TARTUFFE
A monologue from the
play by Molière
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NOTE: This monologue is reprinted
from The Dramatic Works of Molière, Vol. II. Ed.
Charles Heron Wall. London: George Bell & Sons, 1898. |
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CLEANTE: No, I am not a revered doctor, brother; no,
all the knowledge of this world has not found its abode in me.
I have merely the science of discerning truth from falsehood.
And as I know nothing in the world so noble and so beautiful
as the holy fervour of genuine piety, so there is nothing, I
think, so odious as the whitewashed outside of a specious zeal;
as those downright imposters, those bigots whose sacrilegious
and deceitful grimaces impose on others with impunity, and who
trifle as they like with all that mankind holds sacred; those
men who, wholly given to mercenary ends, trade upon godliness,
and would purchase honour and reputation at the cost of hypocritical
looks and affected groans; who, seized with strange ardour, make
use of the next world to secure their fortune in this; who, with
great affectation and many prayers, daily preach solitude and
retirement while they themselves live at Court; who know how
to reconcile their zeal with their vices; who are passionate,
revengeful, faithless, full of deceit, and who, to work the destruction
of a fellow-man, insolently cover their fierce resentment with
the cause of Heaven. They are so much the more dangerous in that
they, in their bitter wrath, use against us those weapons which
men revere; and their anger, which everybody lauds, assassinates
us with a consecrated weapon. There are too many such mean hypocrites
in the world; but from them the truly pious are easy to distinguish.
Our age offers us abundant and glorious examples, my brother.
Look at Ariston, look at Périande, Oronte, Alcidamus,
Polydore, and Clitandre. No one will refuse them this title.
They are no pretenders to virtue. You never see in them this
unbearable ostentation, and their piety is human and tractable.
They never censure the doings of others; they think there is
too much pride in such censure; and leaving lofty words to others,
they only reprove our actions by their own virtue. They do not
trust to the appearance of evil, and are more inclined to judge
kindly of others. We find no cabals, no intrigues among them;
all their anxiety is to live a holy life. They never persecute
the sinner, but they hate the sin. They do not care to display
for the interest of Heaven a more ardent zeal than Heaven itself
displays. These are people after my own heart; it is thus we
should live; this is the pattern for us to follow. Tartuffe is
not of this stamp, I know. You speak with the best intention
of his goodness, but I fear you are dazzled by false appearances.
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