Clear folly

A soldier in French uniform falls with a crash into an abyss in the lower left corner of the composition after dismounting from his horse, while two friars look on in horror at the spectacle. On the right, a religious man or preacher, excited, addresses his harangue to two people kneeling on his left. He opens his arms with outstretched index fingers pointing in opposite directions to the light and to the precipice into which the soldier falls. Behind him, men hold a wide curtain in acrobatic poses. A mass of rain falls obliquely from the upper left corner. The stage on which the group of figures is arranged and the awning give the picture a scenographic value that is enhanced by the candle-lighting.

In the state of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the horseman falling into the abyss does not appear. Instead, a beam of lightning or fire emerges from him. Therein may lie the key to the meaning of the print, as the clergyman would point to heaven and hell, salvation and damnation. Goya would make an attack on religious fanaticism and the verbiage of preachers and ecclesiastical orators. In fact, the focus is on the preacher, as his fanaticism deforms his own face and his hands are illuminated. The fact that a French soldier falls into hell is related to the post-war atmosphere. The acrobats have also been seen as an allusion to the liberals, as they would support each other in lifting the veil that shrounds society in darkness and ignorance. 

The preparatory drawing for the present print, also entitled Clear folly, is preserved.