Zadig begged to be permitted to speak.  “I distrust myself,” said he, “but may I presume to ask the favor of thee to clear up one doubt that still remains in my mind?  Would it not have been better to have corrected this youth, and made him virtuous, than to have drowned him?”

“Had he been virtuous,” replied Jesrad, “and enjoyed a longer life, it would have been his fate to be assassinated himself, together with the wife he would have married, and the child he would have had by her.”

“But why,” said Zadig, “is it necessary that there should be crimes and misfortunes, and that these misfortunes should fall on the good?”

“The wicked,” replied Jesrad, “are always unhappy; they serve to prove and try the small number of the just that are scattered through the earth; and there is no evil that is not productive of some good.”

“But,” said Zadig, “suppose there were nothing but good and no evil at all.”

“Then,” replied Jesrad, “this earth would be another earth.  The chain of events would be ranged in another order and directed by wisdom; but this other order, which would be perfect, can exist only in the eternal abode of the Supreme Being, to which no evil can approach.  The Deity hath created millions of worlds, among which there is not one that resembles another.  This immense variety is the effect of His immense power.  There are not two leaves among the trees of the earth, nor two globes in the unlimited expanse of heaven that are exactly similar; and all that thou seest on the little atom in which thou art born, ought to be in its proper time and place, according to the immutable decree of Him who comprehends all.  Men think that this child who hath just perished is fallen into the water by chance; and that it is by the same chance that this house is burned; but there is no such thing as chance; all is either a trial, or a punishment, or a reward, or a foresight.  Remember the fisherman who thought himself the most wretched of mankind.  Oromazes sent thee to change his fate.  Cease, then, frail mortal, to dispute against what thou oughtest to adore.”

“But,” said Zadig—­as he pronounced the word “But,” the angel took his flight toward the tenth sphere.  Zadig on his knees adored Providence, and submitted.  The angel cried to him from on high, “Direct thy course toward Babylon.”

THE ENIGMAS

Zadig, entranced, as it were, and like a man about whose head the thunder had burst, walked at random.  He entered Babylon on the very day when those who had fought at the tournaments were assembled in the grand vestibule of the palace to explain the enigmas and to answer the questions of the grand magi.  All the knights were already arrived, except the knight in green armor.  As soon as Zadig appeared in the city the people crowded round him; every eye was fixed on him; every mouth blessed him, and every heart wished him the empire.  The envious man saw him pass;