Page:Candide Smollett E. P. Dutton.djvu/78

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CHAPTER XX

What Befell Candide and Martin on Their Voyage

The old scholar, whose name was Martin, took shipping with Candide for Bordeaux. They both had seen and suffered a great deal; and if the ship had been destined to sail from Surinam to Japan round the Cape of Good Hope, they could have found sufficient entertainment for each other during the whole voyage in discoursing upon moral and natural evil.

Candide, however, had one advantage over Martin: he lived in the pleasing hopes of seeing Miss Cunegund once more; whereas the poor philosopher had nothing to hope for. Besides, Candide had money and jewels, and, notwithstanding he had lost a hundred red sheep, laden with the greatest treasure on the earth, and though he still smarted from the reflection of the Dutch skipper’s knavery, yet when he considered what he had still left, and repeated the name of Cunegund, especially after meal-times, he inclined to Pangloss’s doctrine.

“And pray,” said he to Martin, “what is your opinion of the whole of this system? What notion have you of moral and natural evil?”

“Sir,” replied Martin, “our priests accused me of being a Socinian; but the real truth is, I am a Manichæan.”

“Nay, now you are jesting,” said Candide; “there are no Manichæans existing at present in the world.”

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