Philosophy demands a writer whose principal occupation is a diffusion of it, who is unable to keep it to himself; who pours it out like a gushing fountain, who offers it to everybody, daily and in every form, in broad streams and in small drops, without exhaustion or weariness, through every crevice and by every channel, in prose, in verse, in imposing and in trifling poems, in the drama, in history, in novels, in pamphlets, in pleadings, in treatises, in essays, in dictionaries, in correspondence, openly and in secret, in order that it may penetrate to all depths and in every soil; such was Voltaire.-"I have accomplished more in my day," he says somewhere, "than either Luther or Calvin," in which he is mistaken. The truth is, however, he has something of their spirit. Like them he is desirous of changing the prevailing religion, he takes the attitude of the founder of a sect, he recruits and binds together proselytes, he writes letters of exhortation, of direction and of predication, he puts watchwords in circulation, he furnishes "the brethren" with a device; his passion resembles the zeal of an apostle or of a prophet. Such a spirit is incapable of reserve; it is militant and fiery by nature; it apostrophizes, reviles and improvises; it writes under the dictation of impressions; it allows itself every species of utterance and, if need be, the coarsest. It thinks by explosions; its emotions are sudden starts, and its images so many sparks; it lets the rein go entirely; it gives itself up to the reader and hence it takes possession of him. Resistance is impossible; the contagion is too overpowering. A creature of air and flame, the most excitable that ever lived, composed of more ethereal and more throbbing atoms than those of other men; none is there whose mental machinery is more delicate, nor whose equilibrium is at the same time more shifting and more exact. He may be compared to those accurate scales that are affected by a breath, but alongside of which every other measuring apparatus is incorrect and clumsy. - But, in this delicate balance only the lightest weights, the finest specimen must be placed; on this condition only it rigorously weighs all substances; such is Voltaire, involuntarily, through the demands of his intellect, and in his own behalf as much as in that of his readers. An entire philosophy, ten volumes of theology, an abstract science, a special library, an important branch of erudition, of human experience and invention, is thus reduced in his hands to a phrase or to a stanza. From the enormous mass of riven or compact scorioe he extracts whatever is essential, a grain of gold or of copper as a specimen of the rest, presenting this to us in its most convenient and most manageable form, in a simile, in a metaphor, in an epigram that becomes a proverb. In this no ancient or modern writer approaches him; in simplification and in popularization he has not his equal in the world. Without departing from the usual conversational tone, and as if in sport, he puts into little portable phrases the greatest discoveries and hypotheses of the human mind, the theories of Descartes, Malebranche, Leibnitz, Locke and Newton, the diverse religions of antiquity and of modern times, every known system of physics, physiology, geology, morality, natural law, and political economy,[21] in short, all the generalized conceptions in every order of knowledge to which humanity had attained in the eighteenth century.- Voltaire's inclination is so strong that it carries him too far; he belittles great things by rendering them accessible. Religion, legend, ancient popular poesy, the spontaneous creations of instinct, the vague visions of primitive tunes are not thus to be converted into small current coin; they are not subjects of amusing and lively conversation. A piquant witticism is not an expression of all this, but simply a travesty. But how charming to Frenchmen, and to people of the world! And what reader can abstain from a book containing all human knowledge summed up in piquant witticisms? For it is really a summary of human knowledge, no important idea, as far as I can see, being wanting to a man whose breviary consisted of the "Dialogues," the "Dictionary," and the "Novels." Read them over and over five or six times, and we then form some idea of their vast contents. Not only do views of the world and of man abound in them, but again they swarm with positive and even technical details, thousands of little facts scattered throughout, multiplied and precise details on astronomy, physics, geography, physiology, statistics, and on the history of all nations, the innumerable and personal experiences of a man who has himself read the texts, handled the instruments, visited the countries, taken part in the industries, and associated with the persons, and who, in the precision of his marvelous memory, in the liveliness of his ever-blazing imagination, revives or sees, as with the eye itself, everything that he states and as he states it. It is a unique talent, the rarest in a classic era, the most precious of all, since it consists in the display of actual beings, not through the gray veil of abstractions, but in themselves, as they are in nature and in history, with their visible color and forms, with their accessories and surroundings in time and space, a peasant at his cart, a Quaker in his meeting-house, a German baron in his castle, Dutchmen, Englishmen, Spaniards, Italians, Frenchmen, in their homes,[22] a great lady, a designing woman, provincials, soldiers, prostitutes,[23] and the rest of the human medley, on every step of the social ladder, each an abridgment of his kind and in the passing light of a sudden flash.
同类推荐
热门推荐
世俗之乐是骗局:中观大师谈人性
该书凝聚中观大师近年来的佛学论文精选,以正能量的视角看待世间百态,以佛法解读世界局势,以佛法来评析金融危机,以佛的智慧来谈如何应对心理疾病,由此获得社会正能量。文章通俗易懂,将佛法与现实紧密联系,展示给读者一个全新的佛学世界观。危险关系(昆汀电影《危险关系》原著)
同名电影《危险关系》由著名导演昆汀·塔伦蒂诺执导,是昆汀电影中风格最独特,最与众不同的一部。我飞过七百万英里,嫁过两个酒鬼和一个毒虫。我觉得我永远在一次次从头再来,不知不觉我就没得选了。但是,你知道我最厌倦的是什么吗?微笑。假装愉快。杰姬·布朗,空姐,飞行了十九年,今年四十四岁。某天下飞机后,她被捕了,她的行李箱里藏匿了大量现金和一包毒品,她过的从来不是四平八稳的人生。快穿女配之徘徊年月为寻渊
我们的人生目标是什么?——打倒男主女主,抱住反派大大,作天作地作死,mua系统一口!周泣秋最喜欢干的事,莫过于作死。毕竟身无长处,作为天上人间难有的作精一枚,她势必将自己的风格播撒各个小千世界!系统:我当时一定是瞎了,一定是给我们家杰爷耗得脑子不好使才找了这么个作死的宿主。周泣秋:我这么好看真的是明明给你们占便宜了,死gay滚开别以为你是gay我就会姨母笑宽容你了。1V1,薄情下全部都是满满的真心。现实深情三观正,我们都是社会主义好青年。(才怪)感悟文学大师经典:集外集拾遗补编:鲁迅作品精选
文学作品是以语言为手段塑造形象来反映社会生活、表达作者思想感情的一种艺术,是我们的一面镜子,对于我们的人生具有潜移默化的巨大启迪作用,能够开阔我们的视野,增长我们的知识,陶冶我们的情操。