FRIAR.—What do you mean? Not a philosopher! I am one with a vengeance. I once taught philosophy; nay, better still, I read lectures in theology.
MARCUS AURELIUS.—And, pray, what may this theology of yours be, an’t please you?
FRIAR.—Why, it is—it is that which has made me be here, and the emperor elsewhere. You seem to grudge me the honor I enjoy, and are out of humor at the trifling revolution that has happened to your empire.
MARCUS AURELIUS.—I adore the eternal decrees of Providence: I know man ought not to repine at fate: I admire the vicissitude of human affairs; but since everything is so liable to change, and since the Roman Empire has experienced this wonderful mutability, let me hope the recollets may also experience it in their turn.
FRIAR.—I declare you anathematized: but hold, now I think on’t, it is time to go to matins.
MARCUS AURELIUS.—And I will go and be reunited to the Being of Beings.
DIALOGUE BETWEEN A BRAHMIN AND A JESUIT, ON NECESSITY AND FREE-WILL, AND THE GENERAL CONCATENATION OF CAUSES AND EFFECTS.
JESUIT.—In all probability, you are indebted to the prayers of St. Francis Xavier for that long and happy life you have enjoyed a hundred and fourscore years! Why, ’tis a life-time for a patriarch.
BRAHMIN.—My master, Fonfouca, lived till three hundred; it is the ordinary course of life among us Brahmins. I have a very great regard for Francis Xavier; but all his prayers would never have put nature out of her destined order: had he really been able to prolong the life of a gnat but for one single instant beyond what the general concatenation of causes and events allows of, this globe of ours had worn a quite different appearance from that in which you now behold it.
JESUIT.—You have a strange opinion of future contingents: why, you must be entirely ignorant that man is free, and that our free-will disposes of everything in this sublunary world at its mere fancy and pleasure. I can assure you the Jesuits alone have contributed not a little to some very considerable revolutions.