. I have resisted long; but, ye Gods! what difficulties love can overcome! A load has fallen from me! I am no longer afraid that I may love you too much; there is no limit to my passion now that excess itself is lawful. Ah! how sweetly that thought chimes with my happy heart! But you, who have found a way to break the chains which my soul had forged for itself, when will you break those which fetter my hands? From this moment I give myself to you: show by the speed with which you take me how dear the gift is. My brother, when I shall embrace you for the first time, I think I shall die in your arms.” I can never fully express the joy which I felt at these words; I believed myself, and actually saw myself, in one instant, the happiest of men: I beheld almost fulfilled all the desires which I had formed in my twenty-five years of life, and the disappearance of all the misery which had made it so hard. But, when I had grown somewhat accustomed to these delightful thoughts, I perceived that I was not so near my happiness, as I had on the first blush imagined, although I had overcome the chief obstacle in my path. It would be necessary to evade the watchfulness of her guards; I dared not confide to any one the secret of my life; I had only my sister, and she had only me: if my attempt failed, I ran the risk of being impaled; but no torture seemed so cruel as to be without her. We arranged that she should send to me for a time-piece which her father had left her; and that I should put inside it a file, to cut the lattice of the window which opened on the street, and a knotted rope by which to descend; that thereafter I should cease to visit her, but should wait every night under her window until she could execute her design. I passed fifteen entire nights without seeing any one, because she had not found a favourable opportunity. At length, on the sixteenth, I heard the rasping of the file: from time to time the work was interrupted, and in the intervals my dread was inexpressible. After an hour’s labour, I saw her fasten the rope; she let herself go, and slid into my arms. All danger was forgotten, and for a long time we stood there motionless. Then I led her out of the city to a spot where I had a horse all ready: I lifted her to the croup behind me, and fled with all imaginable speed from a neighbourhood which might have been so disastrous to us. We arrived before morning at the house of a Guebre, in a lonely place to which he had retired, living frugally on the produce of his own labour. We did not think it wise to stay with him, and by his advice we entered a dense forest, where we lodged in the hollow of an old oak, until the rumour of our flight had died away. We lived together in this out-of-the-way abode, unseen of any, telling our love over and over again to each other, and waiting until the ceremony of marriage, prescribed by our religion, could be performed by a Guebre priest. “My sister,” said I, “how holy is that union! Nature has joined us, and our holy law will join us in another bond.” At last a priest came to quiet the impatience of our love. In the house of the peasant he performed all the ceremonies of marriage; he blessed us, and wished us a thousand times the vigour of Gustaspes, and the holiness of Hohoraspes. Soon after we left Persia, where we were not safe, and retired into Georgia. We lived there a year, and every day increased the pleasure we found in each other’s company. But when my money was nearly done, fearing misery for my sister, not for myself, I left her to seek help from our relatives. Never was a parting more tender. My journey, however, was not only useless, but disastrous. For, having found all our goods confiscated, and my relatives almost powerless to aid me, I brought away with me no more money than sufficed for my return. But, imagine my despair! My sister was not to be found. Some days before my arrival the Tartars had invaded the city where she was, and finding her beautiful, had seized her, and sold her to some Jews who were bound for Turkey, leaving me only a little daughter born some months before. I followed these Jews, and overtook them three leagues off. In vain I besought them with tears, they persisted in demanding thirty tomans, and would not bate a single coin.

Having gone to everybody, and having begged the aid of both the Christian and the Turkish priests, I applied to an Armenian merchant: to him I sold my daughter and myself for thirty-five tomans. I went to the Jews, gave them their thirty tomans, and carried the other five to my sister, whom I had not yet seen. “You are free,” said I, “my sister; and I can embrace you. Here are five tomans I have brought; I am sorry that they would not buy me for more.” “What!” cried she, “you have sold yourself?” “Yes,” replied I. “Ah! wretched man, what have you done? Was I not miserable enough, that you should make me more so? Your freedom was my comfort; your bondage will bring me to the grave. Ah! my brother, how cruel your love is! And my daughter? I do not see her!” “I have sold her too,” said I. We both burst into tears, and were unable to utter a single word. At last I had to return to my master. My sister was with him almost as soon as I. She threw herself at his feet, saying, “I beg from you slavery as others ask for freedom: take me, you can sell me for a greater sum than my husband.” Then there took place a struggle which drew tears from my master’s eyes. “Unhappy man!” said she, “did you think that I would accept my liberty at the cost of yours? Master, you behold two unfortunates who will die if you separate them. I give myself to you; pay me: perhaps that money and my services will some day obtain from you what I dare not now ask. It is for your own interest not to separate us: remember his life depends on me.” The Armenian, a humane man, was touched by our woes: “Serve me, both of you, with fidelity and zeal, and I promise you that in a year I will give you your freedom. I see that neither of you deserve the wretchedness of your lot. If, when you become free, your happiness is as great as your merit, and fortune smiles upon you, I am certain that you will repay me that which I shall lose.” We both embraced his knees, and attended him on his journey. We comforted each other in our servile tasks; and I was delighted when I could do the work which fell to my sister’s share.

The end of the year arrived; our master kept his word and set us free. We returned to Tiflis. There I found an old friend of my father’s, who practised successfully as a physician in that city. He lent me some money, with which I traded. Some business called me shortly after to Smyrna, where I established myself. I have lived there for six years in the enjoyment of the most amiable and agreeable society in the world. Unity reigns in my family, and I would not change my lot for that of all the kings of the earth. I have been fortunate enough to meet again the Armenian merchant, to whom I owe all; and I have been able to render him some important services.

Smyrna, the 27th of the second moon of Gemmadi, 1714.

The other day I dined at the house of a magistrate, who had often invited me. After we had talked of a variety of things, I said to him, “Sir, it appears to me that your profession is very laborious.” “Not so much as you imagine,” he rejoined; “as we prosecute it, it is only an amusement.” “But how! is your head not always full of other people’s business? are you not always occupied with matters that do not interest you?” “You are right; these matters do not interest us, because we take not the least interest in them; and that is how our profession is not so fatiguing as you supposed.” When I saw that he took the matter so carelessly, I continued, and said, “Sir, I have not seen your study.” “I believe you; for I have none. When I took this post, lacking the money to pay for it, I sold my library. The bookseller who bought it, out of a vast number of volumes, left me only my account-book. Nor do I regret them: we judges have no need to stuff our heads with useless knowledge. What have we to do with all these legal volumes? Almost all the cases are questions of fact, and outside the general rule.” “But, sir, may it not be because you make them so? For, in short, why should all the peoples of the world have laws, if these laws are not to be applied? And how can one who does not know them, apply them?” “If you were acquainted with the courts of justice,” replied the magistrate, “you would not speak as you do. We have living books, the advocates: they work for us, and take upon themselves the task of instructing us.” “And do they not also sometimes take upon themselves the task of deceiving you?” I retorted. “It would not be a bad thing to guard yourself against their wiles. They have weapons with which to attack your justice: it would be well if you were in a condition to defend it: you ought not to rush into the midst of the fight, thinly clad, among people armed to the teeth.”

Paris, the 13th of the moon of Chahban, 1714.

You would never have dreamed that I could become a greater metaphysician than I was. Such is the case, however; and you will be convinced of it, when you have waded through this flood of my philosophy.

The most sensible of those philosophers, who have considered the nature of God, have declared that He is a being supremely perfect; but they have sadly abused this idea. They have tabulated all the various perfections which man is capable of possessing and of imagining, and with these they have clad the idea of God, not thinking that these attributes are often contradictory, and, being mutually destructive, cannot subsist in the same individual.

The western poets tell how a painter, wishing to make a likeness of the goddess of beauty, gathered together the most beautiful Greek women, and, having taken from each that grace in which she most excelled, combined their selected charms into a picture of the loveliest of the goddesses. If, on that account, a man should think that she was both fair and dark, that her eyes were black and blue, and that she was, at one and the same time, sweet-tempered and haughty, he would pass for a fool.

God often falls short of a perfection which would make Him very imperfect: but He is never limited except by Himself; He is His own law. Thus, although God is all-powerful, He can neither break His promises, nor deceive men. Often too, His impotence is not subjective, but objective; and that is the reason why He cannot change the nature of things.

So, also, it is not so very wonderful that some of our learned men should have denied the infinite foreknowledge of God, upon the principle that it is incompatible with His justice.

However bold this idea may be, it is countenanced remarkably by metaphysics. According to metaphysical principles, it is impossible that God should foresee such things as depend upon the determination of free causes; because that which has not happened does not exist, and consequently, cannot be known; for nothing, having no properties, cannot be perceived: God cannot read a will which does not exist, nor discern in the mind what it does not contain, for, until the mind is made up, the thing determined on is not in it.

The mind is the author of its determination; but there are occasions when it is so irresolute, that it does not even know for which side to determine. Often indeed it makes a selection only to use its liberty; in such a manner that God cannot foresee its choice, neither in its own action, nor in the operation of objects upon it.

How could God foresee things which depend upon the determination of free causes? He could only see them in two ways: by conjecture, which is incompatible with His infinite foreknowledge; or He could see them as necessary effects proceeding infallibly from a cause which produces them as infallibly—a method even more at variance with divine foreknowledge, for it supposes that the mind is free, with a freedom, however, no greater than that of a billiard ball, which is at liberty to move when it is struck by another. Do not think, however, that I wish to limit God’s knowledge. Since He directs the actions of His creatures according to His pleasure, He knows all that He wishes to know. But although He can see everything, He does not always make use of that power: He generally leaves man the power to do a thing or to leave it alone, in order that he may be able to choose between right and wrong; and this is why God renounces the absolute authority which He has over the mind. But, when He desires to know anything, He always knows it, because He has only to will that a thing shall happen as He sees it, and to make His creatures conform to His will. It is thus that He selects what shall happen from the number of mere possibilities, fixing by His decrees the future determinations of men’s minds, and depriving them of the power which He gave them to do or not to do.

Let me employ a comparison in a matter which transcends all comparisons:—A monarch, ignorant of what his ambassador will do in an important affair, if he wishes to know, has only to command him to conduct the negotiation in such or such a manner, and he will be certain that the thing will happen as he planned it.

The Koran and the Hebrew books are constant witnesses against the dogma of absolute foreknowledge: God appears throughout these writings as ignorant of the future determinations of men’s minds: and it seems that this was the first truth that Moses taught mankind.

God placed Adam in the terrestrial paradise, on condition that he should not eat of a certain fruit: an absurd command to be given by a being acquainted with the future determinations of men’s minds; for, in short, could such a being make His favour depend on such conditions, without rendering it ridiculous? It is as if a man who was aware of the capture of Bagdad should say to another, “I will give you a hundred tomans if Bagdad is not taken.” Would that not be a very sorry jest?

My dear Rhedi, why all this philosophy? God is so far above us that we cannot perceive even His clouds. We have no knowledge of Him except in His commandments. He is a spirit, immense and infinite. May His greatness make us conscious of our own weakness. To humble ourselves continually, is to adore Him continually.

Paris, the last day of the moon of Chahban, 1714.

Soliman, whom you love, has been driven desperate by an affront which he has just received. Three months ago a young giddypate, named Suphis, sought his daughter in marriage; he seemed satisfied with the girl’s appearance from the report and description given him by the women who had been with her during her childhood; the dowry had been agreed upon, and all was going well. Yesterday, after the first ceremonies, the girl set out on horseback, accompanied by her eunuch, and veiled, according to custom, from head to foot. But when she arrived at the house of her intended husband, he caused the door to be shut in her face, and swore that he would never receive her unless her dowry were increased. Her relatives hastened from all quarters to arrange the matter; and after a deal of resistance, Soliman agreed to make a small present to his son-in-law. The marriage ceremonies were completed, and the girl conducted to her husband’s bed with sufficient violence; but, an hour after, this giddypate rose in a rage, cut her face in several places, and, declaring that she was not a virgin, sent her back to her father. No one could be more afflicted than he is by this injury. Many people maintain that the girl is innocent. Fathers are most unfortunate in being exposed to such affronts. If my daughter were to receive similar treatment, I believe I should die of grief. Farewell.

The Seraglio at Fatme, the 9th of the first moon of Gemmadi, 1714.

I am sorry for Soliman, especially as his misfortune is without remedy, since his son-in-law has done no more than the law allows him. I think it a very harsh law, which exposes in this way the honour of a family to the caprice of a fool. It has been lightly said that there are sure signs whereby to know the truth: it is an old error from which we have now departed; and our physicians have supplied invincible reasons for the uncertainty of these proofs. Even among the Christians there are none who do not regard them as imaginary, although they are plainly established in their sacred writings, and although their ancient lawgiver has made the innocence or condemnation of all their daughters depend upon them.

I am pleased to know that you are giving great care to the education of yours. God grant that her husband may find her as lovely and as pure as Fatima; may she have ten eunuchs to guard her; may she be the honour and the ornament of the seraglio to which she is destined; may she have overhead none but gilded ceilings, and under foot only the richest carpets! And, to crown these wishes, may my eyes see her in all her glory!

Paris, the 3rd of the moon of Chalval, 1714.

I found myself recently in a company where I met a man very well satisfied with himself. In a quarter of an hour, he decided three questions in morals, four historical problems, and five points in physics. I have never seen so universal a decider; his mind was not once troubled with the least doubt. We left science, and talked of the current news: he decided upon the current news. I wished to catch him, so I said to myself, “I must get to my strong point; I will betake me to my own country.” I spoke to him of Persia; but hardly had I opened my mouth, when he contradicted me twice, basing his objections upon the authority of Tavernier and Chardin. “Ah! good heavens!” said I to myself, “what kind of man is this? He will know next all the streets in Ispahan better than I do!” I soon knew what part to play—to be silent, and let him talk; and he is still laying down the law.

Paris, the 8th of the moon of Zilcade, 1715.

I have heard much talk of a sort of court called the French Academy. There is no tribunal in the world which is less respected; for they say that no sooner does it issue a decree than the people break it, and substitute laws which the Academy is bound to follow.

Some time ago, in order to establish its authority, it issued a code of its decisions. This child of so many fathers may be said to have been old when it was born; and although it was legitimate, a bastard, born before it, nearly strangled it at its birth.

Those who compose this court have no other function than to jabber perpetually: eulogy suggests itself as the one subject of their incessant babble; and as soon as they are initiated into its mysteries, a frenzy of panegyric lays hold of them, and will not be shaken off.

This body has forty heads, all of them chokeful of tropes, of metaphors, and of antitheses; so that their lips scarcely ever open without an exclamation, and their ears are always waiting to be touched with rhythm and harmony. As for their eyes, they are out of the question; the Academy seems to be intended to talk and not to see. It is not firm on its legs; for time, which is its scourge, smites it incessantly and destroys all it does. It is said that at one time its hands were grasping; I have nothing to say on the subject, and will leave those to decide it who know more about it than I do.

Such eccentricities, * * *, are unknown in our Persia. We have no bent towards what is odd and extravagant; we endeavour to shape our simple customs and artless manners in the mould of nature.

Paris, the 27th of the moon of Zilhage, 1715.

Some days ago a man of my acquaintance said to me, “I promised to introduce you to the best houses in Paris. I will take you now to that of a great lord who supports his rank as well as any man in France.”

“What do you mean by that, sir? Is he more refined, more polite than others?” “No,” said he. “Ah! I understand: he makes his superiority felt on all occasions by those who approach him. If that is it, I shall have nothing to do with him; I give up the whole case, and accept my inferiority.” I had, however, to go; and I saw a little man, supercilious to a degree. He took a pinch of snuff with such a haughty air, he blew his nose so mercilessly, he spat with such indifference, and caressed his dogs in a style so offensive to the onlookers, that I could not but marvel at him. “Ah! sweet Heaven!” said I to myself; “if, when I was at the court of Persia, I behaved in this way, I behaved like a great fool!” We would have been very inferior creatures, Rica, had we offered a hundred little insults to those people who waited upon us daily in token of their goodwill. They knew well that we were above them; and if they had not, our favours would have made them daily conscious of it. There being no need to secure their respect, we did our utmost to win their affection: we were accessible to the humblest; in the midst of our greatness, usually so hardening, they found we had feelings; only our hearts appeared to belong to a higher order; we descended to their wants. But, when it was necessary to support the dignity of our sovereign in public ceremonies, to make the nation worthy of respect in the eyes of strangers; and, lastly, when, in times of danger, we required to animate our soldiers, our bearing became more lofty a hundred times than it had been before lowly; we resumed our haughty looks; and not seldom we were found to play our part at least adequately.

Paris, the 10th of the moon of Saphar, 1715.

I must confess that I have not noticed in the Christians that lively faith in their religion which prevails among Mussulmans. With them there is a vast difference between profession and belief, between belief and conviction, between conviction and practice. Religion is not so much a matter of holiness as it is the subject of a debate, in which everybody has a right to join. Courtiers, warriors, women even, array themselves against the ecclesiastics, and insist upon their proving what they have made up their minds not to believe. Not that, willing to be guided by reason, they have taken the trouble to examine the falseness of that religion which they reject: they are rebels who have felt the yoke, and have shaken it off before knowing what it is. Nor are they any securer in their incredulity than in their faith: their life is a constant ebb and flow between belief and unbelief. One of them said to me once, “I believe in the immortality of the soul for six months at a time; my opinions depend entirely upon my bodily condition: I am a Spinozist, a Socinian, a Catholic, ungodly or devout, according to the state of my animal spirits, the quality of my digestion, the rarity or heaviness of the air I breathe, the lightness or solidity of the food I eat. When the doctor is at my bedside, the confessor has me at a disadvantage. I know very well how to prevent religion from annoying me when I am in good health; but I allow myself to be consoled by it when I am ill: when I have nothing more to hope for here below, religion offers itself, and gains me by its promises; I am glad to give myself up to it, and to die with hope on my side.”

A long time ago the Christian princes enfranchised all the slaves in their dominions; because, said they, Christianity makes all men equal. It is true that this religious action was of great service to them, for by its means they diminished the power which the great lords exercised over the lower classes. Afterwards, having made conquests in countries where they found it to their advantage to keep slaves, they permitted them to be bought and sold, forgetting that religious principle which had moved them so strongly. What can one say? Truth at one time, error at another. Why should we not do like the Christians? We were very simple-minded to reject settlements and easy conquests in pleasant climates, because we could not find water pure enough to wash us according to the principles of our holy Koran. I give thanks to Almighty God, who sent His great prophet Hali, whence it is that I profess a religion which requires to be preferred before all human interests, and which is as pure as the sky from which it came.

Paris, the 13th of the moon of Saphar, 1715.

European law is dead against suicide. Those who kill themselves suffer, as it were, a second death: they are dragged with ignominy through the streets: their infamy is published, and their goods confiscated. It seems to me, Ibben, that this law is very unjust. When I am loaded with grief, misery, and contumely, why should I be hindered from putting an end to my sufferings, and cruelly deprived of a remedy which is in my hands?

Why should I be forced to labour for a society to which I refuse to belong? Why in spite of myself, should I be held to an agreement made without my consent? Society is founded upon mutual advantage; but, when it becomes burdensome to me, what hinders me from leaving it? Life was given me as a blessing; when it ceases to be so I can give it up: the cause ceasing, the effect ought also to cease.

Will any prince require me to be his subject, if I reap none of the benefits of subjection? Can my fellow-citizens require our lots to be so unequal; theirs, usefulness—mine, despair? Will God, unlike other benefactors, condemn me to receive favours which are a burden to me?

I am obliged to obey the laws while I live under them; but, if I cease to live, can they still bind me? “But,” some one may say, “you disturb the order of Providence. God has joined your soul to your body; in separating them, you oppose His designs and resist His will.”

What force is there in this argument? Do I disturb the order of Providence, when I alter the qualities of matter, and square a ball which the first laws of motion, that is to say the laws of creation and preservation, made round? Certainly not; I only exercise a right which has been given me and, in that sense, I can disturb, as my fancy dictates, the whole order of Nature, without any one being able to say that I oppose Providence.

When my soul shall be separated from my body, will there be less order, less harmony, in the universe? Do you think that that new combination will be less perfect, and less dependent upon general laws; that the world would lose anything by it; that the works of God would be less great, or rather less immense?

Do you think that my body, become a blade of grass, a worm, a grass-green turf, will be changed into a work of nature less worthy of her; and that my soul, freed from all its earthly trammels, will become less sublime?

All these ideas, my dear Ibben, have their only source in our pride. We do not feel our littleness; and, however small we may be, we wish to count for something in the universe, to cut a figure there, and to be of some consequence in it. We imagine that the annihilation of such a perfect being would degrade all nature: and we cannot conceive that one man more or less in the world—what do I say?—that the whole world, that a hundred millions of worlds like ours, can be more than one small frail atom, which God perceives only because His knowledge is all-embracing.

Paris, the 15th of the moon of Saphar, 1715.

My dear Usbek, it seems to me that, in the eyes of a true Mussulman, misfortunes are not so much punishments as warnings. Those are priceless days upon which we are led to atone for our offences. It is the time of prosperity that ought to be curtailed. To what end is all our impatience, but to show us that we are seeking happiness, independently of Him who gives it, because He is happiness itself?

If a human creature is composed of two beings, and if the acknowledgment of the necessity of preserving their union is the chief mark of submission to the decrees of our Creator, that necessity should be made a religious law; and if the enforced preservation of this union will make men more responsible for their actions, it should be made a civil law.

Smyrna, the last day of the moon of Saphar, 1715.

I send you a copy of a letter, written by a Frenchman who is in Spain: I believe that you will be glad to see it.

I have travelled for six months in Spain and Portugal, where I lived among people despising all nations except the French, whom they honour with their hate. Gravity is the distinctive characteristic of both nations: it has two chief methods of manifestation—spectacles and moustaches.

Spectacles demonstrate clearly that the wearer of them is an accomplished man of science, who has injured his sight by the extent and profundity of his reading; and every nose which they adorn or burden, may pass, without contradiction, for the nose of a savant. As regards the moustache, in itself it is respectable, independently of results; although sometimes it has been of great use in the service of the king, and in the maintenance of national honour, as appears from the case of a famous Portuguese general in the Indies: for, being in want of money, he cut off one of his moustaches, and offered it to the inhabitants of Goa as a pledge for the loan of twenty thousand pistoles, and the money was advanced at once; afterwards he redeemed his moustache with honour.

One can easily understand how such a grave and phlegmatic people might very well be haughty; and so they are. They usually base their pride upon two matters of sufficient importance. Of those who live in Spain and Portugal, the most uplifted are such as are called old Christians; that is to say, such as are not descended from the converts to Christianity made by the Inquisition in later times. Those who dwell in the Indies are not less elated by the consideration that they have the sublime merit to be, as they say, white-skinned men. There was never in the seraglio of the Grand Seigneur, a sultana so proud of her beauty, as the oldest and ugliest rascal among them is of his complexion of pale olive, when in a Mexican town he sits at his own door with his arms folded. A man of such importance, a creature so perfect, would not work for all the wealth of the world; and could never persuade himself to compromise the honour and the dignity of his colour by vile mechanic industry.

For you must know, that, when a man possesses some special merit in Spain, as, for example, when he can add to the qualities which I have already described, that of owning a long sword, or that of having learnt from his father to strum a jangling guitar, he works no more: his honour is concerned in the repose of his limbs. He who remains seated ten hours a day obtains exactly double the respect paid to one who rests only five, because nobility is acquired by sitting still.

But, although these invincible foes of work make a great show of philosophic calm, they have nothing of the sort in their hearts; for they are always in love. In dying of languor under their mistress’s windows they have not their match in the world; no Spaniard is esteemed gallant who is without a cold.

They are, firstly, bigots—secondly, jealous. They are particularly careful not to expose their wives to the attempts of a soldier riddled with wounds, or of some decrepit magistrate; but they will shut them up with a fervent novice who casts down his eyes, or a robust Franciscan with a bold glance.

They allow their wives to appear with uncovered bosoms; but they would not have any one see their heels, lest hearts should be ensnared by a glimpse of their feet. They say all the world over that love is cruelly rigorous: in Spain it is especially so. The women cure love, but only with the substitution of other suffering: there often remains a long and disagreeable memorial of an extinguished passion.

They have certain little courtesies which in France would appear out of place; for example, an officer never strikes a soldier without asking his permission; and the Inquisition always apologises to a Jew before burning him.

Spaniards who are not burned seem so fond of the Inquisition, that it would be ill-natured to deprive them of it. Indeed, I should like to see another established; not for heretics, but for heresiarchs who ascribe to paltry monkish practices the same efficacy as to the seven sacraments; who worship what they should only respect; and who are so devout that they are hardly Christians.

Wit and common sense are to be found among the Spaniards; but let no one seek for them in their books. Glance at one of their libraries, with romances on the one side, and the schoolmen on the other; and you would say that the arrangement had been made, and the whole collected by some secret foe of human reason.

Their only good book is one which was written to expose the absurdity of all the others.

They have made immense discoveries in the New World, and yet they do not know thoroughly their own country: there are upon their rivers an undiscovered bridge or two, and among their mountains races unknown to them.

They say that the sun rises and sets within their dominions; but it must also be said that in making his journey he encounters only ruined fields and desolate countries.

It would not grieve me, Usbek, to see a letter written to Madrid by a Spaniard who was travelling in France: I think he would have little difficulty in avenging his nation. What a grand opportunity for an even-tempered, thoughtful man! I imagine he would begin his description of Paris in this way:

There is a house here in which they place mad people: one would at first expect it to be the largest in the city; but no, the remedy is much too insignificant for the disease. Without doubt, the French, being held in very slight esteem by their neighbours, shut up some madmen in this house, to create the impression that those who are at large are sane.

There I leave my Spaniard. Farewell, my dear Usbek.

Paris, the 17th of the moon of Saphar, 1715.

Most legislators have been men of inferior capacity whom chance exalted over their fellows, and who took counsel almost exclusively of their own prejudices and whims.

It would seem that they had not even a sense of the greatness and dignity of their work: they amused themselves by framing childish institutions, well devised indeed to please small minds, but discrediting their authors with people of sense.

They flung themselves into useless details; and gave their attention to individual interests: the sign of a narrow genius, which grasps things piecemeal and cannot take a general view.

Some of them have been so affected as to employ another language than the vernacular—a ridiculous thing in a framer of laws; for how can they be obeyed if they are not known?

They have often abolished needlessly those which were already established—that is to say, they have plunged nations into the confusion which always accompanies change.

It is true that, by reason of some extravagance springing rather from the nature than from the mind of man, it is sometimes necessary to change certain laws. But the case is rare; and when it happens it requires the most delicate handling; much solemnity ought to be observed, and endless precautions taken, in order to lead the people to the natural conclusion that the laws are most sacred, since so many formalities are necessary to their abrogation.

Often they have made them too subtle, following logical instead of natural equity. As a consequence such laws have been found too severe; and a spirit of justice required that they should be set aside; but the cure was as bad as the disease. Whatever the laws may be, obedience to them is necessary; they are to be regarded as the public conscience, with which all private consciences ought to be in conformity.

It must, however, be admitted that some legislators in their attention to one matter have shown sufficient wisdom; and that is, in giving fathers so much power over their children: nothing is a better lightener of the magistrate’s labours, nothing tends more to keep the courts of justice empty, in short, nothing is more conducive to tranquillity in a state, for morality always makes better citizens than law.

Of all powers it is that which is least abused; it is the most sacred of all magistracies—the only one which does not spring from a contract, which, indeed, precedes all contracts.

It has been noticed that families are best ruled in those countries where there is a large paternal discretion in matters of reward and punishment; fathers represent the Creator of the universe, who, although able to lead men by His love, does not refrain from binding them to Himself still more closely by motives of hope and fear.

I cannot finish this letter without pointing out the capricious turn of mind of the French. It is said that they have retained many things in the Roman laws which are useless, and even worse than useless; from them, however, they have not derived the paternal power, which they have established as the source of all lawful authority.

Paris, the 18th of the moon of Saphar, 1715.

Yesterday, some Armenians brought to the seraglio a young Circassian slave whom they wished to sell. I made her enter the secret apartments; I undressed her, I examined her with the eyes of a judge; and the more I examined, the more beauties I found. A virginal shame seemed anxious to hide them from my view: I saw how much it cost her to obey: she blushed upon beholding herself naked, even before me, exempt, as I am, from the passions which can alarm decency, and entirely delivered from the dominion of the sex—the servant of modesty in the freest actions, looking only with the chastest glance, and capable of inspiring nothing but innocence.

From the moment I judged her worthy of you, I cast down my eyes, and threw over her a scarlet cloak; I placed a ring of gold upon her finger, I prostrated myself at her feet, I adored her as the queen of your heart. I paid the Armenians, and hid her from every eye. Happy Usbek! you possess more beauties than all the palaces of the east enclose. What a pleasure to find on your return whatever Persia has that is most ravishing, and to see in your seraglio all the graces reborn as fast as time and possession work their destruction!

The Seraglio at Fatme, the 1st of the first moon of Rebiab, 1715.