"--_"Life of Voltaire," Vol. II, pp. 208, 209._
The World Set to Thinking
This earthquake set men to thinking of the great day of God. Voltaire,
the French philosopher, was "profoundly moved" by it, we are told. "It
was the last judgment for that region," he wrote; "nothing was wanting
to it except the trumpet." More than a month afterward, while still the
perturbations of the earth were continuing, this skeptic wrote a poem
upon the problem presented, voicing the sentiment:
"My heart oppress'd demands
Aid of the God who formed me with his hands.
Sons of the God supreme to suffer all
Fated alike, we on our Father call....
Sad is the present if no future state,
No blissful retribution mortals wait,
If fate's decrees the thinking being doom
To lose existence in the silent tomb.
_All may be well_; that hope can man sustain.
_All now is well_; 'tis an illusion vain.
The sages held me forth delusive light,
Divine instructions only can be right.
Humbly I sigh, submissive suffer pain,
Nor more the ways of Providence arraign."
--"_Poem on the Destruction of Lisbon,_"
_Smollet's translation; Works, Vol.
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