The life of Voltaire

by Evelyn Beatrice Hall

Écrasez l’infâme! Pompignan was but a victim to that purpose. Voltaire kicked him aside with his foot, and looked out for other foes to vanquish.

There were always plenty of them. He had on hand at the moment a satire called “The Poor Devil,” which set out to be an account of the adventures of that Valette, the friend of d’Alembert and the guest of Délices, but which ended as a fiercer “Dunciad,” “more than a satire, more than a chef d’œuvre of incomparable verve and malignity,” and which reveals to our own day many an ugly secret of the literary life and men of that strange epoch.

But the general satisfaction of whipping a multitude is nothing to the personal satisfaction of whipping a unit.

While the Pompignan affair was still running high, news came one morning—on April 25, 1760—that a comedy by a certain Charles Palissot, entitled “The Philosophers” and bitterly ridiculing that party, was about to be played in Paris. “Very well,” says Délices; “I cannot prevent that. But what I can and will do is to withdraw “Tancred,” already in rehearsal.” So “Tancred” is withdrawn.

On May 2d, Palissot’s “Philosophers” was performed for the first time.

A clever journalist was Charles Palissot, who, in 1755, had been Voltaire’s guest at Délices with Patu the poet. His play was clever too, a rollicking comedy in three acts, which not only laughed at the philosophic party but represented them as dangerous to society and the State. Helvétius, Diderot, Duclos, Madame Geoffrin, and Mademoiselle Clairon were openly satirised. J. J. Rousseau, declared Voltaire, was represented on all fours, with a lettuce in his pocket for provender.

The “Encyclopædia” was mentioned by name. Two noble ladies openly gave the play their patronage. One was the Princess de Robecq, the mistress of Choiseul the minister, and so a force to be reckoned with.

“The Philosophers” had carefully omitted to attack the two greatest of the philosophers, d’Alembert and Voltaire. But the one wrote an account of the thing to the other, and that Other began to inspect his weapons.

True, he tried mild measures at first. Palissot sent him a copy of the play. And Voltaire wrote back trying to win its author over to the right side, or at least to an impartial attitude of mind. But Palissot did not mean to be convinced. Then Abbé Morellet-Mords-Les-Bite-Them was flung into the Bastille, at the instigation of the Princess de Robecq and the command of Choiseul, for having sneered at the Princess in his comic answer to Palissot’s comedy, called “The Preface to The Philosophers.” These things were not precisely soothing. To meet ridicule with reason had failed. Gibe for gibe, then; foolery for foolery! If Voltaire was one of the two who could play at that game, he was always the winner when he played.

He had another, older, deadlier foe than Palissot, who would also be the better for a beating. The older foe was Fréron. And the beating he received with Palissot was called “The Scotch Girl.”