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Responses to the The
Lisbon Earthquake (1755) Directions for the Debate: 1. Choose from the exam list a philosopher or thinker or character from the past to be the advisor of your character. (Job? St. Augustine? Plato? Democritus? Chaucer? Machiavelli?) 2. Be prepared to speak about the Lisbon earthquake but also to answer extemporaneous questions about good and evil. Debate Questions: 1. What caused the earthquake
which crushed the worshippers at mass, and then the tsunami which flooded the
streets drowning the shocked and stunned, and finally the fire which burned
to death those trapped in the rubble? 1. Gabriel
Malagrida, "An
Opinion on the True Cause of the Earthquake," 1756 A Jesuit and supporter of the Spanish Inquisition What was the cause of the earthquake, according to Malagrida? “Learn, Oh Lisbon, that the destroyers of our houses, palaces, churches, and convents, the cause of the death of so many people and of the flames that devoured such vast treasures, are your abominable sins, and not comets, stars, vapours and exhalations, and similar natural phenomena.” Why is it “scandalous to pretend the earthquake was just a natural event”? "It is scandalous to pretend the earthquake was just a natural event, for if that be true, there is no need to repent and to try to avert the wrath of God, and not even the Devil himself could invent a false idea more likely to lead us all to irreparable ruin.” What should we do to prevent
another such disaster? "It is necessary to devote all our strength and purpose to
the task of repentance." 2.
John Wesley, 'Some Serious Thoughts Occasioned
by the Late Earthquake at Lisbon,' 1755 The dynamic evangelist who led the Great Awakening in England during the first half of the 18th century: the founder of Methodism, he preached an emotional and personal kind of religion that contrasted with the practices of both Catholics and traditional Protestant groups. How do we know that God is not pleased with us, according
to Wesley? "How
many hundred thousand men have been swept away by war, in Europe only, within
half a century! (6) How many thousands, within
little more than this, hath the earth opened her mouth and swallowed
up! Numbers sunk at Port-Royal, and rose no more! Many thousands
went quick into the pit at Lima! The whole city of Catanea,
in Sicily, and every inhabitant of it, perished together.(7)
Nothing but heaps of ashes and cinders show where it stood. Not so much
as one Lot escaped out of Sodom!" Why does Wesley think that Lisbon was an
especially deserving target of God’s wrath? On what grounds does Wesley argue that the
people who believe that the earthquake had natural causes are absolutely
wrong? First, it is untrue: Second, it is uncomfortable. On what grounds does Wesley argue that
people who believe that the earthquake had natural causes are purveyors of
hopelessness? How can we prevent earthquakes, according to
Wesley? "Love God then, and you are a true worshipper."
Francois Marie Arouet (1694-1778) (whose pen name was Voltaire) was a social activist and pamphleteer who ran into trouble in France for challenging Church doctrine and government practices. He lived in England in exile where he became fascinated with the application of Newton's physics to society. What did Newton discover and what made his discovery so
wonderful, according to Voltaire? "there is in all Bodies a central Force which acts to the
utmost Limits of the Universe, according to the invariable Laws of Mechanicks." Gravity: "an
inverse Ratio of the Squares of the Distances" "That Man claims
our Respect, who commands over the Minds of the rest of the World by the
Force of Truth, not those who enslave their Fellow Creatures; He who is
acquainted with the Universe, not They who deface it...." Does Voltaire think that the fact that the world is governed by natural laws makes it a better place? _______ How do you know? Yes, because of the inordinate glee with which he tells his story. According to Voltaire, what role did or does God play in this “best of all possible worlds”? "The Cause
of this Cause is among the Arcana (15)
of the Almighty." What
would Voltaire1 have said about the Lisbon earthquake? Well, he must have thought it was good because it emanated from the original act of God's creation. See Susan Nieman
on Leibniz's Theodicy
English poet, friend of Voltaire, a member of England's Roman Catholic minority What seems to be the main idea of the first stanza? All
are but parts of one stupendous whole, The soul of God is present in every detail of the universe and, therefore, it must be good. And why is “whatever is, is right”? All
Nature is but Art, unknown to thee; Whatever we consider to be evil, whatever seems cruel and unjust in our world will be revealed as part of a divine plan whose complexities are truly beyond our current comprehension but must be rational and for a greater good. Would Pope seem to agree with Voltaire 1? Explain
Yes. They both insist that rational= divine= good. However, Pope suggests that trying to understand the reason why God would allow innocent children to die in natural disasters is beyond the scope of human thought. Know then thyself,
presume not God to scan, See Susan Nieman on Pope's Essay on Man (1732) 7.
From Voltaire, "Poem on the Lisbon
Disaster, or An Examination of that Axiom ‘All Is Well’” 1755 In his "Poem on the Lisbon Disaster, or An Examination of that Axiom “All Is Well,” published twenty years after Letters, we have the work of an older Voltaire, whose words reflect a growing doubt about the ideas of the early Enlightenment on the relationship of the physical world to God. What is Voltaire's view of
God's role in the physical world in this poem he wrote on receiving the news
of the Lisbon disaster? “What crime, what error did these children,
“Deluded philosophers who cry, "All is
well," If God did nothing to prevent
the deaths of innocent women and children in a natural disaster beyond human
control, then he must be either malevolent or impotent. If God punished these innocents for the sins of others, then he is unjust.
He himself and Leibniz did. Exegete (provide an analytical
explanation of) the passage: “Will you say that
this is result of eternal laws Can this event be justified as part of an eternal plan expanding towards the future harmony of mankind? If you can, then you and your God are heartless. Who said “God is revenged…”? Malagrida. Wherein lies the irony of “…they dance in Paris”? Did Lisbon
which is no more have more vices/ Than London and Paris immersed in their
pleasures? / Lisbon is destroyed and they dance in Paris? How can someone argue that one city is more righteous than another? Further, how can the philosophes, who were centered in Paris, gleefully dance if their Aristotelian God allows the massacre of innocents?
What crime, what error did these children,/
Crushed and bloody on their mothers' breasts, commit? What
possible implications for the later Enlightenment's views on God do you find
in this work of the influential Voltaire? We are moving away from a conception of God that is related to the physical functioning of the universe. What
is the difference between Voltaire (1) and Voltaire (2)? An inability to accept the death of innocent people as part of a divine plan. Therefore, the physical universe cannot be regarded as having a moral bias or basis. Morality must exist elsewhere. (Uh-oh, Plato just rolled over in his grave.) 8. From Jean-Jacques Rousseau's "Letter to Voltaire Regarding the Poem on the Lisbon Earthquake", August 18, 1756 Unknown at that time, Rousseau would become a powerful critic of the philosophes and help initiate the Romantic movement in letters. Instead of glorifying reason and elitist intellectualism, Rousseau argued that our instincts and feelings were innately good. His political theories would influence the radical phase of the French Revolution. In the first two paragraphs, what is Rousseau’s principal
objection to Voltaire’s poem? “Instead
of the consolations that I expected, you only vex me. It might be said
that you fear that I don't feel my unhappiness enough, and that you are
trying to soothe me by proving that all is bad.” Rousseau accuses Voltaire of indulging in despair. God is either malevolent, impotent or does not exist. Use contemporary slang to paraphrase Rousseau’s paraphrase of Pope and Leibnitz. “Of all the possible plans, he chose that combining the
minimum evil and the maximum good. If it is necessary to say the same
thing more bluntly, God has done no better for mankind because (He) can do no
better.” Let it be, baby! Use contemporary slang to paraphrase Rousseau’s paraphrase of Voltaire (2). “Suffer forever unfortunate one. If a God created
you, He is doubtlessly all powerful and could have prevented all your
woes. Don't ever hope that your woes will end, because you would never
know why you exist, if it is not to suffer and die. . . .” Die, pointless peon! Who does
Rousseau blame for the size of the Lisbon disaster in the “I do not see…”
paragraph? “I do not see how one can
search for the source of moral evil anywhere but in man.... Moreover ... the
majority of our physical misfortunes are also our work. Without
leaving your Lisbon subject, concede, for example, that it was hardly nature
that there brought together twenty-thousand houses of six or seven
stories. If the residents of this large city had been more evenly
dispersed and less densely housed, the losses would have been fewer or
perhaps none at all. Everyone would have fled at the first shock.
But many obstinately remained ... to expose themselves to additional earth
tremors because what they would have had to leave behind was worth more than
what they could carry away. How many unfortunates perished in this
disaster through the desire to fetch their clothing, papers, or money? ...” The architects and planners of the city of Lisbon itself who have not planned for such a contingency are responsible. They construct buildings that will fall in an earthquake, encourage overcrowding, and have no organized method of evacuation or fire fighting. What is the
underlying main idea of Rousseau’s “There are often…” paragraph? “… rapid death is not always a
true misfortune, and that it can sometimes be considered a relative
blessing. Of the many persons
crushed under Lisbon's ruins, some without doubt escaped greater misfortunes,
and ... it is not certain that a single one of these unfortunates suffered
more than if, in the normal course of events, he had awaited [a more normal]
death to overtake him after long agonies…[T]he misfortunes
nature imposes upon us are less cruel than those which we add to them....
" A quick death in such a disaster is no more cruel than natural death years later as the result of disease or old age. 'Natural death' can also be more physically and psychologically painful because doctors' 'remedies' often make the suffering of the dying worse and priests find 'moral purpose' in pain (it purges us of sin). Exegete Rousseau’s ad hominem (personal) attack on the validity of Voltaire’s reasoning. “Satiated with glory ... you live free in the midst of
affluence. (26) Certain of your immortality, you peacefully
philosophize on the nature of the soul, and, if your body or heart suffer,
you have Tronchin (27) as doctor and
friend. You however find only evil on earth.” Your despair is made ridiculous by your own wealth, access to health care, and long life while my own poor health does not prevent me from hope of eventual blessings in heaven. Why does Rousseau believe in a good God and the promise of heaven? "I have suffered too much in this life not to look
forward to another…. I sense it, I believe it, I wish it, I
hope for it, I will uphold it until my last gasp.... " What do you think Voltaire said when he got Rousseau’s letter? He has a point about ways that we can prepare for these terrible contingencies, but his argument about a 'quick death' being more merciful and just than a long life and a slow, painful death do not offset my horror at the violent deaths of innocent children. See Susan Nieman
on Rousseau's Second Discourse (1754) 9. David Hume, “The Essay on Miracles,” 1748 On what grounds does Hume question the idea of
consubstantiation – that the body and blood of Jesus
are actually in the communal bread and wine? “It
is acknowledged on all hands… that the authority, either of the Scripture or
of tradition, is founded merely on the testimony of the Apostles, who were
eyewitnesses to those miracles of our Saviour, by
which he proved his divine mission. Our evidence, then, for the truth of the Christian religion, is less than the evidence for the
truth of our senses; because,
even in the first authors of our religion, it was no greater; and it is
evident it must diminish in passing from them to their disciples; nor can
anyone rest such confidence in their testimony as in the immediate object of
his senses. But a weaker evidence
can never destroy a stronger; and therefore, were the doctrine of the real
presence ever so clearly revealed in Scripture, it were directly contrary to
the rules of just reasoning to give our assent to it.” The argument is based on the testimony of the apostles who were eyewitnesses to Christ's miracles. So we must trust testimony of those who told their stories to others (the writers of the gospels), from whom we have the story ourselves. But how can this testimony, once removed from the actual original events, overcome our own rational analysis of primary sensory observations of the purported 'miraculous' conversion of bread and wine into body and blood?
How does Hume use the idea of probability to
undermine the claim that miracles (violations of the laws of nature) have
occurred? “One who in our climate should expect better weather in any week of
June than in one of December, would reason justly and conformably to
experience; but it is certain that he may happen, in the event, to find
himself mistaken. However, we may
observe that, in such a case, he would have no cause to complain of
experience, because it commonly informs us beforehand of the uncertainty, by
that contrariety of events which we may learn from a diligent
observation. All effects follow
not with like certainty from their supposed causes.” We cannot predict what the weather will be like tomorrow with any absolute conviction. All we can do is trust to our own experience in like circumstances in the past. It is statistically probable that the weather will be warmer in June than in January, but it is not absolutely certain. How does Hume use the idea of
probability to undermine the testimony of those who claim to have seen
miracles? “A wise man, therefore, proportions his belief to the evidence…. he
weighs the opposite experiments: he considers which side is supported by the
greater number of experiments: to that side he inclines with doubt and
hesitation; and when at last he fixes his judgment, the evidence exceeds not
what we properly call probability.” Now, with absolutely no scientific evidence of the occurrence of any miraculous event, we cannot rely on reason at all to support it. How does Hume use the idea of probability to undermine the validity of the Christian religion? “though a hundred uniform
experiments, with only one that is contradictory, reason according to the
principle here explained, this subtraction with regard to all popular
religions amounts to an entire annihilation; and therefore we may establish
it as a maxim, that no human testimony can have such force as to prove a
miracle, and make it a just foundation for any such system of religion....” How can such a belief form the foundation of a credible system of thought? Could Hume find evidence of the God of Malagrida and Wesley on one hand or of the God of Newton and the early Voltaire on the other? His dedication to strict logic would enhance his belief in the probability of a rational force that directs the universe, but there is no way that such an entity can be proven to exist. How does Hume explain the fact that many people do believe in Christianity? "whoever is moved by Faith to assent to it, is
conscious of a continued miracle in his own person, which subverts all the
principles of his understanding, and gives him a determination to believe
what is most contrary to custom and experience." So what does Hume think about the Lisbon earthquake? A physical act of nature that could possibly have been predicted, but it cannot be logically asserted as the result of a sequence of cause and effect. We can only discuss the probability of such an event based on statistics. See Susan Nieman
on Hume's Skepticism. 10.
From Paul-Henry Thiry, Baron d'Holbach, The System of
Nature (1770) What room is there for a divinity in d’Holbach's view,
which sees the world as an "uninterrupted succession of causes and
effects" in which "matter always existed"? "Nature, equal
in her distributions, entirely destitute of goodness or malice, follows only
necessary and immutable laws, when she either produces beings or destroys
them..." Since d'Holbach denies the existence of a creator, there is no place for a rational being in the constant development of phenomena. How does he explain the creation of man as a purely material phenomenon? "matter acts by its own
peculiar energy, and needs not any exterior impulse to set it in
motion." "If flour be wetted with water, and the mixture
closed up, it will be found, after some little lapse of time, by the aid of a
microscope, to have produced organized beings that enjoy life, of which the
water and the flour were believed incapable: it is thus that inanimate matter
can pass into life, or animate matter, which is in itself only an assemblage
of motion. Reasoning from analogy, the production of a man, independent
of the ordinary means, would not be more marvellous
than that of an insect with flour and water.... " How does he discredit the theory that the universe could have been created by a spiritual force? That theory is based on the idea that "matter could have begun to exist": "a hypothesis that, until
this moment, has never been demonstrated by anything like solid proof.
To produce from nothing, or the Creation, is a term that cannot give
us the most slender idea of the formation of the universe; it presents no
sense, upon which the mind can fasten itself. " Why do you think
Holbach's contemporaries, including Voltaire,
criticized his position as atheistic? There is no place for God in the material development of the universe.
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