HKB
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Often appears with: religious persecution and toleration · religious deception · morality and religion · heresy, orthodoxy, and schism · doubt, skepticism, and certainty · chinese dialogue characters
Usually: dialogue (1) · temptation (1) · censure (1) · exhortation (1)
“You would have yourselves stoned by the people if you taught them impure morality. Men are so made that they want to do evil, but that they do not want it preached to them.” Voltaire, Voltaire's Philosophical Dictionary · observation
A dialogue between Bambabef, a fakir, and Ouang, Confucius’s disciple, debates whether religious teachers should deceive people with superstition, with Ouang arguing for truth without harmful fables.
BAMBABEF: We must imitate the Supreme Being who does not show us things as they are; he makes us see the sun in a diameter of two or three feet, although this star is a million times bigger than the earth; he makes us see the moon and the stars set on the same blue background, whereas they are at different depths. He requires that a square tower shall appear round to us from a distance; he requires that fire shall s…