Volume I Part 43 (1/2)
”Observe, my son, that God never abandons the man who, in the midst of misfortunes, falls down in prayer before Him, and that He often allows the wretch who has no faith in prayer to die miserably”
”Yet we meet with Atheists who are fortunate and happy”
”True; but, in spite of their tranquillity, I pity them because they have no hope beyond this life, and are on a level with anier in dark ignorance, and, if they never think, they have no consolation, no resource, when adversity reaches them God has made man in such a manner that he cannot be happy unless he entertains no doubt of the existence of his Divine Creator; in all stations of life man is naturally prone to believe in that existence, otherwise s and of all things”
”I should like to knohy Atheism has only existed in the systems of the learned, and never as a national creed”
”Because the poor feel their wants reat many impious men who deride the true believers because they have faith in the pilgriht to respect the ancient custoious principles, and ie under all ive way to all the excess of despair”
Much pleased with the attention I gave to all he said, Yusuf would thus yield to the inclination he felt to instructoodness exerts upon all hearts, I would often go and spend the day with him, even without any previous invitation, and Yusuf's friendshi+p soon beca, I told my janissary to take me to the palace of Ismail Effendi, in order to fulfil ave me the most friendly welcome, and after an excellent breakfast he invited arden We found there a pretty summer-house which we entered, and Ismail attempted some liberties which were not at all toin a very abrupt ry, the Turk affected to approveI left hi hiain, but I was compelled to do so, as I will explain by-and-by
When I saw M de Bonneval I told hi to Turkish reat proof of his friendshi+p, but that I need not be afraid of the offence being repeated He added that politeness required that I should visit hi, a perfect gentleman, who had at his disposal the most beautiful female slaves in Turkey
Five or six weeks after the commencement of our intimacy, Yusuf asked me one day whether I was married I answered that I was not; the conversation turned upon several moral questions, and at last fell upon chastity, which, in his opinion, could be accounted a virtue only if considered from one point of view, namely, that of total abstinence, but he added that it could not be acceptable to God; because it transgressed against the very first precept He had given to man
”I would like to know, for instance,” he said, ”what nahts of Malta They take a vow of chastity, but it does not ether, they renounce eneral, is violated only by e is one of your sacraive way to lustful incontinence in the only case in which Godlustful unlawfully as often as they please, and whenever an opportunity ranted to theally a child which can be born to the part of it all is that these children of crime, who are of course perfectly innocent themselves, are called natural children, as if children born in wedlock came into the world in an unnatural manner! In one word, my dear son, the vow of chastity is so much opposed to Divine precepts and to hureeable neither to God nor to society, nor to those who pledge the in such opposition to every divine and human law, it must be a crime”
He enquired for the second tiative, and added that I had no idea of ever getting married
”What!” he exclaimed; ”I must then believe that you are not a perfect man, or that you intend to work out your own damnation; unless you should tell me that you are a Christian only outwardly”
”I aest sense of the word, and I am a true Christian I must even confess that I adore wo htful of all pleasures”
”According to your religion, damnation awaits you”
”I feel certain of the contrary, because, e confess our sins, our priests are coive us absolution”
”I know it, but you ree with ive a crime which you would, perhaps, not commit, if you did not think that, after confession, a priest, a ives only the repenting sinner”
”No doubt of it, and confession supposes repentance; without it, absolution has no effect”
”Is onanisreater than lustful and illegitimate copulation”
”I are of it, and it has always caused islator who enacts a law, the execution of which is iood health, if he cannot have a woman, must necessarily have recourse to onanism, whenever imperious nature de his soul, would abstain from it, would only draw upon himself a mortal disease”
”We believe exactly the reverse; we think that young people destroy their constitutions, and shorten their lives through self-abuse
In several communities they are closely watched, and are asin that crinorant fools, and those who pay the watchers for such a service are even more stupid, because prohibition h such a tyrannical law, to set at nought an interdiction so contrary to nature”
”Yet it seems to me that self-abuse in excess must be injurious to health, for it must weaken and enervate”