The Revolt of the Angels. Anatole France
the Maenads believed in Dionysus and for the same reason. I believe in the God of the Jews and the Christians. But I deny that He created the world; at the most He organised but an inferior part of it, and all that He touched bears the mark of His rough and unforeseeing touch. I do not think He is either eternal or infinite, for it is absurd to conceive of a being who is not bounded by space or time. I think Him limited, even very limited. I no longer believe Him to be the only God. For a long time He did not believe it Himself; in the beginning He was a polytheist; later, His pride and the flattery of His worshippers made Him a monotheist. His ideas have little connection; He is less powerful than He is thought to be. And, to speak candidly, He is not so much a god as a vain and ignorant demiurge. Those who, like myself, know His true nature, call Him Ialdabaoth.”
“What’s that you say?”
“Ialdabaoth.”
“Ialdabaoth. What’s that?”
“I have already told you. It is the demiurge whom, in your blindness, you adore as the one and only God.”
“You’re mad. I don’t advise you to go and talk rubbish like that to Abbé Patouille.”
“I am not in the least sanguine, my dear Maurice, of piercing the dense night of your intellect. I merely tell you that I am going to engage Ialdabaoth in conflict with some hopes of victory.”
“Mark my words, you won’t succeed.”
“Lucifer shook His throne, and the issue was for a moment in doubt.”
“What is your name?”
“Abdiel for the angels and saints, Arcade for mankind.”
“Well, my poor Arcade, I regret to see you going to the bad. But confess that you are jesting with us. I could at a pinch understand your leaving Heaven for a woman. Love makes us commit the greatest follies. But you will never make me believe that you, who have seen God face to face, ultimately found the truth in old Sariette’s musty books. No, you will never get me to believe that!”
“My dear Maurice, Lucifer was face to face with God, yet he refused to serve Him. As to the kind of truth one finds in books, it is a truth that enables us sometimes to discern what things are not, without ever enabling us to discover what they are. And this poor little truth has sufficed to prove to me that He in whom I blindly believed is not believable, and that men and angels have been deceived by the lies of Ialdabaoth.”
“There is no Ialdabaoth. There is God. Come, Arcade, do the right thing. Renounce these follies, these impieties, dis-incarnate yourself, become once more a pure Spirit, and resume your office of guardian angel. Return to duty. I forgive you, but do not let us see you again.”
“I should like to please you, Maurice. I feel a certain affection for you, for my heart is soft. But fate henceforth calls me elsewhere towards beings capable of thought and action.”
“Monsieur Arcade,” said Madame des Aubels, “withdraw, I implore you. It makes me horribly shy to be in this position before two men. I assure you I am not accustomed to it.”
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