It is probable that Numa took his measures very carefully, and that he
deceived the Romans for their benefit, with a dexterity suitable to the
time, the place, the intelligence of the early Romans.

Mahomet was twenty times on the point of failing, but he succeeded at
last with the Arabs of Medina; and people believed that he was the
intimate friend of the Archangel Gabriel. If to-day someone came to
Constantinople to announce that he was the favourite of the Archangel
Raphael, far superior to Gabriel in dignity, and that it was in him
alone people should believe, he would be impaled in the public place. It
is for charlatans to choose their time well.

Was there not a little charlatanry in Socrates with his familiar demon,
and Apollo's precise declaration which proclaimed him the wisest of all
men? How can Rollin, in his history, reason from this oracle? How is it
that he does not let the young idea know that it was pure charlatanry?
Socrates chose his time badly. A hundred years earlier, maybe, he would
have governed Athens.

All leaders of sects in philosophy have been somewhat charlatans: but
the greatest of all have been those who have aspired to domination.
Cromwell was the most terrible of all our charlatans. He appeared at
precisely the only time he could succeed: under Elizabeth he would have
been hanged; under Charles II. he would have been merely ridiculous. He
came happily at a time when people were disgusted with kings; and his
son, at a time when people were weary of a protector.


OF CHARLATANRY IN SCIENCE AND LITERATURE