attacks, almost all through satirical language, and absurd characters and irony on the Church and their contemporary philosophy. When taking a closer look at these attacks it becomes apparent that there is nothing that is inherently revolutionary about them. While it definitely makes for a provoking type of comedy, there aren’t really any solutions given other than living a grave life on a farm. The lack of really “enlightened” ideas in the novel is especially noticeable in the portrayal of women. Voltaire, as well as Rousseau, thought it most unwise to educate the poor, and it’s easily seen that Voltaire’s imagining of women in Candide is hardly enlightened. Even though Voltaire was known to have supported the equal rights of women, (citation), this concept is not seen in his work, especially looking at the fact that the main female characters in the novel are prostitutes, women that marry to get money, pawns in the spread of disease, and most frequently victims. Overall, even though Voltaire’s work is definitely critical of the society at that time, any potential revolutionary significance is only in the idea that it exposed some of the many weaknesses of the prominent societal structure. In the terms of religion, Candide explores the never-ending hypocrisy that was extensive in the Church.
Look at for example, the inhumanity and duplicity of the clergy, and most particularly the Inquisitor in hanging and executing his fellow citizens over mere philosophical differences. Moreover, he then orders the flogging on Candide for merely listening with an air of approval and therefore in some way proving himself implicit and blasphemy. The Church officials in Candide are portrayed as being some of the most sinful of all citizens. They are engaging in homosexual affairs, having mistresses and stealing jewels. Indeed, possibly the most outrageous example of hypocrisy in the Church is the face that the Pope has sworn celibacy and yet, has a daughter. In these situations, Voltaire is poking fun at the Church and its behavior and comes up with several of these ironic and satirical situations in the novel, there is definitely an element of high comedy about such actions and one can get the sense that philosophers, like Voltaire, were merely working through the system that they appeared to detest instead of working against it in a more proactive way. The theme of actual revolutionary action or words versus static speculation is yet another theme that is rampant throughout the novel and is seen not only in Candide’s satirical accounts of the Church hypocrisy, but directly of philosophy as
well. In many ways, it seems that in Candide Voltaire seeks a more active solution to the plethora of problems present in society. Ultimately, the group manages to lighten their troubles by using hard labor to numb their minds. This is proving that maybe Voltaire believes there really is a way to work through the problems that face society versus philosophy. While Voltaire’s ending of Candide definitely shows this idea, the book has several interesting characters that show the uselessness of this idea of static philosophy and even suggests some damage is done by this modern philosophy. A prime example of this is Pangloss, a devotee to his own type of philosophy called “metaphysico-theologo-cosmolo-nigology” which advocates the belief that this world is the best of all worlds is actually damaging to others. While the good Jacques is drowning