"If you leave the women any hands at all," interrupted the Sultan, "those men whom you would reduce to the sole instrument of their passions, would be pursued. This chace would be a pleasant sight: and if the sex was as greedy of this game every where else as in Congo, the species would soon be extinct."
"But," said Selim to the favorite, "of what would you compose affectionate and sensible women, constant and faithful lovers?"
"Of a heart," answered Mirzoza; "and I well know," added she, darting a tender glance on Mangogul, "that, to which mine would wish to be united."
The Sultan could not stand against this declaration: he sprung from his seat to the favorite: the courtiers disappear'd, and the new philosopher's chair became the theatre of their pleasures: he gave her repeated proofs that he was not less charmed with her sentiments than with her discourse; and the philosophic equipage was thrown into disorder. Mirzoza return'd the black petticoats to her women, sent my lord Seneschal his enormous peruke, and to Monsieur l'Abbé his square cap, with assurances that he should be on the list at the next nomination. What would he not have attained, if he had been a genius? A seat in the academy was the least reward that he could expect: but unluckily he knew but two or three hundred words, and had never been able from that stock, to compass the composing of two Ritournelles.
[CHAP. XXVII.]
Sequel of the preceding conversation.
Mangogul was the only person that had given attention to Mirzoza's philosophic lecture without interrupting her; and as he was pretty much inclined to contradict, she was astonish'd at it. "Does the Sultan allow my system from beginning to end?" said she within herself. "No, that is not probable: has he found it too bad to deign to attack it? that may be. My notions are not the most just that have been broach'd to this day; I grant it: but neither are they the most false; and I am apt to think that worse have been invented."
In order to clear up this doubt, the favorite resolved to ask some questions of Mangogul. "Well, prince," said she, "what are your thoughts of my system?" "It is admirable," answered the Sultan; "I find but one defect in it." "What defect is that?" replied the favorite. "It is," said Mangogul, "that it is as false as false can be. Pursuant to your notions, we must all be endowed with souls: now observe, my soul's delight, that there is not common sense in this supposition. I have a soul: there is an animal that acts most part of the time as if he had none; and perhaps in reality he has none, even while he acts as if he had one. But he has a nose made like mine; I feel that I have a soul, and that I think: therefore that animal has a soul, and thinks likewise. This argument has been made use of above a thousand years, and it has been impertinent full as long."
"I own," said the favorite, "that it is not always evident that others think." "And add," replied Mangogul, "that it is evident on an hundred occasions that they do not think." "But in my opinion," says Mirzoza, "it would be going a great length, to infer from thence, that they never have or ever will think. A person is not always a beast, for having been so sometimes; and your highness——"