LETTER XCVII. Usbek to Hassein, Dervise of the mountain of Jaron.

O THOU, sage dervise, whose curious mind is resplendent with such a variety of knowledge, hearken to what I am going to say to thee. There are philosophers

here, who indeed have not arrived at the pinnacle of oriental wisdom: they have not indeed been caught up to the throne of light: they have not heard the ineffable words echo from the consorts of angels, nor felt the awful impressions of a divine fury: but, left to themselves, deprived of these holy assistances, they follow, in silence, the traces of human reason. Thou canst not believe how far this guide hath led them. They have dispersed the chaos, and have explained, by a simple mechanism, the order of the divine architecture. The author of nature hath given motion to matter; there was nothing more wanting to produce that prodigious variety of effects which we see in the universe. The laws which common legislators offer to us to regulate human society, are subject to alteration, like the minds of those who form them, and the people who observe them: these men here talk of nothing but of laws general, immutable, eternal, which are observed without any exception, with order, regularity, and an infinite readiness, in the great immensity of space. And what dost thou think, divine man, that these laws are? Thou imaginest, perhaps, that penetrating into the councils of the Eternal, thou shalt be astonished with the sublimity of deep mysteries; thou renouncest beforehand, the power of comprehending; thou promisest thyself only admiration. But thou wilt soon change thy thoughts; they do not dazzle us with a false parade; the plainness of them have made them long misunderstood; and it was not till after much reflection, that all their fruitfulness and extensiveness were discovered. The first law is, that all bodies tend to form right lines, unless they meet with some obstacle which turns them out of them; and the second, which is no more than a consequence of the former, is that all bodies which move round a center, have a tendence to fly from it; because that the farther it is removed, the more the line which it moves in, approaches to a right line. See, divine dervise, the key of nature; here are the fruitful principles, from which they draw consequences which extend beyond our sight. The knowledge of five or six truths hath filled their philosophy full of wonders; and hath enabled them to effect more marvellous miracles than all those which are related to us of our holy prophets. For in short, I am persuaded that there is none of our doctors who would not have been embarrassed, if he had been asked to weigh in a balance, all the air which surrounds the earth, or to measure all the water which falls every year upon the surface of it; and who must not have thought more than once, before he could have told how many leagues sound travels in an hour? What time a ray of light takes up in its journey from the sun to us? How many fathoms it is from hence to Saturn? What is the curve according to which a ship should be cut to make the best sailor that can possibly be? Perhaps if some divine man had embellished the works of these philosophers with lofty and sublime expressions; if he had mixed bold figures and mysterious allegories, he would have composed a noble work, which would have been inferior to none except the holy Koran. However, if it be necessary to tell thee what I think, I rarely give into the figurative stile. Our Koran abounds with trifles, which to me always appear as such, although they rise with strength and liveliness of expression. At first it seems as if these inspired writings were only the divine ideas cloathed in the language of men. On the contrary, we often meet in the Koran, the language of God, and the ideas of men, as if, by a marvellous caprice, the supreme Being had dictated the words, and man had furnished the sentiments. Perhaps thou wilt reply, I talk too freely of things which are deemed most holy among us; this thou wilt believe is the fruit of that liberty which distinguisheth the people of this country. No; heaven be praised, my head hath not corrupted my heart; and, while I breath, Hali shall be my prophet.

Paris, the 15th of the moon Chahban,
1716.