The Equinox (Volume I, Number IX)

THE EQUINOX Do not let us here speak of Voltaire! Voltaire was not a wonder-worker, he was the witty and eloquent interpreter of those on whom the miracle no longer acted. Everything in his work is negative; everything was affirmative, on the con- trary, in that of the “Galilean,” as an illustrious and too unfortunate Emperor called Him. And yet Julian in his time attempted more than Voltaire could accomplish; he wished to oppose miracles to miracles, the austerity of power to that of revolt, virtues to virtues, wonders to wonders; the Christians never had a more dangerous enemy, and they recognized the fact, for Julian was assassinated; and the Golden Legend still bears witness that a holy martyr, awakened in his tomb by the clamour of the Church, resumed his arms, and struck the Apostate in the darkness, in the midst of his army and of his victories. Sorry martyrs, who rise from the dead to become hangmen! Too credulous Emperor, who believed in his gods, and in the virtues of the past! When the kings of France were hedged around with the adoration of their people, when they were regarded as the Lord’s anointed, and the eldest sons of the Church, they cured scrofula. A man who is the fashion can always do miracles when he wishes. Cagliostro may have been only a charlatan, but as soon as opinion had made of him “the divine Cagliostro,” he was expected to work miracles; and they happened. When Cephas Barjona was nothing but a Jew proscribed by Nero, retailing to the wives of slaves a specific for eternal life, Cephas Barjona, for all educated people of Rome, was only a charlatan; but public opinion made an apostle of the 208