Candide #5

Phelps, Sydney; Entry #5
Rachel, you're the queen bee.
    I thought about the section of the all the dethroned kings a little bit and it almost seemed like a support group for the ex-kings because they were all sharing their miserable stories about being dethroned. This is before the scene with the old man that is content with his life and it just might be comparing how unhappy they are with his happiness. They had already had a taste of power and of being a king so now they are not content with living like a normal peasant. Voltaire could be making another judgment on nobility and people in power like he does earlier on in the book. 
  I think one of the most important pieces of the book is that it is all a huge satire to make fun of or do make judgments on many people, religions, and philosophies. Every detail placed in the book was to add to the satirical nature of it-- whether it be crazy tragedies, the cruel Inquisition, hypocritical preachers and monks, El Dorado, etc. He also wrote it to ridicule other philosophers and their philosophies. In the intro to Candide it says, "[Voltaire] wrote it to ridicule the optimism of Leibniz"(7), who was a German philosopher of the time (wikipedia). 
  The main theme of Candide is to prove that optimism and total pessimism are not sound philosophies. Candide always says that, "all is for the best in this world"(24) even though he clearly sees that there is evil in this world and is affected by this evil many times. The character Martin believes that everything is bad in this world even when some good things happen to him; he meets and accompanies Candide, Pangloss is alive, Candide finds Cunegonde, etc. Through the philosophies of Pangloss, Candide and Martin, Voltaire also makes a judgement on the philosophers themselves. He ridicules them for not seeing the reality of the world even when it was thrust in their faces. He ridicules them for spending all their time philosophizing instead of actually experiencing the world or helping others. 
   Another big theme in his book was the hypocrisy of religions. In the intro, it says that Voltaire was,  "a theist in name, a humanist in fact...[he believes that] God is everywhere, morality is in nature itself"(6). He also says that through observing the world it is obvious that their is a Creator because there are such wonderful creations like nature, animals, art, etc. It explains that Voltaire believes that there is a universal God but he does not identify with a religion like Christianity, Judaism, or Islam. For this reason, in his book he condemns the hypocrisy of organized religions. Voltaire shows the hypocrisy of Protestantism through the preacher who won't give starving Candide money, the cruelty of the Inquisition's auto-da-fe, the irony that Muslims pray to their God but then go and kill their enemies, and the lust and corruption of the monks and their monastery. 
   At the end of the book, Voltaire finally reveals to us his own philosophy of life. The intro also tells us that Voltaire believes that, "the world is mad and cruel; the earth trembles and the sky hurls thunderbolts; kings fight.. Let us limit our activity and try to do as well as we can the small task that seems to be within our powers"(8) and he also believes that, "action is necessary. All is not well, but all things can be bettered"(8). I believe that Voltaire demonstrates his own philosophy through two characters: James, the Anabaptist, and the old farmer towards the end. Neither of them had spectacular lives but they both realized that there is something wrong with this world and each of them took some action, unlike Candide or Pangloss. James was very charitable towards people and helped them if he could, while the old man was content with his humble work at his farm. Voltaire leaves us with the words from Candide, "we must cultivate our garden"(120). That is an instruction to us as readers that we should work hard and do the best with what we have and to not get caught up in philosophies or wishful thinking. 
    Rachel, I thoroughly enjoyed this book and I enjoyed how Voltaire used it so skillfully to display his philosophies and critiques of other philosophers. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did!!