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THE MARQU:S DE SADE
intense frigging from her five girls, allowed that my method of
proceeding was more skillful than hers.
‘“‘And now,” said I, ‘‘we must think of these five nimble-
fingered fricatrices here; they deserve a reward.”
Disposing them in various and voluptuous positions, upon the
body of each we applied a brace of young fuckers. Contrary to all
principles, we clapped the grosser pricks into asses, into cunts the
smaller were stowed; we moved from group to group, proffering
advice and encouragements. Olympia’s delight was to snatch a
prick out from wherever it happened to be buried, to suck it a while,
and to restore it to place again; and sometimes when she came
upon a vacant orifice, whether cunt or ass, she would thrust her
tongue into it and spend a quarter of an hour licking and sucking
away. And whenever shie evicted a fucker, while she tongued his
partner she would receive a fucking from him. More marked in
my attentions than she, it was by means of smart slaps upon the
buttocks and occasional] kicks that I cheered on the combatants,
or else I'd squeeze a testicle here, twiddle a clitoris there, or jab
my thumb into an anus while whispering smutty instructions in
an ear and biting it next. In fine, I omitted nothing apt to expedite
the emission of fuck, and my interventions usually brought it forth
in gushes. But those discharges occurred in my ass; for I would
not for the world have let those sluts reap the fruit of my labors,
certainly not, I never do anything save it be for my personal
advantage and if the things I do are done well, that, my friends,
is the reason why.
This scene concluded, I proposed another. Here, we would
each sprawl flat upon one of the girls, our cunt covering her mouth,
she would suck it while: we sucked the cunt of another girl just
ahead of us and presented our asses to the ten youths who, served
by the remaining girl of the five, would embugger us now the one,
now the other. All this was acceptable to Olympia, save that where
she was concerned—and her amendment attested to a greater
degree of libertinage than I would have given her credit for—
she preferred to kiss an ass rather than a cunt; and the whore,
of her own accord, without any prompting from me, but thereby
demonstrating a perfect sympathy with my ideas, bit that ass
fiercely enough to draw blood. Seeing this, I felt completely at my
Juliette 669
ease, and catching hold of the breasts belonging to her whose cunt
I was lapping, I wrung and wrestled with them in a way that won
a sudden shrill scream from her. That was the moment Olympia
discharged.
“I’ve caught you, you rascal,” I said to her, ‘“‘you are begin-
ning to detect pleasure in the commotion created by pain inflicted
upon others. It is a favorable sign: we ought soon to be moving
on to better things.”
After having been embuggered ten times in succession we
swung our cunts around to the adversary. A girl squatting above
our foreheads simultaneously gave us her cunt and her bum to kiss;
with both hands a second massaged our clitoris and asshole; in
the meantime we were encunted; we discharged . . . we wallowed in
a sea of delights. Oral pleasures came next; we sucked all those
lads, we got them all to discharge into our mouths; and while this
was going forward each of us was having her clitoris sucked by
one girl, her asshole pumped by another. Exhausted, Olympia sug-
gested that we restore our forces; we repaired to a gorgeously
lighted, luxuriously furnished dining room. A superb collation was
awaiting us in a huge basket of flowers, this basket lay nested in
the boughs of an orange tree laden with fruit; when I reached for
an orange I discovered it was of ice. Such surprises were held in
all the rest, everything showed the mark of the most refined taste
and the most elegant sumptuousness. We were served by the girls;
from where they were concealed behind a decoration the youths
charmed us now by the sounds of their melodious instruments.
Intoxicated after our feats of lubricity, Olympia and I were
shortly drunk from wines and liqueurs also.
“Now then,” I asked of my companion, whose head was
reeling like mine, ‘what would you say to ending with an infamy ?”
“Simply name it, I am ready for anything.”
“Let us immolate one of these girls.”
“This one,” Olympia answered, catching the prettiest of the
five by the wrist.
“Gracious! You consent?”
“Why, of course. For what reason should I refrain from
imitating you? Do you think I am to be daunted at the prospect of
a murder? Ha, you shall see whether I am fit to be your pupil.”
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And, our victim in tow, we returned to the circular room
where our orgies had taken place. All servants are dismissed, all
doors barred, we three are alone.
“How shall we torment the jade?” I wanted to know. “Instru-
ments seem to be lacking here.”
While speaking I was examining the body of that truly superb
young thing; I studied it by the light of two candles which ever
and anon I would snuff out upon her buttocks, upon her thighs,
upon her breasts. Olympia picked up a candlestick too; thus did
we amuse ourselves for the space of an hour or so. After burning
her we pinched her, tweezed her, prodded her, and clawed her a
little with our fingernails. Both of us completely tipsy, without
quite realizing what we were doing or saying, we vomited, belched,
farted, and pissed—all that confusedly—and we tortured our
victim amain. The wretched creature screamed away, but neither
her cries nor our wild laughter were heard by any living soul, the
precautions having been well made against it. My suggestion was
that we hang the girl by the breasts and stab her to a slow death
with hairpins. Olympia. whose progress was keeping pace with
her lessons, agreed to everything. The unlucky girl’s agonies
extended over another two hours during which we drank ourselves
into a further stupor or rum and her tears. Next, my companion
and I, both spent after the fatigues of lust and of cruelties, numb
from our intemperances, sank upon the cushions underfoot and
slept for five hours, the victim dangling between us. The sun was
already well up in the sky when we awoke; I helped Olympia bury
the corpse beneath some bushes, and as I took my leave of her we
both declared our earnest wish to pursue a collaboration which had
begun so auspiciously.
Having neglected to tell Sbrigani I would be away overnight
in the country, he and my women had been troubled by my absence
and great was their relief to see me return; I assured them I was
well but weary, and went straight to my bed. The following day
Sbrigani, who thought of nothing but money, asked what profit
I supposed might be gleaned from this intrigue.
“It has already been worth a host of pleasures,” I sighed.
“It could be worth better still,” replied my serious-minded
gentleman squire. “I have glanced into the matter; my informants
Juliette 2 671
tell me Borghese is the Pope’s familiar. We must have her intro-
duce you to the Holy Father, we must prepare ourselves access to
the Church treasures, we must drive out of Rome with an additional
seven or eight millions in our baggage. You know, Juliette, I am
wondering whether it was not a mistake to have adopted such an
aristocratic style here, I fear lest it disserve our aims.”
“Not at all,” I assured Sbrigani; ‘“‘the lofty tone, a dazzling
panoply, and these titles are so many supplementary means to
excite lewd covetings; their ambition will be flattered to have
dealings with a woman of quality, | shall be able to triple my fees.”
“Ah,” Sbrigani rejoined, ‘‘’tis not a few hundred thousand
francs more or less that is at stake here. I have my eyes on higher
objectives: Pius VI possesses tremendous riches. We must steal
some of them.”
“To do so, entry into his apartments must be gained, and is
there any way to achieve this unless I be summoned there upon
some libertine mission ?””
“Certainly not; but instead of waiting idly for an opportunity
we must take the initiative, we must create the occasion as soon
as we can, we must get into the Vatican and fleece that beggar.”
As we were in the midst of this conversation a page in the
service of Cardinal de Bernis brought me a message from his
master. It was an invitation to supper at Villa Albani, several
hours’ ride from Rome, and the prelate of that same name was,
with Bernis, expecting me in his charming retreat.
“Juliette,” Sbrigani exhorted me, ‘‘make the most of your
outing : bear it ever in mind that larcenies, fraud, imposture, those
are the sole aims of our travels; to enrich ourselves, there’s our
sole purpose, that’s our duty, and if we failed of it ’twould be
unpardonable. To it all pleasures are secondary and likely to entice
you into detours; the only road we must follow is the great highway
that leads to fortune.”
Though no less ambitious than Sbrigani, quite as greedy for
gold as he, my views concerning motives were not entirely similar
to his. With me the proclivity for crime was the primary and com-
pelling thing, and if I longed to steal it was far more for the sake
of the pleasure which the act itself procured me than for lavishing
money upon delights.
672 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
assented to it gladly. The moment drew nigh; thinking the two
lovers properly at grips, I bade the Duke follow me on to the
stage.
“So then, good sir,” said I, directing his attention to the
frantically copulating couple, ‘is this less than you require to be
convinced ?”
Furious Grillo, drawn dagger in hand, hurls himself upon the
adulterous pair. Aiding his arm, I see to it the blow falls upon his
faithless spouse: the blade sinks deep into her flank, the Duke
would now vent his rage upon the lover, but nimble Dolni rolls
away, springs to his feet, scampers from the room, Grillo hot in
his pursuit. They race clown a long corridor .. . at its farther end
two trap doors open, one dropping the young man into an under-
ground passage, where he is safe, the other tumbling Grillo into
the works of a frightful machine fitted with a thousand sharp blades
for carving to ribbons whatever is placed inside it.
“Great God, what is this? what have I done?” cries the Duke,
‘oh, hideous snare! LDiiabolical knaves, all your design was to
trick me! And you, dearest wife, I was mistaken, they deceived me—
you were seduced, at bottom you are innocent—”’
These last words ‘were scarce out of the Duke’s mouth when
Borghese sent his naked and bleeding wife flying to join him in
the pit.
Over the open trap we lowered a grillwork, upon it we three,
Dolni, Olympia, and I, lay down flat and peered at our captives.
“There she is, my Lorci,” said I, “innocent no doubt and yet more
certainly wounded by ycur treatment of her. Succor her if you dare,
but know that in doing so your peril is great.”
Grillo starts impulsively toward his wife; but his movement
releases a spring, the machine starts to whirr, its many blades to
turn, their edges slash at the two victims who in less than ten
minutes are threshed shapeless, of them nought but blood and
splintered bone remains. I need not describe our ecstasy, Borghese’s
and mine, as we watched that scene; both frigged by Dolni, we
loosed discharge after discharge, at least a dozen in all, the sight
of that atrocity left our cunts in a state nearly as gruesome, and
inspired our minds to a very rare degree.
‘Come spend the day with me tomorrow,” Olympia suggested
Juliette & 725
when we had returned to the city, “I shall introduce you to the
personage who has offered me a hundred thousand crowns to burn
down all the hospitals and alms-houses in Rome. The man who is to
attend to the lighting of the fires will be there too.”
“What, do you still have that horror on your mind, Princess ?”
“Certainly, Juliette. You confine your criminal activity to
upsetting households whereas I make mine felt by at least half a
city. Incendiary Nero is my model; I too would like to stand on my
balcony, a lyre in my hand, and while singing gaze forth upon my
native land become a pyre for my countrymen.”
“Olympia, you are a monster.”
“Oh, not so great a one as you; the base scheme that brought
the Grillos to their end was absolutely typical of your invention,
I'd never have dreamt up the like.”
At Borghese Palace the next day Olympia presented her
guests to me. “The first of these gentlemen’’—it was to the elder
she alluded—“is Monsignor Chigi, related to that line of princes
several of whom have occupied the Holy See; he is today at the
head of the Roman police; the proposed fire I mentioned to you
yesterday will benefit him, and the hundred thousand crowns fee
he is to pay me is part of his investment in a very profitable venture.
And here is Count Bracciani who, as Europe’s foremost physician,
is to conduct the operation. Juliette,” Olympia added in a lowered
tone, “both are friends of mine; I implore you to take their
eventual requests of you into kindly consideration.”
“You shall not be embarrassed by my behavior,” I assured
her.
And the Princess having given the strictest orders that we be
left undisturbed, conversation was engaged.
“I am having you dine,” said Olympia, “with one of the most
famous scoundrels to come out of France in generations; she has
been giving us Romans daily examples of very high proficiency in
crime; her presence need not hinder you, my friends, in the forth-
coming discussions of the one we are preparing.”
“Truly, Madame,” said the master of the police, ‘‘you here
qualify as crime an altogether unpretentious and certainly very com-
prehensible act. I consider charitable institutions the most baneful
things a large city can contain; they drain the people’s energy, they
726 & THE MARQUIS DE SADE
soften its fiber, they promote sloth; they are in every sense perni-
cious; the needy individual is to the State as the parasite branch
is to the peach tree: it causes it to wither, drinks its sap, and bears
no fruit. What does the horticulturist do when he espies that
branch? He cuts it off, and without qualms. The statesman must
proceed likewise: one of the basic laws of Nature is that nothing
superfluous subsist in tae world. You may be sure of it, not only
does the shiftless beggar, always a nuisance, consume part of what
the industrious man produces, which is already a serious matter,
but will quickly become dangerous the moment you suspend your
dole to him. My desire is that instead of bestowing a groat upon
these misfortunates we concentrate our efforts upon wiping them
out; my desire is that they be totally eliminated, extirpated; ex-
terminated; killed, that is to say, and why make any bones about it?
killed as one kills a breed of noxious animals. That is the first
reason that led me to offer Princess Borghese one hundred thou-
sand gold crowns for destroying these houses that are a blight
upon our city. The second is that upon their sites I mean to build
hospices for travelers, pilgrims, and the like; some buildings razed,
others constructed in their place, don’t you see, and the revenues
which went formerly to pay for maintaining the hospitals I now
ask to have paid to me; and paid to me they shall be; mine as well
shall be an annual one hundred thousand crowns rental: thus I
sacrifice only the first year of an assured income to Madame
Borghese, who in Count Bracciani, she tells me, has the suitable
man for delivering Rome of these houses and for making a need
felt for those I am ready to put up on their foundations, and for
which I shall have no trouble obtaining the funds originally set aside
for the hospitals.’* There are twenty-eight of these asylums in the
city,” Chigi continued, “as well as nine conservatorios containing
roughly eighteen hundred poor girls whom, needless to say, I in-
clude in my proscriptions. All that must be set simultaneously
ablaze; there will be some thirty or forty thousand good-for-
nothings sacrificed—firstly, to the welfare of the State; secondly,
to the pleasures of Olympia, who is going to reap a pretty penny
18 This project was actually conceived while I was at Rome, and I alter nothing
but the names of the actors.
Juliette & 727
from this affair; thirdly, to my fortune, for with what I already
possess, I become one of Rome’s richest ecclesiastics if the plan
goes successfully through.”
“It would appear,” said Bracciani, ‘‘that I, who am to execute
it, come off the most poorly; for it seems not yet to have occurred
to you to offer me a sequin out of the great profits you are due to
make.”
“Chigi supposed that I would give you some of my hundred
thousand,” Olympia said to the Count, ‘“‘he was mistaken: the sum
is modest, once divided it amounts to twice nothing at all, and I
feel you should demand a hundred thousand for yourself; you are
worth that much to Monsignor, what more capable practitioner
could he hope to find ?”
“Softly,” said the churchman, “‘let’s hae no falling out at the
start of an undertaking so important, it would be the way to have
it all end very dismally and to provoke difficulties for one another.
I grant the Count the same emoluments Madame Borghese is to
have, I grant a further hundred thousand francs gratuity to this
charming woman,” Chigi went on, smiling in my direction; ‘““Olym-
pia’s friend must have a similar character and by that title alone
deserves to be treated as an accomplice.”
“She has all the virtues you can expect in one,” said the Prin-
cess, ‘‘and I guarantee she will not disappoint you. The question of
remunerations may be considered settled; in behalf of my friends I
accept your offers; let us now bend our thoughts to success.”
“T shall obtain it,” said Bracciani, ‘‘and it shall be entire:
there shall not escape a single one of the victims Chigi’s profound
statecraft, or rather his voluptuous wickedness, dooms to die.”
“Upon what henceforth shall Roman doctors be able to ex-
periment, I wonder?”
“As Juliette implies, it is very certain,” Olympia observed,
‘that almost all of them have long been in the habit of trying out
their remedies upon these poorer patients whose disappearance will
pose a problem to the profession. I am reminded,” she added, “of
what young Iberti, my personal doctor, said to me only the other
day upon arriving at my bedside fresh from one of those experi-
ments. ‘What concern to the State is the existence of the vile beings
that ordinarily crowd those dens?’ he said in response to the look of
728 & THE MARQUIS DE SADE
disapproval I assumed in order to find out how he would justify
himself; ‘you would be doing society an enormous disservice by not
permitting us medical artists to test our talents upon society’s dis-
honoring dregs. These inave their use; Nature, in making them weak
and defenseless, indicates what it is to be, and to refrain from so
using them is to flout ‘Nature’s instructions.’ ‘But,’ said I, depart-
ing a little from the central issue, ‘when, in a different case, some
sordid interest leads a man distinguished by wealth or by position
to seize the favorable opportunity afforded by a person’s illness to
commit a crime against that person, and when this man invites
a doctor to hasten the patient’s last moments, is it a grave fault for
the doctor to accept the proposition ?”
“““Great heavens, no,’ my young Aesculapius replied, ‘pro-
vided he is well paid he has no real choice but to accept. Doing the
deed, he has nothing to fear from his accomplice, neither does his
accomplice have anything to fear from him: both have everything
to gain from guarding their secret. Refusing to do the deed would
get the doctor nowher2, for he could hardly boast of having de-
clined a proposition which is not of the kind that is made to an
honest man: from a refusal he would thus extract nothing but
solitary and intellectual pleasure much inferior to that which the
offered sum would procure him. And even were he to proclaim that
to such a proposition he had said no, he’d not be praised for it;
but only told he had done his duty. And as for those who do it there
is never any reward, needless to go to the bother of chasing
empty applause. Comparing what, apart from that applause, he
is to gain from acceptance or refusal, he discovers that in electing
the latter alternative he may either say nothing of the proposition
and all alone reap the meager enjoyments that having a good
opinion of oneself provides to fools, or create a stir and thereby
doom his accomplice—and what does he gain from dooming the
accomplice rather than the patient ?—in order to obtain the tawdry
and barren satisfaction of having it said he has done his duty. Weigh
it up: a futile pleasure as against the sum offered him to shorten
the patient’s life: what responsible man could conceivably hesitate
an instant? To the sane physician only one course is open: bargain
for a high price, then kill and keep his mouth shut.’
Juliette & 729
‘Those were the words, those the views of Iberti, the prettiest,
the wittiest, the most engaging doctor in Rome” and you will
readily understand how little difficulty he had convincing me. But
to return to the business before us,” Olympia continued; ‘‘are you
sure of the operation, Bracciani? Is there not the danger that the
perfidious efforts of rescuers might ruin the effects we are striving
for? Humane impulses, as much to be dreaded as loathed, and
capable of spoiling many a fair crime—dare we suppose that they
will not move a certain number of people to rush to the aid of our
victims ?”’
“TI expect this,” said the Count. “I take up my position atop
a high hill in the middle of Rome. From there I launch invisible
bombs, thirty-seven of them, one for each of the thirty-seven
asylums ; they land in barrage. Other projectiles follow at carefully
spaced intervals: rescuers flock to a new burning area after having
mastered the flames in a former one, which I set promptly back on
fire.”
“In this way, Count, you could have an entire city ablaze.”
“Exactly,” said the physician, “and our present undertaking,
limited in scope though it be, may very well cause half the popula-
tion of Rome to perish.”
“Some of the hospitals are located in extremely poor quarters
of the city,” said Chigi, “those quarters shall be destroyed in-
fallibly.”
“Such considerations do not make you pause?” Olympia
wondered. ;
‘Not for one instant, Madame,” Chigi and the Count replied
as one.man.
“These gentlemen seem to have firmly made up their minds,”
I observed to the Princess, “and my guess would be that the crime
they are about to commit is to them something of slight im-
portance.”
‘There is nothing of crime in our project,” Chigi explained.
18 Let me render thee this homage, charming and never to be forgotten friend.
Thy name is the only one I have been unable to take it upon myself to disguise in
these memoirs. Thou wert ever the philosopher, that is thy role in my writings and
thou must surely forgive me for my eagerness to make thy identity known to the
whole world.
730 2 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“All our errors under the chapter of ethics come from the absurd-
ity of our ideas touching good and evil.
“If we fully apprehended the indifference of all our actions,
were we properly persuaded that those we call just are anything
but that in the eyes of Nature, and that those we characterize as
iniquitous are perhaps, in her view, the most perfect measure of
reason and equity, for a certainty we would make far fewer mis-
calculations. But childhood prejudices lead us astray and will never
cease inducing us into error so long as we have the weakness to
listen to them. It does indeed seem that the lamp of reason does
not begin to enlighten us until such time as we are no longer able
to profit from its rays, and not before stupidity has been added to
stupidity that we arrive at the discovery of the source of all that
ignorance has caused us to commit. We almost always employ the
laws of our government as our compass for determining right and
wrong, just and injust. The law, we say, prohibits doing this or
that, this or that is hence unjust; than this manner of judging
none is more deceiving, vor the law is oriented toward the general
interest; now, nothing is at a farther remove from the general
interest than individual interest, its very opposite; hence, noth-
ing less just than the law which sacrifices all individual interests
to the general interest. But, they maintain, man wishes to live
in society; he must therefore forego a portion of his private
good for the sake of public good. Very well; but how ever could
he have made such a )act without being sure of receiving at
least as much as he gives? Now, he extracts nothing from the
pact he makes when consenting to the law; for you put him
far more heavily to coritribution than you satisfy him, and for
every occasion upon which the law protects him there are a
thousand others when it restricts him; he hence ought not to have
consented to the law, or ought to have insisted that it be made
infinitely more lenient. Laws have served only to delay the annihila-
tion of prejudices, to lengthen our term of shameful bondage to
error; law is a bridle man imposed upon man when he saw with
what ease man freed himself of other bridles, hence a makeshift—
to answer what purpose? There are punishments for the guilty,
true enough; in them I see cruelties but not a means to make men
better, and that it seems t:o me is the end to which one should have
Juliette & 731
labored. Punishments, aye—and there’s nothing easier to escape,
this certitude encourages the emancipated and venturesome spirit.
Ah, let it be understood once and for all, laws are nothing but futile
and dangerous; their sole effect is to multiply crimes or to cause
them to be committed in safety by compelling the criminal to act
in secrecy. But for laws and religion there is no imagining the degree
of grandeur and glory human knowledge would have attained today ;
no imagining how these infamous curbs have retarded progress;
that is our single debt to them. Priests dare inveigh against the
passions; lawyers dare fetter them with laws. But merely compare
the ones and the others; see which, passions or laws, have done
mankind the more good. Who doubts, as Helvétius proclaims, that
the passions are in morals precisely what motion is in physics?
Tis to strong passions alone invention and artistic wonders are
due; the passions should be regarded, the same author goes on to
say, as the fertilizing germ of the mind and the puissant spring
to great deeds. Those individuals who are not motivated by strong
passions are mediocre beings. Only great passions will ever be able
to produce great men; when passion falters decrepitude enters in,
when it is absent stupidity prevails. These fundamentals established,
I ask how laws that inhibit the passions.can be anything but pro-
foundly and in every sense dangerous. In the history of any country
compare the periods of anarchy with those during which order was
most vigorously maintained by the most vigorously enforced laws,
and recognize that only at moments when the laws were held in
contempt do stupendous actions occur. Law resumes its despotic
sway and a fatal lethargy is seen to invade the spirits of men;
though vice ceases to be noticeable, the disappearance of all virtue
is yet more conspicuous: the inner workings rust and revolutions
begin to breed.”
“But,” Olympia interrupted, ‘‘you wish to do away with all
laws in an empire ?”
“No. Restored to a state of Nature, mankind, I afirm, would
be happier than it can possibly be under the absurd yoke of law.
I am opposed to man’s renunciation of a single ounce of his capaci-
ties. He has no need of laws for his self-protection; in him Nature
put the necessary instincts and energy for that; taking the law into
his own hands he will always obtain a speedier, purer, more in-
732 & THE MARQUIS DE SADE
cisive, stronger-brewed justice than anything to be had in a cowt-
room, for his act of personal justice will be determined by his
personal interest and the hurt he has personally sustained, whereas
the laws of a people are never other than the mass and the result
of the interests of all the lawmakers who cooperate in erecting
those laws.”
‘But without the laws you will be oppressed.”
“That matters not to me if I have the right to repay oppression
in kind: I prefer to be oppressed by a neighbor whom I can oppress
in my turn than to be oppressed by the law before which I am help-
less. My neighbor’s passions are infinitely less to be dreaded than
the law’s injustice, for zhe passions of that neighbor are held at
bay by mine, nothing checks the injustices of the law, against the
law there is no reprisal to be taken, no recourse to be had.
All the defects in humans belong to Nature; accordingly, man can
have no better laws thar. those of Nature; no man has the right to
repress in him what Nature put there. Nature has elaborated no
statutes, instituted no code; her single law is writ deep in every
man’s heart: it is to satisfy himself, to deny his passions nothing,
and this regardless of the cost to others. Think not to hinder this
universal law’s impulsions whatever their effects may be; you have
no right to curb them; let this be the concern of him they outrage;
if strong, he will know how to react. The men who thought that
from their necessity to join together was derived a necessity for
framing laws to themselves fell into heaviest error; they had no
more need of laws gathered in society than dwelling alone in the
forest. A universal glaive of justice is of no purpose; everybody
naturally possesses one of his own.”
“But not everyone will wield it appropriately, and iniquity
will beome general—”
‘Impossible. Never will Tom be unjust toward Dick when he
knows Dick can retaliate instantly; but it’s a very unjust Tom you
have as soon as he discovers he has nothing to fear except laws
that he can elude or from which he can make himself exempt. I go
farther, I grant you that without laws the sum of crime increases,
that without laws the world turns into one great volcano belching
forth an uninterrupted spew of execrable crimes; and I tell you this
situation is preferable, far preferable to what we have at present.
Juliette & 733
I envisage a perpetual outpouring of conflict, injury, and aggres-
sion; it is nothing beside what takes place under the rule of law, |
for the law often smites the innocent, and to the total of victims
produced by the criminal must be added the mass of those pro-—
duced by legal miscarriage and iniquity: give us anarchy and we will —
have these victims the less. Ta be sure, we will have those crime
sacrifices; but the ravages of the law will be a thing of the past.
Invested with the right to do his own revenging, the oppressed
man will proceed with speed, diligence, economy, and certitude to
punish his oppressor and none other.”
“However, opening the door to the arbitrary, anarchy is
necessarily the cruel image of despotism—”
‘Another error; ’tis the abuse of the law that leads to despo-
tism; the despot is he who creates the law, who bids it speak or be
still, who uses it to serve his own interests. Deprive the despot of
this means for abuse and there’s an end to tyranny. There has
never been a tyrant who failed to-raise laws for props in the exercise
of his cruelties; if everywhere human rights shall be well enough
distributed to enable each man to avenge the wrongs done him, no
despot shall arise, for he would be overthrown the moment he at-
tempted to make his first victim. Never are tyrants born of anarchy,
you see them flourish only behind the screen of the law or attain
supremacy by means of it, basing their authority upon law. Vivious-
ness thus reigns under the rule of law; thus, lawful rule is inferior
to anarchy: the greatest proof whereof is the government’s obliga-
tion to plunge the State into anarchy whenever it wishes to frame
a new constitution. ‘To abrogate its former laws it is driven to
establish a revolutionary regime in which there are no laws at all:
from this regime new laws finally emerge. But this second State is
necessarily less pure than the first, since it derives from the earlier
one, since, in order to achieve its goal, constitution, it had first to
install anarchy. Men are pure only in their natural condition; as
soon as they stray out of it their degradation begins. Give up the
idea of improving men by laws, give it up. I tell you, by laws you
will render them greater scoundrels, more cunning, more wicked,
never more virtuous.”
“But crime is a plague to the world, Monsignor. The more
laws there are, the fewer crimes shall there be.”
734 % THE MARQUIS DE SADE
‘A pretty jest. But seriousness commands us to recognize
that it’s the multitude of laws that is responsible for this multitude
of crimes. Cease to believe such-and-such a deed is criminal; make
no laws to repress it; the crime disappears.
“But I return to the first part of your proposition: crime,
you say, is a plague to the world. What sophism! That which de-
serves to be called a plague to the world would be some destructive
mechanism threatening the existence of all the world’s inhabitants;
let us see if crime answers this description.
‘A crime being committed presents the picture of two individ-
uals, one of whom is performing the act called criminal, the other
of whom is being madz this act’s victim. Two individuals: one
happy, the other unhappy; crime is therefore not a plague in the
world since, although rendering half the world’s population un.
happy, it renders the other half very happy indeed. Crime is nought
but the means Nature employs to attain her ends in regard to us
and to preserve the equilibrium so indispensable to the maintenance
of her workings. This explication alone suffices to make clear that it
is not for man to punish crime, because crime belongs to the Nature
that possesses every right over us and over which we dispose of
none. If, viewing it from another angle, crime is the consequence
of passion, and if the passions, as I have just said, must be beheld
as the sole springs to great deeds, you should always favor the
crime which gives energy to your society over the virtues which
disturb its operations and undermine its strength. You cannot now
continue to punish crime; you ought instead to encourage it, and
thrust virtues into the background where they will be buried forever
under the scorn they deserve from you. We must of course take
great care not to confuse great deeds with virtues: very often a
virtue is farthest of all from a great deed, and more often still
a great deed is sheer crime. Well, great deeds are frequently very
necessary ; virtues never are. Brutus, the kindly head of his family,
would have been but a dull and melancholy fellow; Brutus, the
murderer of Caesar, sirrultaneously performs a crime and a great
deed: the former personage would have remained unknown to his-
tory, the latter became one of its heroes.”
“And so, according to you, one may feel at complete ease
amidst the blackest crimes ?”’
Juliette & 735
“Tis in virtuous surroundings comfort is impossible since
it is clear that you then exist in an unnatural situation, in a state
contrary to the Nature which cannot exist, renew herself, preserve
her energy and vitality save through the immensity of human
crimes; and so the best course for us is to endeavor to make vir-
tues out of all human vices, and vices out of all human virtues.”
“Tt has been to that end,” said Bracciani, ‘‘that I have toiled
since the age of fifteen, and I may truthfully report that I have
enjoyed every minute of my career.”
““My friend,” Olympia said to Chigi, ‘‘with the ethical be-
liefs you have just laid before us you must have very lively passions.
You are forty, the age when they speak most imperiously. Oh, yes,
you have surely achieved horrors !””
“In the position he holds,” said Bracciani, ‘‘with the inspection-
general of the Rome police, occasions for doing evil must certainly
not be lacking.”
“There is no denying it,” said Chigi, ‘‘I am in an exceedingly
favorable position for doing evil, and it would be yet harder to
claim that I let pass many occasions for doing it.”
“You commit injustices . . . you suborn witnesses, you falsify
evidence,” asked Madame Borghese, ‘‘you use the instruments of
Themis entrusted to you to doom a good many innocent persons?”
‘“‘And having done all you say, do no more than act pursuant
to my principles; which I believe is to do well. If I suppose virtue
a dangerous thing in this world, am I wrong to immolate those who
practice it? If, reciprocally, I consider vice useful on earth, am I
wrong to let escape from the law those who profess it? They call
me an unjust man, I know, they may, for all I know, call me worse
yet; their opinion matters not to me: provided my behavior accords
with my principles I have an easy conscience. Before acting accord-
ing to those principles I began by analyzing them, then based my
conduct thereupon; let the entire world blame me, little do I care,
I have done well by my own lights, and for my actions I am ac-
countable to no one but myself.”
“There’s the true philosophy,” Bracciani remarked, “I have
not developed my principles as much as Chigi, but I assure you that
they are absolutely the same, and that I put them into practice just
as often and just as faithfully.”
736 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
‘‘Monsignor,” said Olympia to the first magistrate of Rome’s
police, “‘you are accused of making much too extensive use of the
strappado; you apply it, they say, to numerous innocents and
especially to them, prolonging the torture, so we commonly hear,
to the point where it invariably costs the guiltless party his life.”
“I am going to elucidate the enigma,” said Bracciani. ‘The
torture you mention composes this scoundrel’s pleasures; he stiffens
watching it exercised, he discharges if it does away with the
patient.”
“Count,” Chigi retorted, “I fail to notice anything constrain-
ing you to celebrate my tastes here, nor do I recall having charged
you to unveil my foibles.”
‘‘We are much obliged to the Count for this disclosure,” I
put in with vivacity; “i: announces glad tidings to Olympia, for
from such a man much can be expected and I will frankly confess
that what he has reported has already touched me deeply.”
‘‘And we should be yet more deeply touched,” said Olympia,
‘‘were Chigi to care to enact his favorite game before us.”
‘Why not,” the libertine replied; “have you an object to
hand?”
“Tl have no difficulty finding one.”
“Yes, but it may not have all the required qualities.”
‘“W hat might the required qualities be?”
‘Those of material indigence,” said Chigi, “‘of blamelessness,
of the submissiveness due to a supreme judge.”
‘‘Are you able to combine all that ?” Olympia asked.
“Oh, yes,” the magistrate assured her, “‘my prisons are teem-
ing with such individuals and at your demand, in less than an hour
I’ have produced you something suitable to the pleasures you
intend to procure yourselves.”
‘Could you describe the article ?”
‘‘A young woman of eighteen, a Venus for beauty, and eight
months pregnant.”
‘‘Pregnant!” I expostulated. ‘‘And you will subject her in that
state to such rough handling ?”
“If worse comes to worst, it will kill her, and as a matter of
fact it is pretty certain to. But that’s how I like to have them:
Juliette & 737
pregnant. You get two pleasures instead of one: it’s what they call
‘cow and calf.’ ”
‘And this poor creature,” said I, “I'll wager she is guilt-
less... .”
“T’ve had her ripening two months in prison. Her mother sus-
pects her of a theft I myself had committed in order to get hold of
the girl; the trap was nicely laid and succeeded irreproachably.
Cornelia is safe and sound behind bars, and you need but say the
word and I'll have her do a better rope-dance for you than ever
was done by any acrobat. Afterward I shall have it bruited that out
of compassion I had her spirited away to save her from punishment,
and while covering up what fools call a crime I'll have the merit a
superb deed confers.”
“Excellent,” I said; ‘however, this mother you are leaving
alive, I fear she may someday reveal everything, and won't that
bring on no end of difficulties? It should surely be easy enough to
persuade her that she is her daughter’s accomplice and that she was
party to the theft for which she wishes to see the guilt remain on
the girl’s shoulders.”
‘‘And who knows, the family may include a few other mem-
bers,” the Count suggested.
““Were there twenty,” said Olympia, “it seems to me that
Chigi’s personal safety would require murdering them all.”
“You people are insatiable,” the magistrate sighed, ‘I merely
ask you not to lay up to your concern for my welfare what really
originates in your perfidious lust. Alas, there’s nothing to do but
content it. Cornelia has « brother in addition to a mother ; I promise
to have all three of them die before our eyes and under the torture
with whose use the Count wishes to identify the source of my
pleasures.”
“Tt is just that we had in mind,” Olympia said; “‘once you go
so far as to indulge in such bloady pranks as these, I feel you
should carry them to the limit; I know nothing worse than stop-
ping halfway. Oh, fuck,” the whore grunted, rubbing her cunt
through her dress, “I declare to you I’m leaking already.”
Therewith Chigi rose to his feet and went to issue the neces-
sary orders. A little garden ringed by dense cypress trees and ad-
738 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
joining Olympia’s boudoir was chosen for the place of execution,
and we fondled one another while waiting for the merriment to
begin. Chigi and Olympia were thoroughly acquainted with each
other, but Bracciani had never had anything to do with my friend
and I was unknown to both of the men. So the Princess took it upon
herself to make the initial advances; such libertines never stand
long on ceremony. The hussy sets straight to undressing me and
soon turns me over naked to my two admirers. They devour me, but
in the Italian style: my ass becomes the unique object of their
caresses, they both kiss it, tongue it, nibble it, worry it; they make
tireless and prolonged to-do over it, cannot get their fill of it; and
behave for all the world as if they are unaware I am a woman.
After fifteen minutes of these nasty preliminaries some order is
restored. Bracciani approaches Olympia who has just cast aside her
every stitch, and I becorne Chigi’s prey.
‘Do not be impatient, charming creature,” that infamous liber-
tine says to me, his face zlued to my rump; ‘my capacity for pleas-
ure dulled from long habituation to its sensations, I must struggle
before I feel the blunted needle’s prick. It will take time, I may
weary you, and it may be that I finally fail to do myself honor; but
you shall have given me pleasure, and that, I think, is quite enough
for any woman to strive after.”
And the lecher ratt.ed and banged his tool with all his might,
the while continuing to savor my bum.
“Madame,” said he 'o Olympia in whose posterior Bracciani was
foraging, ‘‘I am not too fond of having thus to do the job all alone;
it appears to me that the Count would also appreciate some assist-
ance; you surely have some little girls or boys somewhere about,
pray send for them. Frizged, licked, pumped, socratized, we shall
reach the altars of the (Callipygian Venus ready and fresh.”
Olympia rings, two girls of fifteen promptly answer the sum-
mons; the libertine always kept the likes within call.
‘‘Ah, very good, very good,” said the magistrate, “tell them to
busy themselves promptly at these chores it is disagreeable to have
to undertake oneself.”
No sooner heard than obeyed, into the maidens’ hands Chigi
deposits the unglorious vestiges of his failing manhood, and my
buttocks continue to be the object of his kisses; his tongue soon
Juliette & 739
penetrates; but success is not yet in sight. A luckier Bracciani is
already inside Olympia’s anus while his young satellite, on her,
knees behind him, sucks his vent. Peering at this group in action,
Chigi takes heart; he spreads my buttocks, lays his half-stiffened
member between them, and has himself flogged to brace his attack.
. . . The traitor! He dishonors my charms; lacking consistency
enough to hold his ground, he is put to rout. And for his discomfi-
ture blames the little girl; she had been fustigating him.
“Had you laid on harder,” he cries, very wroth, “this would
never have happened.” So saying he gives the child such a mighty
buffet he sends her flying three yards away.
‘‘What’s this, Monsignor, what’s this!” Olympia exclaims. “‘Be
a little harsher with the slut, take a lash to her, that’s what I
always do when they disappoint me.”
“Right you are, Madame,” says Chigi, catching up a whip.
And despite the graces, the mildnegss, the gentleness of that
sweet child and despite the beauty of her ass, the barbarian smites
it with such force that great patches of skin are gone off it by the
sixth blow. Noticing his glance wander to my behind and that he
has taken a firmer grip on the whip, ‘‘Strike, libertine,” I say, “be
bold and strike; I surmise your intentions, I defy your blows. Lay
on, dear friend, and spare me not.”
Chigi does not reply to me, he whips me; he whips me so
soundly that his flabby tool, brought back to life at last, is in
sufficient fettle to perforate me. I get myself hastily into the proper
stance, he embuggers me, he is embuggered in his turn, and there we
are on the threshold of joy.
“Shall we discharge?” inquires Bracciani, still bum-fucking my
companion.
“No,” is Chigi’s answer, “no; we must remember the great
operation ahead of us, and restrict ourselves for the moment to
getting into form: only to the agonies of Cornelia and her family,
to that atrocity alone must we accord our fuck.”
This resolution is adopted; without concern for our feelings,
the two libertines instantly dismount and the pleasures of the table
create a diversion to those of lubricity. In the middle of the meal,
Chigi, almost drunk, suggests that one of the girls, she whom he
did not whip, be placed flat upon the table and that we eat a dozen
740 ee THE MARQUIS DE SADE
sugared omelettes hot off her buttocks. It’s done; burned to the
quick, the poor child emits ringing screams, which does not prevent
the company from digging their forks all the more vigorously into
bits of food they lift from a platter of bleeding and scorched flesh.
“It would be amusing to sup a little off her breasts,” Bracciani
observes.
‘‘To this you have my agreement,” says Chigi, “provided I am
allowed to clyster her. With boiling water, be it understood.”
“And I shall clyster her too. A pint of acid into her cunt,” said
Olympia in the shrill tone that would enter her voice whenever
some infamous idea entered her head.
“Since I must pronounce in my turn,” said I to the assembly,
“I humbly submit that another serving of omelette be eaten off this
engaging little thing’s face, that we so manage our silverware as
to pluck out her eyes, that she then be impaled in the center of the
table, for a decoration.”
All these proposals are put into howling effect; we four swill
and eat ourselves giddy while watching the divine spectacle of that
charming little girl writhing and slowly expiring in hideous pain.
“How did you find my dinner?” Borghese asked us as we
reached dessert.
“Splendid,” we replied.
And truly, it had been no less sumptuous than delicate.
“Why then,” said she, “let’s swallow some of this.”
It was a liqueur which immediately brought splashing up all
we had just filled ourselves with, and in the space of three minutes
our appetite was as keen its it had been before sitting down to dine.
A second feast is brought on, and we fall to like wolves.
“A sip now of this other liqueur,” says Olympia, ‘‘and it will
all flush out below.”
This ceremony is scarce over when pangs of hunger make
themselves felt. In comes a third dinner, more succulent than either
of the preceding two; we begin to feed anew.
‘No ordinary wine this time,” Olympia says; “‘let’s start with
Aleatico, we'll end with Falernian, and spirits after cheese.”
““And the victim?”
‘‘Jesusfuck,” Chigi declares, “there’s still life in her.”
Juliette & 741
“Never mind, let’s get her off the table and buried, dead or
alive. We shall replace her with a fresh one.”
No sooner said than done: the first of the girls is prised loose
and removed and the same great skewer is run into the second
girl’s asshole, she serves as our centerpiece for the rest of the third
meal. New to these excesses of the table, I feared I would not be
able to bear up under them, but was mistaken; emptying the
stomach, the elixir we were taking soothed it too; and although we
had each eaten of the ninescore plates offered to our voracity, none
of us felt any the worse for it. The second victim was still breathing
when we came to this final dessert; irritated, our libertines had at
her hammer and tongs. Foaming from fuckshed and drunkenness,
there was nothing they did not inflict upon her bedraggled body,
and I must own that I was in the forefront of the general assault.
Bracciani made a number of physical experiments upon her, the last
consisted in producing an artificial thunderbolt: it smote her, such
was the cruel end she came to. Life had just seeped out of her
when the arrival of Cornelia and her family wakened in us desires
for new and more frightful horrors.
If Cornelia’s beauty was without peer, neither was there any-
thing to match the majesty of feature, the elegance of figure, that
distinguished her unfortunate mother, aged thirty-five. Leonardo,
Cornelia’s brother, was only fifteen and in no respect inferior to
his kin.
“Ha,” Bracciani exulted as he grabbed the lad to him, “here’s
the prettiest bardash I’ve laid eyes on in a long time.”
But this ill-starred family seemed so laden down by an air
of suffering and sorrow that one could not help but pause a moment
to consider it in this state; the criminal, you know, always delights
in battening upon the grief his wickedness has caused the virtuous.
“TI spy a light kindling in your eyes,” Olympia murmured to
me.
“That may well be,” said I, “only a heart of stone would be
left unmoved by such a spectacle.”
“I know none more delicious,” the Princess agreed, “‘in all the
world not one so stirs my bowels and warms my womb.”
“Prisoners,” spoke forth the magistrate, affecting a solemn
and awful tone, “you are, I believe, fully aware of your crimes?”
742 + THE MARQUIS DE SADE
‘We have never committed any,” Cornelia replied.
“For a moment I thought my daughter guilty of a theft but,
enlightened by your behavior, I have seen through your schemes.”
‘Madame, you’re going to see them even more clearly later
on.”
And we conducted our three captives into the little garden
prepared for the executions. There Chigi submitted them to a
thorough questioning; I frigged him meanwhile. You cannot
imagine with what art he would lure them into a hundred snares,
nor the subterfuges he employed to trip them up, and notwith-
standing the candor, the naiveté of their defenses, Chigi found all
three guilty, very guilty, and pronounced sentence on the spot.
Olympia pinions the mother, I seize the daughter, the Count and
the magistrate leap upon the youth.
A few preliminary tortures seemed in order before turning to
the final one with whick these orgies were to conclude. Olympia
must take a whip to Cornelia’s belly, with rods Bracciani and Chigi
beat Leonardo’s fair buttocks all to tatters, and I mauled the
mother’s breasts. In due time we bound their arms behind their
backs and attached the fatal ropes. Again and again they were
hoisted a goodly distance into the air and dropped nearly to the
ground; fifteen consecutive bounces wrench their shoulders from
the socket, break their arms, split their breast-bones, tear their
chests amain, at the tenth the infant in Cornelia’s womb drops out
and flies into Chigi’s lap, whose member I am frigging upon
Olympia’s hinder parts, while Bracciani is working the windlass.
The sight of this accident made us all discharge, and the frightful
truth is that we kept rigsht on with the game. Though .our sperm
was spent and our heads calm, none of us thought to beg quarter;
and the bouncing continied until we had bounced the ghost clean
out of those wretches. Thus it is crime will sport with innocence
when, having wealth and influence on its side, nought remains for
it to do but combat misfortune and poverty.
The appalling project planned for the morrow was carried out
brilliantly. From a terrace Olympia and I surveyed the disaster,
frigging ourselves as the conflagrations spread. By evening the
thirty-seven asylums were all in flames and the dead already ex-
ceeded twenty thousand.
Juliette & 743
“Godsfuck!’” I exclaimed to Olympia, discharging at the en-
chanting spectacle of her and her confederates’ crimes, ‘‘how divine
it is to perform such pieces of mischief! Inexplicable and mysterious
Nature, if ’tis true these evil acts outrage thee, why makest thou
me to delight in them? Ah, wench, thou deceivest me perhaps, as of
old I was by the foul deific chimera to which they said thou wert
subordinate; and what if we were no more thy bondsmen than a
god’s? Causes, may be, are unnecessary to effects, and we all,
through some blind force that is in us, a force both irrational and
essential, we are but stupid machines of the vegetation whose secret
workings, explaining the origin of all motion, also demonstrate the
origin of all human and animal activity.”
The fire lasted eight days and nights during which we had no
glimpse of our friends; they reappeared on the ninth morning.
“It is all over,” said the magistrate; “the Pope has ceased
wringing his hands; I have been granted the privilege I was seek-
ing: my profit is as well as in the bank, and here are your rewards.
Dear Olympia,” Chigi continued, “that which would most surely
have touched your benevolent heart was the burning of the con-
servatorios; had you only been able to see all those little maids,
panic-stricken, naked, trampling one another in their maddened
efforts to escape the flames, and the horde of ruffians I had stationed
at the entrances, pitchforks in hand, while pretending to rescue
them driving the greater part back into the fire but saving a few,
the prettiest of the lot, to be sure, who shall live until the day they
are sacrificed to my tyrannical lust... . Ah, Olympia, Olympia, had
you been witness to all that you’d have died of pleasure.”
“Villain,” said Madame Borghese, ‘‘how many have you pre-
served ?””
“Nearly two hundred; for the time being they are under guard
in one of my palaces and shall later on be parceled out to my farms
in the country. The best twenty specimens shall be yours, I promise
them to you, and by way of thanks ask only that from time to time
you bring me other such creatures as this charming person,”
Monsignor said, pointing to me.
“Why,” said Olympia, “from what I know of your philosophy
upon this article, it surprises me that you still think of her.”
“IT admit,” said the magistrate, “that my sympathies do not
744 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
was doubtless obliged to add the other of esteeming his mortal
self beyond price. Indeed, how could the beloved masterpiece of a
bountiful divinity, how could heaven’s favorite have come to any
other conclusion? the severest penalties had incontrovertibly to be
prescribed for whoever should wreck such a splendid machine.
This machine was sacred; a soul, the brilliant image of a yet more
brilliant divinity, animated this construction whose destruction must
be the most dreadful cr.me it would be possible to commit. And
even as he reasoned thus, to appease his gluttony he roasted the
lamb entire on a spit, he carved into pieces and boiled in a pot this
gentle and peaceable lamb, a creature shaped by the same hand
that shaped him, his inferior simply because differently built. How-
ever, had he reflected a little he would have thought a great deal
less highly of himself; a rather more philosophical glance cast at
the Nature he misunderstood would have caused him to see that,
a weak and ill-formed product of that blind mother’s manufacture,
he resembled all other creatures, that his condition was bound
inextricably to the condition of all others, necessitated like all the
others’, and hence not one whit better than theirs.
“No earthly creature is expressly formed by Nature, none
deliberately made by her; all are the result of her laws and her
workings, in such sort that, in a world constituted like ours, there
had necessarily to be such creatures as we find here; very different
creatures probably inhabit other globes, the myriads of globes
wherewith space is freighted. But these creatures are neither good
nor beautiful, precious nor created; they are the froth, they are the
result of Nature’s unthinking operations, they are like vapors
which rise up from the !iquid in a caldron that is rarefied by heat,
whose action drives our the particles of air this liquid contains.
This steam is not created, it is resultative, it is heterogeneous, it
derives its existence from a foreign element and has in itself no
intrinsic value; its being or not has no adverse effect upon the
element it emanates from; to this element it adds nothing, owes
nothing, this element owes nothing to it. Let some other vibration
different from heat modify this element, it will continue to exist in
its new modification, and the vapor which resulted from it before
will cease to result from it now. Let Nature become subject to other
laws, these creatures resulting from the present laws will exist no
Juliette }» 767
more under these different ones, but Nature will nonetheless still
exist, although by different laws.
‘‘Man thus has no relationship to Nature, nor Nature to man;
Nature cannot bind man by any law, man is in no way dependent
upon Nature, neither is answerable to the other, they cannot either
harm or help each other; one has produced involuntarily—hence
has no real relationship to her product; the other is involuntarily
produced—hence has no real relationship to his producer. Once
cast, man has nothing further to do with Nature; once Nature has
cast him, her control over man ends; he is under the control of his
own laws, laws that are inherent in him. With his casting man
receives a direct and specific system of laws by which he must abide,
under which he must proceed ever after; these laws are those of
his personal self-preservation, of his multiplication, laws which re-
fer to him, which are of him, laws which are uniquely his own, vital
to him but in no way necessary to Nature, for he is no longer of
Nature, no longer in her grip, he is separate from her. He is an
entity entirely distinct from her ; of such little usefulness is he to her
workings, of such little necessity to her combinations, that whether
he were to quadruple his species or annihilate it totally, the uni-
verse would not be in the slightest the worse for it. If man destroys
himself, he does wrong—in his own eyes. But that is not the view
Nature takes of the thing. As she sees it, if he multiplies he does
wrong, for he usurps from Nature the honor of a new phenomenon,
creatures being the necessary result of her workings. If those crea-
tures that are cast were not to propagate themselves, she would
cast new entities and enjoy a faculty she has ceased to be able to
exercise. Not that she is unable to recover the use of that faculty,
if she wished to have it, but she never does anything needlessly,
and so long as the first series of beings propagate themselves by
faculties inherent in them, she suspends propagation: our multipli-
cation, only one of the laws inherent in us, is therefore decidedly
detrimental to the phenomena whereof Nature is capable.
“Thus, those that we regard as virtues become crimes from her
point of view. Whereas, contrariwise, if creatures destroy one
another, they do well as regards Nature; for no obligation to
reproduce has been imposed upon them, they have simply received
the faculty to reproduce; turning to destruction, they cease exer-
768 & THE MARQUIS DE SADE
cising it, and give Nature the opportunity to resume the propaga-
tion from which she refrained so long as it was needless. You may
perhaps object that if this possibility of propagation she has left
her creatures were detr:mental to her, she would not have be-
stowed it in the first place. But observe that she has no choice in
these matters, that she is bound by her laws, that she cannot alter
them, that one of her laws is the casting of creatures which are cast
at a single stroke and emerge such as they must remain, and that
another of her laws is that her creatures be invested with the possi-
bility to propagate themselves. Observe as well that were .these
creatures to cease propayating, or to destroy themselves, Nature’s
original rights, contested hitherto, would be restored to her;
whereas in propagating, or in not destroying, we confine her to her
secondary functions and deprive her of her primary powers. Thus,
all the laws we humans have made, whether to encourage popula-
tion or to prevent its destruction, necessarily conflict with all of
hers: and every time we act in accordance with our laws, we di-
rectly thwart her desires; but, reversibly, every time we either
stubbornly refuse to urdertake the propagation she abhors, or
cooperate in the murders which delight her and which serve her, we
are sure to please her, certain of acting in harmony with her wishes.
Ah, does she leave us in any doubt of the point to which our in-
crease inconveniences her? can we not tell how eager she would be
to halt our multiplication and be delivered of its ill effects? Is all
this not proven by the disasters she sends to harry us, by the di-
visions and discords she sows in our midst, by the thirst for murder
she constantly inspires in us? These wars, these famines she hurls
at us, these pestilences she now and again looses with the aim of
wiping us off the face of the earth, these great villains she fabricates
in profusion, these Alexanders, these Tamurlanes, these Ghengis
Khans, all these heroes who lay the world waste, by these tokens, I
say, does she not plainly demonstrate that all our laws are contrary
to hers, and that her purpose is to destroy them? Thus it is that
these murders our laws 9unish so sternly, these murders we suppose
the greatest outrage that can be inflicted upon Nature, not only, as
you very well see, do her no hurt and can do her none, but are in
some sort instrumental to her, since she is a great murderess herself
and since her single reason for murdering is to obtain, from the
Juliette 2» 769
wholesale annihilation of cast creatures, the chance to recast them
anew. The most wicked individual on earth, the most abominable,
the most ferocious, the most barbarous, and the most indefatigable
murderer is therefore but the spokesman of her desires, the vehicle
of her will, and the surest agent of her caprices.
“Let us go further. This murderer thinks he destroys, he
thinks he consumes, and these beliefs sometimes engender remorse
in his heart; let us put him confidently at ease, and if the system I
have just developed is a little beyond his reach, let us prove to him
from what happens before his very eyes that he has not even the
honor of destroying; that the annihilation upon which he flatters
himself when in sound health, or at which he shudders when he is
sick, is no annihilation at all, and that annihilation is unfortunately
something he cannot possibly achieve.
“The invisible chain which links all physical beings together,
the absolute interdependence of the three kingdoms, animal, min-
eral, and vegetable, proves that all three are in the same case as
regards Nature, that all three are resultant from her primary laws,
but neither created nor necessary. These kingdoms are governed
by the same laws. All three mechanically reproduce and destroy
themselves, because all three are composed of the same elements,
which sometimes combine in one fashion, sometimes in another; but
these laws and workings are distinct from Nature’s laws and work-
ings, and independent of them; upon the three kingdoms she acted
only once, she cast them, cast them once and for all; since having
been cast they have acted on their own; they have acted according
to their own laws, the foremost of these being a perpetual
metempsychosis, a perpetual variation, a perpetual permutation
embracing all three in a perpetual movement.
“In all living beings the principle of life is no other than that
of death: at the same time we receive the one we receive the other,
we nourish both within us, side by side. At the instant we call death,
everything seems to dissolve; we are led to think so by the excessive
change that appears to have been brought about in this portion of
matter which no longer seems animate. But this death is only
imaginary, it exists figuratively but in no other way. Matter, de-
prived of the other portion of matter which communicated move-
ment to it, is not destroyed for that; it merely abandons its form,
770 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
to be. Among them you do not have many rivals.”
“Princess Borghese surpasses me,” I replied.
‘Far from it,” the Pope retorted, ‘‘she is forever having fits
of remorse. A week from today,” he continued, ‘I shall give you
the supper I have promised; the Princess will be there, and your
friends the Cardinals too. Believe that I am sincere, beloved child,
when I say that I hope we shall achieve horrors exceeding anything
we have accomplished this evening.”
‘I too look forward to the occasion,” I said politely, having
in mind the theft I was planning to operate on my next visit to the
Vatican, ‘‘yes, I am in expectation of great things.”
Braschi, who had been rubbing his testicles with a spirituous
lotion meant to stimulate them, proposed that we return to our
tricks.
“I’m afraid I lack the consistency to embugger you,” said he,
“but you might suck me.”
I got astride his chest; my asshole settled over his lips and the
rogue, Pope that he was, blew his seed into my mouth while for-
swearing his God like an atheist.
And he fell asleep. I was greatly tempted to take this oppor-
tunity to steal everythinz I could carry out of his treasury; I knew
the way, he had shown it to me himself, I would encounter no
guards. But this project having been concerted with Olympia, I did
not want to cheat her of the pleasure of participating in it; more-
over, Elise and Raimonde were to be along and between the four
of us we would be able o get away with that much more booty.
Pius VI awoke after a short while. There was to be a con-
sistory that day. I left him in peace to discuss the state of Christian
conscience throughout the world, and besought pardon of mine for
not having laden it with a sufficient quantity of crimes. I have said
it before, I affirm it again: nothing is worse than virtuous remorse
for a soul accustomed to evil; and when one exists in a state of
complete corruption, ’tis infinitely wiser to overdo wickedness than
to rest in arrears; for doing more always brings some pleasure,
while from doing less one has nothing but pain.
Two or three baths washed away the Pontifical stains, and I
betook myself to the Borghese Palace to tell my friend of my
Vatican success.
Juliette & 805
To avoid the monotony of details I shall not tarry long over
those of the new orgies we celebrated there. The Sistine Chapel
was their scene; above four hundred subjects of both sexes ap-
peared at them; what was enacted in the way of impurities beggars
description. Thirty virgin girls, between the ages of seven and
fourteen and one more beautiful than the next, were violated and
afterward massacred; forty boys met the same fate. Albani, Bernis,
and the Pope buggered one another and were buggered, gorged
themselves on drink and infamy, killed, bibbled and fucked them-
selves senseless, and when finally they were, that was the moment
we chose, Olympia, Elise, Raimonde, and I, to slip away and
pillage the treasury. We made off with twenty thousand sequins
which Sbrigani, posted nearby with a few trusty individuals, had
transported straight to the Princess’ home where, the next day, we
divided the loot. Braschi never noticed the theft, or else deemed
best to feign not to have noticed it. I did not see His Holiness
again; he felt, I suspect, that my visits to the Vatican were a little
more than he could afford. In view of these circumstances I saw no
reason to remain on in Rome, indeed, it seemed wiser to leave;
Olympia was desolate when she heard the news; but part we must,
despite the strain, and at the beginning of winter I set forth for
Naples with a packet of letters of recommendation to the royal
family, to Prince Francaville, to every other grandee and high-bred
figure in Naples. My funds I left in the hands of Roman bankers.
We traveled in an excellent coach, Sbrigani, my women and
I. Four mounted valets were escorting us, when between Fondi and
Minturno, where the road follows the Gulf of Gaeta and at some
twelve or fifteen leagues from Naples, ten horsemen appeared
toward dusk. Pistol in hand, they proposed that we quit the high-
way and come have a talk with Captain Brisatesta who, honestly
retired in a castle overlooking the bay, did not suffer gentlefolk
traveling in the land to pass so near his dwelling without gratifying
him with a visit. We had no trouble understanding the meaning of
this language and after a rapid estimation of the odds between our
forces and the opposing ones, we felt called upon to capitulate.
“Comrade,” said Sbrigani to the officer, “I have always heard
806 <& THE MARQUIS DE SADE
it said that rascals get on together; if you exercise the profession
in one way, we exercise it in another, and both of us are engaged in
dupery.”
“You will tell all that to my captain,” this lieutenant replied,
‘tas for me, I simply obey orders and especially when my life de-
pends upon it; march.”
As the riders had been tying our valets to the tails of their
horses during this excharge, we found ourselves without anything
further to add. We advanced. The officer had climbed into our
carriage and four of his men were driving it. For five hours we
continued thus, and it was during that time our guide informed us
that Captain Brisatesta was the most famous brigand in all Italy.
“He has,” said the lieutenant, ‘twelve hundred men enrolled,
and our detachments roam the Papal States as far north as Trento
and southward to land’s end in Calabria. Brisatesta’s wealth is
colossal. He made a journey to Paris last year and while there
espoused the charming |ady who today does the honors of the
house.”
“Brother,” I said to the bandit, ‘‘it would seem to me that the
honors of a thief’s house must not be very onerous.”
“IT beg your pardon,” the officer returned, ‘‘Madame’s em-
ployment is more considerable than one might think: ’tis she who
cuts the captives’ throats, and I assure you she acquits herself in
a thoroughly conscientious and commendable manner, you will be
enchanted to die by her hand.”
‘Ah, I see,” said ::, “that then is what you call doing the
honors of the house—you are not reassuring, sir officer. And is the
Captain presently at hore, or shall we have dealings with Madame
alone?”
“You will find thern both at home. Brisatesta has just now
returned from an expedition to the interior of Calabria which cost
us a few men but which was worth a great deal of money. Since
then our pay has tripled: oh, he is a kind man, our Captain, as fair
and just as they come. He always pays us according to his means;
he’d give us ten ounces a day’ if his earnings permitted it. But here
we are,” the officer said. “I am sorry that darkness prevents you
1The Neapolitan ounce is worth about eleven French livres ten sous.
Juliette % 807
xs
from seeing the location in which this superb house is set. Down
below is the sea, we turn upward to reach the castle which cannot
be approached otherwise than on foot; we must therefore alight.
From now on the path mounts steeply.”
Following the lead of our guides, after an hour and a half of
struggling single file up the highest mountain I had ever climbed in
my life, we came to a moat, a drawbridge was lowered, we tra-
versed some fortifications bristling with soldiers, were challenged,
allowed to pass, then found ourselves inside the citadel. It was
indeed a formidable one, and maintained as it was by Brisatesta
looked capable of withstanding any assault or siege.
It was about midnight when we arrived; the Captain and his
dame were in bed, they were wakened. Brisatesta came at once to
examine the catch. His was a striking appearance. He stood five
feet ten inches tall, was in the flower of his manhood, his face was
exceedingly handsome and at the same time exceedingly harsh. He
cast a quick piercing glance at the men in our party, his eyes lin-
gered only a little longer upon each one of us women; his brusque
manner, his fierce stare made us tremble. He spoke a few words to
the officer; the men were immediately led off in one direction, our
trunks and belongings borne off in another. My friends and I were
cast into a lightless dungeon, where after groping about we found
some straw; there we lay ourselves wearily down, rather to bewail
our ill fortune than seek the repose our horrible situation denied
us. What cruel thoughts assailed us then, how were our souls not
tried! The anguishing recollection of our past pleasures rose to
mind, and only made our present plight seem darker. From dwell-
ing upon our state of affairs we could deduce nothing but melan-
choly presumptions; thus tormented by the past, terrified by the
present, shuddering at the future, the blood hardly ran at all
through our feverish veins. "T'was then Raimonde thought to in-
voke religion.
“Don’t bother with those illusions, child,” said I, ‘‘when one
has despised them one’s whole life long it is impossible, no matter
what the circumstances may be, to believe in them again; let them
lie. Only remorse, furthermore, recalls one to religion and I am far
from repenting or even regretting anything I have ever done; of
all those deeds there is not one I am not prepared to commit
808 <2» THE MARQUIS DE SADE
afresh, granted the chance; it is over being deprived of my
capacities I grieve, and not over the results obtained from them
when they were in my possession. Ah, Raimonde, you do not
realize the grip vice exerts upon a soul like mine! Riddled with
crimes, fed by crime, it exists for nought but to batten on crime,
and even with my neck on the block, still I shall be wanting to
commit more; I’d like crime to emanate from my very ashes, I’d
like the ghost of me wandering the world to harass mortals with
crimes or to inspire crimes in them. I think, however, we need not
be afraid, for we are in the hands of vice: a god will protect us.
Much greater would be my dread were we prisoners of the fright-
ful goddess men dare ca!] Justice. The spawn of despotism mated
to imbecility, if ’twere ttat whore held us captive I would already
have said my last farewells; but I have never been afraid of crime;
the sectators of the idol we worship respect their peers and smite
them not; we'll join forces with these people if need be. Though
I’ve not yet met her, I like what I have heard about this Madame
Brisatesta; I wager we shall please her; we'll make her discharge;
and she'll not kill us. Come here, Raimonde, and you too, dear
Elise, and since the only pleasure remaining to us is frigging, let
us enjoy it.”
Stirred by my speech and my fingers, the little minxes fell to
playing; Nature served us just as well in this hour of grim ad-
versity as in bygone days of prosperity. Never had I been so
rocked, so whelmed by pleasure; but the return to reason was
frightful.
“We are going to be slaughtered like sheep,” I said to my
companions, “‘we are going to die like dogs, it is useless to delude
ourselves, death is the fate in store for us. And it is not death that
I dread, I am philosopher enough to be very sure that I’ll be no
more unhappy after vegetating a few years on earth than I was
before I got here; no, it is pain I dread, these scoundrels are going
to make me suffer; they will perhaps enjoy torturing me as I have
enjoyed torturing others; this captain has an evil look to me, he
has long moustaches, a bad sign, and . . . and his wife is probably
as cruel as he. .. . Oh, a moment ago I was full of confidence, and
now I quake.”
‘“‘Madame,” Elise spoke up, “deep inside me there is a hope, I
Juliette 809
know not what it is, but your teachings put me at ease. It is accord-
ing to the eternal laws of Nature, you have told me so, that crime
will triumph and virtue be humbled; I place my trust in that
immutable decree; ah, dear mistress, it shall spare us from
disaster.”
“To be sure, to be sure, and my reasoning thereupon shall
appear lucid and incontrovertible,” said I to my companions. “If, as
cannot be doubted, might makes right, and the mass of crimes
weighs heavier in the balance than on the other side do virtue and
its practitioners, human self-interest is but the result of man’s
passions and nearly all of them lead to crime; well, crime’s interest
is to humble virtue; therefore, in almost all the situations of life, I
shall lay my stake by crime rather than by virtue.”
“But, Madame,” said Raimonde, ‘‘look here, as matters stand
between our captors and us, we are virtue, and vice is represented
only by them; therefore they shall crush us.”
“‘We are speaking in general terms,” I replied, ‘“‘this is but a
particular case; Nature may make a single exception to her rules,
and thereby confirm them, you know.”
We were in the midst of such discussions when a jailer, of
more forbidding aspect even than his master, unlocked the door
and handed us a plate of beans.
“Here,” said he in a guttural voice, “don’t waste any, it’s all
you’re going to get.”
“What,” I demanded, “‘is it then to be of hunger we are to
die?”
“No, for from what I hear you’re to be done in tomorrow, and
Madame probably feels there’s no use spending good money to
have you form turds you're not going to have time to shit.”
“But, dear fellow, you do perhaps know what kind of death
is being prepared for us?”
“It'll depend on what Madame’s fancy happens to be, our
Captain leaves all that up to her; she does whatever she likes; but,
you being women, your death ought to be milder than the one the
men in your party shall have to face, for Madame Brisatesta is
not very sanguinary except with men. She enjoys them first; then,
when she’s tired of them, she puts ’em out of their misery.”
“And this does not arouse her husband’s jealousy ?”
810 & THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“Not at all, he does the same with women, when he’s finished
amusing himself with them he turns ’em over to his wife who
pronounces this or that sort of a sentence and usually executes it
herself if the Captain is no longer in the mood for such pleasures.”
‘Your master seldom kills?”
‘‘Hardly at all. Five victims a week, maybe six. You see, he’s
done so much slaughtering in his time! He’s tired of it. Besides, he
knows his wife has a dreadful weakness for killing, and since he’s
very devoted to her, he just steps aside and allows her to handle
the business. Adieu,” said the churl, fitting the key into the lock,
“I must be getting on my way, I have others to serve; we are kept
pretty busy here; thanks to heaven, the house is always full, you’ve
no idea the number of prisoners we take—”
“Comrade,” said I. “our belongings—are they safe?”
“Safe and sound in storage. You'll not be seeing them again,
but don’t worry, nothing is ever lost around here, we are very
careful about that.”
And the door clanged shut behind him. Through a slot be-
tween the bars a weak ray of light entered the dungeon, enough to
enable us to see one another’s faces.
After a moment I spoke to Elise. ‘Well, my dear, does that
not suffice to dash whatever hope you have?”
“Not entirely,” was the amiable girl’s answer to me, “I cling
to it in spite of all. Let us eat and not despair.”
That meager repast was barely finished when our warden
reappeared.
‘They are calling for you in the council chamber,” he in-
formed us. “You won't be kept waiting, it’s for today.”
We trudged after him.
It was a long room we entéred at one end. At the other was a
table, behind it a woman sat writing. Without looking up she
signaled for us to approach; then, laying aside her quill, she
raised her eyes and ordered us to reply to the questions she was
about to ask . . . oh, my friends! what expressions can I find to
convey my surprise. This woman about to interrogate me, this con-
sort of the most wicked of all Italy’s brigands, it was Clairwil—
my precious Clairwil, whom I found again under these incredible
Juliette & 811
circumstances. I could contain myself no longer; I rushed into her
arms.
“Whom do I behold?” cried Clairwil. ‘‘What! Juliette, is it
you? Oh, tenderest friend, let me kiss you and may this, which
would have been a day of sorrow for any other, become one of
rejoicing for you!”
The multitude of feelings that beset my soul, the conflict be-
tween them, their vivacity and heat cast me into a veritable stupor.
When I opened my eyes again I found myself in an excellent bed,
surrounded by my women and Clairwil, who were vying for the
pleasure of comforting me and giving me the care my state
required.
“Long lost and dearest heart, I have you back again,” said my
friend of olden days. “What happiness this is for me! I have al-
ready told my husband who it is destiny has brought under our
roof; your servants, your effects, everything shall be restored to
you, we ask only that you spend a few days with us; our style of
life will cause you no alarm, I know you to have principles, and to
be immune to scandal; what we achieved together in the past
permits me to suppose that you will find this a sympathetic
atmosphere.”
“Oh, Clairwil, your friend is ever the same,” I exclaimed;
“my mind has matured with age, and the progress I have made is
of a sort that only renders me worthier of you; I joyfully await
the criminal spectacles you prepare for me: we shall enjoy these
pleasures together. For I have come a long way from the pusilla-
nimity that came near to being my undoing once upon a time, and
your friend, be sure of it, blushes no more save at: virtue. But you,
dear angel, where have you been? What have you done? Ah, we
have been separated for ages; what lucky star has led us both to
this place ?”
“You shall have all the particulars,” Clairwil assured me; “but
I want you to begin by calming yourself, by recovering your seren-
ity, by accepting our apologies for having given you such a poor
welcome. You are going to see my husband, I venture to predict
you will take very kindly to him. . . . Oh, Juliette, recognize the
hand of Nature; she has always championed the cause of vice, she
does so again, as you see. Had vou fallen into the clutches of a
812 e% THE MARQUIS DE SADE
virtuous woman, you, vicious rascal that you are, you were doomed;
but we are of your own sort, and by us you can only be saved.
Cheerless followers of virtue, avow your weakness and may the
everlasting superiority of crime over your souls of slime impose
eternal silence upon you.”
Brisatesta arrived just as his wife concluded this speech.
Whether because the situation had altered or because my now
tranquil spirits caused me to view things with a different eye, this
brigand no longer struck me as so frightening; scrutinizing him
attentively, I found him extremely attractive; and so in truth he
was.
‘You have got yourself a fine husband,” I congratulated my
friend.
“Look well at his face, Juliette,” Clairwil replied, ‘‘and tell
me if you think none but the bonds of wedlock unite us.”
‘You bear a strange likeness to each other, it is true.”
‘This splendid fellow, oh, Juliette, is my brother; events had
separated us, a journey re made last year brought him back to me.
Marriage reinforced our ties; we wish them to be indissoluble.”
‘‘And indissoluble they shall be,” said the Captain, “for when
two people resemble each other so perfectly, when their inclinations,
their morals so completely conform, ’tis madness ever to part.”
‘You are a couple of rascals,”’ said I, ‘“‘you live in the depths
of incest and crime, there shall never be any absolution for you;
were you in my place, just come from Rome, all these sins would
make you quake to the soul, and the fear of never being able to
purge them would prevent you from persevering in your wicked-
ness.”
“Let us dine, Juliette,” said my friend, ‘‘you can finish your ser-
mon over dessert.” Then, opening the door to an adjoining room,
“There,” she went on, “‘are your possessions, your servants, there
is your Sbrigani; be all of good cheer in this house, become its
friends, and when you have gone away from here, make it known
abroad that the charms of sweet amity have their faithful even in
a den of crime and depravity.”
A magnificent meal was awaiting us. Sbrigani and my women
sat down beside us; my valets joined my friend’s in serving the
dishes and pouring the wine; and we were soon all one happy
Juliette & 813
family. It was eight o’clock in the evening when we rose from the
table. Brisatesta never left it before he was drunk; it appeared to
me that his beloved wife had adopted the same failing. From the
dining hall we passed into a larger salon where our hostess
suggested we twine the myrtle of Venus to the vine leaves of
Bacchus.
“This bugger here has the look of a man with something in
his breeches,” said she, pulling Sbrigani to a couch. “Brother, peep
under Juliette’s skirts, you'll find she is favored in the way you
appreciate.”
“Oh, God,” I cried, my head beginning to reel also, “to be
fucked by a highway robber, by an assassin!”
And I was not done speaking when I was bent over a sofa by
the outlaw, a prick as thick as my arm was already nudging between
my quivering buttocks.
“Fair angel,” the libertine said, “you will pardon a little pre-
liminary rite without which, well standing as you see my prick to
be, it would nonetheless be impossible for me to do your charms the
profound homage they deserve; I shall be obliged to bloody this
gorgeous ass, but trust my skill, you'll hardly feel a thing.”
Catching up a steel-tipped martinet wherewith he dealt my
behind a dozen whistling blows, he had laid open that entire part
of me inside two minutes, without causing me anything like a
disagreeable sensation.
“That should do very nicely,” said the Captain, “my thighs
shall be wet as they press against you, and my prick lodged deep
in your bowels will perhaps wash them with a dense sperm, un-
obtainable save through this ceremony.”
“Lay on, brother, lay on!” called Clairwil from the midst
of her fucking with Sbrigani, ‘ther ass has weathered the worst,
we used often to wear whips out upon each other.”
“Oh, sir!” I cried upon feeling the Captain’s outsized bludg-
eon thunder into my rectum, “‘the lash was as nothing to this. .. .”
But my protest came too late, Brisatesta’s monstrous engine
had already struck rock-bottom; I was embuggered to the hilt.
Others were imitating us: Clairwil, as was her custom, offering
only her rear to her fucker, was solidly run on by Sbrigani’s
spirited device, while Raimonde, frigging her clitoris, was bestowing
”
814 & THE MARQUIS DE SADE
the same voluptuous services to her that I was extracting from
Elise.
Oh, friends of mine, this bandit chief, what a fucker was he!
Not so much attached to the one shrine where I at first thought
his tastes would hold him fast, he alternately repaired to each of
them and by that dual intromission the rascal kept me in constant
discharge.
“There it is, Juliette,” said he as he withdrew and couched
his enormous member etween my bubs, “‘the explanation and
cause of all my wild ways and delinquencies; it is the pleasures I
receive from this fine prick that have shaped my career; as is the
case with my sister, crime heats me, and I am unable to loose a
drop of fuck save through the plotting or enacting of some
horrors.”
‘Why then, for sweet fuck’s sake let us create a few of them,”
I replied. “Since we are all animated by the same desire and the
opportunity for satisfying it is probably within our grasp, let’s
blend bloodshed and fuckshed. Have you no victims about?”
“Ah, slut,” said Clzirwil, overtaken by a spasm, “I recognize
you in those words, they are your hallmark. Come now, brother,
let us please this charming creature, we'll immolate the Roman
belle we arrested this mo-ning.”’
“Right you are, have her brought up; her death will amuse
Juliette, we shall all frig and discharge while conducting the oper-
ation.”
The traveler arrives. Friends, will you guess the identity of
the woman who now stands within my sight? Borghese, yes, she,
the delicious Borghese; the sensitive Borghese; brokenhearted at
my departure, life had lost all meaning for her, she had flown
forth in search of me, and Brisatesta’s men had just taken her on
the Naples road as they had taken me the day before.
“Clairwil,” I excla:‘med, “this woman’s not for victimizing
either, she is an accomplice, she is the friend who assumed the
place you had occupied in my heart, to the extent that another
could replace you there; treat her lovingly, my angel, the rascal
is deserving of us.”
And the heavenly Olympia kissed me, caressed Clairwil, and
seemed to implore Brisatesta.
Juliette & 815
“Oh, Godsfuck,” muttered the latter, erected like a Car-
melite, “this complication of adventures, heating in me desires to
-fuck this lovely lady, cool me to other projects; first let’s fuck her,
then we'll decide her fate.”
I surrender my post to Olympia; her nobly formed ass re-
ceives the wide praise it deserves. Using the same means he
employed with me, Brisatesta makes the same artistic shambles of
it and sodomizes it straight off and tempestuously. My women frig
me, and Sbrigani goes on rasping Clairwil. For once no other
stimulant is needed to rouse our spirits; Brisatesta lines us up in a
row, all five on our hands and knees upon a sofa and our flanks
nicely lifted: Sbrigani and he plumb us turn by turn, while one
ass-fucks the other fucks cunt, and the scoundrels finally discharge,
Sbrigani in Clairwil’s fundament, Brisatesta in Olympia’s.
Some more decent behavior succeeded these pleasures.
Borghese, newly emerged from a dungeon, also needed a bite to
eat; she was served a supper and we went to bed. After breakfast
the following morning, the reunion of a Parisian petite maitresse
with a bandit chieftain in the wilds of Italy still seemed so sur-
prising to us all that we begged the Captain to relate what
promised to be a very unusual story.
“I shall tell it if you like,” Brisatesta consented; “but it
includes details rather more scandalous than those one would
ordinarily hazard in company; your manners, however, vouch for
your philosophy and I believe there is nothing I need keep from
your hearing.”
BRISATESTA’S STORY
If modesty still had any habitation in my soul, I would surely
hesitate to disclose my eccentricities; but having long ago arrived
at that degree of moral corruption where one is safe from all
shame, not the slightest scruple prevents me from confiding to
you all down to the least and seamiest events of a life which,
summed up in a phrase, amounts to a tissue of crime and execration.
The gracious personage you see at my side, and who bears the title
816 te THE MARQUIS DE SADE
of wife to me, is that and my sister also. We are both the children of
that famous Borchamps, renowned not only for his concussions but
for his wealth and libertinage as well. My father had just entered
into his fortieth year when he married my mother, twenty years
his junior and much richer than he; I was born before the marriage
was a year old. My siste: Gabrielle came into the world six years
later.
I was turning sixteen, my sister ten, when Borchamps ap-
parently decided that henceforth he alone would be in charge of
my upbringing; we had been away at school, we were now fetched
home. And to return under the paternal roof was to be restored
as it were to life; the little we had learned of religion my father
helped us now to forget, and the most agreeable talents he taught
us instead replaced the gloomy obscurities of theology. We were
soon to notice that my mother was in no wise pleased by such
proceedings. Mild-tempered, gently bred, innately pious and
virtuous, she was far from imagining that the principles our
father was inculcating in us were someday to make for our hap-
piness; and full of her little notions, she interfered as best she
could in her husband’s enterprises, who while mocking her and
sneering at her objections, went on notwithstanding to destroy not
only all there was in us of religion’s principles but those of morality
also. The most inviolable bases of what is popularly understood
as natural law were likewise reduced to rubble; and this amiable
father, in his eagerness that we become as thoroughly philosophical
in our outlook as he, left no stone unturned in his effort to render us
impassive before prejudices and insensible to remorse. To forestall
the possibility of these maxims suffering contradiction, he took care
to keep us well isolated fom the world outside. Only the occasional
visit of one of his friznds, and of that friend’s family, ever
mitigated our lonely retirement; the intelligence of the sequel
requires that I now say something of this worthy individual who
would pay us visits.
Monsieur de Breval, forty-five years of age at the time, nearly
as wealthy as my father, like him had a young and virtuous wife
and, like him, a pair of charming children, one of whom, his son
Auguste, was fifteen and the other, Laura, a truly stunning creature,
almost twelve. Each time Breval came to our house he brought
Juliette 2 817
his wife and children along; we four youngsters would be put
together under the supervision of a governess named Pamphylia,
she being twenty, very pretty, and perfectly in my father’s good
graces. All four being raised in the same manner, having identical
information and attitudes, the conversations we had and the games
we played were well in advance of our years; and truly, anyone eaves-
dropping upon our conventicles would have sooner taken them for
meetings of a philosophical circle than for the recreations of
juveniles. By dint of being made familiar with Nature we were
shortly lending an ear to her voice, and the extraordinary thing is
that it did not inspire us to mingle. Each remained within the
bonds of kinship; Auguste and Laura were in love, confessed
their sentiments with the same candor, the same joy, as Gabrielle
and I declared ours to each other. Incest does not cross Nature’s
plans, since the first natural impulses we had were in that direction.
There is this too which may seem remarkable: our young ardors
were accompanied by no twinges of jealousy. This ridiculous feeling
is no proof of love; begot of pride and selfishness, it is more a token
of the fear of seeing another object preferred to oneself than to
that of losing the object one adores. Although Gabrielle might be
fonder of me than of Auguste, she embraced him no less warmly
for that; and although I might worship Gabrielle, I did nonetheless
conceive violent desires to be loved by Laura. Thus did six months
go by without us combining any earthly element into this soulful
metaphysics; ‘twas not willingness that we lacked, but instruction,
and our fathers, who were keeping a watchful eye upon us, at last
decided to lend their aid to Nature.
One day when the weather was very warm and our elders,
as was their wont, had forgathered to spend a few hours among
themselves, my father, half-naked, came to find us and he proposed
that we move from the nursery into the apartment where he and
the other adults were; we accompanied him, the young governess
following on our heels. And there, fancy our surprise at seeing
Breval on top of my mother, and his wife the next instant under-
neath my father.
‘‘Pay close attention to this mechanism of Nature,” our young
Pamphylia said to us, “study it well, your parents may soon be
disposed to initiate you into these mysteries of lubricity both for
818 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
your education’s and your happiness’ sake. Examine each of these
groups; you observe that they who compose them are enjoying the
pleasures of Nature; apply yourselves to imitating them. . . .”
Upon all this we bent the stare of open-mouthed bewilder-
ment, this being the usual effect such a spectacle has upon children’s
minds; but a keener interest took hold of us by and by, and we
went forward to view matters from nearer on. It was then we
perceived the difference in the four actors’ situations: the two men
were taking manifest pleasure in what they were about, while the
two women seemed not “o have their heart in the game and even
showed what looked like repugnance for it. Pamphylia demon-
strated, explained, pointed things out, and identified them by name.
“Retain it all carefully,” said she, ‘for you shall soon be put
into action.”
She then entered into the most extensive details. There came a
momentary pause in the scene, but one which, instead of reducing its
interest, enhanced its attractiveness. Leaping hotly away from
Madame de Breval’s behind (for those gentlemen ass-fucked only),
my father drew us toward him and had each of the four of us
touch his member, showing us how it was to be frigged. We
laughed, we gaily did as we were told, and Breval watched us
while continuing his buggery of my mother.
“‘Pamphylia,” my father said, “relieve them of their clothes;
it is time to join a little practice to the theory of Nature.”
The next instant, we are naked; Breval drops what he is in
the middle of doing, and the two fathers fall to caressing us
indiscriminately, fingering us and sucking us here and there and
everywhere, without forgetting Pamphylia, whom the rascals
fondle and kiss almost «o pieces.
“What an atrocity!” cried Madame de Breval, “how does
one dare behave in such a way with one’s own children?”
“Silence, Madame,” her husband shouted at her; “confine
yourselves, both of you, to the passive roles you have been allotted;
you are here to be made use of, not to harangue us.”
Thereupon returning quietly to work, the libertine and his
colleague continued their examinations just as phlegmatically as
if in this height of impurity there were nothing that could justify
the two mothers’ feelings of outrage.
Juliette & 819
The sole object of my father’s fervent attentions, he appeared
to be neglecting all the others in favor of me. Gabrielle, if you
wish, did indeed interest him too; he kissed her, he frigged her; but
his most impassioned caresses were all aimed at my youthful
charms. I alone seemed to inflame him; I alone received that
voluptuous caress of the tongue in the ass, sure sign of a man’s
predilection for another man, certain gage of the most refined lust,
and which true sodomites are loath to lavish upon women, from
fear of the appalling disgust the environs expose them to; now
ready for anything, my father steers me to the couch where my
mother is lying, places me flat upon her belly, has me held there
by Pamphylia who, naked pursuant to his orders, during the oper-
ation gives him the world’s prettiest ass to handle. His lips moisten
the spot he wishes to penetrate; once he considers the outer gates
sufficiently ajar, his engine arrives before the portal of the
temple... thrusts . . . pushes . . . passes in. . . drives far, and
depucelates me with ecstatic effects.
“Good my Lord,” shrieked my mother, ‘oh, what manner of
horrors are these! Was your son made to be the victim of your
libertinage, and are you not at all aware that what you have just
done bears the stamp of two or three crimes, for the least of which
there are gallows raised ?”
“Eh, but, Madame,” was my father’s dry retort, “’tis pre-
cisely what you tell me that is going to make me discharge the more
deliciously. You have nothing whatever to fear, the boy is at a
very fit age to endure these mediocre assaults, it could easily have
been done four years ago, and ought to have been: I depucelate
far younger children in the same manner every day. I have every
intention of soon doing the same to Gabrielle, even though she is
but ten: my prick is slender, thousands will tell you so, and as for
my skill, it is incredible.”
Be all that as it may, blood seeps from my wounds; floods
of sperm stanch it, my father grows calmer, continuing, however,
to caress my sister who takes my place after I have been dismissed.
Meanwhile, Breval was not wasting his time; but being more
enamored of his daughter than of his son, it is upon Laura he
first opens fire and the little thing, likewise placed upon her mother's
bosom, has just seen her maidenhead blasted.
se?
820 % THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“Fuck your son,” my father calls to him, “I am going to
embugger my daughter: let them all four slake our brutal thirsts
this day. The time has come to have them enter into the one role
Nature assigned them to play; it is time they realize that it is
only to serve as our whores they were born, and that were it not
in the hope of fucking them, we might never have created them at
all.”
The two sacrifices are offered simultaneously. To the right
one sees Breval depucelating his son while kissing his wife’s asshole
and palpating his daughter’s buttocks, still slimed with his fuck;
to the left, my father bum-fucking Gabrielle while he licks my
behind, while he molests my mother’s with one hand and frigs
Pamphylia’s anus with the other; both gentlemen discharge, and
quiet is restored.
The remainder of :he evening is devoted to giving us lessons.
Weare married; my father mates me to my sister; Breval does the
same with his children. ‘They excite us, prepare avenues, consolidate
junctions; and while they have us thus linked front to front they
sound our asses, now this ass, now that, taking turns; in such a
manner that Breval would be buggering me while Borchamps was
fucking Auguste, and waile all this was going on, the two mothers,
constrained to participate in the celebration of the orgies, would,
along with Pamphylia, be making broad display of their charms
to the two libertines. A. number of other lubricious scenes follow
that one: my father’s imagination was limitless. Messieurs place
the children upon their mothers, and while the husband of one
bum-fucks the wife of the other, they oblige us youngsters to frig
our mothers. Pamphylia runs up and down the ranks, she cheers
the contestants on, emboldens them, shows them the way; her turn
comes, she is sodomized; delicious discharging finally pacifies
spirits, and festivities are declared at an end.
Several days later my father summoned me into his library.
‘‘My friend,” said he, “you alone shall henceforth provide
me the joys of my life; I worship you, and wish to fuck nobody
else; I am going to send your sister back to her nunnery. She is
very pretty, I do not gainsay it, I have received much pleasure
from her; but she is fenale, and that in my view is a serious flaw.
Moreover, I could well become disturbed by the pleasures you
Juliette & 821
might taste with her; I want only you beside me. You shall be
lodged in your mother’s apartment; she will step down from her
place and yield it to you, she has no other choice; we shall lie every
night together, I shall spend myself dry in your splendid ass, you
shall discharge in mine, we shall be very happy with each other,
tis certain. Such assemblies as the one at which you were present
will be held no longer; Breval is mad about his daughter, and plans
to behave with her as I am going to do with you. We shall not
cease to be friends; but, too envious of our mutual pleasures, too
jealous of our own, we have reached the decision to mingle them
no more.”
“But my mother, Sir,” said I, “may not all this anger her?”
“Dear friend,” my father replied, “‘listen carefully to what I
have to say to you on that head; you are clever enough to under-
stand me.
“This woman who brought you into the world is perhaps the
creature who in all the universe I most supremely detest; the ties
binding her to me render her a thousand times more loathsome yet,
that is my attitude. Breval has a similar one toward his own wife.
The manner in which you have seen us use these women is the
result of our disgust and our indignation; it is far less for the sake
of amusement than in order to debase and degrade them that we
prostitute them as we do; we outrage them from hatred and a kind
of cruel delectation you yourself shall, I trust, someday come to
know, and whereof the aim is to extract an unspeakable pleasure
from vexations imposed upon an object one has enjoyed over much
and over long.”
“But, Sir,” was the question common sense bade me put, “you
will then torment me also when at last you grow weary of me?”
“That is an altogether different affair,” my father explained,
“they are neither conventional usages nor laws which bind us, but
rather similarities of taste, common convenience, that is to say,
true love; furthermore, our union is criminal in the eyes of man-
kind, and one never wearies of crime.”
Knowing neither more nor better at the time, I believed all
I was told and from there on lived with my father on exactly the
same footing as if I had been his mistress; I passed all my nights
at his side, very often in the same bed, and we would ass-fuck each
822 + ‘THE MARQUIS DE SADE
other until we collapsed from exhaustion into sleep. Pamphylia
was, after Breval, our second confidante and a regular collaborator
in our pleasures; my father liked having her whip him while he em-
buggered me; he would also sodomize and lash her; and sometimes
she would be made to kiss and caress me, then my father would
invite me to do whatever I cared to with her, upon condition that,
while I was doing it, I caress and kiss his ass. And Borchamps, like
Socrates, taught his disciple even as he fucked him. The most im-
pious, the most antimoral principles were suggested to me; and if
I was not already out robbing on the highways, it was through no
fault ef Borchamps. Now and then, at holidays, my sister came to
the house, but she was not warmly welcomed there; very unlike my
father in this regard, whenever I could obtain a moment alone with
her I bore her testimony of great ardor, and fucked her at the
slightest chance.
“Father dislikes me,” Gabrielle told me, “he prefers you. .
So it is, so let it be. Live happily with him and never forget me... .
I kissed Gabrielle and swore I would adore her always.
I had for quite some time noticed that my mother never
emerged from Borchamps’ private study without a handkerchief
pressed to her eyes and heaving sighs of greatest sadness. Curious
to know the cause of her sorrow, I cut a slit in the partition separat-
ing that study from my boudoir and, when the first opportunity for
spying upon them came, stole quietly to the hole and peered
through it. I was witness to horrors; my father’s loathing for his
wife vented itself in the form of frightful physical mistreatments.
There is no imagining what his ferocious lust would inflict upon
that unhappy victim of his aversion; after beating her senseless
with his fists, he would kick her as she lay on the floor, at other
times he would flog her bloody with a martinet, and more often
still he would prostitute her to an exceedingly ill-favored man, un-
known to me, and with whom he held lewd commerce himself.
‘Who is this fellow?” I one day asked Pamphylia, to whom
I had confided my disceveries and who, full of friendliness for me,
offered to help me make more of them.
“He,” said she, ‘‘'s a professional scoundrel your father has
saved two or three times from hanging; the sort of man who for
six francs would assassinate anyone you wanted put out of the way.
”
Juliette 823
One of Borchamps’ greater pleasures is to have him flog your
mother and then, as you have yourself seen, to prostitute her to
him. Borchamps is dreadfully fond of the man, and used to have
him very often in his bed before that became your regular place.
But you have still a few things to learn about the libertinage of
him who sired you: be at your spyhole tomorrow and you will ob-
serve a scene to outdo all those you have just now described to me.”
No sooner am I at my post than four stout swashbuckling
lads march into my father’s library, clap a pistol to his nose, seize
him, bind him fast to one side of a double ladder, then, catching up
each a bundle of withes, beat him about the buttocks and thighs,
perhaps a thousand strokes apiece; the blood was bubbling out of
him when they loosed his bonds to toss him upon a couch and as-
sault him in such wise that at all times he had a prick in his mouth,
one in either hand, and one in his bum. He was fucked more than
twenty times over, and by what pricks, my God! I could not have
got my hand around the smallest of them.
“I'd have liked to have been embuggering you while watching
all that,” I admitted to Pamphylia, “perhaps, dearest friend, you
might be able to induce my father to have my mother the victim of
a similar joust.”
“Oh, that should not be difficult,” the dear girl assured me,
“you have simply to propose a horror to Borchamps for him to
seize the idea. You'll not have to wait long for the scene you
desire.”
A few days later, in effect, Pamphylia told me the moment
was at hand, I glued my eye to the crack in the partition. My poor
mother was lashed and sodomized with such force that the quartet
left her motionless on the floor. As usual, Pamphylia lent me her
superb hindquarters during the show; and I may honestly say that
I had never discharged more deliciously before.
I avowed everything to my father, including the extreme pleas-
ure his clandestine revels had been procuring me.
“The suggestion that you treat your wife as you have just
done originated with me after I saw how you had yourself treated.”
“My friend,” Borchamps wanted to know, “‘are you capable
of helping me in these operations ?”’
“Be sure of it,” I replied.
824 < THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“Truly? This woman who brought you into the world?”
‘She labored only in her own behalf, and I detest her as pow-
erfully as you possibly can.”
‘Kiss me, my beloved, you are delicious; and believe me when
I say that you shall from now on begin to taste the most violent
pleasures in the realm of human experience. Only in outraging what
man is stupid enough to call the laws of Nature is he able to find
authentic delight. Why, dare I believe my ears? You will mistreat
your mother, word of honor ?”
“More cruelly thar you, I swear it.”
“You will martyrize her?”
“‘Martyrize her, torture her, I’ll kill her if you like.”
And Borchamps, who had been fondling my behind through-
out this conversation, here lost control of himself, spilling his seed
before he had time to skoot it into my ass.
“Until tomorrow, my friend,” said he, “it’s tomorrow that I
put your mettle to the test; between now and then, no nonsense, eh?
Rest yourself, as I intend to do: fuck is vital to any such under-
taking, one must lay by a double dose of it if one wishes to achieve
infamies.”
At the appointed hour my mother passed into Borchamps’
study; Borchamps’ wicked protégé was there; the scene was fright-
ful. The poor woman burst into tears at seeing me there, and that
I was one of her most implacable enemies. I strove to improve
upon the horrors wherewith my father and his friend beset her.
Borchamps would have the man embugger me as I lay atop my
mother clawing the sacred breast whence I had first drawn suste-
nance. Energetically prodded by a length of goed prick in my ass,
my imagination wonderfully stimulated by the thought of being
fucked by a professional rogue, I went a bit farther than I had
been told and came away with the nipple of my very respectable
mother’s right breast i1 my teeth; she emits a scream, loses con-
sciousness, and my delirious father rushes to replace his friend in
my ass, covering me with praise, and filling me with sperm.
I had just attained my nineteenth year when my father at last
chose to broach all that was on his mind.
“I simply cannot stand the presence of that woman any
Juliette & 825
longer,” he declared; “I must get rid of her—but not outright, not
crudely. Rather, by torturing her. . . . Will you assist me, my boy?”
“The thing to do,” said I, ‘is cut her belly open, one horizon-
tal slash, one vertical, I’ll go into her entrails with a hot iron, I'll
cauterize her heart and viscera, she will die, but very gradually.”
“Heavenly child,” my father sighed, “‘little angel... .”
And this infamy, this execration by which I made my entry
into the career of crime, it was enacted. My father and I consum-
mated it in the throes of acutest pleasure; the rascal fucked my
ass and frigged my prick while I massacred his wife.
Unhappy dupe that I was! Lending myself to this crime I
toiled toward nought but my own undoing; it was only in order
to wed another woman that my father had got me to slay my
mother, but so well had he hid his scheme that I went a whole year
without guessing what he was about. Once I had wind of it I spoke
to my sister. I told her the entire tale.
“My child, this man is bent on destroying us,” said I.
“That has been my opinion for a long time,” Gabrielle re-
plied; ‘‘ah, dear brother, I would have spoken to you had I thought
you would heed a warning, but you were blind to everything, and
to his character blindest of all; we are both ruined if we do not
take measures to prevent it. Are you as firm of soul and purpose
as I, and shall we act in concert? I have here some powder, a
schoolmate gave it to me; by these means she freed her own self
from the parental yoke; let us do the same. If you cannot bring
yourself to it, leave the thing to me; the urge has been on me for
years, and I shall be acting in accordance with Nature’s reiterated
counsels; and what she demands of us is just. Do I see you shudder,
my friend?”
‘Not from fear. Give me this powder : before noon tomorrow
it shall be in the guts of him who presumes to make fools of us.”
“Not so fast! Don’t think I am ceding you all the honor of
breaking our shackles; we shall perform the deed together. I shall
be at dinner tonight; take half the packet, put the stuff in his wine.
To make sure of our kill, I’ll put the other half in his soup. We'll
be orphaned in an hour; in three clays’ time we shall be sole owners
of the possessions fortune has destined us to.”
No mouse ever scampered straighter into a trap than did
826 <& THE MARQUIS DE SADE
Borchamps drink his way to the doom our wickedness prepared for
him; he fell dead at dessert. This sudden end was attributed to a
choleric stroke, and all was forgotten.
Being nearly twenty-one years of age, I obtained patents of
majority and the wardship of my sister. Once affairs were arranged
she emerged as one of the most eligible matches in all France. I
found her a man as rich as she, of whom she very dextrously disen-
cumbered herself when once, by means of a child, she was assured
of his legacy. But let us not anticipate events. Once I saw my sister
properly established, I out my wealth into her safekeeping and
told her of the exceedingly great desire I had to travel abroad. I
converted a million into letters of credit with the foremost Euro-
pean bankers; then I embraced my dear Gabrielle.
“I adore you,” I to.d her, “but I must be on my way and this
absence will doubtless last a little while. We are both of us made
for great things and to go far; let us both gain more knowledge
and acquaintances; later, we shall join company definitively, for
heaven has intended us one for the other, and heaven’s wishes must
not be disappointed. Love me, Gabrielle, forget me not, and I
shall ever cleave to my love for you.”
As for what became of Clairwil, the story, Juliette, is already
known to you, at any rate for the greater part; she had, as I told
you, contrived to slough off her conjugal ties, she was able to
live a free and happy woman in the lap of abundance and lewd
joys; her liaisons with the Minister cemented her disorders by
guaranteeing their absolute impunity. There was a moment when,
in desperate straits, you were led to form unreasonable suspicions
and could doubt of her loyalty to you; but do greater justice to her
heart, never was she your enemy, never did the Minister inform
her of the fate he intended for you. I shall therefore say no more
of her here, and shall be content to recount my own adventures; you
will in due time hear of their denouement, of how we were brought
back together and what the reasons are that enjoin us to live as we
do, one for the other, in this impenetrable asylum of crime and
infamy.
The northern courts excited my curiosity, it was toward them
I bent my steps; The Hague was the first I visited. The Stadtholder
had just recently married Princess Sophia, niece of the King of
Juliette hk 827
Prussia. No sooner did I set eyes upon that ravishing creature than
I desired her; and I had no sooner declared my heat than I fucked
her. Sophia of Prussia was then eighteen years of age, and pos-
sessed the loveliest figure and the most delicious face ever to be
seen; but her libertinage was excessive and her debauchery so no-
torious that by now her suitors were interested chiefly in her
money. Promptly enlightened upon this object, I put myself gal-
lantly forward; willing enough to pay for my pleasures, but young
and vigorous enough to expect women to contribute to the cost of
my travels, I was resolved never to accord my favors save to those
who were capable of appreciating them.
‘“‘Madame,” said I to the Princess after I had been tupping
her steadily for almost a month, “I flatter myself in the belief that
you will acknowledge the expense I have incurred on your account;
few men, you will agree, can match me for endurance, none is better
membered: all that comes with a price, Madame, in the age we live
in.”
“Oh, how you put me at ease, Sir,” the Princess replied, “I so
much prefer to have you at my orders than to be at yours. Here,”
she continued, handing me a purse bulging with gold, “and remem-
ber that I now have the right to demand that you serve my pas-
sions, however bizarre they be.”
“It is only meet,” said I; “your gifts oblige me, I am at your
entire disposition.”
“Come this evening to my country house,” said Sophia, “come
alone, and be not afraid, no matter what happens.”
Though made somewhat apprehensive by these last words, I
nevertheless decided to let nothing daunt me, so that 1 might come
to a thorough acquaintance of this woman, and thereby be able to
eke more money out of her.
So it is I set forth alone and arrive at the indicated time and
place; an aged woman opens the door and, without a word, ushers
me into a mysterious room where I am greeted by a young lady of
nineteen, exquisite to behold.
“The Princess will soon appear, Sir,” says she, in a voice both
sweet and pleasing. ‘‘Meanwhile, as she has instructed me to do, I
shall ask you to make me the most solemn vow never to disclose
828 << THE MARQUIS DE SADE
anything of the strange rites which are to be celebrated here in our
sight.”
“Doubt of my discretion offends me, Madame,” I rejoined,
“Tam dismayed, I am pained that the Princess can form it.”
“But if you were tc have cause for complaint? If perchance
your part in the proceedings were to be that of victim only?”
“I should glory in it, Madame, and my silence thereupon
would not be the less eternal.”
“Such a reply might exempt me from insisting farther were
I not obliged to comply s:rictly with my orders. I must have the re-
quired oath, Sir.”
I swore it.
“And I add that if by misfortune you were not to keep your
pledge, the speediest and most violent death would be your unfail-
ing reward.” ;
“Madame,” I protested, “this threat is superfluous; my man-
ner of fulfilling your request would indicate that it was unmerited.”
But Emma disappeared from the room even as I was speaking,
and for a quarter of an hour I was left to my thoughts.
When she returned she was accompanied by Sophia. Both were
in a disorder that convinced me the hussies had just been frigging
themselves.
“Eh, by Christ’s tears,” said Sophia, “let’s not coddle the bug-
ger any longer; we have bought him, he is ours to use, let us make
the most of our purchase.”
Emma invites me to remove my clothes.
“You see very wel’ that we ourselves are naked,” she said
upon observing me hesitate; ““do two women frighten you?”
And aiding me to undress down even to my stockings, once
I am divested of every stitch they guide me to a bench upon which
they have me kneel on hands and knees. A catch is released; and
suddenly all my limbs are shackled fast, and three sharp blades
stand pointed, one at my belly, one at either flank, in such sort that
I cannot stir a muscle. Outbursts of laughter answer the alarmed
glances I cast around me, but what causes me truly to tremble is
to see these two women pick up long iron martinets and approach
me with visibly villainous intent.
After twenty minutes the flagellation wore to an end.
Juliette %& 829
“Come, Emma,” Sophia then called to her fricatrice, “come,
be a good girl and kiss me next to the victim; I like to juxtapose
love and anguish. Let’s chafe cunts opposite the wretch, dear heart,
and watch him suffer while we discharge.”
The royal whore rings, two fifteen-year-old maids, beauties
each, come to receive her orders; they strip off their clothes and
upon pillows strown in front of me the tribades spend an hour wal-
lowing in swinish delights; now and again one of them would
wriggle toward me, she would provoke me with a display of her
charms presented from every angle and as soon as she saw the
impression she was able, despite my inconveniencing position, to
cause upon me, she would slither away again, laughing at my help-
lessness. Sophia, as you may easily imagine, played the leading role
in this obscene drama, everything centered upon her, all efforts were
deployed in her favor, and I assure you I was perfectly amazed to
find such science, such subtlety, and such impurity in someone so
young. It was very clearly to be seen that the rascal’s passion, as
with nearly every other woman who has a taste for her sex, was
to have her clitoris sucked while sucking that same part in others.
But Sophia did not stop there: she was encunted, embuggered with
dildoes; and there was not a tit she took but she gave a tat. And
when from sucking and fucking the slut was very high and very
hot, ‘‘Come,”’ she said, ‘‘let’s settle this knave’s affair.”
The whips are fetched out again, the two newcomers are
armed with a pair of them. Sophia opens the assault by dealing mé
fifty rapid and powerful strokes. In the midst of her cruelty she
preserved an unbelievable calm. After every ten stripes she would
come around and gaze gleefully at my face, studying the effects nec-
essarily wrought there by the ferocious pain she inflicted; once she
was done she established herself in front of me, flung wide her
thighs, bade her three consorts whip me as hard as she had just
done, and during the ordeal she had her'self frigged.
“One moment,” said she when the tally had risen nearly to
two hundred lashes, “I am going to slip beneath him in order to
suck him while the whipping continues; arrange yourselves in such
a way that my clitoris gets a sucking in return from one of you and
I have someone else’s clitoris to finger.”
The actresses take their place, the play begins . . . and, vio-
830 «% THE MARQUIS DE SADE
lently excited by the blows I was receiving, deliciously sucked by
Sophia, I shall not pretend that before three minutes of this had
gone by I had not filled her mouth with fuck; she swallowed it and
promptly slithered out from under my belly.
“Emma,” she exclaimed, “‘he is charming, he discharged, I
must now repay him with a fucking.”
A dildo is fitted around her loins, and here’s the whore in my
ass, cunt-sucking two of her sweethearts while the third gives her
cuntwardly what I am getting bumwise from her.
“You may release him now,” she said when at last she could
stand no more. “Come kiss me, Borchamps,” the Messalina went
on; ‘‘come express your gratitude, I have given you no end of
pleasure. Nor is that all: I rarely treat a man with such forbear-
ance. Poor child, all this that has just happened must be laid up
alone to your puerile modesty. Just think of it! You have bedded I
don’t know how many tirnes with me, and always content to encunt
me like any imbecile, not once has it ever seemed to enter your
silly little head that I have an ass. Why, such a story would simply
not be believed.” ,
“The desire made itself felt in me, Madame; but timidity held
it in check.”
“A pity . ..a pity; modesty is no longer excusable at your
age. But shall we let bygones be bygones? Will you make amends
for your callowness, and forget my cunt a little in order to concern
yourself a little with my ass? (She herewith turned around and
showed it to me.) A pretty ass, is it not ? See how smooth it is, how
fair, and how it yearns for you—so fuck it, Borchamps. Take his
prick, Emma, there’s a clear, and clap it into my ass.”
My response was to bestow a thousand kisses upon that truly
superb behind; and my engine, trained by Emma upon the cunning
little hole, shortly convinced Sophia of my burning eagerness to
right past wrongs.
“Stay,” the Princess bade me, “‘’tis I who now wish to be slave
to you, I shall place myself in the machine where a moment ago
you were captive, now I shall be yours; exercise your rights, sultan,
and take a keen revenge.” (The irons hold her wrists and ankles
fast.) ‘Spare me not, I beseech you; punish at once the whorish-
ness and the cruelty in me.”
oy
Juliette %& 831
“Buggeress!” I cried, divining her tastes, ‘‘it’s a lashing you
want, and they shall be awful strokes you'll get.”
“I do dearly hope so,” said she. ‘Touch the skin on my ass,
see how it glistens, fairly cries out for the whip.”
“Aye, it is so,” said I, therewith dealing the first blow. And
while I smote her with might and main the lovely Emma, kneeling
before me, sucked my engine and the two girls of fifteen busied
themselves about my ass. When Sophia’s was all in tatters, my
furious device, bolting headlong into her anus, consoled her for
my barbarity.
“Ah, fuck!” she shrieked, “how delicious to be embuggered
directly after a whipping; nothing marries so happily as these two
pleasures.”
Emma then advances upon her mistress, frigs her, kisses her,
teats her, frigs herself, and we all three sink in a sea of delights.
“Borchamps,” the Princess said to me as we were readjusting
ourselves, ‘‘there is, it seems to me, a certain community of spirit
between us, and I feel less reluctant to confide myself to you.”
Upon a signal the young girls retired and we three having
seated ourselves around a table, here as follows is the speech Sophia
made to us the while we drank punch and genever.
“To ordinary souls, to small minds it will perhaps appear odd
that as my device for sounding your character I choose lubricity.
Surprise at that is ridiculous; if by misfortune this be your case,
let me then tell you, my dear, that I never judge of what a man is
in the course of life, save by his passions in libertinage. He whose
fiery spirit displays energetic tastes is indubitably susceptible of
resolute action where interest or ambition is the concern: you are
hot-blooded and no dullard. Say, Borchamps, what are your politics
regarding human life ?”’
“Princess,” I answered, “of what price was it in the eyes of
the Duke of Alba when he undertook to subdue these provinces ?”
“Delicious man,” said my ardent interlocutress, “such is the
reply I wanted from you; I count upon your courage,” she added,
squeezing my hand, “‘now listen to what remains for me to propose
to you.
“Niece of Europe’s hero, sprung from the line of a man made
to reign over the entire world, I bring to these Low Countries his
832 e& THE MARQUIS DE SADE
soul, his vision, and his vigor; I presume that you recognize, Bor-
champs, that I am fitted for better than to be wife to a republican
doge, and this soft, mercantile, and craven people, born to wear
irons, ought to be honored by mine. I am nothing loath to reign
over the Dutch, but the throne raised upon these humid plains must
be wet also with their tears and built by their gold. One hundred
armed battalions assure my project; Frederick is sending them from
Konigsberg. This revolution does not doom my husband’s head; he
is worthy of me, and Batavia’s blood, shed in great floods, will
cement the throne to which | pretend. It is therefore not the scepter
I offer you; I simply propose to you the place of him who is to de-
fend my keeping of it: you shall be our counselor, our minister,
our strong right arm; the proscriptions will be dictated, executed
by you: the post requires boldness; have you that quality in suitable
measure ? Answer as you are of a mind.”
‘““Madame,” said I after taking thought for a moment, “be-
fore fixing upon this startling act of power and authority, did it
occur to you to inquire how this revolution might be viewed by the
neighboring powers? The French, the English, the Spanish, the
northern States also, who see in you mere courtiers and tradesmen,
shall they sit calmly by and watch you become rivals and van-
quishers ?”
“We are sure of France’s attitude; we don’t care a fig for the
rest. Once sovereign in the United Provinces we shall take the field
against the three major kingdoms and perhaps bring them very
quickly to their knees. Everyone trembles before a warlike nation;
such shall ours become. One great man is enough to subject the
world: there is that greatness in my soul, I have it from mighty
Frederick. We here are weary of belonging to whoever bothers to
invade us and of being the easy prize with which every European
conqueror’s career begins.”
“Once given arms to repulse the cruelties of Spain, will the
Dutch surrender them and suffer your tyranny ?”
“Courts shall be set up, as they were by Alba. There is no
other way to bring a people to heel.”
“Your subjects will flee the land.”
“Tl have the property they leave behind. From the flight of
rebels I stand only to gain; it will simplify the matter of maintain-
Juliette & 833
ing my grip upon those who stay. My aim is not to become the
quaking monarch of many, but to rule despotically, if need be over
a few.”
‘Sophia, I believe you cruel, and it is nought, I fear, but lust?
that fires you in this ambition.”
“Nearly all the vices in the heart of man have the same cause:
all proceed from his more or less marked propensity to lubricity.
This propensity, ferocious in a strong spirit, leads the solitary
mortal, lost and alone in Nature’s wilderness, to perpetrate a thou-
sand furtive horrors, and him who governs others, to perpetrate a
thousand political crimes.”
‘Oh, Sophia, I understand what it is you seek; ambition in
you is nothing else than the desire to lose your fuck with somewhat
greater warmth.”
‘Little does it matter what sentiment engenders ambition once
it exists and is confirmed by a crown. But, my friend, if you reason
thereupon, you waver; waver, and you tremble; and for him who
trembles I have no use at all.”
Singularly aroused by Sophia’s propositions, taking a view
analogous to hers in seeing herein sure means for exercising my
native ferocity, I promised everything. Sophia embraced me, had
me repeat the most solemn oaths to absolute secrecy, and we took
leave of each other.
I went thoughtfully homeward; by the time I reached my lodg-
ings I was beginning to sense the full danger of the engagements I
had just contracted, and noticing that the risks involved in breaking
them hardly outweighed those in keeping them, I spent the night
in dreadful perplexity. There’s nothing for it, I said to myself, I
am done for either way, the only solution lies in flight. Oh, Sophia,
had you but proposed some private crimes, I’d gladly have com-
mitted them all, for with you as my accomplice I could have laughed
at the Jaw. But to expose myself to every imaginable risk only to
be the agent of your despotism! No, woman, count not upon me.
Ready I am and very willing to commit crimes for my passions’
sake, not one will I do to benefit the passions of others. When my
2 With what art the workings of the tyrant soul are here developed; and how
many revolutions explained by this single word!
834 << THE MARQUIS DE SADE
refusal comes to your knowledge, tax Borchamps not so much with
faintheartedness as with greatness of soul... .
I stole out of the city that very night and made in all haste for
the port nearest England. En route I was momentarily assailed by
regrets: what with my profound liking for crime, it was hard for
me to think I had declined Sophia’s offer of the political means for
committing a lot of it. But I reminded myself that her projects had
been rather too uncertain; and, in addition, that I would be happier
operating for my own advantage than for that of some crowned
individual.
Upon reaching London I took apartments in Piccadilly, where
I had the misfortune, the very next day, of being robbed of every
penny I had about me; this was a serious loss, since the previous
week, in The Hague, I had cashed all my letters of credit. There
was nothing else for me “o do than set straight out with the letters
of recommendation I had to various London notables, and to beg
some aid at least for the short time it would take me to obtain funds
from my sister.
From what I had heard tell of Lord Burlington I decided that
this was the man to see first. When he had finished reading my let-
ters, I recounted my woes; the good Englishman was prepared to
do me every sort of service. Although Burlington was not very rich,
one thousand guineas were his immediate offer, and he simply would
not hear of my lodging anywhere except under his own roof. I ac-
cepted his invitation all the more readily for having already taken
stock of this honest family and detected there a quantity of possi-
bilities for repaying, in the form of crimes, the debt of gratitude
I owed my benefactor.
Before entering into the details of the little infamies with
which I was about to occupy myself, it is essential that I give you
an idea of the persons in whose midst I had landed.
Burlington, the ktndliest and most ingenuous of men, must
have been nearing fifty-five; blithe, guileless, void of penetration,
at once generous and a fool, such was my Lord’s portrait. A son-in-
law and two daughters composed the rest of the household. Tilson,
but twenty-three, had just wedded the elder of the girls, who was
about the same age as he. They were a delicious couple the like of
which Nature affords us only rare examples; charms, graces, naiveté,
Juliette & 835
candor, piety, gentility, good breeding, nothing was lacking, and
this personification of all the virtues assembled consoled Burlington
for the wild conduct of Miss Cleontine, the younger of his daugh-
ters, at most eighteen years of age, and the loveliest creature you
have ever clapped eyes on. But mischievousness, nay, downright
wickedness, black whorishness carried to extreme lengths, those
were Cleontine’s incorrigible vices; wherein she had the audacity
to assert she was a thousand times happier than ever was Clotilda
in her dull and tedious virtues.
Upon perceiving the girl’s delicious character I became
straightway enamored of her, to the extent a man so corrupt as I
could be enamored of anyone; but her father having confided to
me all the heartaches this young person caused him, I found myself
obliged to proceed with utmost circumspection.
Over and beyond the tumultuous impressions Cleontine was
producing in my soul, Tilson’s pretty face and the graces of his
charming wife remained ever clear in my eye, and if Cleontine in-
spired the more libertine desires in me, her brother-in-law and
sister quickened the more sensual. I imagined Tilson’s ass as a
masterpiece, and the desire to fuck him burned just as keenly in
me as the idea of doing the same to his voluptuous partner. Set
upon by all these various passions, it seemed to me that the proper
way to satisfy them was to begin with Cleontine. Everything which
can conspire to a woman’s downfall being already contained in the
soul of her whom I was attacking as well as in my means for seduc-
tion, the dear child was quickly mine.
Nothing so fresh, nothing so plump, nothing so pretty as all
the parts of that charming thing’s body, nothing so eloquent as the
voice of her passions, nothing so lewd as her mind. There was a
moment when, truly, I wondered whether I was not better behaved
than she; whereupon, as you may readily imagine, there was no re-
striction to the pleasures we tasted; and Cleontine avowed to me
that the more a delight seemed in conflict with the laws of Nature,
the more it stimulated her lubricity.
“Alas!” she said one day, “I have come to the point where I
find none strong enough to satisfy me.”
Her pretty ass was attacked on the spot, and the pleasures she
gave me in that style were so piquant, so poignant, so thoroughly
836 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“She is vindictive; her upright soul would not all by itself
hatch the plot I shall suggest to her, but when warmly proposed by
me she will seize what I offer her, be sure of it.”
“And the others?” Cleontine abruptly demanded.
“Ah, little minx,” said I, folding her in my arms, “every pass-
ing minute brings added proof that Nature created us for each
other. And so here is how we shall be rid of those others, my angel:
once Lady Tilson has acted upon my advice and removed her hus-
band from the picture, I shall unveil the whole intrigue to her father
who, likewise pressed bv my solicitations, shall, I am confident of
it, call in the police. Sae will be brought to trial. Her lawyer,
selected and perfectly feed by me, will embrace Clotilda’s cause
and so plead it as to shift the guilt onto the father who will be
shown to have murdered his son-in-law and had his daughter ar-
raigned on false charges. The witnesses, the testimony, the proofs:
with guineas all that is to be found in London, just as with Jowis
it is in Paris. A fortnight and Burlington is lying in one of His
Majesty’s jails.”
“Your benefactor ?”’
“Ah, Cleontine, what must I call the man whose existence casts
a cloud upon our future together? This arch-enemy is no sogner
flung into prison, condemned (he will be, Cleontine, inside a month
from today), than he mounts the scaffold; he is no sooner dead,
I say, than your sister is freed and we leave. We leave England,
I wed you, and simply consider how easy it will be to eliminate the
last obstacle preventing you from taking exclusive possession of
Burlington’s estate.”
“Oh, my friend, you are a villain!”
‘“T am but a man and one who adores you, Cleontine, who
cares for nought but to see you rich and his married wife.”
“But my father... and all he has done for you—”
“Beside the sentiments I owe you all others pale, they vanish:
I must possess you, Cleontine, there is nothing I do not sacrifice
in order to succeed.”
The ardent creature effuses her gratitude, showers kisses upon
me; she swears to aid me, and streams of fuck, shot from one side
and from the other, seal vows I have not the faintest intention of
keeping.
Juliette -& 839
However, since the first act of the play was to bring me to the
catastrophe I was secretly planning, I hastened to stage that first
act. Directed by me, Clotilda surprises her husband in her sister’s
arms. But it is not to revenge herself solely upon the faithless one
that I recommend, it is to immolate them both.
“Yes, that is how I feel in the matter, and it concerns me,” I
tell her. “I am too furious at what has been done to you not to
sacrifice those who have inflicted this outrage. From now on your
life itself shall be in danger from such monsters; you must either
consent to their destruction or reconcile yourself to being destroyed
by them.”
An expressive silence is Clotilda’s response to this; and the
same beverage rids her, at a stroke, of a sister and a husband... .
I had fucked them both that morning.
I turn now to the second act in the Burlington tragedy.
“Oh, Clotilda,” I say, rushing to her in great terror, “these
two sudden deaths have alarmed your father, I fear suspicion is
wakening in his breast. Why would he not attribute the loss of his
son-and-law and daughter to your vengeance, aware as he is of
the motives that would lead you to seek it? Well, if he comes to a
very obvious conclusion, you, my dear, are in a damnable case; you
must have the best defense ready if this misfortune arises.”
An hour later I am in conference with the father.
“You are baffled, Sir? You search far afield for the assassin of
Tilson and Cleontine, you need not look beyond Clotilda,” I
pointed out to that honest man; ‘for whose interests are so closely
associated with this horror? And if, as there is scarce any room for
doubt, the wretch has been to this point capable of scorning her
duties and the yet more powerful voice of Nature, presume the
dire danger that must accrue to you in letting this tiger remain at
your side.”
To these calumnious assertions I add a string of spurious
proofs; Milord is convinced; his daughter is taken into custody. My
barrister hirelings fly to find her; they have no trouble persuading
Clotilda that some recrimination is imperative, everything needed
to support the counterattack is furnished her. This interesting crea-
ture entreats me not to abandon her; her hand, if I deign accept it,
will be the reward for my loyalty. I swear to hold steadfast by her,
840 <% THE MARQUIS DE SADE
come what may. Burlington, sharply suspected of the crime he
ascribes to his daughter, is dragged promptly before his judges; he
is, at my instigation and at my expense, himself accused of having
had treacherously murdered his daughter and son-in-law, and of
having had Clotilda imprisoned as guilty of an atrocity he alone
has committed. The trial created enough stir in London to last only
a month; and in that brief period I had the satisfaction of freeing
from behind bars her for whose sake I had perpetrated my terrible
acts, and of seeing their third victim expire.
“Clotilda,” I cried, once gratitude had brought that lovely
woman to my feet, ‘make haste, claim your inheritance; having no
child by Tilson you unfortunately cannot pretend to anything there,
but realize what belongs to you and let us be off. Our conduct will
not bear too close scrutiny, let us not wait for eyes to open but get
us speedily away from here.”
‘Oh, Borchamps, it is a terrible thing for me, to owe my life
only to my father’s death!”
“Ha, an end to idiot remorse, stifle it directly,” was my quick
reply to my charming mistress; ‘remind yourself that your father
aspired only to your doorn, and that any measure enforced by self-
preservation is warrantecl.”
‘But you shall at least be there, Borchamps, to dry away my
tears?”
“Can you doubt it, dear angel ?”
‘‘Ah, then call a priest, let the ceremony be for tomorrow; let
wedlock’s sweet pleasures crown us the same day, and the next
morning let sunrise see us set forth from a land where the conse-
quences of this horrible affair might at any moment turn to our
disadvantage.”
All is done as I desire it, and Clotilda is my wedded wife.
Clotilda’s mourning for 1er first husband had been too brief for
us to dare publish our marriage, but it nonetheless received the
sanction of the law, human and divine.
I wish here to make it very plain that Clotilda cannot be con-
sidered even partly responsible for any of the pieces of mischief I
have just related to you. The passive instrument of my maneuvers,
she was in no wise their cause; no, I shall not hear of that gentle
and charming person being blamed for anything that had befallen:
Juliette 841
the murder of her sister and husband, to which she had consented
only through silence, was all alone my doing, she was still less guilty
of her father’s death, and had it not been for my interventions, my
briberies, perjurers and the rest, she would surely have gone to the
gallows instead of Burlington. ,
All this I am at pains to say lest in the eyes of my auditors
there be lost to Clotilda’s character one jot of the candor, modesty,
or rectitude I accorded her when first I gave her description. And
so also it was that however I might reason with her, she remained
forever the prey of remorse; it is true that the manner whereby I |
acquiesced in the love she confessed for me did for a while attenu-
ate her sufferings from that quarter. But let me repeat it once and ©
for all, so long as the sequence of events obliges me to speak of her,
never visualize Clotilda as anything but conscience-stricken, guilt-
ridden. As such appearing to me a thousand times more piquant,
she gave me the most extraordinary inspirations. Who would be- |
lieve it? Even before enjoying her charms I thought to profane |
them. Clotilda was no sooner my wife than I hardened over the
twofold idea of fucking her in a brothel that first night and of
prostituting her charms to the first comer.
Early on in my stay at London I had made the acquaintance of
a celebrated procuress at whose house I used to sport with the ~
prettiest rascals in town, to compensate myself for the monotonies |
entailed by a regular intrigue. I go off to find Miss Bawil, I impart —
to her my resolutions, she answers for their success; in the bargain
I put the clause that the libertines to whom Clotilda is to be sur-
rendered confine themselves to pollutions, nastiness, and brutalities. |
Everything arranged »etween us, I return to Clotilda and propose ©
that after the wedding ceremony we consummate our marriage else-
where than in this mansion fraught with gloomy memories; a_
friend, I tell her, has invited us to stay the night. Trusting Clotilda |
accompanies me to Miss Bawil’s, where a merry feast is spread |
before us. Someone less a scoundrel than I would have enjoyed this |
moment during which happiness displaced Clotilda’s chagrins and
she was oblivious to all save the charm of belonging to me. The
poor fool was kissing me tenderly in her joy when three rascals
posted by break suddenly in upon us, daggers in their hands.
“Run for your life!” they say to me. ‘‘Begone and leave this
842 & THE MARQUIS DE SADE
woman to us, we’ve some frolicking to do before you get to her.”
I flee from the room and pass into an adjoining one whence,
through a spyhole, I am able to observe everything. Clotilda, half
in a swoon, is promptly stripped by these rufians who expose her
naked to my gaze. The effect was enchanting as libertinage here
performed the usual office of love. "T'was thus profaned I had my
first glimpse of the graces with which Nature had endowed the ex-
quisite creature, ’twas thus the world’s most beauteous ass was re-
vealed to my lascivious stare. A superb courtesan was frigging me
in the meantime, and at a previously arranged signal the outrages
redoubled. Clotilda, sprawled over the knees of one of the three
was flagellated by the other two, after that condemned to the most
lubricious and the most humiliating penances. Obliged to tongue the.
asshole of one, she had also, at the same time, to frig the other two.
Her face—that moving emblem of her sensitive soul—her breast,
her lily-white and rosy breast, were washed by the impure jets of
that unholy trio’s ardor, who, so instructed by me and to humiliate
the heavenly creature’s virtue that much more thoroughly, ended
by pissing and shitting upon her body while I proceeded to embug-
ger another whore sen: to complete my excitement during the
scene. Quitting this second girl’s ass without having discharged
there, I pick up a rapier and rush into the dining room; I look as
though I have returned at the head of reinforcements, I rescue
Clotilda, my bought rufhans take to their heels and, casting myself
theatrically at my beloved’s feet, ‘““Oh, dearest soul,” I cry, ‘‘have
I not arrived too late? May not these monsters have already—”
“No, my friend,” replies Clotilda as she is being wiped and
made tidy, “no, your wite is still worthy of you—humiliated, mis-
treated for a certainty, but not dishonored. Oh, Borchamps, why
ever did you bring me to this house ?” ;
“Ah, be calm, my angel, all danger is past. Miss Bawil has
enemies, this untimely incursion was their work; but my call for
help was heard, the house freed, and we can spend the rest of the
night here in safety.”
Clotilda was not easily reassured; at length, however, she re-
covered from her experience and we betook ourselves to bed.
Greatly heated by the scene I had lately provoked, astonishingly
electrified to hold beauty, virtue sullied in my arms, I wrought
Juliette & 843
prodigies of vigor... . While this charming creature wanted some-
thing of her sister’s disorderly imagination, she made up for that
shortcoming by a more just, more lucid spirit and by an infinitely
fetching beauty of physical detail. It would be impossible to be
fairer of skin, better made of body, impossible to have sweeter,
more winsome, more tantalizing parts. Clotilda absolutely untu-
tored in lubricity and new to its pleasures, was ignorant even of the
possibility of traveling Cythera’s narrower bypath.
“My angel, a husband must find some first fruits to pluck on
the wedding night; having none but these,” said I, touching her
asshole, “you will surely not refuse them to me.” ;
So saying I catch a good grip on her flanks and from sodomiz-
ing her five times in succession bring my seed to a boil; it was how-
ever in her cunt I deposited it. And ’twas there and then that
Clotilda, luckier or more ardent with me than with Tilson, con-
ceived a very unlucky daughter, who due to my inconstancy and
neglect, I never saw at her birth.
Dawn found me so tired of my goddess that had I consulted
my sentiments alone, Clotilda would indeed never have got out of
London; but, persuaded that this creature could perhaps be useful
during my travels, we readied ourselves for departure. Helped by
me, Clotilda assembled her fortune, it came to twelve thousand
guineas all told and, taking them with us, I and my wife left Lon-
don two years to the day after I had first set foot there.
Since I was ever bent on visiting the courts of the North we
now headed for Sweden. We had already been traveling some nine
or ten weeks when one day, looking back over our adventures to-
gether, Clotilda hazarded a few reproachful remarks upon the
violence of the means I had employed to win her. My prompt reply
was framed in such language as to give my dear wife very clearly
to understand that I was perfectly ready to have her commit crimes
but by no means prepared to see her repent them. Clotilda’s tears
flowed forth afresh; I then revealed to her the whole truth of
what had happened.
“And every single part of it,” I told her in conclusion, “was
my handiwork; the desire to be rid of your sister and your husband,
both overmuch fucked by me; that of fucking you too and of ap-
propriating your money by killing your father: such, my sweet,
844 «> THE MARQUIS DE SADE
were the real motives behind all my enterprises. Whence you will
observe that in all this I have toiled for none but my own sake, and
not one instant for yours. To this I may usefully add, dear creature,
that my intention being to plunge into a very nefarious career, I did
not unite you to my destiny in order to have you thwart that aim,
but to promote it.”
“In that case, what is the distinction you draw, Sir, between
a slave and a wife?”
“And you, tell me now, what distinction do you draw between
a slave and a wife?”
“Ah, Borchamps, why did you not take this line the very first
day I met you? How bitter have now become the tears you force
me to shed over my unhzppy family!”
“No more weeping, Madame,” was my harsh warning to her,
“and no more illusions concerning your fate; I expect utter submis-
sion from you. If it so pleased me to have the carriage stopped this
instant and to have you suck the prick of the man who’s driving it,
you'd suck that prick, my dear, you’d suck it. For if you did not,
I’d blow your brains out on the spot.”
“My God, Borchamps! Is this love?”
‘Why, I do not love you, Madame, what an idea. I have never
loved you; I wanted your money and your ass, I have them both,
and it may not be long before I have had altogether enough of the
latter.”
‘And the fate then in store for me will probably be the one
Cleontine met?”
“With you I shall probably resort to less mystery and surely
a great deal more artistry.”
At this point Clotilda thought to use the weapons of her sex:
she leaned toward me in an effort to kiss and sprinkle me with her
tears; I thrust her rudely away.
“Cruel man,” she said, half-choked by her sobs, “‘if you wish
to offend the mother at least respect the poor creature who owes its
life to your love: I am pregnant . . . I beg you to stop at the first
town we come to, for I do not feel at all well.”
We did indeed stop and Clotilda, who took directly to bed,
fell gravely ill. Irritated at having to interrupt my journey and at
being delayed by a creature for whom I was beginning to have the
Juliette ® 845
keenest distaste, to which there had to be added the loathing where-
with I had always beheld pregnant women, I was on the point of
taking a charitable leave of them both, she and her child, when a
woman who was staying in a chamber near ours, stopped me in the
hallway and bade me come for a moment into her room. Great
heavens! what was my surprise upon recognizing Princess Sophia’s
pretty confidante, the same Emma of whom I spoke a short while
ago.
‘What an unexpected encounter, Madame,” said I, ‘“‘and what
a fortunate one! But are you here by yourself ?”.
“I am indeed,” that charming personage replied, “I too have
had to flee from an insatiable, ambitious mistress whom it must
become damnation to serve. Well-advised you were, Borchamps,
to have been of such firm resolve! You did not then know and may
still be unaware of the chores her perfidious politics were reserving
for you. She told you the Stadtholder was party to her scheme; she
lied; her intention was to have you put that prince out of the way,
and had the attempt failed you would have been a dead man. In
despair after your escape, nevertheless she continued to harbor her
wicked designs for another two years, and finally insisted that I
undertake the murder she was meditating. Had it been a question
merely of an ordinary crime, I would doubtless have executed it,
for crime amuses me; | enjoy the shock it imparts to the mechanism,
its effervescence delights me, and rid as I am of all prejudice, I
give myself over to it without qualms before or regrets afterward;
but a deed so important as that one—well, discretion is the better
part of valor and I followed your example in order that having
declined to be her accomplice, I not become her victim.”
“Charming woman,” said I, putting my hand in Emma’s
bosom, “‘let us banish all ceremony, we are nearly enough ac-
quainted for it to be of no purpose. Let me tell you once again, dear
angel, how very pleased I am to have found you again. Restrained
by the exigent Sophia, we were unable to act in accordance with
what we felt for each other; here, however, nothing hinders us—”
“You say so, my friend; but this woman accompanying you,
might one know who she is?”
“She is my wife.”
And I hasten to recount to my new friend the whole of the
846 > THE MARQUIS DE SADE
London story, and how I whittled the Burlington family down to
the sole survivor now lying sick in another room of this inn. Emma,
a great rascal at heart, saw all the humor in the adventure and
when she was done laughing asked if I would not introduce her to
my tender spouse.
“Surely, you shall not go on dragging her about forever,” she
said to me, “leave her here, I’m a more suitable companion for you
than this prude. And I ask no sacraments from you, not I. I’ve al-
ways detested Church ceremonies. Although noble-born, but a lost
woman through my debauchery and thanks to my attachment to
Sophia, from you I want only the title of mistress and dearest
friend. How are your finances ?”
“In the very best order. I am extremely rich.”
“A pity. I have one hundred thousand crowns and was count-
ing upon offering them to you, thinking thereby to get you some-
what into my power, which would be agreeable to me.”
“I dare say, Emma, and I am touched by your delicacy, but it
is not in this manner you would ever get me into bondage; mine is
too lofty a soul to consent to dependence upon a woman: I must
either dominate her or not use her at all.”
“Why, very well then, I shall be your whore, I like that role;
how much will you pay me a month?”
‘‘What did you get from Sophia ?”
“The value of one hundred French louis.”
“I will give you the same; but you will be faithful? Submis-
sive ?”
““Asa slave.”
“Slavery implies that you be dispossessed of the tokens of
freedom and the means to fail your master. Hand your funds over
to me.”
“Here they are,” and Emma fetched me her casket.
“But, my angel,” said I, raising the lid, “‘you must have stolen
this sum: with one hundred Jouis a month you could not possibly
have composed this fortune, Emma, not at your age.”
‘Do you suppose I left that Messalina without first giving her
treasury a feel?”
“And if I were to do unto thee that which thou hast done ?”’
“Borchamps, I love you, what I have is yours; I am not en-
’
Juliette = 847
trusting my money to you, I am giving it; but this gift and my
favors are not to be had save upon one condition.”
‘And that condition ?”’
“It is that we be this very instant rid of the drab piece of
baggage you are towing across Europe.”
‘You are paying me for her death?”
‘That is what I demand in exchange for my hundred thousand
crowns.”
“Exquisite little minx! The idea is amusing; but the project
must be embellished by a few rather severe episodes.”
“Tll though she is ?”
“But the object is to do her in, is it not ?””
“To be sure.”
‘Well, come along, I shall present you as an irate wife who
demands that I return to her; I shall excuse myself for a fit of
blind passion which, in my embarrassed situation, forced me to
behave in my mysterious manner; you will fulminate; I shall be
obliged to tell her that I am abandoning her, and the poor woman
will die of chagrin, she and the infant inside her.”
“She is pregnant?”
“Indeed she is.”
‘““Why, we shall have a jolly time!” And in Emma’s sparkling
eyes I saw how this villainy was arousing her; the whore is over-
come by emotion, she kisses me, a paroxysm shakes loose her fuck.
... We enter.
So well did we play our parts that the wretched Clotilda
swallowed everything down to the dregs. Emma, witty, malicious,
and a wicked tease, maintained that when I’d deserted her I’d also
robbed her, and that not a button or a handkerchief in the room
belonged by rights to this bedridden adventuress. I agreed that all
this was indubitably so, and my sorrowful wife, only too well aware
of the black situation menacing her, turned her beautiful face away
to hide her weeping.
‘Oh no, sir traitor, I shall not let you out of my sight,” Emma
declared with great energy, “I am not going to budge from here,
for I intend to get my due.”
Supper is brought into the room. Emma and I eat heartily
and call for the best wines in the house while the helpless Clotilda
848 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
to which Philip the Fair put their last Grand Master, Molay,
for the sole purpose of laying hands upon the Order’s property:
“In us you see,” he said to me, “the leaders of that Northern
Lodge which Molay himself instituted even as he awaited his doom
in a cell of the Bastille. If we accept you into our midst it is only
upon the most express condition that, upon the victim about to be
presented to you, you swear to avenge our great founder, and at
the same time to fulfill the clauses of the oath here set forth.
Recite it aloud and intelligibly.”
‘I do hereby swear,” said I, reading from the vellum, “to
exterminate all kings till none remain alive on earth; to wage in-
cessant war against the Catholic religion and the Papacy; to preach
liberty for all the world’s peoples; and to strive to build a universal
republic.”
An awful clap of thunder dinned deafeningly; the pavilion
rattled upon its foundations; the victim rose up through a trap
in the floor, in his two hands lay the poniard with which I was to
smite him; he was a fair youth of sixteen years, entirely nude.
I take the profferred weapon, I drive the blade into his heart.
Brahe comes up with a golden chalice, gathers the blood, has me
drink first thereof, presents the goblet to the others one by one,
and each drinks, pronouncing a barbarous phrase whose meaning
is this: We shall die rather than break faith with one another. The
platform descends, the cadaver disappears, and Brahe resumes his
interrogation.
“You have just now,” says he, “shown yourself worthy of us;
you have seen that we are of the same intrepid stuff we require
in you, and that our wives are likewise dauntless. Are you so care-
less of the crime you have just committed as to be able to employ
it even in your pleasures ?”
I: “It augments them, it electrifies them; I have always re-
garded murder as the soul of libidinous delights; its effects upon
the imagination are enormous, and lubricity is as nought unless
depravity of spirit fuel its fire.”
He: “Do you admit of restrictions in the taking of physical
pleasure?”
I: ‘I know not what they are.”
He: “All sexes, all ages, all conditions and sorts, all degrees
Juliette & 865
of kinship, all manners of enjoying these various individuals, all
this, I say, is then a matter of indifference to you?”
I: “I make no discriminations..”
He: “But you do nonetheless have preference for certain
forms of enjoyment?”
I: “Yes, I am particularly disposed toward the stronger ones,
those which fools dare call antinatural, criminal, ridiculous, scan-
dalous, the unlawful, the illegal kind, the antisocial and ferocious
ones: for those I have a predilection, and they shall always be
the delight of my life.”
“Brother,” said Brahe, “take your place amongst us, you
are received into the Society.”
And when I had sat down, “In asking now,”’ Brahe went on,
“whether your wife’s attitudes and principles correspond to your
own, we refer ourselves only to you.”
“They do. I swear to it in her behalf,” I replied.
“Then heed what I am about to tell you,” the Senator began.
“The Northern Lodge, whose chiefs we are, has a consider-
able following in Stockholm; but the rank and file Masons know
nothing of our behavior, our secrets, our customs, they trust our
leadership and obey our instructions. I have therefore to speak
to you upon but two matters, Brother: our morals and our inten-
tions.
‘These intentions are to overthrow the Swedish throne as well
as every other throne, everywhere, and principally those occupied
by the Bourbons. But our Brothers in various parts of the world
will attend to that; our task is here in our own country. Once
upon the throne of the kings, there shall never have been a tyranny
to equal ours, no despot shall ever have put a thicker blindfold
over the eyes of the people; plunged into essential ignorance, it
shall be at our mercy, blood will flow in rivers, our Masonic
Brethren themselves shall become the mere valets of our cruelties,
and in us alone shall the supreme power be concentrated; all
freedom shall go by the board, that of the press, that of worship,
that simply of thought shall be severely forbidden and ruthlessly
repressed; one must beware of enlightening the people or of lifting
away its irons when your aim is to rule it.
“You, Borchamps, shall not be permitted to share in this
866 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
authority, your foreign origins exclude you therefrom; but you:
shall be entrusted with the command of the armies and above all
the robber bands which, very early in the day, shall spread murder
and rapine across the ler.gth and breadth of Sweden to consolidate
our hold upon the cour.tryside. When the time comes, will you
swear faithful allegiance to us?”
“T swear it in advance.”
‘‘We may then turn to the question of our morals.
“Their depravatior, Brother, is appalling; the foremost of
the moral pledges which bind us, after those political ones I have
just indicated, is mutually to prostitute our wives, our sisters, our
mothers and our children one to the other; to enjoy all those
persons, pell-mell, in the presence of one another and, preferably,
in the manner that God. as they say, punished at Sodom. Victims
of both sexes serve in our orgies, and ’tis upon them falls the brunt
of our desires’ irregulari-y. Is your wife of your own mind touching
these immoralities, and as determined as you in their execution?”
“Be certain of it!’ said Emma.
“That however is not all,” Brahe continued, ‘‘the most
frightful disorders entertain us, there is no excess before which
we hesitate. With us, THE MARQUIS DE SADE
buttocks have just drained out of it; those Brahe presents to me,
and whose anus I sound, quickly make me forget the happiness
of a moment before. I fuck Brahe an uninterrupted half-hour and
only quit him for Volf who has been sodomizing Ulrika, whose
delicate ass obtains my sperm before long. What libertinage! what
foulness of mind and filth of behavior in this Jast-named creature!
Everything voluptuousress can have of the tartest, everything
libertinage contains of the wildest was organized and applied by
this Messalina. Grabbing my prick directly it had discharged, the -
slut did everything under the sun to revive it and lodge it in her
cunt; but I proved invincible. Staunch adherent to the Society’s
laws, I reached the point of threatening Ulrika with denunciation
if she persisted anothe: instant in her attempts to seduce me;
furious, the rascal crammed my device back into her ass and flung
and danced so ardently about that she squirted fuck in every
direction.
While I was thus facking every ass in the room, Emma, just
as bountifully regaled, had not missed a prick; they had all, even
mine, been in and out of her ass, but not all had discharged there;
these were libertines of raark whom a single enjoyment, be it of an
uncommonly fine ass, was not apt to electrify so keenly as to cost
them their fuck, no, they did not part with it as readily as all that;
they every one, for exarnple, buggered me, and from not one of
them did I get sperm. Ericsson, the most licentious of the lot,
might well have fucked fifteen such ones as he had at his disposal,
and it is doubtful whether his prick would have purpled. Young
and vigorous though he was, Brahe, had it not been for the in-
credible episodes wherecf we shall speak anon, would not have
brought matters to their conclusion either. As for Steno, his strug-
gles were over: bewitched by Emma, that voluptuous creature’s
stunning ass had, so he said, sufficed, and his boiling fuck had
flooded it. On the other hand, Volf, more refined in his needs, still
lacking what he required for discharge, had also merely tuned his
instrument, and it was only at supper, which was shortly announced,
that I began to glimpse the essential peculiarities of my new
acolytes’ tastes. This supper was awaiting us in another hall,
where six fair boys of from fifteen to eighteen and six charming
girls of the same age were at hand, naked, to serve us. After a
Juliette % 869
sumptuous repast further orgies were celebrated and now the whole
truth about those Swedish despots’ unruly passions finally came out.
Steno, as we know, had discharged with ease into Emma’s ass;
he nonetheless desired, for the perfection of his ecstasy, that a
young boy suck his mouth amorously and simultaneously finger his
asshole while he himself fucked a man: such was his passion.
To rescue his honor, Ericsson had first to lash the skin off a
pair of young persons, one male, the other female: without
this preliminary he could never get anywhere.
There was Volf who would have himself embuggered while,
for a solid hour he plied a cat-o’-nine-tails against the ass in which
he proposed to discharge. Otherwise, no erection worth speak-
ing of.
More mischievous yet, Brahe was not disposed to ejaculate
until he had maimed a victim hard by the ass he coveted.
These passions were unfolded between fruit and cheese.
Wine, hope, ambition, pride went to everyone’s head, all inhibitions
were forgotten; the women, positively uncontrollable, were the
first to set examples of the disorderliness which, by the time the
evening ended, had cost six victims their lives.
As we were about to take our leave, Steno, in the name of
the Society expressing his joy at having us in its midst, asked me
if I were by any chance in need of a sum. ..; I thought it wisest
to say no, at least for the moment. And for a week I heard nothing ©
more from my new friends. Then, on the morning of the eighth
day, Steno came to see me.
‘We are going on a prowl tonight,” said he, “the women shall
not be along; do you care to join us?”
‘What have you in mind?”
‘Some random crimes. We mean to do a little stealing, —
pillaging, assassinating, burning. In a word, to commit some
horrors; are you with us?”
“Surely.”
“Meet us at eight o’clock at Brahe’s house in the suburbs;
we leave from there.”
A delicious supper was awaiting us, and twenty-five troopers, |
chosen for superiority of member, were, in spending themselves in |
our asses, to impart to us the energy necessary for the projected
870 & THE MARQUIS DE SADE
expedition. We were fucked forty times apiece, which was more
than I had ever been before at a single tourney. These preliminaries
left us all afire, in such a state of agitation that we'd have taken a
knife to the throat of Almighty God himself had the bugger-
fucker existed.
Escorted by ten of the stoutest champions in the band, there
we are roaming the streets like furies, blindly assaulting everybody
in our path: as one by one our victims were robbed and killed,
their bodies were tossed into the canals. If we stopped anything
worth the bother, we'd rape it first, murder it afterward. We
broke our way into several humble dwellings, which we devastated
once we were done terrorizing, mutilating, and finally butchering
their inhabitants; we permitted ourselves every imaginable and
every nameless execration, and left screams, flames, and blood in
our wake. We found the patrol, we attacked it, put it to flight;
and ’twas only when we were glutted on atrocities that we wended
our way homeward as ‘he sun rose to shine upon the debris left
by our scandalous orgies.
Needless to say, we had it printed in the press that such were
the frightful abuses the government was perpetrating, and that so
long as the royal regime prevailed over the Senate and the law,
no fortune would be in safety, no citizen would walk in peace
abroad or breathe in peace at home. The people believed what they
read and sighed for a revolution. Aye, so it is the poor fools are
hoodwinked, so it is the common population is at once made the
pretext and the victim of its leaders’ wickedness: always weak and
always stupid, sometimes it is made to want a king, sometimes a
republic, and the prosperity its agitators offer under the one
system or the other is never but the phantom created by their
interests or by their passions.°
However, the hour was approaching, such was the desire for
a change that this was che sole subject of conversations. A more
discerning and an abler politician than my associates, at the very
moment they were convincing themselves that success was at hand,
I saw that the wind lay in the other direction; calmer than they,
5 See, in La Fontaine, the ingenious fable “The Frogs Who Seek a King.” Un-
happy inhabitants of this globe, there’s the story of you one and all.
Juliette % 871
I sounded out opinion, and from the immense quantity of people
I found firmly attached to the king and his royalists I drew the
conclusion that the senatorial revolution was destined to be still-
born. It was then that, faithful to the principles of egoism and
villainy to which I have been devoted all my life, I resolved to
change camp on the spot, and inhumanly to betray the one into
which I had been received. Of the two it was the weaker, that was
obvious; it was neither goodness on the one side nor badness on the
other that decided me, force was the only deciding factor, and
it was only with force I wished to keep company. I would have
unfailingly stayed with the senators had I believed their faction
not the better (I knew perfectly well that it was the more vicious),
but the more powerful; the evidence convinced me that it was not:
I turned traitor. This, it will perhaps be said, was infamous; so
be it. But infamy meant little to me when my welfare or safety
lay in treason. Man is born to pursue his happiness on earth, and
for no other purpose; all the vain considerations opposed thereto,
all the prejudices which hinder him are better flouted than heeded,
for it is not the esteem of others that will render him happy;
he is happy only if he is so in his own opinion, and it will never be
from laboring toward his prosperity, whatever the road he chooses
for getting there, that he will be able to lose self-respect.
I request private audience with Gustavus; I obtain it; I reveal
everything to him, I name those who have sworn to dethrone him,
I give him my word not to leave Stockholm until he has investigated
the conspiracy I allege, and I ask no more than a million by way
of reward if my warnings prove founded and exact; eternal im-
prisonment if false. The monarch’s vigilance, aided by my dis-
closures, averts the catastrophe. On the day the insurrection was
to break out, Gustavus was up and in the saddle before dawn:
he sent the people home, isolated the plotters, won over the mili-
tary, seized the arsenal, and all that without shedding a drop of
blood. This was not at all what I had been counting upon; gloating
in advance over the terrible consequences I fancied my treachery
would have, I too was up with the sun and gone out to see all those
heads fall: the imbecile Gustavus spared them every one. I was
aghast. Oh, said I to myself, how I regret having broken faith
with those who at least would have drenched this kingdom in
872 > THE MARQUIS DE SADE
blood. I have been deceived; they accused this prince of being a
despot, and look at the clumsy oaf! he is meek as a lamb when I
give him the means and the occasion to fortify his tyranny! Bah,
a plague upon the fellow!
‘“‘Ah, mark my words,” said I to all those who cared to listen
to me, and they were not many, “your prince is jeopardizing the
future instead of taking this precious opportunity to plant his
scepter, as he ought to do, upon a hill of corpses. Brief will be his
reign, believe me, and unhappy his end.’”*
I was not however obliged to remind him of his promise;
Gustavus himself summoned me to his palace and along with my
fee of a million gave me the order to get out of his States im-
mediately.
“I pay traitors,” he said to me, “they are useful, I need them;
but I despise them and, once they have served their purpose, prefer
to have them out of my sight.”
What does it matter to me, said I to myself as I went away,
whether this clod esteems or detests me; he has money, that is what
I was after. As for the character he reproaches in me, he'll not
correct it: I delight in treason and am going to commit a little
more of it very soon.
Ten minutes later I fly to Steno.
“My wife let it out,” I tell him, “she is a monster; I have
just learned the entire story, she received money for this horror.
Thanks to her treachery [ have orders to leave Sweden, I shall go,
for I must. But before I do I'd like to settle my score with her.
The town is quiet, nothing prevents us from meeting together this
evening, let us do so; and let us punish the creature, that is all
I ask of you.”
Steno consents. I conduct Emma to the Society without her
knowing for what reason it is gathering; all the men, all the
women rise in fury agairist her whom I accuse, unanimously con-
demn her to the most atrocious death. Emma, bewildered at such
charges, seeks to recriminate against me; she is reduced to silence.
While lubricious scenes are enacted around the scaffold raised
for her destruction, the luckless wretch, entrusted to my tender
mercies, is flayed alive, and one by one I slowly grill each part of
6 He was the one Ankerstrém killed in 1789.
Juliette & 873
her whence I have removed the skin. Throughout it all I was
being sucked, and my four friends, each fucking a bardash, were
whipped by their wives whom young girls were cunt-sucking; never
in all my days had I discharged so deliciously. The operation over
with, the company mingled; ‘twas then that Amelia, Volf’s wife,
accosted me.
“I like your firmness,” she declared. “It was long ago I
noticed this woman was not the sort you need; I am more suitable
for you, Borchamps. But I am going to surprise you: swear to me
that I too shall someday become your victim. I cannot help it, my
imagination is what it is: delirious. My husband is too fond of me
to satisfy it; I can stand no more: since the age of fifteen the
idea of perishing the victim of libertinage’s cruel passions has been
gnawing my brain. No, I do not want to die tomorrow, my extrava-
gance does not go that far. But that is how I want to die, and only
in that manner. To become, as I expire, the occasion of a crime—
ah, my head reels at the thought; and in the morning I leave
Stockholm at your side, if you vow to satisfy me.”
Deeply stirred by this so uncommon proposition, I protest to
Amelia that she will have cause to be content with me: arrange-
ments are made, she slips away to join me before the night is over,
and at sunrise we set forth from the city together.
I went out of Stockholm with riches that by now had become
immense: I had inherited from my wife, I had the King’s million,
and my new friend handed over to me a further six hundred
thousand francs, which she had stolen from her husband and
insisted that I take.
Saint Petersburg, Amelia and I agreed, was to be our desti-
nation, and thither we took ourselves. She demanded that we
marry, I consented; and it being needless, in view of our means,
that we deny ourselves anything we desired, we rented a splendid
mansion in the finest quarter of the city. Valets, retinue, equipages,
choice wines and good meat, we stinted not, and soon the flower
of society was honored. to obtain entry to my wife’s house. The
Russians are fond of display, lavishness, luxury; but, in everything
taking their guidance from us, just as soon as a French lord appears
874 > THE MARQUIS DE SADE
with some magnificence in their midst, they all rush off to copy him.
The Empress’ minister came in person to invite me to present
myself to his sovereign: and knowing I was born for great adven-
tures, I accepted his propositions.
Always familiar with those who pleased her, Catherine asked
me several particular questions about France, and my replies having
satisfied her, she gave me permission to pay her frequent court.
Thus did two years pass, during which we, Amelia and I, swam
in all that noble city could offer in the way of pleasures. A note
from the Empress finally clarified the reasons lying behind her
willingness to see me so often. In this missive she besought me to
accompany the man who delivered it to me: at nightfall he would
escort me to one of her country residences, situated a few leagues
outside the town. Amelia, whom I told of this stroke of good luck,
did all she could to dissuade me, and was much aggrieved to see
me set forth.
‘Concerning your person,” the Empress began as soon as
we were alone together, “I have gathered all the information
necessary. I know of your behavior in Sweden, and whatever
others may have said alout it, or thought, I strongly approve it.
For you may be perfectly certain, my good young Frenchman,
that it is wiser to stand for kings than against, theirs is the better
side: those who embrace it and to it remain faithful are never
sorry. Behind a mask of popularity Gustavus sought to fortify
despotism’s position on is throne; exposing the conspiracy threaten-
ing to foil his designs, you served despotism well; I praise you
therefor. Your age, your mien, what they publish of your wit,
everything appertaining to you excites my interest; and to your
fortune I may be able to make solid contributions, if you rally to
my projects... .”
“Madame!” said ], truly touched by this woman’s charms,
superb though forty years old, ‘‘the good fortune of pleasing Your
Majesty is reward enough for the services she enables one to render
her, and in advance I swear that her orders shall henceforth be
the duties cherished of my heart and my heart’s sole delights.”
Catherine gave me her hand, I kissed it with feeling; a fichu
slips aside, and the world’s most gorgeous bosom appears before
my eyes; Catherine, covering it over again, speaks of her thinness,
Juliette -&» 875
as if any living man had ever spied anything plumper, more de-
licious, than what I have just had a glimpse of. When the Empress
observed that I could not contain my enthusiasm, she soon allowed
me to convince myself that all her other features matched the
quality of the sample I had just detected. Eh, my friends, what
else would you have from me except the truth? I showed prick
to the Empress before the day was out; and as she found me
infinitely to her liking I was promptly admitted to the honors of
the imperial bed. Few women of her day could rival Catherine
for beauty; fleshly parts and forms are not more richly made nor
more prettily turned; and when I’d come to know a little of her
temperament I ceased to wonder at the multitude of my prede-
cessors. All manners of enjoyment were desired by Catherine, and
you will of course understand that I refused her none of them:
her ass especially, the fairest ass I’d seen in my life, caused me no
end of sweetest comforts and cheer.
“These little malpractices are very prevalent in Russia,” she
told me, “and I am careful not to proscribe them; the size of this
swarming population is responsible for the wealth of the nobility,
and their power interferes with mine, I must use every means to
weaken it; this one is of effective value and amuses me too, for
I like vice and its practitioners; promoting it is among my prin-
ciples. I could easily prove to any sovereign that he can ill afford
not to do as I. Borchamps, I am enchanted to see you treating my
behind with such deference and attention”—I was kissing it even
as she spoke—‘‘and declare to you that it is at your disposal when-
ever you are of a mind to fuck it... .”
I made much use, that evening, of the license granted me.
It was here the Empress, who was not altogether without
prudence, drew the line during our first interview, she did not open
herself farther; the second transpired a week later, and in the
same way. But at the third Catherine spoke to me in this wise:
“T now feel confident enough in you to associate you with my plans.
Before disclosing them, however, I require a sacrifice of you, and I
want you to subscribe to it this instant. Who isthe pretty Swede
you have in your train, Borchamps ?”’
“She is my wife.”
“Be that as it may, I do not want to see her alive tomorrow.”
876 2 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“The swelling prick you are holding in your hand, Princess,”
was my reply, ‘‘is ready to sign her death warrant in your ass. .. .”
“Good,” said Catherine, lodging my instrument inside her,
“but I am cruel; this woman has roused my jealousy to a dangerous
point, and since I wish her to endure sufferings proportional to the
uneasiness she has caused me, I wish that, while you and I look on,
she be tonged tomorrow, with heated pincers; every quarter of an
hour the procedure will be interrupted in order that she be sus-
pended in this or that raanner and half-broken on the wheel; my
executioners will fuck her at each stage, I'll have her bathed in
quicklime before all the life is gone out of her. In the meantime
I shall be examining your countenance: if you prove steadfast,
brave, the secret shall be revealed to you. Otherwise, it shall
not be.” :
Lovely though Amelia was, two years of enjoying her had
furiously calmed my desires. In her there were overmuch tender-
ness, overmuch affection, and a mind far less cruel than at first
I had supposed. What she had told me about the way in which
she wanted to end her days, this, the more I pondered it, had
simply been an effort on her part to be ingratiating; it did not
correspond to her real feelings. What was more, Amelia was with-
out all the gracious coridescension I expected in a woman; she
refused to suck me, and as for her behind, while I do not for a
moment deny that it had had its very great charms, I would ask
you, does a woman’s still have any after you've fucked it for two
years? Everything was therefore promised to Catherine, who was
greatly entertained by the possibility of satisfying the desire my
wife had once expressed touching on the death she wished to die:
the very next day, Amelia was brought to one of the Empress’
houses, a very obscure one and far away from the city, and pre-
sented to Her Majesty.
There is no imagining the transports of this woman, who was
accustomed to seeing everything and everyone yield to her will.
There is no believing the harshness, the tyranny she displayed
toward the unlucky Swedish girl; she exacted the most debasing
services from her; had A.melia lick and frig her, submitted her to
the most trying vexations, and then, surrendering her to her
executioners, the monster watched her actually undergo every one
Juliette 3 877
of the tortures prescribed in the plan she had elaborated. She
insisted that I embugger the hapless victim during the intervals;
such was her delirium, she demanded that I fuck the executioners
even as they were at work torturing Amelia; and pleased to see
my prick keep at an even stand the whole while, of my character
she formed the opinion that answered to her desires. My poor
bedraggled wife expired after eleven hours of varied and violent
agonies. Catherine discharged twenty times at least; she herself
lent the executioners a hand; and she said that a week hence, she
would unfold her grand scheme to me, and I was dismissed.’
Hitherto I had been the Empress’ guest at her country
establishments only; this time it was into the Winter Palace I had
the honor to be admitted.
“From what I have observed of you, Borchamps,” Catherine
declared to me, “I can be in no doubt about the energy of your
character. No longer under the influence of childhood prejudices
toward what fools call crime, the attitude you exhibit is plain and ©
enlightened; but if this mode of action is frequently useful to |
ordinary folk, how often it becomes indispensable to rulers and
to statesmen! The private individual, laying sturdy foundations |
for his worldly well-being, has seldom to go beyond one or two |
crimes in the course of his existence; those persons who oppose his _
desires are in number so few that to combat them he needs little |
in the way of arms. But we, Borchamps, perpetually surrounded |
by flatterers seeking only to deceive us, or by powerful enemies
whose unique aim is to destroy us, how many are the different
circumstances under which we are obliged to employ crime! A
sovereign who is jealous of his prerogatives ought never to go to |
sleep without his mace under his pillow.
“The famous Peter fancied he was performing a great service
for Russia when he struck off the chains of a people who had never |
known nor cherished anything but its bondage; but Peter, more
mindful of his reputation than of the lot of those who were to |
follow him on his throne, did not realize he was tarnishing mon- |
archy’s diadem without making the people happier. And what in
7 Those who have had a close view of this woman, famous as much for her wit |
as for her misdeeds, will here recognize her sufficiently well to agree that this
portrait of Catherine could only have been painted from nature.
878 2° THE MARQUIS DE SADE
fact did this great change he instituted gain him? He increased
the territories of Russia; but what could the greater or lesser
extent of his dominions matter to him, who lived only upon a few
acres of it? Why, at great expense, import arts and sciences from
abroad and plant them in a native soil where he wished to see
corn grow ? What pleased him in the semblance of a freedom which
only added to the weight of his subjects’ shackles? It may be un-
hesitatingly afirmed: Peter was as certainly the downfall of Russia
as will be her liberator he who reimposes the yoke upon her: en-
lightened Russia perceives what she lacks, Russia restored to
slavery would see nothng beyond her physical needs. Now, in
which of the two situations is man more fortunate: in the one
where, the blindfold removed from his eyes, he is able to discern
all his privations? or in the other, where his ignorance prevents
him from suspecting any of them? These bases once established,
does one deny that the most violent despotism better befits the
subject than the fullest independence? And if you grant me this
point—which I think it impossible to contest—do you blame me
for resorting to every conceivable device in order to arrange affairs
in Russia as they were before the baneful advent of Peter?
“Basilovitch reigned as I mean to reign; his tyranny is the
model I propose to adoot. He used to amuse himself, they say,
dashing out his captives’ brains, raping their wives and daughters,
mutilating them with his own hands, rending them into pieces, and.
after that burning them; he assassinated his son; at Novgorod he
punished an insurrection by having three thousand human beings
thrown into the Volga; he was the Nero of Russia. Well, I shall
be her Theodora or her Messalina; whatever the horror that en-
ables me to strengthen my hold on the throne, I shall not falter,
and the first of those I must consummate is the killing of my son.
You, Borchamps, are the man J have in mind to accomplish this
political atrocity. He arnong my compatriots whom I were to
select for the task migh: have a sentimental attachment to this
prince, and instead of an accomplice I would be engaging my be-
trayer; only too well I recall the legitimate grievances I had of the
Russian to whom I entrusted the slaying of my husband; I want
no more such unpleasant experiences. Nothing necessitates that it
Juliette = 879
be one of my countrymen whom I charge with these great commis-
sions; a remnant of the loyalty he imagines due one of his nation’s
princes could deter him, and crime is always bungled when preju-
dices are operative. With you I have no such fears; I have here
the poison I want you to employ. . . . I have spoken, Borchamps;
how do you decide ?”
“Madame,” I replied to this woman whose greatness of char-
acter has been admitted universally, “even had I lost the taste for
crime I was born with, even had crime ceased to be my element and
very sustenance, this one that you propose would flatter me, and the
mere idea of ridding the world of a meek and debonair prince in
order to preserve there the tyranny whereof nobody is a more
zealous partisan than I, this idea, Madame, would alone suffice to
cause me to undertake, joyfully, the project you outline to me:
count upon my obedience.” :
“This profound resignation makes you mine forever,” said
Catherine, folding me in her arms. “I intend, tomorrow, to treat
you to an orgy of delights, to make all your senses boil. I want you
to behold me in pleasure’s throes; and I want to behold you in
them; and when we are both very merry and very high from lewd
sights and lewd doings, you shall be given the venom that is to put
an end to the abhorrent existence of that contemptible creature I
failed to avoid bringing into this world.”
The rendezvous was at the country house where I had seen
the Empress previously. She was awaiting me in a magical boudoir,
a veritable garden where, in the warm air, exotic flowers were
blooming in mahogany benches agreeably scattered throughout
this exquisite chamber. Turkish sofas, surrounded by mirrors and
beneath mirrors affixed to the ceiling, cried to be put to voluptuous
use. From there a more lugubrious alcove was visible; in it was to
be seen a quartet of twenty-year-old youths. They were in irons,
helpless, held at the mercy of Catherine’s unbridled passions.
‘“‘What you are looking at in there,” the Empress said to me,
‘fs the climax to the entertainment. A preliminary series of ordi-
nary pleasures will fettle us gradually; we shall not come to grips
with those boys until our fever has attained its final pitch. Would
victims of my sex please you better ?”
880 + THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“Why, tis a matter of indifference to me,” I assured her; “I
will share your pleasures, and whatever the individual upon whom
murder is committed, it is always certain to stimulate my senses.”
“Ah, Borchamps, nothing else in the world is worth the
candle! It is so sweet to behave unnaturally—”
“But what is more natural than murder ?”’
“T know; but it constitutes an infraction of the law, and I
adore the idea.”
‘*The law? What can she care for the law who makes the law?
Tell me: has Your Highness already enjoyed these four fine young
men?”
“Would they be in my chains otherwise ?”
‘Do they realize what fate lies in store for them?”
‘“‘Not yet; we shall announce it while utilizing them. I shall
pronounce the sentence of each while your prick is in his ass.”
“IT would also like :hat to be the moment when you carry it
out.”
“Ah, you're a villain, an adorable villain!’ Catherine ex-
claimed.
And the lust-objects appointed for the impending games ap-
peared forthwith. They were six lasses of fifteen or sixteen years,
of rarest beauty; and six men, each five feet ten inches tall, all with
members as thick as your forearm and at least as long.
“Install yourself there where you have a clear view of me,”
Catherine instructed me, ‘‘and consider my pleasures, keeping your
distance; frig yourself if you like, but do not disturb me. I am
going to taste the supreme delights of offering you a display of
thorough whorishness; cynicism is part of my character, I like to
make a discreditable parade of myself, scandal excites my mind.”
I do as I am told. The girls undress their queen, then shower
her with the prettiest caresses. Three of them suck, one her mouth,
another her cunt, the last her asshole; they are #eplaced at their
posts by the other three; “he first team relieves the second; and the
exercise was conducted at a very smart pace; they picked up withes
and bestowed a gentle scourging upon Catherine, each toiling over
a different part of her body. The men stepped forward and while
they were at work, this or that girl would now and again approach
Juliette > 881
to kiss mouths and stroke members. When the Tsarina’s body was
all a bright scarlet she had herself rubbed with spirits; then, sitting
on the face of one of the little maids, who was ordered to tongue
her vent, she received a second, kneeling, between her thighs, who
sucked her clitoris; the third sucked her mouth; the fourth, her
teats; and she frigged the remaining two, one with either hand.
The six lads, now grouping themselves likewise, put prickpoint to
everything of the six girls’ behinds they could reach. No, I had |
never beheld anything so voluptuous as this exquisite ensemble; its |
maneuvers cost Catherine a discharge. I heard her moan and utter
blasphemies in Russian, it was her custom.
Another scene was enacted immediately. It was she who now |
frigged the girls, each in her turn; but she sucked only their funda- |
ments; and while she was sucking them, the men were tickling hers. |
This calling for the participation of only two subjects, the ten —
others did before her eyes what she herself was doing. After a —
little everything changes again. Now she stuffs a prick into her cunt _
and, lying atop him who is fucking her so, she offers her ass to |
another who sodomizes her mightily; to left and to right she chafes _
a prick upon a girl’s buttocks; he who embuggers her is flogged,
and all the rest cluster around her, in suggestive attitudes. Thus
did the six men fray her cuntwise and asswardly; after which, she
served the six girls up for fucking, all by herself she fitted pricks
into avenues of pleasure, sucked each engine as it emerged from |
this breach or that, meanwhile herself titillating the clitoris and
kissing the mouth of the girl; she sprawls upon the sofa and has |
herself mounted by the men, one after another: each, raising her
thighs, was to tup her in front and behind; as this was going for-
ward, each of the girls had to squat above her brow, kiss the man
serving her, and then piss on her face. During this scene the rascal |
shed another great quantity of fuck. It was at its conclusion that |
she summoned me. I was at the end of my tether, Tantalus’ suf-
ferings were as nothing next to mine, and to see me thus was what
the whore had wanted.
“Are you stiff?” she inquired ironically.
“Have a look at it, slut!’ I stormed.
That insolent reply pleased her beyond words.
882 < THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“Why then,” she went on, turning around, “my ass is at your
disposal. It’s full of fuck, you can deposit yours in there along
with the rest.”
And the saucy creature sucked one of her men’s asses while
I sodomized her. Ass after ass was presented to her lips; I handled
the asses of the girls while I fucked away, and despite all I could
do, my seed escaped me. She forbade me to leave her ass, then
commanded the men to fuck me back into fucking form; her orders
to the girls were to giv me their buttocks for kissing, and their
cunts to her for tonguing; so it was that three times in succession
my fuck flowed.
“‘Let’s perform some cruelties now,” Catherine proposed; “I
am spent, I must resort to severities.”
Each man then got down on all fours, a girl got astride him,
so that each couple offeed a pair of vulnerable asses. Catherine
armed herself with a whip of the kind executioners use in Russia
for administering the knout,® and with her royal hand the trollop
lashed all those fair behinds so thoroughly that blood lay in puddles
on the floor; I was whipping her at the same time, but simply with
birch rods, and after every twenty cuts I had to kneel behind her
and lick her anus.
“Tam going,” she told me, “to martyrize all these individuals,
but in a rather more serious manner; once I have had my pleasure
from them I propose to put them to no very pretty death... .”
The men seize the g rls, spread their legs wide apart and hold
them thus; Catherine sends whistling blows of her whip into the
poor souls’ gaping vaginis, from which she fetches forth streams
of blood. Next, the girls lay hold of the men and Catherine plies
her scourge upon their pricks and balls.
‘What concern can any of that be to me now?” she was ask-
ing. ““Drained and limp, :t’s worthless, there’s nothing to be done
with such tripe but feed it to worms; frolic with these individuals,
8 This whip is fashioned from a bull’s pizzle; to it are attached three thongs of
moose hide. A single stroke draws blood: these instruments are of incomparable
utility to those who cherish, either actively or passively, the pleasures of flagellation.
To increase their effectiveness, steel tips may be fitted to the thongs; it then becomes
possible to remove flesh virtually without effort; one hundred strokes applied by a
vigorous arm will kill anyone. One such whip, more or less studded, is in the pos-
session of every voluptuous Russian.
Juliette 3} 883
Borchamps, they're yours and I'll take my turn watching you.”
Directed and encouraged by me, the girls bring the men’s
members aloft again and I am fucked another two times by each
of them; I push my prick into all those dozen fundaments, I ar-
range various tableaux, and Catherine masturbates while observ-
ing me.
“That will do,” says she, “let us move on to more important
matters.”
The victims entered; but what was my astonishment at seeing
one of those young men so closely resemble the Empress’ son that
for a moment I could believe it was the Tsarevitch himself.
“I should hope,” Catherine said to me upon noticing my sur-
prise, “that you are able to read my intentions.”
“Gauging your mind by the standard of my own,” was my
answer, “I take it that this is the person upon whom we are going
to test the poison you have selected for the young man who could
easily be his twin.”
“Exactly,” Catherine admitted; “I shall be deprived of the
pleasure of witnessing my son’s agonies, this fellow’s will give me
an image of them. My illusion will be agreeable; I'll discharge you
perfect floods.”
“Delicious mind,” I cried, “what a pity you are not the whole
earth’s queen, and I your prime minister !”
“‘Assuredly,” said the Empress, “we'd achieve a great many
wicked things together, and it would be a planet inhabited by our
victims... .”
Before anything else Catherine had herself fucked by those
four ill-starred young men while I embuggered them and the dozen
other subjects were either flogging or frigging us, or adopting ob-
scene poses.
“The first six men with whom we began our fucking,” the
Empress told me, “are my ordinary executioners; you shall see
them in action upon that pretty quartet. As for these women, does
your lubricity doom any of them? If so, point them out now and I
shall dismiss the rest so that we can quietly amuse ourselves con-
templating the destruction of these unfortunates.”
Two of those charming creatures having made a strong im-
pression upon me, I designated them for death, and then only four-
884 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
teen of us remained: six executioners, a like number of victims, the
Tsarina and I.
The living image of Catherine’s son was the first victim to
appear on the stage. I myself presented him the fatal drink whose
effects were not felt until half an hour later; by then we had both,
and in every manner, enjoyed him fairly to shreds; when we were
done, his pains began, and they were terrifying. Ten minutes after
his first convulsions the wretch expired, before our avid gazes; and
during the spectacle, Catherine had herself embuggered uninter-
ruptedly. Then she had each of the other young men one after the
other bound fast atop her body: she pecked at them, she frigged
them, while the executioners, into whose ranks the whore had in-
corporated me, hacked and slashed those knaves to mincemeat as
they squirmed and thrashed upon her; the torments we subjected
them to were beyond namber and example. The two girls I had
asked leave to execute ty myself perished under treatment just as
rigorous as that which :he men had undergone, and I dare say I
may even have improved upon the horrors the Empress had or-
dered. I opened the cunt of one of them and stuck fifty or sixty
minikins into the walls of her vagina; then I fucked her. Each
thrust of my prick, driving those tiny pins in to the head, wrung
piercing shrieks from the unhappy creature, and Catherine avowed
she had never invented anything so delightful.
The corpses were removed, and Catherine and I sat down to
a private supper; we were both naked. She waxed very passionate,
bestowed unstinting praise upon my rigidity of prick and principle,
and for me foresaw the most brilliant future at her Court once I
had brought about her son’s death. The poison was entrusted to
me, I promised to take action on the morrow. Twice again did I
fuck Catherine the Great in the ass, and we parted.
For quite some time I had been the young prince’s familiar;
Catherine had, on purpose, encouraged those frequentations; she
had even wanted me to frig myself in that young man’s company,
in order to excite her lewdness by the details I would give her con-
cerning the person of this child her rage doomed. The téte-a-téte
had taken place; on another occasion Catherine, in hiding, had even
watched us indulge in a bout of buggery. This liaison favored the
Juliette & 885
carrying out of our plan. The Tsarevitch, as was his wont, came
one morning to take breakfast with me, and it was then the blow ©
was struck. But from long exposure to his mother’s attempts on his
life, the young prince had made a rule of never eating anything
in town without swallowing some antidote as soon as he felt the
faintest signs of an indisposition. Thus, our perfidious scheme
came to nought; and the unjust Catherine, immediately suspecting
me of having lost my nerve, greeted me with invectives and had
me arrested as I left her palace. You know that Siberia is the fate
of all this cruel woman’s state prisoners; my holdings were confis-
cated, my personal effects seized, I was led off to that horrible place
of exile; there, like the others, I had to turn over a dozen animal
skins to the commander every month, and when I failed to do so,
was flogged to ribbons. Siberia was the grim school where I con-
verted this punishment into a kind of need which has become so
violent in me that, for my health’s sake, I absolutely cannot forego
having myself whipped once a day.®
Upon arriving in those remote parts I was given a hut whose
former occupant had just died after fifteen years of detention. It
was divided into three rooms; light entered them through windows
of oiled paper. It was built of pine, the only floor was a deep layer
of old fishbones, which shone like ivory. The roof was covered over,
rather picturesquely, by the foliage of the trees growing around.
For security against the incursions of wild animals the place was
surrounded by a ditch and a palisade of thick stakes reinforced by
horizontal planks; the upper ends of those stakes were sharpened
to a point, so that one was protected as though by a fence of spears,
and when the outer gate was shut one was quite as safe as in a
little fortress. Inspecting the hut I came upon the former tenant’s
larder: it contained dry biscuits, salted reindeer flesh, some earthen-
ware jugs of ale; that was all. Such was the joyless abode to which,
after my day of hunting, I would return, to weep over the injustice
®8This habit is so compelling that its addicts are unable to do without whipping,
and were they to deprive themselves of it, it well might be to their peril. Just prior
to those moments when they customarily repeat the ceremony, they are subject to
itchings so extreme that sound thrashing constitutes their sole hope of relief. See
Abbé Boileau’s history of the Flagellants; and the excellent translation Mercier
de Compiégne has given us of Meibomius.
886 << THE MARQUIS DE SADE
of monarchs and the brutal unkindness of fortune. Nearly ten
years did I spend in this cruel retirement, having no company save
that of a few other luckless souls in the same plight as I.
One of them, Hungarian by birth, an utterly unprincipled man
and who was called Tergowitz, appeared to be the only person
there with whom I had anything in common. He at least had a
rational approach to crime; the others committed it like the ani-
mals they tracked in the awful Siberian forest. Tergowitz alone,
instead of soliciting the compassion of God, generally thought to
be the cause of our woes, confined himself to cursing the deity
every day; although he was guilty of every crime under the sun,
his iron soul afforded no room to regrets, and if he was sorry about
artything, it was to be obliged, owing to the circumstances we were
in, to neglect his penchants. Like myself, Tergowitz was nearing
thirty; his face was agreeable, and the first thing our exchange of
confidences led to was an evening of embuggering each other.
“(Mark you,” explained the Hungarian as soon as we were
finished, ‘‘it’s not the absence or need of women that drives me to
what I have just done, but simply taste. I idolize men and abhor
females; even if we hac three million of them here, I’d not touch
a one.”
“Tell me,” I asked my comrade, “‘is there anyone else in this
miserable region whom we might associate in our sodomite pleas-
ures ?””
“Yes,” said Tergawitz; “not far from here dwells a Pole
named Voldomir, fifty-s x years old, as handsome a man as there’s
anywhere to be found . . . and as fanatic a bugger; he has been in
these wastelands for eighteen years; he is passionately fond of me
and, I’m sure, will be most willing to become acquainted with you.
Borchamps, let’s the three of us join forces and get ourselves out
of this melancholy part of the world.”
That same day we went to find the Pole. He lived fifty versts”®
away: someone that distance from you is your neighbor in Siberia.
Voldomir, exiled for horrible crimes committed in Russia, struck
me as a very attractive person indeed, but of remarkable ferocity ;
his manner of address was gruff, flintlike, and misanthropy seemed
10 Fifty versts make about thirty-five miles.
Juliette THE MARQUIS DE SADE
then his two daughters; the same father will lead them forward;
you will decree a torture for each of these individuals, but a mild
and simple torture for a start: our entertainments are to last for
quite some time, hence the procedure must be by degrees. I shall
take note of the sentences you pronounce, and they will be executed
the instant you have completed your discharge.”
Positions are tak2n, but my wicked cohorts wait until my
brain is reeling from pleasure before sending the victims up to me.
Rosine appears first; I order her brought near; I examine her in
minute detail and, fincling her bosom superb, proclaim that her
breasts shall be whipped. Francisco follows, I observe the beauty
of his hinder parts, ’tis upon his buttocks the lash is to fall. Chris-
tine crawls forward, I condemn her to eat the turd of the first one
among us who may nappen to wish to shit. And the young
Ernelinde, whose charraing countenance affects me, will get a pair
of slaps from each of us.
“Are you about to discharge, Juliette?” inquires Borchamps,
whom my two tribades are overwhelming with obscene attentions.
“Yes, by Jesus, I can contain myself no longer—oh, Carleson,
your prick is performiny: wonders!”
“There’s the signal,” says the captain; “let us carry out the
first round of sentences. Borghese will judge next.”
All the penalties I have imposed are undergone; but, by a
wise decision, they are inflicted by some woman other than she who
pronounces them. So it is Clairwil who, this time, puts my orders
into effect, and as she is of a mind to be rid of the fuck deposited
in her ass, ’tis her excrement Christine swallows. Ah, what ardor
the whore then puts into fustigating Rosine’s fair breasts; by the
thirtieth stroke she has bloodied them both, and the vixen kisses
the wounds her ferocity has opened; getting to Francisco’s excellent
ass, it is with undiminished fury the rascal lashes it.
“Your turn now, Borghese,” says the captain. “I am in the
hope,” he adds, “that Sbrigani, realizing our need of his weapon,
has not dulled it too soon.”
“Let the sight cheer you,” said Sbrigani, from my behind
removing a stiff and unruly device and the next instant plunging
it to the hilt in Borghese’s ass, “and I shall proceed just as cir-
Juliette & 917
cumspectly with this one. Count upon it, captain, Ill not discharge
save in the last extremity.”
Borghese sits in judgment; | become the executioner.
“Increased severity,” says the captain, “remember, it’s step
by step to lead them gradually to death—”’
“To death!’’ exclaimed Rosine. “Just heaven! What have I
done to merit this ?”
“Had you merited death, buggeress,” said Carleson, sodom-
izing Borchamps, who nests in Raimonde’s ass the while he tongues
Elise’s; “‘yes, fuck my eyes, had you merited it, whore, we'd con-
demn you to something else. We here have the greatest respect
for vice and the mightiest abhorrence for everything resembling
virtue; firmly wrought principles found this way of thinking, and
with your approval, my dear, we shall not deviate a hairsbreadth
from our creed.”
“Come along, Borghese, pronounce,’
energetically fucked by his favorite.
“Rosine,” the hot-tempered Olympia announced, ‘“‘will receive
from each of us half a dozen pricks from a bodkin here and there
upon her person; the comely Francisco will have his buttocks
bitten by his father, his member by all the ladies; the executioner
will then administer twenty blows of a stick upon the back of
Christine and will break two fingers on each of Ernelinde’s hands.”
These punishments are begun by me: after having six times
run the needle-sharp instrument well into Rosine’s plump breasts,
I pass it to my friends, who one by one wield it upon the most
sensitive areas of that beautiful body; her frightful husband dis-
tinguishes himself, ‘tis inside her vagina the mischievous fellow
delivers his six stabs; I see to the rest, and I execute with art and
zeal enough to provoke everyone into a discharge. Clairwil replaces
Borghese.
“Increased severity, sister,’
the goal we are working toward.”
“Never fear,” that harpy replies. “You will soon recognize
your kin.”
Carleson returns to the sofa, over his mast-high device the
captain’s sister hovers, slowly engulfs its length in her ass;
said the captain, being
the captain says, ‘‘don’t forget
918 << THE MARQU:S DE SADE
Borghese and I frig her amain, and she formulates troubles for
our victims to endure.
“I would,” says she, “that a hot iron be applied to the two
breasts of the wife of him embuggering me at present; I would,”
the slut continued, ever ready to lose her head the moment she
felt a prick tickling her entrails, ‘that four gashes be inflicted upon
the pretty buttocks belonging to the youth whom my brother seems
to be fucking while awaiting our verdict; I would have Christine’s
buttocks seared, and a rinse of boiling oil injected into Ernelinde’s
lovely ass, warming though may be the caresses I see Borghese
bestowing upon it.”
But then a very comical thing occurred: panic-stricken at the
thought of the clyster intended for her, the girl let loose everything
her bowels contained, flooding shit all over the floor.
“Blast me,” storrned Borchamps, bestowing a tremendous
kick upon the girl’s beh nd, who all but flew out the window some-
one had just opened to air the room, ‘‘’tis an outrage if the
wretched little whore’s throat is not cut on the spot.”
‘‘What the devil is the matter?’ Clairwil demanded of her
brother. “It’s nothing but shit, and you love shit; would it be
Juliette’s you want instead? Come, have some then, my fingers
feel her mard, she’ll hatch it into your mouth.”
“Bah, we’re becoming a filthy lot,” the captain jubilated,
fitting his lips to my vent and soliciting what he has heen put into
hope of obtaining; “when you hear such words uttered, fuck is
never far off.”
I shit; would you believe it? He shits too, and ’tis into the
mouth of Christine, whom he has had posted underneath his ass,
the villain looses the broadside, simultaneously swallowing the
dainty I produce for him.
“Your pleasures are indecent in the extreme,” Clairwil ob-
serves the instant before she has Francisco perform the same
operation upon her face.
“Ah, wench,” her brother calls to her, “‘you’re close to a
yield of sperm, I can tell it from your infamies.”
“Fuck!” she rejoins, “I wish to be stretched out on the floor,
I wish to be rolled, to wallow in the nastiness that little jade has
just spattered about.”
Juliette & 919
“Are you mad ?” Olympia exclaims.
‘No, merely determined to satisfy my desires, as always.”
Her wishes are obeyed, and it is while writhing in ordures
the rascal is overtaken by her spasm.
The punishments are resumed; Borghese metes them out.
“Stay,” says the captain, seeing Olympia pick up the iron
due to char Rosine’s breasts, “I must embugger this woman while
you are torturing her.”
He sodomizes; Olympia operates.
“‘God’s prick and balls!” he cries, “how sweet it is to ass-fuck
an object undergoing pain! Woe unto him who passes through life
in ignorance of that pleasure! There is no greater one in Nature.”
But her fear notwithstanding, at the hands of her father,
who embuggers her first, Ernelinde receives the formidable remedy
prescribed by Clairwil; everything else on the program is accom-
plished in like wise, which brings us around to fresh horrors.
Carleson, berserk, and ever aroused by my ass, which, says he,
has been driving him to this distraction, lays hands upon his
children; he beats them, whips them, fucks them, while -we women
frig one another opposite a spectacle which affords the idea of a
wolf rampaging through a sheepfold.
“Up, wench,” and it is Rosine who hears herself addressed
by a Borchamps embuggering me and fondling the hindquarters
of Olympia and of Raimonde, “’tis your turn, whore, you are
going to torture your children; Carleson, put the point of your
dagger to the abominable creature’s heart, and if she so much as
wavers when told what to do, stab her straight to death.”
Rosine is racked by sobs.
“A little self-control,” Olympia advises; ‘‘signs of distress
excite our cruelty. Weep, and it will go worse with you.”
“Catch your elder daughter by the hair,” Borchamps shouts
at her, ‘‘and you, Clairwil, issue the orders; Borghese will follow
you; the last word will be Juliette’s.””
“I decree,” my friend said, ‘that the nasty creature chew
blood from her daughter’s bubs.”
Rosine seems paralyzed; the point of Carleson’s dagger pricks
her skin; the unhappy mother obeys.
“Olympia, what is your will ?”
920 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“That she drip molten wax upon her daughter’s buttocks.”
Again, manifestations of stubborness; again, prods from the
dagger; again, compliance on the part of the sorry Rosine.
“And you, Juliette ?”
“Oh, I would have the girl given a general lashing by her
mother, who shall lay on until she has drawn blood.”
What difficulties before these instructions are finally carried
out! At first, the strokes are so mild that they leave no trace
behind; but Carleson’s dagger has its stimulating effect, Rosine
plies the whip in great earnest, and in due time she flays the skin
off her daughter’s ass. Comparable tortures are inflicted upon the
others, each outdoing the other in horror. When my turn comes,
one of my desires is that Francisco embugger the elder of his sisters
while gashing his mother, and Borchamps, sodomizing me as I
give that command, succumbs to its suggestiveness, inundating my
bowels.
“Fuck my eyes,” the captain swears, withdrawing from my
fundament, his prick still up and purple, “enough of this, let’s get
down to business: we shall begin by binding these four individuals
belly to belly, so that they compose, as it were, one and the same
body.”
“Very well, and now ?”
“Let each of the eight of us, armed with a red-hot poker,
belabor this carrion a little... .”
Then, after an hour of strenuous exertion: ‘“‘Rosine, take this
dagger,” the captain says severely, “plant it in your son’s heart;
his father will hold him while you do—”
“No, barbarian, no!” that mother shrieks in despair. ‘‘No,
twill rather go into my own heart—” and she would have ended
her life had I not checked her arm in time.
“Slut, you shall obzy!” roared Carleson.
And seizing his w fe’s hand at the wrist, he himself guides
the blade into his son’s breast. Clairwil, jealous at seeing herself
excluded from the murder of this young man, she who only lives
for masculine murders, snatches up a second knife and deals the
wretch wounds a thousand times more grievous; Rosine is then
stretched upon a narrow wooden bench, affixed to it, and then
Borchamps would have Ernelinde open her mother’s body with a
Juliette oe 921
scalpel. The child refuses; menaces follow. Terrified, bruised,
bloodied, excited by the hope of saving her life by consenting, her
hand, steered by Carleson’s, yields to the barbarous instructions
imparted to it.
“You received your existence here,” says the cruel father
once the opening has been made, “you must now return into the
womb whence you emerged.”
She is garroted, then pressed, twisted until by dint of much
force and considerable art, there she is, breathing still, back inside
the loins that once gave her to the world.
“As for that other one,” says the captain, referring to Chris-
tine, ‘she must be bound to her mother’s back. Wonderful, is it
not,” he observed when that had been done, “the insignificant
volume to which three women can be reduced.”
“And Francisco ?” Clairwil wanted to know.
“He’s yours,” Borchamps answered, “take him into a corner
and finish him off in whatever way you like.”
“Come with me, Juliette,” said Clairwil, leading the young
man into an adjoining chamber.
And there, a couple of frenzied bacchantes, we cause that
unlucky youth to expire under everything of the cruelest and most
refined it is in the power of ferocity to devise. Returning from
those exercises, Carleson and Borchamps found us so aglow with
beauty that neither could resist tupping us straightway; but at this
the jealous Borghese begins to fume, protesting that the victims
are being left to languish, and the pleasures of torturing them being
delayed. The point is well taken, and since the hour is advanced,
it is decided that supper will be served while play proceeds.
“In that case,” says Borghese, upon whom the. right to pre-
scribe punishment now devolves, having taken no hand in the
tormenting and undoing of Francisco, “the victims must be dis-
posed in front of us, flat on the table. The first of our pleasures
will be derived from a view of the state they are already in, and
this, I believe, is nigh to damnable; the second, from the effect of
the further mistreatment they will sustain from us once they are
there.”’
“Aye, set them on the table,” says Clairwil, “but I want to
fuck before I sup.”
922 << THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“But with whom?” I ask my friend. ‘‘They are all drained
dry.”
“Brother,” the insatiable creature resumes, “have ten of the
prettiest members of your armed forces brought in, and give them
to us for employment as sluts.”
The soldiers appear; we all three, Borghese, Clairwil, and I,
defying the pricks lifting threateningly at us, fling ourselves down
upon cushions scattered about on the floor. Elise and Raimonde act
as our aides. Sbrigani, the captain, and Carleson sodomize one
another while watching us, and during four great hours, to the
sound of our victims’ lamentations, the three of us fuck like the
world’s mightiest whores: our champions, winded and spent, are
dismissed.
‘“What good is a man when he reaches the end of his erection ?
Brother,” said Clairwil, “bring those ten louts back in here, where
we can see it done, and have their throats cut this instant, if you
please.”
The captain issues instructions, twenty of his trusties seize the
first ten, and the massacre goes forward while we frig one another,
Borghese, Clairwil, and I. It is, so to speak, upon their corpses
that a delicious collation is served to us. And there, naked, smeared
with blood and fuck, drunk with lust, we carry our bestial ferocity
to the point of mixing in our food those morsels of flesh we detach
from the bodies of the unhappy women lying upon our table.
Gorged on murder and impudicity, we at last all fall asleep amidst
cadavers and a deluge of wines, spirits, shit, fuck, and bits of
human flesh: I am not sure what happened after that. I simply
recall that when I opened my eyes to the light I found myself
lying between two cadavers, my nose in Carleson’s ass, with whose
shit my gullet was filled, and whose prick was wedged in Borghese’s
ass, where he had forgotten it. The captain, who had gone to sleep
with his head pillowed on Raimonde’s shit-slimed buttocks, still had
his prick in my behind, and Sbrigani was snoring in the arms of
Elise . . . the victims in pieces still lay on the table.
Such was the state n which the star of day found us out, and
far from wondering at ur excesses, never, I believe, did it smile
so brightly since the world was born. Thus, you see, it is false that
heaven condemns men’s erring behavior, ’tis absurd to suppose
Juliette & 923
heaven offended thereby. Would it accord its favors to villains as
well as to honest folk if it were annoyed by crime?
“Why, no. No,” I said to my friends who, that morning,
were listening calmly while I exposed my thoughts, “we offend
nothing by surrendering to crime. A god? How incur his dis-
pleasure when no god exists? Nature? Still less is Nature to be
vexed by our misconduct,” I went on, summoning to mind the moral
science upon which I had been nourished, excellent fare. ‘‘Man is
in no wise Nature’s dependent; he is not even her child; he is her
froth, her precipitated residue. No other laws govern him than
those graved in mineral, in vegetal, in animal stuff; and when he
reproduces, while he conforms to laws which are peculiar to him,
he does nothing by any means necessary to Nature, nor by any
means desired by her. Destruction more fully satisfies this universal
mother, since it tends to restore to her a potential she is cheated
of through our propagation. Thus, our crimes are pleasing to her,
my friends, and our virtues are an affront; thus, atrocity in crime
is what answers her most ardent desires; for he who were to
serve her best would incontestably be him whose crimes through
their number or magnitude destroyed even up to destroying the
possibility of a regeneration which, perpetuated in the three king-
doms, only narrows Nature’s capacity for further creative thrusts.
Little fool that I was, oh, Clairwil! before we parted I was yet
an adept of Nature; the systems I have absorbed since then have
freed me from her, and moved me toward the simple laws of the
natural realms. Having embraced these systems, ah, great dupes
we must me, dear friends, if ever we deny anything to the passions,
since they become the motor forces of our being, and we are just
as unable to turn a deaf ear to their promptings as we are to be
born again, or to return to being unborn. Indeed, these passions
are so inherent in us, so necessary to the functioning of our inner
workings, that their satisfaction becomes fundamental to our
existence. Oh, dear Clairwil,” I continued, taking my friend’s hand
warmly in mine, “the degree to which I am now these passions’
slave! Oh, whatever they might be, how willingly I would sacrifice
everything to them! This victim or that, how little must it matter !
None more deserves to be spared than any other. If, according to
popular prejudice, one existed which might seem to merit exception,
924 ce» THE MARQUIS DE SADE
from the simple breaking of this curb my delights must increase:
I would interpret the excessive foretaste of pleasure as a com-
mand to act, and my hand would fly to do the bidding of my
desires.’’'*
A striking instance of the rewards fortune almost always
lavishes upon great criminals now added its support to my argu-
ments.
We had scarce come out of the scene of horror I have just
described when Borchamps’ troops rode in with six wagonloads
of bullion that had been on its way to the Emperor, sent by the
Venetian Republic. Only one hundred men were escorting this
magnificent convoy when, in a mountain pass in the Tyrol, two
hundred of our captain’s cavalry fell upon them and captured this
hoard after an hour-long battle.
‘There I am, rich for the rest of my life,” said Clairwil’s
fortunate brother. “Notice, if you will, at what moment this hap-
piness befalls us. "Tis into hands soiled by wife-killing, infanticide,
sodomy, multiple murders, prostitution, and infamies that heaven
deposits this treasure; ’:is to reward me for these horrors heaven
puts it at my disposal. And you would have me doubt that Nature
is otherwise than honcred by crimes? Ah, my thinking is not
likely to change on this cuestion, and I shall go on committing them
forever, since the consequences are so encouraging. Carleson,” said
the brigand, “before we begin the count, from the contents of one
of these wagons take a hundred thousand crowns, they’re yours,
the gift testifies to the satisfaction I received from your courage
and purposefulness during the late scene for which you supplied
the actors.”
Carleson kissed his commander’s knees in thanks.
“I see no reason to hide it, fair ladies,” Borchamps said
to us, “I am exceedingly fond of this lad, and when one loves, it’s
‘with money you must prove it. At the beginning, of course, I sup-
posed that the enjoyment would sooner or later pall; but it has
been quite the other way, the more I discharge with this delicious
13 May these excellent principles, taking firm root in good minds, make an end
forever of the dangerous prejudices which are the cause for our regarding these
passions as enemies, when from them alone is born the only felicity we can hope for
on earth.
Juliette 2% 925
boy, the more attached to him [ become. A thousand pardons,
Mesdames, ten thousand, but ’twould perhaps not be the same
thing with any of you.”
We passed several more days in Borchamps’ retreat; and
then, seeing us eager to be off, he spoke to us as follows:
‘“‘My thought, good friends, was to accompany you to Naples,
the prospect pleased me. But with the wish that is mine soon to
quit my present calling, I ought to dedicate myself to business
rather than pleasure. My sister will go with you to that noble town,
and here are eight hundred thousand francs to defray the costs
of your stay. Hire an appropriate mansion upon your arrival,
give out that the three of you are sisters—as indeed one might be
ready enough to believe, certain features in common create a kind
of resemblance among you. Sbrigani will continue to look after
your affairs while you make the most of the numerous sinful op-
portunities that magnificent city offers. Elise and Raimonde will
be your chaperones. As for myself, I shall come to visit you if I can;
amuse yourself, all three, and forget me not in your pleasures.”
We left. I regretted Carleson, I admit it; I had, while a guest
in Borchamps’ castle, got myself prodigiously fucked by that pretty
fellow, whose prick had been admirable, and it was something of a
hardship for me to forego it. My feelings had nothing to do with
love: I have never worshiped that god; the question was merely
of the need to be well fucked, and nobody satisfied it better than
Carleson. The obligation, moreover, to hide our activities in order
to avoid displeasing Borchamps, very jealous of his handsome
lieutenant, had lent an out-of-the-ordinary flavor to the enjoyment
of him, and our last farewells were sealed by a mutual inundation
of fuck.
Reaching Naples, we rented a superb house on the Chiagia
quay, and passing ourselves as sisters, as the captain had advised,
we gathered round us a royal entourage of domestics. First, we
devoted a month to a careful appraisal of the morals and manners
of this half-Spanish nation; we considered its government, its
policies, its arts; its relations with the other nations of Europe.
This study completed, we esteemed ourselves ready to sally forth
926 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
into society. Our reputation as light ladies soon spread about.
The King conceived a wish to see us; as for his wife, that spiteful
woman did not look upon us with sympathy.’* Worthy sister to her
who had married Louis XVI, this arrogant princess, after the
example of all the other members of the House of Austria, sought
to captivate her spouse’s heart solely in order to rule him politi-
cally; ambitious like Marie Antoinette, it was not the husband she
cared about, it was the kingdom she wanted. Ferdinand, slow-
witted, simple-minded, blind—in fine, a king, Ferdinand fancied
he had a friend in that headstrong wife, when in fact he had only
a spy and a rival, and tke whore, like her sister, in devastating, in
plundering the Neapolitan nation, toiled to the advantage of no-
body except her Hapsburg tribe.
Shortly after our presentation I received a billet from the
King of Naples, couched in these or very similar terms:
“To Paris, the other day, Juno, Pallas, and Venus were of-
fered; he has made his choice, upon you he bestows the apple; come
to receive it tomorrow at Portici, I shall be there alone; your re-
fusal would disappoint :ne cruelly and gain you nothing. I shall
therefore expect you.”
A communication so despotic, so laconic, deserved the most
straightforward reply; | made it verbally, and contented myself
with assuring the page boy that I would be punctual. Once the mes-
senger has left, I fly to tell my sisters this piece of good news. All
three thoroughly determined to banish the least suspicion of envy
from our relations, to adopt a lightsome attitude toward human
folly, to wring profit fro it, to laugh at it—Olympia and Clairwil
besought me not to miss the adventure. And arrayed like that very
goddess who had merited the apple, I spring into a coach-and-six
which, a few minutes later, brings me to the gate of the royal castle,
renowned for the ruins of Herculaneum upon which it stands.
Mysteriously introduced into this house’s most obscure apartments,
I at last come to the King, nonchalantly reposing in a boudoir.
‘My choice has created jealousies, naturally?” the fool says,
speaking French with a villainous accent.
“No, Sire,” I answer him, “‘my sisters noted this preference
with equanimity, as did I, no more touched, in honor, not to be
14 The reader must think back to the period at which this was written.
Juliette @ 927
included therein than am I by the vast honor you perhaps fancy
it does me.”
He stares. “A singular reply, bless my soul.”
“Ah, though full aware that to please kings one must always
flatter them, I, who in them perceive nought but ordinary mortals,
never speak to them save it be to tell them the truth.”
“But if that truth is harsh ?”’
“You wonder why they deserve to hear it? But why should
they suppose themselves less entitled than other men to the naked
truth? Because they have a yet greater need of it?”
“They dread it more.”
“Tush. Let them then behave justly, let them renounce an
empty pride out of which they strive to enslave men, and a liking
for truth will replace their fear of it.”
“But, Madame, such speeches—”’
“They startle you, Ferdinand, I see it. You doubtless thought
that, flattered by your choice, I was going to approach you on my
hands and knees; that I was going to bow down before you, serve
you. No; a Frenchwoman, the pride that my sex and nationality
inspire in me lends itself ill to such usages. Ferdinand, if I have
been willing to grant you the interview you solicited, ’tis because
I consider myself perhaps a little better equipped to enlighten you
regarding your veritable interests. So forget for a moment the
frivolous pleasures you promised yourself with an ordinary woman,
and listen to one who knows you well, who knows your kingdom
still better, and who can, concerning these subjects, speak to you
in a manner your courtesans do not dare.”
Seeing that the King, slackjawed from surprise, bewildered,
was paying all possible attention to me, 1 addressed him thus:
“My friend, you will permit me to dispense with those vain-
glorious nicknames and titles which tell only of the impertinence
in him who receives them and of the shameless baseness in him
who mouths them; my friend, I say, I have lately been examining
your nation with utmost care, and have found it extremely difficult
to put my finger upon its genius; I have been studying it since com-
ing to Naples, and I confess I as yet see nothing there. Neverthe-
less, I think I have detected the reason for the trouble I have been
having. Your people have lost track of their origins; successive mis-
928 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
taining the people in dependence, shuts them out from wealth;
their ills are thus rendered beyond remedy, and the political state
is in a situation no less grave than the civil government, since it
must seek its strength in its very weakness. Your apprehensiveness,
Ferdinand, lest someone discover the things I have been telling
you leads you to exile a-ts and talents from your realm. You fear
the powerful eye of gerius, that is why you encourage ignorance.
Tis opium you feed your people, so that, drugged, they do not
feel their hurts, inflicted by you. And that is why where you reign
no establishments are to be found giving great men to the home-
land; the rewards due knowledge are unknown here, and as there
is neither honor nor prof t in being wise, nobody seeks after wisdom.
“T have studied your civil laws, they are good, but poorly en-
forced, and as a result they sink into ever further decay. And the
consequences thereof? A man prefers to live amidst their corrup-
tion rather than plead for their reform, because he fears, and with
reason, that this reform will engender infinitely more abuses than
it will do away with; things are left as they are. Nevertheless,
everything goes askew and awry, and as a career in government
has no more attractions than one in the arts, nobody involves him-
self in public affairs; anc! for all this compensation is offered in the
form of luxury, of frivo.ity, of entertainments. So it is that among
you a taste for trivial things replaces a taste for great ones, that
the time which ought to be devoted to the latter is frittered away
on futilities, and that you will be subjugated sooner or later and
again and again by any foe who bothers to make the effort.
“In view of its situation, your State needs a fleet for its de-
fense. I have seen a few soldiers in your country, but not one war-
ship. With this insouciance, with this unpardonable apathy, your
nation foregoes the possibility of becoming the sea power which
by all rights it ought to be, and as your forces on the land do not
make up for your lack cof a navy, you wil! finish by amounting to
nothing. Expanding nations will laugh at you, and if ever a revolu-
tion were to regenerate some one or other among them, you will
be rightly deprived of the honor of constituting a weight on the
scales. Anyone at all could make you tremble, even the Pope if he
cared to bestir himself.
“Well, Ferdinand! It is not worth dominating a nation if one
Juliette 931
rules it in such a way. And do you think a sovereign, even a despot,
can be happy when his people do not flourish ? Where are the eco-
nomic principles in your State? I have searched for them high and
low, and uncovered none anywhere. Are you promoting agricul-
ture? Encouraging the growth of population? Protecting trade?
Aiding the arts? Not only is there no sign hereabouts of anything
others are doing elsewhere, but everything I see points in the op-
posite direction. The outcome of it all? Your pallid monarchy
languishes in indigence; you yourself become a nullity in the concert
of European powers; your downfall is not far off.
“Shall I examine your city from the inside? Shall I analyze
its manners? Nowhere do I perceive those simple virtues that pro-
vide the bedrock to society. Company is kept out of snobbery,
friendship goes on through habit, marriage is determined by ma-
terial need; and as vanity is foremost among the Neapolitans’
vices, a fault they acquired from the Spanish under whose heel they
lived for so long; as, I say, pride is a vice inherent in your nation,
its members prefer to avoid close scrutiny for fear lest the face of
horror appear once the mask is removed. Your aristocracy, igno-
rant and stupid as it is everywhere else, brings disorder to its peak
by placing its trust in lawyers, melancholy and dangerous breed
swollen now to such ridiculous proportions there is practically no
justice anymore. The little there is costs its weight in gold; and
among all the countries I have visited, this is perhaps the only one
where I have seen more wit exercised absolving a guilty man than
is elsewhere devoted to justifying an innocent.
“IT had imagined your court would offer me some ideas of
polite behavior and gallantry, I see it contains nothing but boors
or imbeciles. Weary of monarchical vices, I had the hope, in com-
ing here, of finding a few antique virtues: instead, in your govern-
ment I discover only the result of all the disorders to be encoun-
tered in the various kingdoms of Europe. Each individual, in your
country, seeks to appear somehow larger than life-size; and as
nobody has the qualities requisite to acquiring wealth, fraud is
substituted for them; dishonesty thus becomes ingrained, congeni-
tal, and foreigners can no longer have confidence in a nation that
has none in itself.
‘After having glanced at the nobility, I take a look at your
932 <% THE MARQUIS DE SADE
common people. Without exception, I find them uncouth, stupid,
indolent, thieving, bloodthirsty, insolent, and possessing not a single
virtue to redeem any of those vices.
“Do I wish, joining the two halves of the picture together, to
contemplate this society as a whole? J behold a confusion of eco-
nomic conditions; the citizen lacking the necessities of life taken
up with useless activities; each man serving as amusement or spec-
tacle to some other; indigence itself putting on grandiose airs that
are the more revolting since, while horses draw its carriages, its
cupboard at home is bare. One of the disastrous effects of the
Neapolitans’ taste for luxury is that, in order to have a coach and
valets, three out of four of the best households avoid marrying
their daughters; this frightful practice extends throughout all
classes. Again, what happens? The population diminishes in direct
proportion to the increase of luxury; and the State gradually sinks,
the brighter the sheen it acquires by these vile means.
“But it is in your weddings and in your takings of the veil
especially that this wastefulness becomes as preposterous as it is
cruel. In the first case, you raid the luckless bride’s dowry in order
to embellish her for a day; in the second, you'd have enough to find
her a husband if you did not spend it upon the ludicrous ceremony
which is to deprive her of one for the rest of her life.
“Particularly, Ferdinand, it is that although your subjects are
poor, you are rich. And you would be a great deal richer had your
predecessors not sold the State piecemeal for great sums of silver.
A State that has reciprocal commercial interests can bargain past
rainy days; but a people who borrows from anybody and lends to
nobody, a people who, in the article of trade, plays a lone hand
against the whole of Europe, must inevitably become poor. Such
is the history of your nation, my dear prince; all the others, having
industry, make you pay the price for their goods, and your industry,
practically at a standstill, wins you no customers.
“The amusing thing is that your arts reflect the puffed-up
character of your people. Not a city on earth surpasses yours in
operatic decorations; Naples is all tinsel and frippery, like its
population. Medicine, surgery, poetry, astronomy are still in the
dark ages here; but your dancers are excellent; and nowhere do we
have such droll Scaramouches. In other countries they go to all
Juliette Ys 933
sorts of lengths to become rich; all alone, the Neapolitan exerts
himself only to look rich: his heart is less set on owning a large
fortune than in persuading others he enjoys one, and his search is
far less for opulence than for outward signs thereof. That is the
reason why in this country there are so many people stinting them-
selves on essentials in order to have the superfluous. Meanness
reigns at the most lavish banquets; culinary refinements are un-
known; apart from your macaroni, what do they eat here that’s
good? Nothing: your countrymen are absolutely innocent of the
voluptuous art of stimulating every passion by the delicious means
of a subtle cuisine Everything is subordinated to the absurd pleas-
ure of having a handsome carriage, expensive livery; along with
the pomp and magnificence of modern times you have retained the
frugality of the ancients—the contrast is unsightly. Your women
are imperious and dirty, demanding and shrewish, without style
and without conversation. In other climates, their commerce,
though it spoils the heart, may at least improve the mind; here,
the men do not even derive that latter advantage from them; the |
vices contracted in their society are mitigated by nothing; with
them it’s all loss, never any gain. |
“However, one must be fair: there are some positive things to
be said about your people. There is a basic goodness in them; the
Neapolitan is quick-tempered, irascible, brusque, but his ill-humor
doesn’t last, and his heart, grievances once forgotten, is warm and |
not without virtues. Almost all the crimes committed here are |
rather the products of a thoughtless first impulse than of premedi- |
tation, that this people is not spiteful is proven by the great num-
ber of the Neapolitans, which is maintained without police. This |
people loves you, Ferdinand: show your subjects you love them in |
return, be capable of a great sacrifice. Christine, Queen of Sweden, |
abjured her crown through philosophy: break your scepter out of |
benevolence, relinquish the reins of a so badly organized govern-|
ment that enriches nobody but you. Remind yourself that kings are |
nothing in today’s world, the common masses everything. Leave to |
this people the task of overhauling and refitting a ship which will |
never sail very far with you at its helm; let Naples live as a Re-|
public: to the extent this race, and I have studied it well, makes for |
bad slaves, it will produce good «citizens; liberate its energy by de- |
934 <> THE MARQUIS DE SADE
livering it from the shackles of your power, that will be to accom-
plish two meritorious acts at one stroke: there will be a tyrant the
less on the face of Europe, and one nation the more to admire
there.”
Ferdinand, who had listened to me with his best attention,
asked, when I had finished, whether all Frenchwomen thus rea-
soned about politics.
“No,” I replied, “and more’s the pity: the majority of them
are better analysts of ruffles and flounces than of the structure of
kingdoms: they weep when oppressed, they are insolent once un-
chained. As for me, frivolity is not my vice; I’ not say the same
for libertinage. ... I am: excessively addicted to it. But the pleasure
of fucking does not blind me to the point of being unable to discuss
the interests of the world’s populations. In strongly made souls the
passions’ torch lights a Minerva as well as a Venus; burning with
the latter’s fire, I fuck ‘ike your sister-in-law; illuminated by the
rays of the former, I think and discourse like Hobbes and Montes-
quieu. Is it then, in your opinion, such a difficult thing to manage,
an empire? So assure tie people’s welfare that nobody can envy
you yours; then dedicate yourself unreservedly to this latter, which
you can safely do, since human beings cease to be observant or rest-
less when they are happy—that, it seems to me, is the whole secret,
and I would have put it into practice long ago had I had, like you,
the power and the foolishness to rule a nation. But mark you well,
my friend, it is not despotism I forbid you, I am too familiar with
its charms to deny it to vou; I simply advise the suppression or the
rectification of whatever jeopardizes or interferes with the main-
tenance of this despotism, if it is upon the throne you choose to
stay. Render every sentient being happy if you wish to be so your-
self; for the moment the crowd’s enjoyments pale, be very certain
of it, Ferdinand, the crowd will spoil your pleasures in its turn.”
“And by what means?”
“Institute the broadest freedom of thought, of belief, and of
conduct. Do away with moral impediments: the man with an erec-
tion wishes to act as freely as a cat or dog. If, as is done in France,
you are going to appoint for him the altar upon which he must shed
his fuck, employing absurdities to bend him under the yoke of a
16 Marie Antoinette of France.
Juliette eh 935
puerile morality, he will repay you in kind and with good measure.
Such irons, forged to your order by pedants and priests, will be
yours to wear ere long, and it may be that you'll carry them to the
scaffold, for your erstwhile victim will have his revenge.”’””
“Your opinion, then, is that there must be no moral standards
under a government?”
“None save those inspired by Nature. You will always render
the human animal unhappy when you seek to subject him to any
others. To him who has suffered the outrage leave the problem of
obtaining redress, he will handle the business better than do your
laws, for his interests are more closely involved; your laws, more-
over, are frequently eluded, but the object of just revenge rarely
escapes.”
“Faith, all that is quite beyond me,” the great simpleton con-
fessed with a sigh. “I fuck, I eat macaroni without cooks, I build
houses without architects. I collect medallions without antiquarians,
I play at billiards like a lackey, I exercise. my cadets like a drill-
sergeant; but I don’t talk politics, religion, ethics, or government,
because I know nothing about any of them.”
“And your kingdom ?”
“Oh, it gets along, it gets along as best it can. Think you then
that to be king one has to be so very wise?”
“Apparently not, for I must take you as proof,” I replied.
“But that is not enough to convince me that a leader of men can
dispense with reason and philosophy, nor that, deprived of the one
and the other, a prince like you can avoid blunders which will one
fine day see your subjects up in arms and ridding themselves of an
idiotic master. And this will come very shortly to pass unless you
take every possible measure to prevent it.”
“TI have cannons, fortresses.”
‘“Who mans them ?”
“My people.”
‘When they weary of you, they'll turn the guns against your
castle, take your fortresses and perhaps, who knows, drag you in
the mire.”
17It has been remarked that there were never so many police regulations, re-
strictive codes governing morals, etc., as during the closing years of the reigns of
Charles I and of Louis XVI.
936 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
its populations shall never be rid save through a general revolu-
tion.”
Ferdinand agreed chat I was quite right, and we moved on.
Of Herculaneum’s thoroughly raided ruins there is little worth
looking at today, and the site has been covered over to protect the
ground Portici stands upon; one cannot well judge of the ancient
theater, much disturbed by the diggings. When we returned to
Portici, Ferdinand put us into the hands of the knowledgeable
guide he had himself selected for us, and the amiable man wished
us a fair journey, urging us to call upon his friend Vespoli, of
Salerno, to whom he had given us letters of recommendation and
under whose roof, he assured us, we would find capital entertain-
ment.
We went to Resina and thence took the road to Pompeii. Like
Herculaneum, that city had been overwhelmed by ashes and lava,
and in the course of the same great eruption. We noticed that
Pompeii was itself built upon two more ancient towns, which had
been visited by previous catastrophes. Vesuvius, as you see, is for-
ever absorbing, destroying all that man has built in these parts, and
yet man, undiscouraged, rebuilds again: but for this cruel enemy,
the country surrounding.Naples would be the most agreeable on
earth.
From Pompeii we reached Salerno and lay overnight at the
famous house of correction situated two miles outside that city, and
in which Vespoli exercises his redoubtable superintendency.
Vespoli, scion of one of the great families in the Kingdom
of Naples, used once to te First Almoner at the Court. The King,
whose pleasures he had served and whose conscience he had di-
rected,** had accorded him the despotic administratian of the
asylum where we found him. There, guaranteed by royal protec-
tion, the libertine was free to indulge in everything his criminal
passions might dictate. Atrocities being the warden’s specialty,
Ferdinand was eager to have us be Vespoli’s guests.
He was fifty years of age at the time, with an imposing and
24It is the common practice in Italy to make one’s confessor one’s pimp; in
high-ranking circles, these two offices are closely knit, and the priests, given a little
to intriguing anyhow, usually exercise them admirably and simultaneously.
Juliette & 981
harsh physiognomy, tall, strong as a bull; he greeted us with
marks of extremest consideration. He read the letters we presented
and, since the hour was very advanced, promptly gave orders to
have a supper and beds readied for us. It was Vespoli himself who
brought us breakfast the next morning; and then, we having made
known our wish to visit it, he led us on a tour of his establishment.
Each of the rooms we were shown provided us infinite matter
for criminally lewd reflections, and we were already horribly
aroused by the time we reached the cages in which the crazed were
kept.
The superintendent, who up until now had done nothing but
grow steadily warmer, was wearing an incredible erection when we
stepped into this courtyard, and as fucking witless victims was
what he most enjoyed, he asked us whether we cared to see him in
action.
‘By all means,” we replied.
“I ask,” he said, “because my transports with these creatures
are so prodigious, my proceedings so bizarre, my cruelties so ap-
palling, that it does rather embarrass me to have my behavior in
this place observed.”
“Nonsense,” said Clairwil, ‘were your caprices a thousand
times more incongruous, we would still wish to watch, and indeed
we entreat you to act your wonted role as though you were all by
yourself; and especially to deprive us of none of the precious
idiosyncrasies without which we can obtain no true insights into
your tastes and your soul.”
“You merely intend to look on?” he inquired, rubbing his
prick with emotion as he posed the question.
“And why should we not also enjoy fucking these madmen?”
Clairwil asked. “Your fantasies electrify us, we are eager to imi-
tate all of them. I trust these subjects are not dangerous? No?
Then we shall sport with them like you. But do not make us wait
any longer, dear sir, I am burning to see you at work.”
The cages were disposed around a large open court planted
with tall cypresses through whose foliage there came a lugubrious
green light, giving the place a graveyard look. In its center stood
a cross studded with nails on one side; it was there the wicked
982 «> THE MARQUIS DE SADE
Vespoli had his victims exposed. Four jailers, carrying spike-
studded clubs a single blow of which could have slain an ox, es-
corted us watchfully. Vespoli, accustomed to having them as on-
lookers during his amusements, felt no awkwardness in their
presence, and instructed two of them to stand by us while we
witnessed the scene seated upon a bench at one side of the court-
yard; the two other jailers were to loose from their cages those
playthings the superintendent felt a need for.
First to be set at large was a handsome young man, naked, a
veritable Hercules, who cut a thousand strange capers as he came
forth. One of the first of his extravagances was to squat before our
feet and shit, and Vespoli came over to be on hand for this opera-
tion, which he studied with care. He frigged himself, retrieved the
turd, rubbed his prick upon it, and then falling to dancing about
like the madman, to gamboling and frisking in the same way, he
caught him from behind, pushed him up against the cross, and the
guards tied him fast to it in an instant. Immediately the fellow is
secured, Vespoli, ecstatic, kneels down before his ass, opens it,
pants into it, tongues it, caresses it lovingly, then, getting quickly
to his feet, takes a whip and for a long hour flays the unhappy and
loudly screaming lunatic. Once his buttotks are in tatters, the lecher
embuggers, and in his drunken condition, raves in tune with
his victim.
“Holy God Almighty,” the former almoner shrieks now and
again, ‘‘what are the joys to be known in the asshole of a madman!
And I too, I am mad, double-fucked Divinity; I bugger madmen,
I discharge in madmen, I care for nought but them, I want to fuck
nobody else in the world.” However, loath to squander his forces,
Vespoli has the youth unbound. Another one rushes into the lists,
this one fancies he is God.
“I am going to fuck God,” Vespoli announces to us, “observe
me; but I must give Gocl a thrashing before giving Him an em-
buggering. Hither,” he continues, “this way, Bugger-God, bring
Your ass around, Your ass, I say.”
And God, attached to the stake by the jailers, is soon bested
by His puny creature who embuggers Him once His buttocks are
reduced to marmalade. A lovely girl of eighteen succeeds God; this
Juliette & 983
one takes herself for the Virgin. Further subject for the blas-
phemies of Vespoli, who lashes the skin off the Blessed Mother of
God, and who afterward sodomizes her for a quarter of an hour.
Clairwil arises, all afire.
‘This spectacle inspires me,” she says to us, ‘imitate me, my
friends, and you, villain, have your jailers unclothe us and then
lock us into those cages; treat us as though we were mad also, we
shall feign lunacy; you will have us tied to the unspiked side of the
cross, your madmen will whip us and then ass-fuck us.”
The idea appeals to us all. Vespoli carries it out. Ten mad-
men are unleashed against us; some of them flog us, others are
hacked fairly to pieces for refusing to do so; but they all fuck
us, and all, guided by Vespoli, fit themselves into our behinds. The
guards, the warden, everybody has his turn, we are daunted by
none of them.
“So now discharge,” Clairwil says to the master of the house,
“we have done everything you asked, show us how you behave
during the dramatic moment.”
“All in good time, in good time,” our man says, “‘there’s one
here that puts me in seventh heaven; I never leave the house in
the morning without first fucking him.”
Upon a signal to one of his jailers, he is brought an old man
of nearly eighty with a white beard growing down to his navel.
“Come along, John,” Vespoli says, catching him by the beard
and towing him the length of the courtyard, ‘‘pick up your feet,
John, I am going to put my prick in your ass.”
The venerable old man is bound and fustigated mercilessly ;
his ass, his ancient, wrinkled ass is kissed, licked, embuggered;
and withdrawing, very near to ejaculation, “Ah,” says Vespoli,
“you want to see me discharge? But do you realize I never attain
my crisis without it costing two or three of these unfortunate
persons their lives?”
“So much the better,” say I, ‘‘but I trust that in your massacres
you will overlook neither God nor Mary, for I confess that I’d
indeed discharge pleasantly seeing you assassinate the Good Lord
with one hand and His daughter-in-law with the other.”
“T ought then to be embuggering Jesus Christ in the mean-
984 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
in constraining her as it were to come begging at your gate, where
you would cruelly refuse her the pittance she asks; thus, by drawing
the spectacle of misery into your immediate vicinity, improve your
enjoyment through comparison as intimate and at the same time
as advantageous to you as possible, since all the woe confronting
you is of your unique fzbrication. That is what my advice to you
would be, Juliette, that is what I would do if I were you. ... I would
have a daily erection thinking about these delicious ideas, standing
before the still more divine spectacle of the distress I would have
caused; and in the midst of these rare pleasures, I would exclaim,
Yes, there she is; by means of a crime I got possession of her; and
this inheritance I havz usurped, I spend upon pleasures so
sweet that nothing I do is not crime; I am, through my behavior
toward her, nothing but criminal, I am perpetually in a state of
crime; not one of my pieasures is untainted by it. ... And with
an imagination like yours, Juliette, oh! how heavenly such a.com-
plication must be!”
Noirceuil was very hot by the time he reached the end of his
digression, and as since my return we had still done nothing to-
gether, we now moved straight to a sofa. Lying there in his arms,
I admitted that at no moment had I been visited by doubts con-
cerning the fate of little ’ontange, and that what I had said to him
had been said only in order to give him the occasion to expound his
doctrines. I promised hira the young girl, assuring him that, how-
ever interesting she might be, we would not fail to establish her in
a quagmire of grinding poverty, after having wrung all we wanted
from her.
‘Well, well, Juliette,” said Noirceuil, fondling and kissing
my buttocks, “if you depraved yourself in the course of your
travels, J was not idle during the same period either; and you have
returned to find me a thousand times worse than I used to be;
there is not a single horror I have not accomplished since we last
saw each other. Will you believe it? I am responsible for the death
of Saint-Fond; I aspired to his post, I missed getting it; but
nothing will prevent me from succeeding the man occupying it at
present; his doom is a matter of time only, the machinery is in
place; and once I hold office, which I ambition for what it will put
Juliette 1163
in my hands, to wit, all the power of the idiot prince and all the
wealth of his kingdom, then, oh, Juliette, the mountain of pleasures
that shall be ours! Crime, such is my wish, must stamp every
instant of my career; you will not weaken with me as you did with
Saint-Fond, and together we shall go far.”
By and by I had to present my ass to that maniac; but he
withdrew from it without leaving any fuck behind him.
“I am waiting for someone,” he explained. “Allow me to
inform you: she is a very attractive creature of about twenty-five,
whose husband I have had jailed: this in order to get possession of
the wife. If she opens her mouth, he can be put to death tomorrow;
but as she adores him, I think she will keep silent. She also has a
child, whom she idolizes; my aim is to induce her to forsake the lot;
I propose to fuck the wife, have the husband broken on the wheel,
and send the child to the workhouse. I have been preparing the
operation for two months; up until now, the young woman’s love
and virtue have held out admirably. You shall see how pretty she
is. I should like you to help me seduce her. What has occurred is as
follows.
“A murder was committed in her house; she was there when
it happened, along with the victim, her husband, and another man.
Her testimony is crucial; the other man has deposed against the
husband, but this woman’s evidence is needed, and the case cannot
progress until she gives it.”
“Rascal! this entire intrigue smacks of your confection: you
had the man killed by the witness whom you seduced and who has
sworn ’twas the husband did the deed; you want the wife to cor-
roborate the thing, both for the pleasure of making her yours and
for that other pleasure, more piquant still, of turning her into her
husband’s assassin.”
“Quite right, Juliette, how well you know me! All that is my
doing. But I am eager to round out my crime, and I count upon
you. Ah, my dear, it’s a voluptuous discharge I see ahead of me
when this evening I shall fuck that woman.”
She arrived. Madame de Valrose was indeed one of the
prettiest creatures you could hope to see: petite, but exquisitely
shaped, well fleshed, with a dazzling fair skin, the world’s loveliest
eyes, breasts, and an ass that made the mouth water.
1164 % THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“Good evening to you, Madame,” said Noirceuil, “you have
reached your decision ?”
‘Good Lord,” that charming woman replied, her eyes filling
with tears, “how can you expect me to agree to such a horrible
thing?”
“Take care, Madame,” I broke in sharply; ‘Monsieur de
Noirceuil, having acquainted me with your business, has authorized
me to offer you a word of advice. Bear in mind that as matters now
stand, your husband is doomed, for to that end but a single witness
is required, and one exists, as you are aware.”
“But he is guiltless, Madame; the witness who accuses him is
the murderer himself.”
“You shall never convince your judges of it. This witness had
no relations whatever with the dead man, but your husband had a
good many. Therefore, I repeat, you should consider your husband
as done for, incontestably. When, in the light of this terrible cer-
tainty, Monsieur de Neirceuil, whose influence you know to be
great, offers to save him if you agree to testify against him, I for
my part—”
“But what purpose does it serve, this testimony, since Mon-
sieur is eager to save my husband?”
“Without that testimony he cannot do it; it will enable him
to show irregular procedure, and that slander doubtless exists,
if not perjury, once the accused’s wife testifies against him.”
“Then shall I not be punished ?”
“A convent ... whence we will have you out again in a week’s
time. Madame, that you are able to hesitate is more than I can
understand.”
“But my husband will believe that I sought to undo him, he
will blame me in his heart; and in mine this idea shall weigh forever.
It shall lie between us everlastingly: I save my husband only by
creating an undying distrust which means eternal estrangement,
which means—”
‘Agreed, but is that not better than sending him to the gal-
lows? And if you truly love him, should you not grant his life
greater importance than the possession of his affections? If he
dies, will you not also be separated forever ?”
Juliette & 1165
“Terrible alternative! And if I am being deceived . . . if this
avowal seals his doom instead of saving him ?”’
“This injurious suspicion,” said Noirceuil, “is my reward for
wishing to be of help to you, Madame, and I thank you.”
‘Why, yes, Madame,” I put in heatedly, ‘“Monsieur de Noir-
ceuil ought by all rights to drop your case this very minute; how
dare you cast such aspersions upon the most virtuous of mortals?”
‘For the aid he proposes he has set a price that dishonors me.
I worship my husband, never have I broken faith with him, never,
and it is not when he is beset by cruel troubles that I need crown
his misfortune with such a woeful outrage.”
“This outrage is imaginary: your husband will never learn
of it. Manifestly, you are an intelligent person: how then, I
wonder, can you cling to these illusions? It is not, moreover, your
heart Monsieur de Noirceuil is seeking, but simply your favors,
which should greatly reduce the hurt in your eyes. But, I shall
further add, even were this hurt to exist, even were it grave, of
what account can it be when your husband’s life hangs in the
balance?
“By way of conclusion I may say a word in defense of the
price Monsieur de Noirceuil asks. Ah, Madame, you are” ill-
acquainted with the spirit of the age if you fancy that kindnesses
are accorded for nothing nowadays. Actually, in return for a service
which your entire fortune would not begin to pay for, Monsieur
de Noirceuil, by demanding nothing beyond a little forbearance
on your part, is willing to accept exceedingly little, it seems to me.
In short, your husband’s life is in your hands; it is saved if you
accuse him, lost if you do not. There is your dilemma: Speak.”
And at that point the dear little woman was seized by a dread-
ful fit of sobbing which so aroused Noirceuil that the scoundrel had
out his member and gave it to me to frig before Madame de Val-
rose’s very eyes. She fainted.
“Quickly there, buggerblast me!” said Noirceuil, “pull up her
skirts, let me fuck her.”
Her pretty bosom having been brought into view when I un-
laced her stays, Noirceuil was soon kneading and mauling her in
that barbaric manner with which he is wont to caress breasts. I fin-
1166 <2 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
ished undressing the poor creature; she was still unconscious when
I took her upon my lap, exposing that pretty ass to the libertine
who, while I tugged at his pubic hairs, readied himself for his be-
loved sodomy. Careless of his victim’s feelings, Noirceuil drove into
the breach with such impetuosity that he soon summoned the little
lady back to life.
‘Where am I?” she gasped upon opening her eyes, “and what,
good lord! is being done to me?”
‘Have patience, my child,” I said in a rather chilly tone,
won't be long before we have everything we want from you.”
“But these things—”’
“Strange things which your husband never did, eh?”
“Never, oh never! I shudder—”’
“Shudder away, but at the same time think a moment, Ma-
dame,” said the ferocious Noirceuil, pursuing his embuggery, “it
would require no more than to cut through the thinnest of partitions
and the act you take exception to would be nullified; and so, if you
like, Juliette, with a razo-—”
“Fuck, Noirceuil, fuck, your mind is beginning to rove.”
And the little woman, continuing to struggle: “Let go of me,
let go! Tis a violence, an abomination—”
“Why, God damn your soul!” Noirceuil roared, seizing a
pistol and clapping the barrel to her temple, ‘‘any more disturbance
from you, just one more word, and I blow your brains out.”
’T was then the unhappy creature realized that resignation was
her only course. Wearily, tearfully, she bends her head, lays it upon
my breast, I pinch her belly, pull the hairs from her bush, cause her,
in fine, such sharp pain that Noirceuil, locked in that trim little
anus as though in a vice, senses the sperm rising in his balls. He
catches hold of her breasts from underneath, wrenches them so
cruelly, her pain becomes so extreme that the rake fairly screams
as he discharges. He withdraws; and I, leaping upon that charming
woman, I in my turn derive an excruciating pleasure from her. This
scene revives Noirceuil; his prick rearisen, he comes forward to
join us. Through the posi:ion | am in, my buttocks are accessible to
him, he kisses them, and. inserting his prick in Madame de Val-
rose’s mouth, orders her to suck it: her initial reaction is one of
horror, her next impulse is to disobey. What a group! I was
oe
It
Juliette & 1167
sprawled atop Valrose; Noirceuil was lying upon me; he was warm-
ing himself in that pretty little person’s mouth and was tonguing my
ass. I poured fuck into my fricatrice’s cunt, Noirceuil loosed his
into her mouth. Then we readjusted ourselves.
“There we are,” said Noirceuil, his self-possession once re-
turned, ‘“‘the infidelity has been committed; do you or do you not
intend to save your husband ?”
“Will he be saved by that, Monsieur?” was the charming
creature’s question, asked in the mildest and sweetest voice; “are
you very sure it will save him?”
“I swear it by all that is holy,” the traitor declared, “and if
I am mistaken, I am willing to forego all renewal of the pleasures
I have just tasted with you. Be here tomorrow morning, we shall go
to the judge together, you will sign a deposition affirming your hus-
band’s guilt; I shall have him at your side the next day.”
“Oh, Noirceuil,” I murmured to that monster, ‘how I admire
this perseverance you are able to display in crime, even beyond the
moment when the passions have subsided.”
“Why, you saw me accomplish my act of pleasure,” Noirceuil
replied; “‘you know, do you not, that my every expense of fuck is
the signing of a death warrant?”
We separated. Madame de Valrose, whom I conveyed to her
home, besought me to take an interest in her case; and I promised
that I would, with the sincerity one owes to a whore one has become
tired of. The following day she made her deposition; and on the
day after that Noirceuil arranged affairs so cleverly that the poor
little thing was declared her husband’s accomplice, and hanged be-
side him where he, after having been broken, lay exposed upon the
wheel. We were, Noirceuil and I, watching from a window, I
frigged him during the spectacle, he frigged me. Was my discharge
agreeable? Not in ages had I enjoyed a better one. Compassion
moved Noirceuil to ask for the custody of the child, he obtained it,
he fucked it, and inside twenty-four hours had flung it into the
streets, penniless and naked.
“Far, far better that than to kill it,” he pointed out to me,
“its sufferings will last longer, as shall my joy at being responsible
for them.”
Meanwhile, Abbé Chabert had found me everything I needed.
1168 < THE MARQUIS DE SADE
A week after having arrived in Paris I moved myself into a town
house, you know what a delightful place it is; and I bought this
property in the neighborhood of Essonnes, where we are for-
gathered today; I invested the rest of my funds in various holdings,
and when all my business was completed, estimated my income at
roughly four million a year. Fontange’s five hundred thousand was
spent furnishing my two houses, magnificently, I think you will
agree. Next, I turned my attentions to libidinous arrangements; I
assembled my several seraglios of women, in town and in country ;
I hired thirty valets, all of them tall solid fellows, comely, chosen
especially for size of member; and you know the service I get from
them. I have, besides, six mackerels of my own in Paris, they pander
exclusively to me, and when I am in the city I always spend three
hours at one of their establishments, every day. Out here in the
country, they send me what they find, and you have often been able
to. verify the quality of their furnitures. With all that, I would ven-
ture to suppose there are few women who can claim to lead a
more delightful life; anc. yet, you know, I do not cease to want; I
consider myself poor; ray desires are infinitely in excess of my
possibilities; I would spend twice as much, if I had it; and I leave
no stone unturned to increase my wealth, criminal or not, there is
nothing I am unwilling to do for money.
Once these divers arrangements had been made, I sent a ser-
vant to bring Mademoiselle Fontange from Chaillot; everything
owed for her keep was paid, and she was led out of her nunnery.
Nothing in all the length and breadth of Nature could equal that
girl’s beauty. Imagine Flora herself, and of Fontange’s graces and
attractions you will still have a very imperfect idea. Seventeen years
of age, Mademoiselle Donis was blonde; loosened, her superb
tresses reached nearly to the floor; her eyes were a lovely brown,
of incomparable liveliness, sparkling with love and voluptuousness
at once; her delightful mouth never seemed to open save to heighten
her beauty; and her faultless teeth resembled pearls set amidst
roses. Naked, this heavenly creature could have served as model
to the painter of the Graces. That richly rounded mons veneris!
Those gloriously turned, infinitely inspiring thighs! That ass, that
sublime ass! O Fontange! the cruelty it required, and the liber-
tinage, not to spare such a host of charms, and not to exempt
Juliette & 1169
at least you from the rigorous fate I reserved for all my playthings.
Five years before, when her mother had first talked to her
about me, Fontange had been told that all possible respect and con-
sideration were due me; upon learning who had sent the servant to
fetch her away, she was overjoyed; and upon arriving, dazzled by
this opulence, by this multitude of valets, by these magnificent fur-
nishings, things which were all very new to her who had never until
now been outside her convent, she blinked her eyes in disbelief, won-
dering whether she had not been transported to an Olympus, borne
above the clouds to some aerial dwelling place, habitat of gods: she
may even have taken me for Venus. She sank down at my knees, I
raised her up; I kissed her rosy mouth, her glistening eyes, her two
cheeks so fair and which so quickly took Nature’s brightest crimson
hue when touched by my lips. I hugged her to my breast and felt her
little heart beat excitedly against mine, like that of a fledgling dove
one has stolen from its nest. She was dressed with a degree of
stylishness, albeit simply; from underneath a pretty flowered hat her
superb blonde hair fell in curls to her two exquisitely shaped shoul-
ders. When she spoke it was in a gentle tone, in a musical voice full
of sweet mildness.
‘““Madame, J thank a generous heaven for the privilege of be-
ing able to devote my life to you. My mother is dead; in this world
I have no one else but you.”
As the words came forth her eyes grew moist, and I smiled.
“Yes, my child,” I said to her, “‘your mother is dead; she was
my friend; hers was an untimely, an unusual death . . . she left in
my trust a certain amount of money for you. If you behave deserv-
ingly toward me, you may be rich; but that will all depend upon
your conduct, upon blind obedience to my will.”
“I shall be your slave, Madame.” And she bent and kissed
my hand.
And I kissed her mouth again, rather more lingeringly this
second time. I lifted her kerchief away, freed her bosom from its
veils. She reddened; though unsteadied by agitation, nevertheless
she continued, in measured and respectful terms, to sound the well-
bred and decent young lady. Then for the third time I take her in
my arms... her hair is a little disheveled, her lovely breasts are en-
tirely bare; and, after fastening my mouth upon hers, “I believe,”
1170 <& THE MARQUIS DE SADE
I say to her, “I believe I am going to love you, for you are young
and pure and sweet.”
The idea of shocking her occurred to me then: nothing is
prettier than virtue scandalized by vice. I ring for my women; I
have them undress me in the presence of this heavenly little girl;
I gaze at myself in a looking glass.
‘Tell me, Fontange,” I say, kissing her anew, “is it true that
I have an attractive body ?”
And the poor thing: averted her eyes; her face was scarlet.
Around me I had four 0% my most beautiful women: Phryné, Lais,
Aspasia, and Theodora; all four between sixteen and eighteen years
of age; so many Aphrodites.
“Come, Mademoiselle,’ Lais said to her, ‘“‘do not be back-
ward. 'Tis a favor Madame is granting you; take advantage of it.”
She advances, but with lowered eyes. I take her by the hand,
draw her dowa upon my body.
‘What a child she is,” I murmur to my women; “Phryné, show
our babe in arms what shz is to do.”
And Phryné sits dcwn beside me, takes my head upon her
breast and, reaching a hand toward my cunt, begins to rub my
clitoris. No woman acquits herself of that chore so well as she. Her
execution is adroit, tutored, the play of her fingers lascivious,
unerring; she kisses and caresses the behind in a singular manner;
her tongue, when that is what I wish, tickles the anus marvelously ;
her movements upon the mons veneris harmonize amazingly with
what she is capable of doing in the other temple, which she sucks
indescribably when called upon. While Phryné was in action; Lais,
astride my chest, advanced her dear little cunt into position for
sucking; Theodora was frigging my asshole, and the beautiful
Aspasia maintained Fontange nearby the spectacle and her atten-
tion fixed upon it, while frigging her to soothe her aching conscience.
“Did you not use to do the same thing with your compan-
ions?” Aspasia asked her.
“Oh, never !”’
“Fiddlesticks,” said I from between Lais’ buttocks, ‘‘it’s
nothing but masturbation in convents, I know it from experience. At
your age I had already had my hands under everybody’s skirt.”
Juliette & 1171
Then, leaving the cunt I had been sucking: “Come here and kiss
me,” I ordered Fontange.
She approaches; I devour her.
My women received instructions to undress her. And proceed-
ings were temporarily interrupted while the clothing that was
hindering my pleasures was removed, Fontange’s first, then every-
one else’s. Ah, great God! how beautiful the child was when naked!
what fairness of skin! what proportions!
“Very well,” said I, “place her upon me, in such a way that I
have this most winning of cunts above my lips. To you, Aspasia,
will go the ass her position will be offering you: tongue her anus.
Phryné, you shall frig her clitoris, seeing to it that all exhalations
drain into my mouth. I am going to spread my legs; you, Theodora,
between my thighs, shall cunt-suck me while, Lais, you shall be
licking my asshole. Fair friends, pray put all your science to best
purpose; use every trick you know, invent others, for this maid
excites me exceedingly, and I wish to shed a sea of fuck on her
account.”
I need not describe to you all the pleasure I was to extract
from this celestial scene; I went half-mad from joy. Lust did in due
time assert itself in the young Fontange; she was unable to resist
the voluptuous sensations vibrating throughout her being. Modesty
gives way to raptures, and the novice discharges. Oh, how delicious
is the first lowing of fuck! With what joy I fed upon that nectar!
“Turn her over,” were the next instructions I issued to my
women; “have her place her head between Theodora’s thighs, and
suck her cunt; I in the meantime shall frig her ass with my tongue;
Lais will do the same to me; I shall be fondling, stimulating an ass
with each of my two hands.”
Another ecstasy, another ejaculation on my part; it is more
than I can bear, I seize Fontange, I leap upon her, I press my
clitoris hard against hers, I rub frenziedly, I devour her mouth, my
women tease my ass, spank it, thrash it, slip their hands underneath
and worry my sex, in short, they overwhelm me with pleasure, and
I loose what must be my tenth discharge, with my impure sperm
drenching the delicious cunt of the prettiest and most virginal of
girls.
1172 <& THE MARQUIS DE SADE
The fuck gone forth, the illusion faded away. Beautiful as
Fontange was, I now saw her with nought but that malign indiffer-
ence which wakes cruelty in me when I am weary of objects, and
soon her doom was spelled out in the depths of my heart.
‘Put the clothes back on her,” I said to my women.
I too got dressed; I sent the others out, we remained alone.
‘‘Mademoiselle,” I said to her harshly, ‘‘augur nothing from
a fleeting moment of inebriety into which Nature plunged me
against my will; banish any thought that predilection might, on my
part, have had something to do with it; I am fond of women in
general; you satisfied me; there’s an end to it. You must now be
informed that your moter gave me five hundred thousand francs
for your dowry; it were simpler that you learn the fact from me
than from some other source.”
“Yes, Madame, I already know it.”
‘Ah, Mademoiselle, you already know it; my congratulations
to you. However, what you do not already know is that your good
mother contracted a debt in this very same amount to a certain
Monsieur de Noirceuil, to whom I of course transferred the sum,
and who may bestow it upon you, if he chooses, or else keep it, for
it belongs to him, both the money and the decision too. I shall take
you tomorrow to see this gentleman, and urge you to behave with
utmost obligingness should he happen to make any demands upon
you.”
‘‘Madame, the ethical and moral training which supplied the
very basis of the excellert education I have been given—Madame,
I wish to say that they are hardly consistent with your counsels.”
“Nor with my actions, you may as well add, since you have
taken it into your head tc scold me. Blame me even for my kindness
to you, I advise you to do that also.”
‘I am not saying that, Madame.”
‘Well, do say it if you want to, for I assure you that your
reproaches affect me as little as your praise: one frolics with a
little girl like you, and when the game is over, one scorns her.”
“Scorn, Madame! I thought that only vice was to be scorned.”
“Vice amuses, virtue bores. And according to my belief, what-
ever promotes our pleasures always deserves preference over that
Juliette & 1173
which gives nothing but headache and depressive vapors. . . . But
you answer back, my fair one; you are tart, you are forward, you
are insolent, and you are far from that degree of superiority which
renders such failings excusable. An end to these discussions,
Mademoiselle, if you please; the fact is that I owe you nothing;
that with the half a million intended for you I paid a creditor to
whom your mother was in debt; and that it lies with that creditor
to decide whether to retain the sum or return it to you; and I warn
you that he will keep it unless you show all kinds of consideration
for him.”
“What kinds of consideration, Madame?”
“The same kinds I have just required from you; I should
think you must understand what I mean.”
“In that case, Madame, your Monsieur de Noirceuil shall
keep everything. I am not the person to embark upon any such
infamous career as this you propose to me; and if, out of respect
for you, out of frailty or childishness, I was able a little while ago
to forget what I have been taught to regard as my duty, so well
have you opened my eyes that I have been punished for my fault.”
And from those eyes, the most beautiful in all the world, there now
gushed a flood of tears.
“Indeed,” I said, ‘‘it is scarcely to be believed. We do not fall
down at Mademoiselle’s knees, and lo! she makes a scene. My God,
where would we libertines be if we had to perform curtsies and
reverences before all the little harlots who frig us?”
The word harlot was the signal for a veritable tempest; there
was a banging of the head upon the table, there were shrieks of
despair, there were tears scattered all about the room; and, if you
wish to know the truth, ’twas not without the most trenchant
pleasure I carried on my humiliations of the Fontange for whom I
had been all afire a short moment before. Pride is salved by the
illusion’s collapse; and from disdain for the idol one obtains an
indemnity for all one spent when prostrate before it. That silly
little goose irritated me to a point beyond description.
“Look here, my child,” I said to her, “if Monsieur de Noir-
ceuil does not give you your dowry, you will enter my service; it
just so happens that I need a girl in the scullery, you can surely
wash my pots and pans.”
1174 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
And this brought forth tears in such abundance that I won-
dered whether she was not going to suffocate.
“On the other hand,” I continued, ‘‘if you dislike kitchens you
can always go abegging or try whoring. Whoring, that’s what I
believe I would suggest; your looks aren’t bad; and you have no
idea what’s to be earned from frigging pricks.”
‘‘Madame,” said Fontange, quite beside herself, “I am
destined to neither of those trades. I wish to leave this house,
kindly allow me to go. I repent the things I have done here, all my
life I shall pray to be forgiven by the Supreme Being. . . . I intend
to return to my convent.”
“Do you? Your convent won't take you in. To live in convents
costs money. You have none.”
“T have friends there.”
‘“‘No, you don’t, now that you are poor.”
“T shall work.”
“Come, come, little fool, calm yourself, dry your tears; my
women will look after you this evening, tomorrow I shall take you
to Noirceuil, and if you are mild in your manners you may not find
him quite so harsh in his, nor as mischievous as I have been.”
I ring, recommend the girl to the care of my tribades, have
horses hitched to my carriage, and dy to Noirceuil’s house. He
requests details; painting Fontange for him in none but truth’s
colors, I could not fail to arouse him.
“Here,” says he, trundling out a very rigid prick, ‘behold,
Juliette, the effect of your descriptive abilities.”
And bidding me accompany him into his boudoir, he engaged
me to cooperate in several of those curious fantasies which rather
double than extinguish th: effects of desire, which are not pleasure-
takings but which, with libertine spirits like Noirceuil, outvalue all
the licit conjunctions whether of hymen or of love. We were two
hours at play, for I too am fond of those little horrors. I satisfy
them for men with the same pleasure they take in submitting me to
them ; their lubricity ignites mine; no sooner do I content them than
I want them to content me in my turn; and after, as I say, several
hours of foul frolicking, which cost us no loss of any kind, this,
according to my recollection, was the declaration Noirceuil made
to me:
Juliette % 1175
“It is a most extraordinary caprice I have been dwelling upon
for a very long time, Juliette, and I have been awaiting your re-
turn with impatience, having in all the world nobody but you with
whom I could satisfy it. I should like to marry . . . I should like to
get married, not once, but twice, and upon the same day: at ten
o'clock in the morning, I wish, dressed as a woman, to wed a man;
at noon, wearing masculine attire, I wish to take a bardash for my
wife. There is still more . . . I wish to have a woman do the same
as I; and what other woman but you could participate. in this
fantasy? You, dressed as a man, must wed a tribade at the same
ceremony at which I, guised as a woman, become the wife of a
man; next, dressed as a woman, you will wed another tribade wear-
ing masculine clothing, at the very moment I, having resumed my
ordinary attire, go to the altar to become united in holy matrimony
with a catamite disguised as a girl.”
“Assuredly, good sir, this, as you yourself have said, is a
curious caprice that has entered your head.”
“Yes, but since Nero married Tigellinus as a woman and
Sporus as a man, I am originating nothing except the celebration of
the two unions in the space of a single day and, of course, the
whimsical idea of having you imitate me; there is the matter of the
ties which already subsist between ourselves and the objects which
shall be utilized in this farce, and here I think we have greatly
improved upon Nero. Your two wives are, firstly, Fontange who,
clad in mannish garb, will become your husband; secondly, your
daughter who, dressed in the customary raiments of her sex, will
marry a Juliette in man’s clothing. My husband and my wife, who
shall they be, do you wonder? They shall be two children, Juliette,
yes, two children sired by me and of whose existence you have until
now been unaware, of whose existence, indeed, nobody knows. One
of them is nearing eighteen, he is to be my husband: a Hercules for
vigor and looks. The other is twelve; ‘tis the incarnation of Eros.
Both are the fruit of the most legitimate commerce; my first wife
produced the elder, the younger was given me by the sixth. All told,
I have had eight wives. That, I believe, you do know.”
“But did you not tell me that you had no children left?”
“These two have been dead to the world; both have been
raised with great care, and in the strictest conformance with in-
1176 % THE MARQUIS DE SADE
structions, in one of my castles far off in Brittany. Neither one has
ever seen the light of day. They have just been delivered to me here
in town, they made the journey in a sealed coach. They are a pair of
veritable savages, scarcely able to speak. But that is of little im-
portance; properly guided, they will do very nicely for the cere-
mony ; the rest is our affair.”
“And appalling bacchanalia, I take it, are to succeed these
unusual weddings ?”
“Exactly.”
“And Noirceuil, you wish to have my poor adorable little
Marianne become one of the victims in these hideous orgies, is that
it?”
“No, she’ll not be a victim, but she will be present, my lust
demands that. No harm will be done her, of that you may be
perfectly certain: your women will entertain her while we are at
work, thatisall....”
Noirceuil obtains my agreement to everything. It will soon be
seen how the villain kept his word.
*Twas not immediately nor without difficulty that Mademoi-
selle Donis succeeded in understanding the peculiar arrangement
of the forthcoming scene : virtue regularly has trouble accommodat-
ing itself to vice’s extravagances. Partly from fear, partly from
eagerness to please, the unhappy girl did at last give her whole
consent, but only after I had solemnly vowed that these scandalous
weddings would conclude in nothing apt to alarm her modesty. The
first ceremony took place in a small town lying two leagues from the
magnificent castle Noirceuil owned outside Orléans, and in which
the postmarital festival was to be celebrated; the second ceremony,
in the chapel of that same castle.
I shall not fatigue you with the details of those two rites; you
will be content to know that everything transpired decently, punc-
tually, and in strictest accordance with tradition; the religious
ceremonies were followed by their civil counterparts, enacted in an
equally dignified manner. There were wedding rings, there were
Masses, benedictions, constituted dowries, witnesses; nothing was
lacking. Costumes and paint artistically disguised the two sexes,
embellished them where necessary.
By two o'clock that: afternoon Noirceuil’s dual project had
Juliette 2 1177
been carried out: he had become the wife of one of his sons, the
husband of the other, while I found myself the husband of my
daughter and the wife of Fontanges. Everything completed, the
gates to the castle were shut and barred. The weather being ex-
ceedingly cold, great fires were lit in the superb hall where we were
to forgather; and severest orders having been issued that the
impending bacchanalia be interrupted under no circumstances, we
closed ourselves up inside those baronial surroundings. In number
we were twelve.
We being the two heroes, Noirceuil and I sat upon a black
velvet throne placed in the center of the hall; below the throne
there were to be seen, all wearing crowns of cypress, the elder of
Noirceuil’s two sons, named Phaon, eighteen years of age; the
younger, aged twelve, whose name was Euphorbe; my daughter
Marianne and Mademoiselle Donis; the two groomsmen at the
weddings, agents of Noirceuil’s sodomite pleasures and his hired
killers, one of whom was dubbed Desrues, the other Cartouche,
each of some thirty years, both garbed as cannibals, with switches,
daggers, and live snakes in their hands, both posted at our sides in
the attitude of bodyguards; on the right of us as on the left, seated,
were two of my tribades, Theodora and Phryné; at our feet, two
whores, likewise naked, appeared to be awaiting our orders. These
girls, simply picked out of a bawdyhouse, were a bare eighteen and
twenty years of age, and both were of the most charming physi-
ognomy : they were there as auxiliaries to the scene.
Surveying these preparations, I felt just a little apprehensive
for my precious Marianne and was moved to remind Noirceuil of
the assurances he had given me.
“‘My dear,” was his reply, “it ought to be plain to you that
I am tremendously overwrought. Consider what it did to me this
morning, to satisfy the incredible longing that had been preoccupy-
ing me for years. It crazed my brain, Juliette, that’s what it did,
and I fear you have chosen a bad moment to remind me of promises
of good behavior: let a little added irritation set the nervous
system ablaze, and you know as well as I that all such guarantees
go up in smoke. Let us enjoy ourselves, Juliette, let us amuse our-
selves; perhaps I shall abide by my word; but if I do not, in the
lewd pleasures which shall soon see us gripped in ecstasy, strive to
1178 <& THE MARQUIS DE SADE
find the strength to endure the misfortune you seem to dread—a
misfortune which, between us two, is by no means as dreadful as
they make out. Think, dear Juliette, that for libertines like us, the
hand is stayed by nothing, nor is the mind; that, for us, an object’s
ten thousand titles to inviolable respect are that many reasons to
outrage it further: the more exigent virtue appears, the sooner it
pleases furious vice to defile and degrade it.”
One hundred candles lit that hall as the scene opened.
“Cartouche, Desrues,”’ said Noirceuil to his two ministers,
‘worthy emulators of the famous men whose names I permit you
to bear; you who, like your patrons of whose high feats history
shall transmit an indestructible record down to the last generations
of mankind; you, I say, who have never failed to lend your arm to
the noble and ennobling cause of crime, go undress the four destined
to holocaust and whose brows are wreathed in the foliage of death’s
tree, go strip them, and of their raiments, whereof there is no
further need, make the employment I have prescribed to you.”
The emissaries step forward; the four victims are despoiled
of every article of clothing, which is flung piece by piece into the
roaring blazes that warm the hall.
‘What baneful ceremony is this?” asks Fontange, seeing the
fire consume everything she has been wearing, her skirts, her petti-
coats, even her shift; “why burn these garments ?”
‘Dear girl,” Noirceuil replies, ‘‘a little earth, some sod, you
shall soon need no more than that for cover.”
“Good Lord! what do I hear! And what have I done to earn
this ?”
“Bring that creature to me,” Noirceuil says.
And while Lais sucks him, while one of the whores toils over
his ass, and while I excite him verbally, the libertine glues his
mouth to the mouth of that enchanting girl, and pumps it an entire
quarter of an hour despite Fontange’s resistance, which is keen but
vain. Then, shifting his lewd attentions to her behind, “‘Oh, Juliette,
she has an ass too! a beautiful ass,” he cries, working himself into
an ecstasy before it; ‘‘’twill be delightful to fuck all that and to
martyrize it... .”
Therewith his tongue slips into the cunning little hole; mean-
while, upon his orders, I with one hand pluck out the silky hairs
Juliette -& 1179
growing upon that lovely girl’s cunt and pinch her budding breasts
with the other. He forces her upon her knees, bids his two men
tongue her here and there, and ends with having her kiss his bum.
These commencements were trying for the young thing, her
shame and discomposure were extreme; if anything was more
powerful than these two feelings, ’twas the terror inspired in her
by the preparations for what, as best she could tell, seemed due to
follow. Trained to modesty, having received none but the best
principles in the house whence she came, Mademoiselle Donis
was necessarily in an evil situation; and nothing amused us more
than the fierce conflict raging between her sense of decency and her
perception of iron necessity. There was one point at which she
sought to elude the inevitable.
‘Stop that squirming and stay just where you are,” Noirceuil
told her harshly; ‘‘do you not realize how delicate the imagination
is in a man like me? A mere nothing disturbs it, the instant service
fails, everything breaks down, comes all to pieces; understand that
the divinest charms are null unless presented to us submissively and
with obedience.”
And while he spoke the rascal was fondling the girl’s ass, ’twas
over that angelic creature’s buttocks the impurest and most feroci-
ous hands were wandering. ‘‘Bugger-fuck!”” he exclaimed, pursuing
his palpations, “how unhappy I intend to make this little jade!
Look at these charms, and tell me whether they do not cry out for
horrors!”
He then has her take hold of Cartouche’s prick, obliges her
to frig it, savoring the sight of innocent hands accomplishing the
chores of vice; and as the poor girl, all in tears, exhibits much
disgust for the work but no skill, he orders one of the whores to
give her lessons and compels the student to humbly thank her
teacher.
“Some abilities as a fricatrice may well stand her in good
stead,” Noirceuil remarked; “the frightful state of misery to which
I propose to reduce her shall oblige her to do something to stay
alive.”
He bade her tongue the two whores’ cunts; after that, to suck
his prick; and enjoined the company to slap her hard upon the face
whenever the slightest hint of repugnance could be read there.
1180 «& THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“Very good,” said he, “let us give thought to hymeneal
pleasures, we have devoted ourselves long enough to those of love.”
Then, casting a murderous glance in Fontange’s direction: ‘Aye,
well may she tremble,” said he, “‘and more than tremble in anticipa-
tion of the moment when I return to busy myself with her again.”
Lais and Theodora are dispatched toward Phaon, at once
Noirceuil’s husband and his son; they soon succeed in erecting him,
and lead the boy up to Noirceuil who, bent over me, nonchalantly
presents his behind to tke chaste consort whom my tribades guide
his way. I was frigging him from below and he was tonguing now
the one whore’s asshole. now the other’s.
“Have the customary ceremonies observed,” he says to
Phaon’s conductresses, ‘‘rhis young bridegroom is not to make away
with the favors offered to him until he has first shown himself
worthy of them.”
Phaon kneels, adopts a worshipful attitude before the ass
facing him, kisses it respectfully, rises to his feet, and, yielding to
the impulses being developed within him, the handsome youth runs
his instrument hilt-high into his dear papa’s ass. Membered like a
mule, his capers and heaves soon produce quivers of joy in the
patient, and rakish Noirceuil falls to simulating the little shrieks,
the smirks and smiles of the bride undergoing her defloration; he
sighs, he moans, his contortions are amusing beyond words. The
youth, perfectly excited by everything surrounding him, soon dis-
charges into the entrails hugging him happily. When he has com-
pleted his act he is obliged to reiterate the respectful gestures with
which he began. Then he retires; but Noirceuil, very hot, wants
fucking; his panting anus seems to be crying forth the need for
pricks; Cartouche and Desrues sodomize him; while they do, he
kisses the buttocks of Lais and of Theodora to which, he avows, he
has taken a mighty fancy. Niched underneath him, I suck him with
all my strength; and he fondles whore’s ass. Fucked twice by each
of his men, Noirceuil is ready for new things. “Now we shall play
the husband,” he announces; ‘‘after having acquitted myself so
well in the wifely role.”
Euphorbe, his second son, is brought to him. I am asked to
pilot the engine; three lusty blows and the pucelage is no more. His
weapon is still loaded when Noirceuil withdraws, and he comes
Juliette & 1181
forth with an ardent desire for Fontange. It is the whores who
march her up to the line and who supervise the operation.
“Juliette,” says Noirceuil, ‘‘oblige me by violently biting this
little girl’s cunt while I embugger her. Since during my pleasure I
would that she experience a maximum of pain, your instructions,
Cartouche and Desrues, are to seize each of you one of her hands,
and to remove her fingernails with the blade of a pocketknife.”
Everything is put into execution. Fontange, stunned by this
variety of simultaneous agonies, knows not whether it is her
mutilated fingers which hurt her most, or the bites wherewith I
lacerate her cunt, or the hammerings of the monstrous prick tearing
her fundament. But ’tis, it seems, the embuggering which is creating
the greatest difficulties for her ravaged frame; the titillations pro-
voked in her behind appear to be nearly too much for her to endure.
Her screams, her tears, her groans attain such a pitch of violence
that Noirceuil, powerfully stirred by all he hears, teeters on the
brink of crisis. He retreats from the breach.
‘Oh, Juliette!” he cries, ‘‘what a delightful ass the slut
possesses, and how I adore making her suffer. Would that I had all
hell’s demons to help me bother her, each by means of an original
and unheard-of torture.”
He has her turned over and held by the harlots; I open and
present her cunt to him; he plunges impetuously into it, while burn-
ing sulphur is put before the wretched girl’s nostrils and her ears
are shorn away. The maidenhead is blasted, blood flows, and
Noirceuil, more aroused than ever, decunts, has the victim held
aloft by his two trusties, and sets merrily to flogging her with
martinets whose iron tips have been heated in the fire. He himself
is whipped by the whores while he is acting, and he sprinkles kisses
upon the asses of my tribades, whose buttocks are poised nearby on
a level with his lips; I suck him and at the same time tickle his anus.
‘“‘We are comfortable in here, are we not,” says Noirceuil a
few minutes later; ‘the severe cold reigning outside gives me a
splendid idea.”
He wraps himself in a heavy fur mantle, has his two men
and me don others, and we walk out of doors with a naked Fon-
tange. In front of the chateau is a great marble basin now covered
with ice; upon it Fontange is placed. Cartouche and Desrues, hold-
1182 % THE MARQUIS DE SADE
ing great horsewhips and large firecrackers, stand by the basin’s
edge; Noirceuil, two or three paces back, watches, and I am at his
side, frigging him. Foritange is told to skate six turns around the
basin; when she strays too close to the edge, she is driven off by
the whips; when she moves too far away, firecrackers are tossed at
her, they explode about her head or between her legs. Tis a very
gay spectacle, as the poor creature skids and slides this way and
that, falling very frequently, each time all but breaking a leg.
“What!” exclaims Noirceuil angrily, seeing that she is about
to complete her sixth circuit without having met with serious
accident, ‘‘what! the slut is to come through unscathed ?”
But the next instant, to Noirceuil’s relief, an exploding fire-
cracker blows one of her breasts away, she totters, fractures an
arm as she falls.
“That, by God, is a little better,” mutters Noirceuil.
She is borne back into the castle, unconscious; there, she is
given that minimum of attention required to restore her to useful-
ness, her wounds are lightly bound up; and the stage is set for
further scenes.
Noirceuil demands. that my daughter frig me while he looks
on; he avidly kisses the child’s pretty hinderparts while she is en-
gaged at her task.
‘That shall turn into a lovely ass, Juliette,” he says to me, “it
already excites me enormously.”
And though she was but seven years old, the wicked fellow
prodded her tentatively with his gigantean prick; but, wheeling
suddenly away from Marianne and toward his son Euphorbe, Noir-
ceuil fits himself into that other fair young posterior, ordering me to
crush the boy’s testicles. There is no pain to equal what the unhappy
child experiences, simultaneously tormented before and behind.
After a brief run in that charming ass Noirceuil withdraws and has
the child lashed by his ministers. While one of them flogs, the other
embuggers the sore-beset Euphorbe, whose virile parts, in con-
formance with his father’s wishes, are lost to a razor-blade
wielded by me, who shaves them clean off his belly. Noirceuil,
managing to keep one eye on the operation, ardently kisses
Theodora’s buttocks in the meantime.
“Come now, Julietze,” he says to me, “have yourself fucked.”
Juliette %& 1183
In a fearful state, I wanted nothing else. The two cannibals
laid hands on me; one darted into my cunt, the other lodged him-
self in my ass; Noirceuil moved from the first to the next, em-
buggering them by turns while the whores spurred him on with
lashes. As soon as he sees my discharge terminated, Noirceuil calls
for Fontange and surrenders her to the two executioners.
‘Make free with her,” he tells them, “do whatever you like
provided you torture her the while you fuck her.”
The two rascals treated the girl so roughly that, in their arms,
she swooned away once again.
“One moment,” said Noirceuil, “I cannot resist sodomizing
her anew.” ;
And while he was satisfying himself I surprised him with an
unexpected piece of cruelty: using a scalpel, I cut out my ward’s
right eye. That horror overpowers Noirceuil: his patient’s reaction
to the pain is so lively, her muscular contraction so sharp, that the
libertine loses his seed ten inches inside the maid’s rectum, at a
juncture where he is being sodomized himself and is girt round by
display of ass.
“Come along, my fair one,” he says to the bedraggled crea-
ture; he grips her hard by the arm and drags her bodily into an
adjoining chamber. I follow.
“Behold,” says he, pointing to a table upon which lie, in gold
coins, the five hundred thousand francs belonging to the poor girl,
“that is your dowry; in order that you see that wealth, we have left
you an eye, and it is our fond hope that the sight will prove an
unhappy one: for that money is not to be yours. Slut, my intention
is that you die of starvation; and I am going to treat you in such
sort that you shall never be able to complain of your fate, although
I am also going to set you at liberty. Here,” he went on, taking her
by the wrist, ‘‘touch this gleaming stuff, tis gold, ’tis yours, and yet
you shall never have it. Aye, buggeress, feel it, that is what I want
you to do; and now that you have done it, you'll do nothing more
with these useless organs.” So saying, he secures her hands upon a
butcher’s block, embuggers her, and I cleave off her hands while he
is operating; the blood is stanched, the stumps bandaged. . . . Im-
mediately, fucking uninterruptedly, the barbarian orders his victim
to open her mouth and stick forth her tongue: I seize it with tongs,
1184 e& THE MARQUIS DE SADE
I sever it at the root; I gouge out the remaining eye. . . . Noirceuil
discharges.
“Good,” says he, withdrawing and dressing the girl in a shift
of sackcloth, ‘‘we are now assured that she shall not write, that she
shall be blind as a bat, that she shall say never a word to any soul
that lives.”
Weescort her to the gate and out upon the highroad.
“Go seek your living,” says Noirceuil, giving her a ferocious
kick, ‘‘your living, indeed! The thought of the fate that awaits you
gives us greater cheer than we would derive from your assassina-
tion; begone, slut, venture into the world and denounce your
persecutors, if you can.”
“Ah, but she will be able to grasp their questions if nothing
else,”’ I pointed out, ‘ther hearing remains to her.”
“Does it now ?” said the barbarous Noirceuil. ‘“Then we shall
remedy that,” and he drove the point of a knife successively into
each of her ears.
We returned to the company.
“Excite me, you rascals,” our libertine said to the four
women; “I have just discharged, I must recover my forces. . . .
Frig these men and let them fuck me; my need of horrors is never
so great as when I have been lately committing them.”
Noirceuil is encompassed: asses, pricks surround him every-
where; he is frigged, fucked, tongued, sucked.
“Ah, Juliette,” he announces once his device begins to rise,
“Juliette, I wish to fuck your daughter.”
Without allowing rne time to reply, the villain leaps upon her,
has his satellites hold her for him, and embuggers her with the
very speed of light. My poor Marianne’s shrill screams are all the
warning I receive of the dreadful outrage perpetrated against her.
“My stars, Noirceuil! What are you about?”
“T am ass-fucking your child. This had to happen, did it not?
and is it not better that it be your friend rather than some other
who plucks the flower ?”
After having mercilessly scraped and torn the little dear, he
withdraws from her bleeding anus, still in possession of his
energies; and casting haggard glances at the two harlots, he pro-
claims his intention to sacrifice one of them. The luckless girl
Juliette @ 1185
clutches-his knees, implores him, fails to move him: she is seized,
sat astride the top of a double ladder and tied fast. Noirceuil, in a
chair placed five or six yards away, holds a cord whose other end
is attached to the girl. Theodora and Lais, kneeling, frig his prick,
balls, and asshole; the two cannibals fuck me within his view; the
remaining whore is bound head downward to a stake, and in that
awkward posture awaits events. Twenty times the rascal tugs on
the cord, twenty times the victim comes crashing down, is set back
upright, pulled down again, and this abominable game does not
end until she has broken both her legs and had her skull cracked.
These infamies having heated the libertine, he instructs an aide to
blindfold the other whore, and decrees that each of us inflict
several wounds upon her. The ordeal will cease when she succeeds
in guessing the name of her aggressor: choking on her own blood,
she collapses before she is able to identify any of the hands that
are causing her woe. Upon Noirceuil’s orders and following a
suggestion originating with me, these two wretches, out of whom
not all the breath has fled, are hung up inside the chimney for a
slow roasting above the flames and asphyxiation from the smoke.
Drunk with lust, Noirceuil roves in a rage about the salon;
his lunatic stares fall upon the five objects still at the disposition of
his lewd fury: my two tribades, my daughter, and his two sons.
Everything leads me to suspect that he is ready to immolate them
all at once.
“O infamy on high!” he shouts, “remove these curbs that
make me little, when I would imitate thee and commit evil. I ask
of thee no faculty for virtue, but canst not at least communicate to
me thy mighty capacities for crime, and let me wreak havoc after
thy example? Ah, dog of heaven, for one instant, if thou darest,
put thy lightning into my hands, and once I have destroyed mortals,
thou shalt see my loins grow gladder still as I hurl the bolt that
blasts thy execrable existence.”
With these words he leaps upon his son Phaon, embuggers
him, has himself embuggered, and orders me, while I am being
frigged by Theodora, to tear the living heart out of the child he is
fucking, and to give it to him that he may eat it: the villain devours
it, and at the same moment he discharges, drives a dagger into the
breast of his other son.
1186 <% THE MARQUIS DE SADE
“Well, Juliette! Look, my angel, and tell me, have I not done
a fine day’s work? Say, am I steeped enough in blood and
atrocities ?”’
“You make me shudder, Noirceuil, but I imitate you withal.”
“Think not, Juliette, that the orgy is over, nor that I am
done.”
His glittering eyes fall once again upon my daughter; his
erection is that of a maniac; he seizes Marianne, has her pinioned,
and encunts her.
_ “By God,” he cries. “this little creature makes my head spin,
damn me if ’tis not true. What do you mean to do with her,
Juliette? You are not the sentimental fool, you are not the idiot
to have feelings for this loathsome spawn of your abominable hus-
band’s blessed testicle; sc sell her to me. Sell me the slut, Juliette, I
wish to buy her from you; let’s both soil ourselves, you in the
pretty sin of vending me your child, I in the still more rousing one
of paying you only in order to assassinate her. Yes, Juliette, yes,
let’s assassinate your daaghter’—and here he finished wiping his
prick and nodded toward it, gleaming and purple—‘‘consider, if
you will, how this idea inflames my senses. Stay, Juliette, have
yourself fucked before you pronounce, answer me not till you have
a pair of pricks in your body.”
Crime holds no terrors for anyone when in the act of fucking;
and one must always ponder its attractions when swimming in tides
of sperm. Pricks penetrate me, I am fucked; a second time Noir-
ceuil inquires to what purpose I wish to put my daughter.
“O villainous soul!’’ I cry, loosing discharge upon discharge,
“star of perfidy, your ascendant places all else in eclipse, smothers
all else in me save the longing for crime and infamy. . . . With
Marianne do you what you please, whoreson knave,” say I, beside
myself, ‘‘she is yours.”
No sooner does he hear these words than he decunts, takes
hold of the poor child in his two wicked hands, and hurls her,
naked, into the roaring fire; I step forward, and second him; I too
pick up a poker and thwart the unhappy creature’s natural efforts
at escape, for she thrashes convulsively in the ames: we drive her
back, I say; we are being frigged, both of us, then we are being
_ Juliette & 1187
sodomized. Marianne is being roasted alive; and we go off to
spend the rest of the night in each other’s arms, congratulating each
other upon the scene whose episodes and circumstances complement
a crime which, atrocious perhaps, is yet, in our shared opinion, too
mild.
‘So tell me now,” said Noirceuil, “‘is there anything in the
world to match the divine pleasures crime yields ? Is there anything
that can compete with the criminal humor? Beyond the criminal
sensation is there anything that produces such vibrations in us ?”
“No, my friend, not to my knowledge.”
“Then let us live in crime forever; and may nothing in all
Nature ever succeed in converting us to different principles. He is
not a man to be envied who, smitten by remorse, undertakes the
equally baneful and imprudent and needless retreat; for, irresolute,
pusillanimous in his acts, he will be no happier in his new career
than he was in the one he renounces. Happiness is dependent upon
energetic principles, and there can be none for him who wavers all
his life.”
We spent a week at Noirceuil’s country manor and accom-
plished a few new infamies every day. During that stay he urged
me to try one of the passions of the Empress Theodora, Justinian’s
wife. I lay down upon the ground ; two rustics sprinkled barleycorn
upon my bush and upon the labia of my sex; a dozen large geese
were brought up from the barnyard, and they began to peck at the
seeds with their beaks, causing me such furious irritation in those
parts that, when it was all over, I was absolutely obliged to fuck.
Noirceuil, who had foreseen these results, presented me to fifty of
his peasants, who performed prodigies with me. He too wished to
try the geese; he had them feed from his ass, and afterward pro-
claimed that an ass-pecking procured sensations keener than those
of the whip. To these debauches he added that of ordering both
the schoolmaster and schoolmistress of the town to furnish him
thirty pupils of the sex each taught. He held a mixed class at his
castle, had the little girls depucelated by the little boys; then
finished by whipping, sodomizing, and, at last, poisoning the lot.
“My friend,” I said to Noirceuil, “these are all trifles; can we
not advance a step and crown our orgies by some truly brilliant
1188 + THE MARQU:S DE SADE
action? These townspeople have no supply of water but what
comes from their wells; I have something of Durand’s confection
which will envenom the entire population inside two days: between
my women and me, we shall, I promise you, spread devastation
everywhere.” And I was frigging Noirceuil while making that
proposal to him. He proved unable to refuse.
“Fuck,” was the response of the rake, helpless to contain his
sperm at the announcement of such a scheme, “oh, by God!
Juliette, ‘tis a very curious imagination Nature gave you. Do
whatever you like, my angel, the floods you are milking from me
signify my acceptance.”
I was as good as my word. All had been stricken four days
later: fifteen hundred souls were interred, and almost as many
were reduced to a state of agony so dire that they were heard
pleading for death to come. The entire disaster was attributed to
an epidemic. The ignorance of the provincial doctors protected us
even from suspicion; and we returned to the capital after an
expedition which had cost us discharges beyond counting.
Such is the happy position you see me in, my friends; I have
a furious fondness for crime, I would not dream of pretending
otherwise; crime, and nothing else, irritates my senses, I shall go on
professing its maxims down to my dying hour. Exempt from all
religious dreads, able, bv discreet procedures and my wealth, to
avoid difficulties with the law, what is the power, human or divine,
that could impose a check upon my desires? The past encourages
me, the present electrifies me, and I have little fear for the future;
and my hope is that the rest of my life shall by far surpass the ex-
travagances of my youth. Nature created human beings to no other
end than that they amuse themselves on earth, and make it their
playground, its inhabitants their toys; pleasure is the universal
motor and law, it shall always be mine. Too bad for the victims,
victims there must be; all the world would fly to pieces were it not
for the sublime economy that assures equilibrium; only through
acts of wickedness is the natural balance maintained, only thereby
does Nature recover ground lost to the incursions of virtue. Thus,
we are obeying her wher. we deliver ourselves unto evil; our re-
sistance thereto is the sole crime she can never pardon in us. Oh,
Juliette & 1189
my friends! let us take these principles well to heart; in their exer-
cise lie all the sources of human happiness.
Thus did Madame de Lorsange conclude the story of her ad-
ventures, whose scandalous details had more than once wrung bit-
terest tears from the interesting Justine. Otherwise stirred were
the Chevalier and the Marquis; the straining and full-colored pricks
they brought to light proved how different were the sentiments that
animated them. They were in the midst of complotting some horror
when a footman brought word of the return of Noirceuil and Cha-
bert: they, the reader will recall, had been to the country for a few
days, leaving the Comtesse to acquaint her two other friends with
facts of which those other gentlemen had for a long time had cog-
nizance.
The tears which had just wet our unhappy Justine’s cheeks,
her charming air . . . her sorrowing mien, the afflictions it told
of; her native timidity, that touching virtuousness shadowed in all
her features, everything about her incensed Noirceuil and the
churchman, who must absolutely submit this luckless creature to
their filthy and ferocious caprices. They took her off to a separate
chamber while the Marquis, the Chevalier, and Madame de Lor-
sange gave themselves over to other but no less bizarre, crapulous,
lewd frolics with the numerous lust-objects which that chateau had
in plentiful store.
It was toward six o'clock and the day was waning when they all
reassembled again, and deliberation was entered into regarding
Justine’s fate. In view of Madame de Lorsange’s refusal to keep
such a prude under her roof, the debate was whether to fling the
poor soul out of doors or immolate her in the course of divers
orgies. The Marquis, Chabert, and the Chevalier, more than
sated with the creature, stood firmly for the latter alternative;
Noirceuil, who had listened to the opinions of the others, now
asked to be heard.
“My friends,” he said to that joyous society, “in cases like
the present one I have often found it extremely instructive to allow
Nature to take her own course. There is, you have noticed, a storm
1190 «2 THE MARQUIS DE SADE
brewing in the sky; let us entrust this personage to the elements. I
shall embrace the true faith if they spare her.”
This proposal met with general acclaim.
“I love such ideas,” said Madame de Lorsange, “‘let us carry
it out with no delay.”
Lightning glitters, tae winds howl, the clouds boil as though
in a caldron, all the firmarnent is seething. One might have said that
Nature, tired of her worxs, was readying to confound all her ele-
ments in order to force them to adopt new forms. Justine is shown
the door; not only is she not given as much as a penny, she is sent
forth stripped of the litt.e that remained to her. Bewildered, hu-
miliated by such ingratitade and so many abominations, but too
content to escape what could have been worse still, the child of woe,
murmuring thanks to God, totters past the chateau gates and down
the lane leading to the highroad. . . . Scarcely does she reach it
when a flash of lightning breaks from the heavens, and she is struck
down, smitten by a thunderbolt that pierces her through.
“She is dead!” cry te villains, clapping their hands and has-
tening to where Justine lizs upon the ground. “Come quickly, Ma-
dame, come contemplate heaven’s handiwork, come see how the
powers above reward piety and goodness. Love virtue, we are told,
and behold the fate reserved for its most devoted servitors.”’
Our four libertines surround the corpse; and although it has
been horribly disfigured, frightful designs nevertheless shape them-
selves in libertine minds, the shattered vestiges of the defunct Jus-
tine become the object of lewd covetings. The infamous Juliette
excites her friends as thev snatch the clothes from the body. The
lightning, entering by way of the mouth, had burst out through the
vagina; fierce jests are made upon the path by which the fire of
heaven chose to visit the victim.
“Yes,” Noirceuil said, ‘‘praise be to God, he merits it; there
you have the proof of his decency: he left the ass untouched. It is
still a beautiful thing, this sublime behind which caused so much
fuck to flow; does it not tempt you, Chabert ?”
And by way of reply the mischievous Abbé inserts his
prick to the height of the balls in that lifeless hulk. His example is
shortly followed by the others; unto her ashes they all four insult
that dear girl, one by one; the execrable Juliette, watching them,
Juliette & 1191
frigs herself without pause; and finally the company retires, aban-
doning the corpse by the wayside. Woeful and ill-starred creature,
"twas written on high that not even the repose of death would safe-
guard you from the atrocities of crime and the perversity of man-
kind.
“Truly,” declares Madame de Lorsange as the friends walk
back to the chateau, “this most recent episode more than ever con-
firms me in the career I have pursued up until now. O Nature!” she
exclaimed in her enthusiasm, “‘it is then necessary to thy plan, this
crime against which in their stupidity a multitude of fools inveigh;
thou dost desire crime then, since thy hand punishes them who
dread it or refrain from committing it. Oh, these late events are
most welcome, they consecrate my happiness and perfect my tran-
quillity.”
Only a few moments after the party had re-entered the gate a
coach rolled up, having arrived by a different road; it drove into
the coyrtyard just as the five friends got there. From it stepped
down a tall woman, very well attired; Juliette went to greet her.
The newcomer, just heavens! was no other than Durand, the
bosom companion of Madame de Lorsange, she whom the Vene-
tian Inquisition had sentenced to die, and whom Juliette believed
she had seen hanging from the ceiling in that terrible courtroom.
“Dearest soul !” she cried, casting herself into her friend’s embrace,
“by what stroke of fortune . . . great God, explain this to me
. canI believe my eyes?”
A drawing room is opened, everyone enters, sits down, and in
silence listens while the most mysterious of adventures is clarified.
‘““My dear Juliette,” Durand began, and her voice and manner
were composed, ‘‘standing before you is that very one whom you
thought done horribly to death and forever lost, and who, by dint
of her intrigues, her industry, her knowledge, now returns in greater
fortune and better health than ever, since over and above the con-
siderable riches that are hers to keep she has the further happiness
of bringing you what the authorities confiscated from you in Venice,
Exactly, Juliette,” that loyal friend continued, depositing a large
bundle of papers upon the table, “your fifteen hundred thousand
livres a year are there, restored to you; that was all I was able to
salvage; enjoy it in peace, my dear, and grant me nothing in return
1192 e& THE MARQUIS DE SADE
save the certitude of spending the remainder of my days in your
society.”
“Oh, my friends!” cried Juliette, wild from joy, “will he be
wrong, the author who someday writes the story of my life, if he
titles it The Prosperities of Vice? Make haste, Durand, tell us
your wonderful tale, and be persuaded, let me say it at once, that
tis I who beg you never again to leave us so long as you live.”
Whereupon that forever celebrated woman, as succinctly as she
could, informed the company that by promising to lend her services
to the rulers of Venice, she obtained in exchange the assurance that
another woman would be put to death in her stead, the example
being necessary for Juliette whose properties the Council wished to
acquire, and whose departure from the city was esteemed desirable,
as a measure of prudence. The feint having met with complete
success, she had then gone on to satisfy the Inquisitors, and produce
in Venice a pestilence that carried off twenty thousand people; the
operation terminated, she had asked, as a bonus, that her friend’s
belongings be remitted to Aer, the request had been accorded; her
uppermost thought was then to escape from the city without delay,
firmly convinced that these perfidious Venetians, nourished upon
Machiavelli’s principles, would rid themselves of their accomplice
at the first opportunity.
“And so I rushed hither, my dearest, in search of you,” Durand
continued; “I contribute to your happiness, I ask no more. As do I,
laugh at fate, which saved me twice from the gallows: assuredly,
I was not born for the rope. What destiny holds in store for me I
know not; but when my hour comes, let it overtake me as I lie in my
cherished Juliette’s arms, let it be so and I shall endure death with-
out a murmur.”
And the two friends, clasping each other, were fifteen minutes
exchanging avowals of the sincerest friendship, confidence, and de-
votion which vice prizes quite as much as virtue, whatever may say
the churlish sectators of that dismal and tedious divinity. Everybody
was partaking in the two women’s joyous effusions when there was
a great clattering in the courtyard as a courier from Versailles rode
up; he asked for Monsieur de Noirceuil; and when presented to
him, handed a sealed order to our libertine.
“Great heaven!” the latter exclaimed, having perused the doc-
Juliette & 1193
ument, “it has been decreed, my dear Juliette, that every kind of
good fortune be lavished upon us this lucky day. The minister is
no more; here is the letter, in the King’s hand, commanding me to
hie myself back posthaste to the Court, where I am to assume the
reins of government. What an ocean of felicities this news promises
us! I go up to the capital, come with me, both of you,” Noirceuil
continued, addressing Juliette and Durand, “I want to have you by
me forever; and indeed, how can I forego your assistance once I
am at the helm of the ship I am about to steer! You, Chabert, I
give you an archdiocese; Marquis, I name you Ambassador to
Constantinople; for you, Chevalier, it’s four hundred thousand
livres a year: you'll remain in Paris to superintend our affairs.
Come, good friends, let us all rejoice together, from all this I see
nothing but happiness accruing to all save only virtue—but we
would perhaps not dare say so were it a novel we were writing.”
“Why dread publishing it,” said Juliette, “when the truth
itself, and the truth alone, lays bare the secrets of Nature, however
mankind may tremble before those revelations. Philosophy must
never shrink from speaking out.”
The company left the following morning; greatest success
crowned our heroes for the next ten years. At the end of that space,
the death of Madame de Lorsange caused her to disappear from
the world’s scene, just as it is customary that all brilliant things on
earth finally fade away. Unique in her kind, that woman died with-
out having left any record of the events which distinguished the
latter part of her life, and so it is that no writer will be able to
chronicle it for the public. Those who might care to attempt its
reconstruction will do little else than offer us their dreams in the
place of realities, and between the two the difference is immense in
the eyes of persons of taste and particularly in the eyes of those who
have found the reading of this work of some interest.
