That sermon, of which the text is Calas, is one of the most powerful indictments ever written against the religious who have enough religion to hate and persecute, but not enough to love and succour. Voltaire was no Protestant, but that “Treatise” helped the “definite affranchisement” of the Protestant in Catholic countries as no party tract ever did. It gave the fatal blow to that “Gothic legislation” which, if it was dying, still showed now and then a superhuman strength in acts of fiendish barbarism. Sooner or later, said Choiseul, such seed as is sown in Voltaire’s Gospel of Tolerance must bear fruit. What if the author of it had thrown decency to the winds in the “Pucelle”? What if, basing his attack on seemingly irreconcilable statements and incorrect dates, he had in keen mockery attacked the Scripture and Christianity? Not the less “the true Christian, like the true philosopher, will agree that in making tolerance and humanity prevail, Voltaire, whether he wished it or no, served the religion of the God of peace and mercy: and, instead of anger, will feel a reverent admiration for the ways of a Providence which, for such a work, chose such a workman.”
Voltaire did not avow his little Treatise. What censor would or could have licensed such a thing? For a long time it was not even printed. By Voltaire? What could make you think so? The old owl of Ferney screwed up his brilliant eyes and chuckled. “Mind you do not impute to me the little book on Tolerance.... It will not be by me. It could not be. It is by some good soul who loves persecution as he loves the colic.”
That he foresaw it would be one of his best passports to posterity, did not make him in the least degree more anxious to own it to his contemporaries. Abundant experience had proved to him that if it is “an ill lot to be a man of letters at all, there is something still more dangerous in loving the truth.”
So through the year 1763 the “Treatise on Tolerance” was passed from hand to hand in Paris: by a good priest, you understand; by nobody in particular. And at Ferney, Voltaire, having preached tolerance, practised it.
At the convent into which Nanette Calas had been thrown was a good Superior who had loved and pitied the girl and poured out upon her the thwarted maternal instincts of her woman’s heart. It is very pleasant to see how a hot partisan like Voltaire not only gave the Sister her due, but dwelt tenderly on her tenderness; sent on to his brethren, the philosophers, her kind little letters to Nanette; and warmed his old heart at the pure flame of the affection of this “good nun of the Visitation.”
Then, too, when in June the liberal-minded citizens of Geneva appealed against the condemnation of rival Rousseau’s “Émile,” and when on August 8th that condemnation was revoked at their request, Voltaire was quite as delighted as if Jean Jacques had always been his dearest friend, and as if he had thought anything about that hysterical “Émile,” except the “Profession of the Savoyard Vicar,” worth the paper it was written on. Tolerance! Tolerance!
About the same time he produced the “Catechism of an Honest Man,” which had a like burden; and before the year 1763 was out he was deeply engaged in helping other unfortunates whom the case of Calas and that “Treatise” threw at his feet.
In 1740, a daring Protestant gentleman of that fatal Languedoc, called Espinas, or Espinasse, gave supper and a bed to a minister of his faith. For this heinous crime he was condemned to the galleys for life, and had been there three-and-twenty years when his story reached Ferney. Through Voltaire’s exertions he was released in 1763, and came to Switzerland, where his wife and children were living as paupers, on public charity. After interceding passionately for them for not less than three years, Voltaire succeeded in getting back a small part of the property which Espinas had forfeited on his imprisonment.
After Espinas came the case of Chaumont. In February, 1764, Voltaire was writing to Végobre to say that Choiseul had delivered from the galleys one Chaumont, whose crime had consisted in listening to an open-air Protestant preacher—“praying to God in bad French.” He had companions in irons whom Voltaire’s power and pity could not free. But Chaumont himself came to Ferney to thank his benefactor; and all Voltaire’s little entourage made him compliments, including Father Adam.
Though that “Tolerance” was not yet tolerated in Paris; though at the beginning of 1764 it was forbidden to go through the post, as if it contained the germs of some infectious disease; though Calas was still unexculpated, and even powerful Choiseul could not push his authority far enough to liberate the innocent companions of Chaumont, still Voltaire thought that he saw light in the sky, and in the east the beginning of a beautiful day. “Everything I see,” he wrote in prophetic utterance on April 2d, “sows the seeds of a Revolution which must infallibly come. I shall not have the pleasure of beholding it. The French reach everything late, but they do reach it at last. Young people are lucky: they will see great things.” And again: “I shall not cease to preach Tolerance upon the housetops ... until persecution is no more. The progress of right is slow, the roots of prejudice deep. I shall never see the fruits of my efforts, but they are seeds which must one day germinate.”