Philosophy After Drinking — Les Misérables

The senator is a clever old attorney who made his way by treating conscience, sworn faith, justice, and duty as obstacles. Success has softened him. He is not a bad man. He renders small services to sons, sons-in-law, relations, even friends. Everything else seems stupid. He thinks himself a disciple of Epicurus and is only a product of Pigault-Lebrun. He laughs willingly at infinite things and at the crotchets of that good old fellow the Bishop, sometimes with amiable authority in Myriel's presence.

At dessert, after a dinner with the prefect, he is slightly exhilarated and still perfectly dignified. A senator and a bishop, he says, are two augurs; they should wink. He has a philosophy of his own. The Bishop answers that as one makes one's philosophy, so one lies on it, and the senator is on the bed of purple. Encouraged, the senator names philosophers gilded on the edges, like himself. Needham's eels in vinegar paste supply the fiat lux, so God is useless. Hurrah for Zero, which leaves him in peace. Jesus preaching renunciation is an avaricious man's counsel to beggars. No wolf immolates himself for another wolf. After death a shadow-hand cannot seize a handful of dust. There is no good or evil, only vegetation. Immortality is waiting for dead men's shoes. He is Monsieur le Comte Nought. Eat or be eaten. It is better to be the tooth than the grass. The Pantheon for some, the great hole for all. Jehovah is a bugaboo for men. Legends, the soul, paradise, the stars are provided for knife-grinders to spread on dry bread. He reserves Naigeon for himself. The good God is good for the populace.

The Bishop claps. What an excellent and marvellous thing is this materialism. Not everyone who wants it can have it. Those who procure it feel irresponsible, and can devour places, sinecures, useful treacheries, savoury capitulations of conscience, and enter the tomb with their digestion accomplished. He does not say this of the senator. Nevertheless he congratulates him. Great lords have a philosophy extracted from the depths, accessible to the rich alone, good for all sauces. They do not think it a bad thing that belief in the good God should be the philosophy of the people, very much as the goose stuffed with chestnuts is the truffled turkey of the poor.