Journey through Utopia by Berneri Marie Louise; Adams Matthew S.; Woodcock George

Author:Berneri, Marie Louise; Adams, Matthew S.; Woodcock, George
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: PM Press
Published: 2019-03-18T16:00:00+00:00

DIDEROT

Supplement to Bougainville’s Voyage

DIDEROT believed that “Nature gave no man the right to rule over others,” and he maintained his belief by refusing to become, like so many of his contemporaries, a law-giver. There is a charming anecdote which shows that he could resist the temptations of “kingship.” For three successive years Diderot was made king “par la grâce du gâteau,” that is to say he became “Twelfth Night King” for finding the bean in his piece of cake. As a king, he had to produce a code, which he did in a little poem in which he said:

Diviser pour régner, la maxime est ancienne

Elle fut d’un tyran, ce n’est donc pas la mienne

Vous unir est mon voeu, j’aime la liberté

Et si j’ai quelque volonté

C’est que chacun fasse la sienne.

Le Code de Denis

In the third year he wrote another poem in which he renounced even the right to decree that “each should do what he wills,” and declared that, as he did not wish to be given any law, neither did he wish to make one for others:

Jamais au public avantage

L’homme n’a franchement sacrifié ses droits!

La nature n’a fait ni serviteur ni maître

Je ne veux ni donner ni recevoir de lois!

Et ses mains coudraient les entrailles du prêtre,

Au défaut d’un cordon, pour étrangler les rois.

Les Eleuthéromanes ou abdication d’un roi de la fève

In a more serious mood, Diderot did, however, give a description of a free, primitive society which knows neither governments nor laws. The Supplement to Bougainville’s Voyage is an imaginary description of the customs found by Bougainville and his companions when they first landed on the island. Louis Antoine Bougainville had explored the Archipelago of Oceania, including Tahiti, during his great voyage which lasted from 1766 to 1769. On his return he published an account of his travels (1771), which was widely read. A year later Diderot wrote his fictitious account of Bougainville’s visit to Tahiti; it was a powerful indictment of “civilisation,” with its reliance on armed forces and religion, but it also provided Diderot with the opportunity to describe a primitive society, not perhaps as it was, but as it should be. As the subtitle of the Supplement indicates, it contains a strong attack on the accepted code of morals—“On the disadvantages of attaching moral ideas to certain physical actions incompatible therewith.” The violence and the outspokenness of the criticisms prevented it from being printed. It was circulated in manuscript form during Diderot’s life, and was not printed until after the Revolution, in 1796.

The Supplement is written in the form of a dialogue but rather than try to summarise it or quote extracts here and there, it may be better to give in full The Old Man’s Farewell, for this gives a fairly complete idea of the customs of the inhabitants of “Tahiti”.

The Old Man’s Farewell

He was the father of a large family. At the arrival of the Europeans, he looked disdainfully at them, showing neither astonishment, fear, nor curiosity. They accosted him. He turned his back on them, and withdrew into his hut.

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