Voltaire: Pat Robertson is a despicable human being

(Tip to BooMan for the idea for this post.)

The city of Port-au-Prince, Haïti, was flattened in an earthquake on 12 January 2010. Pat Robertson has stated that the earthquake is an act of Jehovah's unleashing his wrath against the sinful Haïtians who made a "pact with the devil" to drive "Napoléon the Third and whatever" from Hispaniola. Of course this assertion despicable, and it should make you feel sick to your stomach, whether you're Christian or not. I'll address that in the second half of this post. But more stupidly, it's also simply ahistorical, which I'll address first.

In fact, Haïti won its independence in 1804, during the reign of Napoléon I^er. This first Napoléon was so vexed by trying to prosecute a war against much of Europe that the slave revolt happening in Haïti was sort of a last straw for his ventures in the Western Hemisphere. Napoléon abandoned Haïti in 1804, sold the Louisiana Territory to the U.S. in 1812 to finance a war against Britain, and stayed in power until 1814, when the European powers got together a coalition strong enough to finally kick his worn-out, mutinous army's ass.

Napoléon III was his nephew, born in 1808. Napoléon III focused not on the Caribbean but on Mexico, where he sought to establish an income-producing French monarchy, and on the Confederate States of America, to which he supplied arms in the hopes of getting their reciprocal support in his Mexico venture. He had interests in Algeria and Indochina, too -- basically preparing France for the military and political quagmires it would get itself into in the 20th century -- but he had no particular interest in Haïti.

The city of Lisbon, Portugal, was flattened in an earthquake and subsequent fire on 1 November 1755. Many influential clergy preached that the earthquake was an act of Jehovah's unleashing his wrath against the sinful Portuguese. Protestants preached that the Portuguese were being punished for not embracing the Reformation; Catholics preached that too many Portuguese were turning to Protestantism.

Voltaire's reaction is as apropos against Pat Robertson today as it was against those clergy 250 years ago. A lot of electrons are being spilled today about Robertson's insane, historically inaccurate claim, but I think Voltaire took care of him already:

Direz-vous, en voyant cet amas de victimes :
« Dieu s’est vengé, leur mort est le prix de leurs crimes ? »
Quel crime, quelle faute ont commis ces enfants
Sur le sein maternel écrasés et sanglants ?

[ ... ]

Les tristes habitants de ces bords désolés
Dans l’horreur des tourments seraient-ils consolés
Si quelqu’un leur disait : « Tombez, mourez tranquilles ;
Pour le bonheur du monde on détruit vos asiles ;
D’autres mains vont bâtir vos palais embrasés,
D’autres peuples naîtront dans vos murs écrasés ;
Le Nord va s’enrichir de vos pertes fatales ;
Tous vos maux sont un bien dans les lois générales ;
Dieu vous voit du même œil que les vils vermisseaux
Dont vous serez la proie au fond de vos tombeaux ? »
À des infortunés quel horrible langage !

In English prose, which doesn't capture the outrage of the original French:

Will you say, when you look at this heap of victims,
"God is avenged; their death is the price for their crimes"?
What crime, what fault did these children,
crushed and bloodied on their mothers' breasts, commit?

[ ... ]

The sad inhabitants of these sorry shores,
Would they be consoled from the horror of their torments
If someone were to say to them, "Fall, and die happily;
Your safe havens have been destroyed for the happiness of the rest of the world;
Other hands will rebuild your flooded palaces,
Another nation will be born within your flattened walls;
The North will enrich itself from your fatal losses;
All of your ills are a good in the natural law;
God sees you the same as the lowly worms
That will prey upon you at the bottom of your tombs"?
What horrible language to the unfortunate ones!

Voltaire, Poème sur le désastre de Lisbonne (1756), Glomarization, trans.