第70章

In order to please Pythagoras, I did not say a word to him and I passed to Zarathustra, who was occupied in concentrating the celestial fire in the focus of a concave mirror, in the middle of a hall with a hundred doors which all led to wisdom.(Zarathustra's precepts are called doors, and are a hundred in number.) Over the principal door I read these words which are the precis of all moral philosophy, and which cut short all the disputes of the causists : "When in doubt if an action is good or bad, refrain."" Certainly," I said to my genius, "the barbarians who immolated all these victims had never read these beautiful words."We then saw the Zaleucus, the Thales, the Aniximanders, and all the sages who had sought truth and practised virtue.

When we came to Socrates, I recognized him very quickly by his flat nose." Well," I said to him, " here you are then among the number of the Almighty's confidants! All the inhabitants of Europe, except the Turks and the Tartars of the Crimea, who know nothing, pronounce your name with respect.It is revered, loved, this great name, to the point that people have wanted to know those of your persecutors.Melitus and Anitus are known because of you, just as Ravaillac is known because of Henry IV.; but Iknow only this name of Anitus.I do not know precisely who was the scoundrel who calumniated you, and who succeeded in having you condemned to take hemlock.""Since my adventure," replied Socrates, " I have never thought about that man; but seeing that you make me remember it, I have much pity for him.He was a wicked priest who secretly conducted a business in hides, a trade reputed shameful among us.He sent his two children to my school.

The other discipfes taunted them with having a father who was a currier;they were obliged to leave.The irritated father had no rest until he had stirred up all the priests and all the sophists against me.They persuaded the counsel of the five hundred that I was an impious fellow who did not believe that the Moon, Mercury and Mars were gods.Indeed, I used to think, as I think now that there is only one God, master of all nature.The judges handed me over to the poisoner of the republic; he cut short my life by a few days: I died peacefully at the age of seventy; and since that time I pass a happy life withh all these great men whom you see, and of whom I am the least."After enjoying some time in conversation with Socrates, Ih went forward with my guide into a grove situated above the thickets where all the sages of antiquity seemed to be tasting sweet repose.

I saw a man of gentle, simple countenance, who seemed to me to be about thirty-five years old.From afar he cast compassionate glances on these piles of whitened bones, across which I had had to pass to reach the sages'