Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-Pierre
Paul and Virginia
(Paul et Virginie)
1788
(A boy and girl grow up in love together on a beautiful tropical island-- but even from afar, society threatens to tear them apart.)
All text except quotations is copyright 2001 by David Lahti, and represents his views alone.
CONTENTS:
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Happening upon a couple of desolate cottages beneath a mountain on the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius, the narrator asks an old man to tell him of the history of these dwellings. The story that follows is one of romance and loss. Madame de la Tour and Margaret are two women who had been dealt hard blows by their former husbands: the former was widowed, and the latter abandoned. Each found herself, with the help of the man relating the story, the mistress of one of the cottages that nestled in the valley near Port Louis, the capital of the French colony. They lived a quiet rural life away from society but with each other's close friendship. Each had a young child, and so from birth Paul and Virginia were the closest companions. Domingo and Mary were two slaves who lived as part of the families.
The two children grew up in the absence of all of the amenities, but also the prejudices, of society. They grew up in the bosom of nature, and learned to love and enjoy life and living things. They derived pleasure from their simple celebrations with their mothers, from walks in the lush Mauritian forests, and from the cultivation of the earth which produced their gardens and the materials for their sustenance. Once, after obtaining pardon for a poor slave woman who had fled her master, Paul and Virginia became lost in the woods, unable to locate the "Mountain of the Three Breasts" which was their landmark, until Domingo rescued them.
All of this happiness seemed to waver when the young couple reached that age at which they felt new emotions crowding in on their friendship. Virginia was unsettled by her feelings, cried often, and began to require time to herself. Paul was also overcome with this new love for Virginia, but threw himself into his passion, which made the young Virginia all the more confused. Madame la Tour, who was originally from a wealthy noble family, was offered the opportunity to send Virginia back to France to be educated and received into society. Paul was told that he could not follow her because he came from a poor family, and Virginia was to be sent off in secret to ensure this. The couple did not want to be parted, however, and Paul argued for the sufficiency of their quiet life on the island. With her mother's pleading, and a priest's affirmation that it was the will of God that she leave, Virginia consented to go, but promised Paul she would return and still be his. During the years of her absence, Paul feared for her corruption, and nearly all of Virginia's letters were intercepted by a disdainful aunt before they were sent to Mauritius. The hermit sat with Paul and attempted to instill in him a philosophy of stoicism, contemplation of nature, and solitude to ease his spirit.
[Don't read the following paragraph unless you want the ending revealed!]
Paul remained depressed until he learned that Virginia was finally returning to him, and was waiting out a storm in a vessel somewhat off the coast. Paul and the hermit sought the boat through the storm, while hearing the firing of distress guns. The storm passed, but the boat remained invisible in a deep fog. Hundreds waited on the shores for a sight of the ship and those aboard, hoping it was able to land before an expected hurricane arrived. The hurricane came first, however. It swept the fog away to reveal the boat, its decks crowded, Virginia among them waving for Paul. Paul rushed into the rising torrent as the hurricane broke the boat. The sea battered Paul and threw him back on the shore, and destroyed the boat. The hermit and Domingo found Virginia dead on the beach, and took Paul home to recover. The old man tried, as Paul recuperated, to argue him out of his grief, but to no avail. The two mothers simultaneously dreamt that Paul and Virginia smiled and danced together again in a grove; and in fulfillment of the dreams, within two months of Virginia's death Paul joined her.
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A short and beautiful novel of love and nature, Paul and Virginia is a gem. Its description of the tropical Indian Ocean island of Mauritius is beautiful, and one may well lament that the landscape that he describes so admiringly has disappeared, replaced with a sprawling city surrounded by sugar cane (although further to the south there still exists some forest preserved by a British land trust). But the mountain Trois Mamelles, or Three Breasts, still rises as a landmark to any who, like Paul and Virginia, wish to find their way through the island's interior. We can be thankful that no economic benefit has yet been discovered for the leveling of mountains.
The story of a boy and girl growing up together in a natural environment is touching-- in fact extremely sentimental. Two cocoa trees are planted at their births and grow up with them. Their adventures and joy will elicit sighs from a romantic, as will the sorrows. The tale can be enjoyed solely as a love story in a tropical, utopic setting, but there is of course more to it. Bernardin de Saint Pierre uses the novel as a way of portraying, and at times for arguing, for a certain view of life and society. Throughout the book he stresses the simple and "naturally virtuous" state of man, away from the corrupting and prejudicial influences of society. Good and evil are not learned by instruction from people, but by nature. Socialization, even that of parents, is seen mostly as an obstacle to the healthy growth of a child, who will do best if left alone, surrounded by nature. It is because Paul and Virginia grow up together sheltered from people that their innate goodness is permitted to develop. The author does not idealize the poor, however-- in fact, he deems them "ordinarily jealous, calumniating, and gross". It is the life close to nature, in attitude and in practice, that produces the good, natural man. The Bible's role should be to inspire devotion to God rather than to instruct, and morality should be an "active principle" rather than a learned code of conduct. Roughly a fifth of the novel in the middle is devoted to the hermit's soliloquy as he urges the depressed Paul to adopt a philosophy of solitude, stoicism, and contemplation of nature. This is followed by a criticism of the current prejudices and social injustices of society, particularly in France; and a portrayal of the unhappy, restless state of the wealthy.
To some the author's style may seem too didactic; he may seem to be debasing the story by using it as an excuse to preach. But it is only after he has successfully involved us in the story and the setting that the author brings out these points, and if they do not actually follow from the story, they fit reasonably well within it. Unlike Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, which appears clearly as a story built solely for the conveyance of a belief system, Paul and Virginia is rather a work of art in itself which, in the course of unfolding, seeks to convey a belief system along with the aesthetics. Perhaps it is best to come to the novel with an open mind, therefore, and allow the storyteller some latitude to vent his heartfelt opinions as he shares his romance. This is not to say that the opinions are consistent or correct. It is far from clear that an existence close to nature is sufficient to produce a virtuous person, however we might define one, even if we shield that person from society throughout upbringing. What is society but people, like the author himself, each with hopes and fears and loves and opinions, and with both vices and virtues? The romantics were perhaps right in their admonition that we learn lessons from nature, but the very fact that we needed their admonishment reveals the urgent need for instruction and guidance. In fact, we need also to learn what to learn from nature. We need to know that to learn peace and humility is helpful to us, but to learn cruelty and selfishness is not-- depending on where we look and how we look, we could learn just about anything from nature. Do we look to the beautiful flower in a glade, for instance, or to the storm that killed the lovers? Another facet of this paradox in the philosophy of the author is the relationship between physical needs and the health of the soul. Because the former seem to be more "natural", or basic, the author tends to want to emphasize them: "he who makes the earth produce a single ear of corn more, renders [men] a greater service than he who writes a book". But one of the most wonderful segments of the book occurs not long after this, when he praises the benefits of literature. In fact, his view of society and his emphasis on virtue would suggest that the growing and consuming of crops is something all do, but that we are all wasting our digestion if we do not live properly, and think properly. The service to humanity of an ear of corn would seem to depend on whether it is the corrupt and vicious that do the enjoying of it.
The experience of the novel includes the philosophy and would not be as enjoyable without it, despite its faults. The whole may inspire us to virtue, appreciation of nature, love, and perceptiveness to beauty. The author's wonderful description of gardening as an embellishment of nature is an example of this. But aside from all of this, and perhaps more enduringly, the novel will cause us to remember tenderly a young innocent girl and boy who frolic in a tropical forest for a time, heedless of the sorrows and vices of the world.
Top of Saint Pierre's Paul and Virginia
Tidbits of Significance (there are no chapter or other divisions in the work; translated from French by Sarah Jones):
"All sensitive and suffering creatures, from a sort of common instinct, fly for refuge amidst their pains to haunts the most wild and desolate; as if rocks could form a rampart against misfortune-- as if the calm of Nature could hush the tumults of the soul."
-near the beginning of the story
"And if sometimes a passion more ardent than friendship awakened in their hearts the pang of unavailing anguish, a pure religion, united with chaste manners, drew their affections towards another life: as the trembling flame rises towards heaven, when it no longer finds any aliment on earth."
-near the beginning of the story
"I never, in the course of my travels, experienced anything like the pleasure in seeing a statue or other monument of ancient art, as in reading a well-written inscription. It seems to me as if a human voice issued from the stone, and, making itself heard after the lapse of ages, addressed man in the midst of a desert, to tell him that he is not alone, and that other men, on that very spot, had felt, and thought, and suffered like himself. If the inscription belongs to an ancient nation, which no longer exists, it leads the soul through infinite space, and strengthens the consciousness of its immortality, by demonstrating that a thought has survived the ruins of an empire."
-1/5 through the story, after Paul and Virginia help the slave.
"'It is only,' she said, 'by promoting the happiness of others, that we can secure our own.'"
-Virginia, 1/3 through the story.
"...the divine precept,-- concealing the benefactor, and revealing only the benefit."
-of Virginia, 1/3 through the story.
"One of those summers, which sometimes desolate the countries situated between the tropics, now began to spread its ravages over this island. It was near the end of December, when the sun, in Capricorn, darts over the Mauritius, during the space of three weeks, its vertical fires. The south-east wind, which prevails throughout almost the whole year, no longer blew. Vast columns of dust arose from the highways, and hung suspended in the air; the ground was everywhere broken into clefts; the grass was burnt up; hot exhalations issued from the sides of the mountains, and their rivulets, for the most part, became dry. No refreshing cloud ever arose from the sea: fiery vapors, only, during the day, ascended from the plains, and appeared, at sunset, like the reflection of a vast conflagration. Night brought no coolness to the heated atmosphere; and the red moon rising in the misty horizon, appeared of supernatural magnitude. The drooping cattle, on the sides of the hills, stretching out their necks towards heaven, and panting for breath, made the valleys re-echo with their melancholy lowings: even the Caffre by whom they were led threw himself upon the earth, in search of some cooling moisture: but his hopes were vain; the scorching sun had penetrated the whole soil, and the stifling atmosphere everywhere resounded with the buzzing noise of insects, seeking to allay their thirst with the blood of men and of animals."
-1/3 through the story.
"'It is better not to let a man know that the heart of his mistress is gained.'"
-Madame de la Tour to Virginia, 1/2 through the story, after they are invited to France.
"Like the globe upon which we revolve, the fleeting course of life is but a day; and if part of that day be visited by light, the other is thrown into darkness."
-1/2 through the story.
"Amber does not shed so sweet a perfume as the veriest trifles touched by those we love."
-1/2 through the story, after Virginia has left the island.
"The powerful sentiment of love, which directed his present studies, had already instructed him in agriculture, and in the art of laying out grounds with advantage and beauty. It must be admitted, that to the fond dreams of this restless and ardent passion, mankind are indebted for most of the arts and sciences, while its disappointments have given birth to philosophy, which teaches us to bear up under misfortune. Love, thus, the general link of all beings, becomes the great spring of society, by inciting us to knowledge as well as to pleasure."
-1/2 through the story, after Virginia has left the island.
"Every man who has much cause of complaint against his fellow-creatures seeks to be alone. It is also remarkable that all those nations which have been brought to wretchedness by their opinions, their manners, or their forms of government, have produced numerous classes of citizens altogether devoted to solitude and celibacy. Such were the Egyptians in their decline, and the Greeks of the Lower Empire; and such in our days are the Indians, the Chinese, the modern Greeks, the Italians, and the greater part of the eastern and southern nations of Europe. Solitude, by removing men from the miseries which follow in the train of social intercourse, brings them in some degree back to the unsophisticated enjoyment of nature. In the midst of modern society, broken up by innumerable prejudices, the mind is in a constant turmoil of agitation. It is incessantly revolving in itself a thousand tumultous and contradictory opinions, by which the members of an ambitious and miserable circle seek to raise themselves above each other. But in solitude the soul lays aside the morbid illusions which troubled her, and resumes the pure consciousness of herself, of nature, and of its Author, as the muddy water of a torrent which has ravaged the plains, coming to rest, and diffusing itself over some low grounds out of its course, deposits there the slime it has taken up, and, resuming its wonted transparency, reflects, with its own shores, the verdure of the earth and the light of heaven. Thus does solitude recruit the powers of the body as well as those of the mind. It is among hermits that are found the men who carry human existence to its extreme limits; such are the Bramins of India. In brief, I consider solitude so necessary to happiness, even in the world itself, that it appears to me impossible to derive lasting pleasure from any pursuit whatever, or to regulate our conduct by any stable principle, if we do not create for ourselves a mental void, whence our own views rarely emerge, and into which the opinions of others never enter. I do not mean to say that man ought to live absolutely alone; he is connected by his necessities with all mankind; his labors are due to man: and he owes something too to the rest of nature. But, as God has given to each of us organs perfectly adapted to the elements of the globe on which we live,-- feet for the soil, lungs for the air, eyes for the light, without the power of changing the use of any of these faculties, he has reserved for himself, as the Author of life, that which is its chief organ,-- the heart."
-2/3 through the story, at the beginning of the hermit's soliloquy.
"As men have ceased to fall in my way, I no longer view them with aversion."
-2/3 through the story, the hermit's soliloquy.
"Among the man children of misfortune whom I have endeavored to lead back to the enjoyments of nature, I have not found one but was intoxicated with his own miseries."
-2/3 through the story, the hermit's soliloquy.
"As for me, I suffer myself to float calmly down the stream of time to the shoreless ocean of futurity; while, in the contemplation of the present harmony of nature, I elevate my soul towards its supreme Author, and hope for a more happy lot in another state of existence."
-2/3 through the story, the hermit's soliloquy.
"The objects which are habitually before us do not bring to our minds an adequate idea of the rapidity of life; they decline insensibly with ourselves: but it is those we behold again, after having for some years lost sight of them, that most powerfully impress us with a feeling of the swiftness with which the tide of life flows on."
-2/3 through the story, the hermit's soliloquy.
"...in the present day, the distinctions which should be bestowed on merit are generally to be obtained by money alone."
-2/3 through the story, the conversation between Paul and the hermit.
"...public bodies have never taken much interest in the discovery of truth. All opinions are nearly alike to ambitious men, provided only that they themselves can gain their ends."
-2/3 through the story, the conversation between Paul and the hermit.
"Let God be your patron, and mankind the public body you would serve. Be constantly attached to them both. Families, corporations, nations and kings have, all of them, their prejudices and their passions; it is often necessary to serve them by the practice of vice: God and mankind at large require only the exercise of the virtues."
-2/3 through the story, the conversation between Paul and the hermit.
"You see, then, that to acquire the glory which a turbulent literary career can give you, you must not only be virtuous, but ready, if necessary, to sacrifice life itself."
-2/3 through the story, the conversation between Paul and the hermit.
"Women are false in those countries where men are tyrants. Violence always engenders a disposition to deceive."
-3/5 through the story, the conversation between Paul and the hermit.
"'...that courage which prompts us on to court death is but the courage of a moment, and is often excited only by the vain applause of men, or by the hope of posthumous renown."
-3/4 through the story, near the end of the conversation between Paul and the hermit.
"'Literature, my dear son, is the gift of Heaven, a ray of that wisdom by which the universe is governed, and which man, inspired by a celestial intelligence, has drawn down to earth. Like the rays of the sun, it enlightens us, it rejoices us, it warms us with a heavenly flame, and seems, in some sort, like the element of fire, to bend all nature to our use. By its means we are enabled to bring around us all things, all places, all men, and all times. It assists us to regulate our manners and our life. By its aid, too, our passions are calmed, vice is suppressed, and virtue encouraged by the memorable examples of great and good men which it has handed down to us, and whose time-honored images it ever brings before our eyes. Literature is a daughter of Heaven who has descended upon earth to soften and to charm away all the evils of the human race. The greatest writers have ever appeared in the worst times,-- in times in which society can hardly be held together,-- the times of barbarism and every species of depravity.'"
-3/4 through the story, near the end of the conversation between Paul and the hermit.
"'Have recourse to your books, then, my son. The wise men who have written before our days are travellers who have preceded us in the paths of misfortune, and who stretch out a friendly hand towards us, and invite us to join their society, when we are abandoned by everything else. A good book is a good friend.'"
-3/4 through the story, near the end of the conversation between Paul and the hermit.
"'There is, moreover, in woman a liveliness and gayety, which powerfully tend to dissipate the melancholy feelings of a man; her presence drives away the dark phantoms of imagination produced by over-reflection. Upon her countenance sit soft attractions and tender confidence. What joy is not heightened when it is shared by her? What brow is not unbent by her smiles? What anger can resist her tears?'"
-3/4 through the story, near the end of the conversation between Paul and the hermit.
"...there are in life such terrible, such unmerited evils, that even the hope of the wise is sometimes shaken."
-4/5 through the story, after the hurricane.
"'My son, beneficence is the happiness of the virtuous: there is no greater or more certain enjoyment on the earth. Schemes of pleasure, repose, luxuries, wealth, and glory are not suited to man, weak, wandering, and transitory as he is.'"
-the hermit, near the end of the story.
"'My son! God gives all the trials of life to virtue, in order to show that virtue alone can support them, and even find in them happiness and glory.'"
-the hermit, near the end of the story.
"'The wickedness of mankind lead them to deny the existence of a Being, whose justice they fear.'"
-the hermit, near the end of the story.
"'...raise your thoughts towards the infinite, to enable you to support the evils of a moment.'"
-the hermit, near the end of the story.
"Heaven-- just Heaven, always sends to the cruel the most frightful views of religion and a future state."
-near the end of the story.
Top of Saint Pierre's Paul and Virginia
...you are in the mood for an innocent and idyllic romance-- a story of nature, philosophy, love, and sorrow; or, you want literary companionship for a time of solitude in nature, especially if experiencing lost love.
Top of Saint Pierre's Paul and Virginia
If you like this, you'd also like...
(for the tragic romantic:)
-Longus, Daphnis and Chloe (mid-3rd century).
-Gottfried von Strassburg, Tristan (c.1210) (or another version, such as The Romance of Tristan and Iseult by Joseph Bédier (1900)).
-Geoffrey Chaucer, Troilus and Criseyde (1380's).
-William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet (c.1595).
-Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights (1847).
(for the conoisseur of the French nature-loving romantic thinkers:)
-Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Émile (1762).
-Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Julie, or the new Héloïse (1761).
-Bernardin de Saint Pierre, Studies of Nature (1784).
-François-René Chateaubriand, Memoirs from Beyond the Grave (1809-1847).
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