To His MAJESTY

The KING of PRUSSIA.

I

SIRE,

Am at present like the pilgrims of Mecca, whofe eyes are turned back towards that object of their devotions, from the moment they leave it; mine are turned towards your court. My heart, full of the favours I have received from you, is penetrated with regret at not being able to live near your majefty.

I take the liberty to fend you a new copy of the tragedy of Mahomet, the first sketch of which I fubmitted to you fome years ago. It is a tribute I pay to the lover of the arts, to the learned judge, especially to the philofopher, much more than to the fovereign.

Your majesty is acquainted with the motives that guided my pen, when I was writing this work. These motives were the love of mankind, and the horror

of

of fanaticism, two virtues made to be ever prefent near your throne. I always thought that tragedy fhould not be a fimple fpectacle, which affects, but not amends the heart. What fignify the paffions or misfortunes of the heroes of antiquity to the prefent race of men, if they do not contribute to our inftruction? It is allowed that the comedy of Tartuffe, this mafter-piece that no nation has equalled, has been of infinite fervice, in fhewing hypocrify in its blackeft colours. Why fhould it not be attempted in tragedy, to attack that fpecies of impofture which fets in action the hypocrify of fame, and the enthufiaftic rage of others? Why fhould not we trace it back to those criminal, though illuftrious founders of fuperftition and fanaticifm, who firft took the knife from the altar, to make victims of those who refused to be their difciples? These who affert that the era of fuch crimes is over, that we shall fee no more Barchochebas, Mahomets, or Johns of Leyden, do too great honour, methinks, to human nature. The fame poison still fubfists,

fubfifts, though lefs uncovered; this plague which appears ftifled, produces every now and then, anew, fome dire effects pernicious enough to infect the world. Have we not feen in our own days, the prophets of the Cevenes* kill in God's name, fuch of their fect as were not entirely fubmiffive to them?

The action I reprefent, is attrocious, and I do not know that horror has been pufhed farther on any ftage. A youth naturally virtuous, feduced by his fanaticism, murders an old man that loves him, and in the idea of ferving God, becomes guilty of parricide without knowing it. An impoftor orders this murder, and the promised recompenfe is the enjoy ment of incestuous love..

I own this is introducing horror on the stage; and your majesty is conscious that tragedy fhould not confift merely in a declaration of love, a fit of jealoufy, and a marriage.

*Fanatic Hugonots in the mountainy parts of the province of Languedoc in France.

Our

Our hiftorians mention actions ftill more criminal than the one I have invented. Seide*, at least, is ignorant that it is his father he kills, and as soon as he commits the fact, he feels a repentance equal to the heinoufnefs of his crime. But Mezeray relates, that at Melun a father murdered his fon for his religion, without feeling afterwards the least regret. The ftory of the two brothers Diaz is well known; one of whom was at Rome, and the other in Germany, in the beginning of the troubles caufed by Luther. Bartholomew Diaz having heard at Rome, that his brother entered into the opinions of Luther, at Francfort, fets out from Rome with a defign to affaffinate him, arrives and kills him. I have read in Herrera a Spanish author, that this "Bartholomew Diaz run a great risk in this action, but that nothing can fhake the refolutions of a man of honour, when probity conducts him."

* The name he gives to the abovementioned young man in Mahomet.

Herrera,

Herrera, in a religion all holy, and an enemy to perfecution and cruelty, in a religion which teaches to fuffer without seeking revenge, was, then, of opinion, that probity could lead to murder and parricide! And yet people will not exclaim from every fide against fuch infernal maxims. Maxims that put the ponyard into the hand of the monster who deprived France of Henry the great; that placed the picture of James Clement* on the altar, and his name in the calendar of faints; fuch maxims loft the life of William, prince of Orange, founder of the liberty and of the grandeur of the Dutch. Salcede first wounded him in the forehead with a pistol shot: Strada relates in these very words, "that Salcede would not

* Clement affaffinated Henry the third of France, at the time he was befieging the city of Paris, whose inhabitants had revolted from his power, and joined the duke of Guife. The Parifians placed the statue of Clement on the altar next to the crucifix, and wore his picture hanging to a ribbon about their necks, as that of a faint and of a deliverer.

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