Essay About Novel Candide And Enlightenment Period

Voltaire
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Throughout the novel Candide, Voltaire satirizes and mocks many aspects of the
Enlightenment period. Just to name a few, he often makes criticisms towards the military,
the church, and cruelty to human beings. The world of the miltary during the
Enlightenment was full of evil, cruelty, and suffering. The church insisted that it was the
only source of truth and that all who lived outside its bounds were damned. Many people
were against the beliefs of Voltaire but based upon the happenings in the militrary and the
church I believe that his criticisms were justified.
Powerful members of the nobility start wars, but common soldiers and subjects
suffer the consequences. Neither side of the conflict is better than the other, and both
engage in rape, murder, and destruction. During the Enlightenment the military nor
those who were governing them did not care for the safety or care of their soliders. They
were both equally corrupt. In the novel, Canide is conscripted to serve in the Bulgar
army, where he suffers abuse and hardship as he is indoctrinated into military life.
When he decides to go for a walk one morning, four soldiers capture him and he is court-
martialed as a deserter. He is given a choice between execution and running the gauntlet
(being made to run between two lines of men who will strike him with weapons) thirty-six
times. Candide tries to choose neither option by arguing that “the human will is free,” but
his argument is unsuccessful. He finally chooses to run the gauntlet (Voltaire Ch. 2).
Voltaire strongly criticizes the military for its contradictory against themselves and the
cruelty and suffering that they inflict on not only each other but others as well. Given that
this is the way that society was during the Enlightenment period, I believe that Voltaires
criticisms were justfied.
“Can an opinion be heretical and yet have no concern with the salvation of souls?”
(Galileo p.223). According to the Inquisitors of Enlightenment, there is no such thing as
having an opinion other than what is taught of the religion. The auto-da-fД©, or act of faith,
was the Inquisitions practice of burning heretics alive. Beginning in the Middle Ages, the
officials of the Inquisition systematically tortured and murdered tens of thousands of
people on the slightest suspicion of heresy against orthodox Christian doctrine. Jews,
Protestants, Muslims, and