Candide

Candide Read Online Free PDF Page B

Book: Candide Read Online Free PDF
Author: Voltaire
may safely affirm that, when an army of 30,000 men fights another equal in number, there are about 20,000 of them so diseased on each side.”
    “Very surprising indeed,” said Candide, “but you must get cured.” “Lord help me! how can I?” cried Pangloss. “My dear friend, I have not a penny in the world; and you know one cannot be bled or have an enema without a fee.”
    This last speech had its effect on Candide. He flew to the charitable Anabaptist James. He flung himself at his feet, and gave him so striking a picture of the miserable situation of his friend, that the good man, without any further hesitation, agreed to take Dr. Pangloss into his house and to pay for his cure. During the course of the cure Pangloss lost only one eye and one ear. Since his handwriting was good and he understood accounts tolerably well, the Anabaptist made him his bookkeeper. At the end of two months, being obliged to go to Lisbon about some mercantile affairs, he took the two philosophers with him in the same ship. Pangloss during the course of the voyage explained to him how everything was so constituted that it could not be better. James did not quite agree with him on this point. “Mankind,” said he, “must in some things have deviated from their original innocence; for they were not born wolves, and yet they worry one another like those beasts of prey. God never gave them twenty-four pounders nor bayonets, and yet they have made cannon and bayonets to destroy one another. To this list I might add not only bankruptcies, but the law which seizes on the effects of bankrupts, only to cheat the creditors.” 4 “All this was indispensably necessary,” replied the one-eyed doctor; “for private misfortunes are public benefits; so that the more private misfortunes there are the greater is the general good.” While he was arguing in this manner the sky was overcast, the winds blew from the four quarters of the compass, and the ship was assailed by a most terrible tempest within sight of the port of Lisbon.

VIII
    The History of Cunégonde
    I was in bed and fast asleep when heaven chose to send the Bulgarians to our delightful castle of Thunder-ten-tronckh, where they murdered my father and brother, and cut my mother in pieces. A tall Bulgarian soldier, six feet high, seeing that I had fainted at this sight, attempted to ravish me. At that I recovered my senses. I cried, I struggled, I bit, I scratched, I would have torn the tall Bulgarian’s eyes out, not knowing that what had happened at my father’s castle was a customary thing. The brutal soldier, enraged at my resistance, gave me a cut in the left groin with his knife, the mark of which I still carry.“nities.” “I long to see it,“ said Candide, with all imaginable simplicity. ”You shall,” said Cunégonde; ”but let me proceed.” “Please do,” replied Candide.
    She continued: “A Bulgarian captain came in, and saw me covered in my blood, and the soldier still as busy as if no one had been present. The officer, enraged at the fellow’s lack of respect to him, killed him with one stroke of his sabre. This captain took care of me, had me cured, and carried me as a prisoner of war to his quarters. I washed what little linen he owned and prepared his food. He was very fond of me, that was certain; neither can I deny that he was handsome, and had a white soft skin; but he was very stupid, and knew nothing of philosophy. It was evident that he had not been educated under Dr. Pangloss. After three months, having lost all his money, and being tired of me, he sold me to a Jew named Don Issachar, who traded in Holland and Portugal, and was passionately fond of women. This Jew showed me great kindness, in hopes to gain my favours; but this got him nowhere with me. A modest woman may be once violated, but her virtue is greatly strengthened as a result. In order to keep me hidden, he brought me to this country house you now see. I have hitherto believed that nothing
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