So La Beaumelle goes to Darget. “You had better leave Berlin,” the prudent secretary advises. Then La Beaumelle seeks, and finds, better consolation in Maupertuis. “Voltaire gave the passage an offensive interpretation,” says the President. “Send the King a copy of your book.” But though La Beaumelle not only did this but addressed petitions to the King, he received no answer and was not invited to the suppers.
In a sentimental affair of La Beaumelle’s, which was the next scene in his adventures, Voltaire took his enemy’s part good-naturedly enough, and did his best to get Beaumelle out of the prison into which an injured husband had thrown him. He had some reason for wishing to conciliate the foolish young man. La Beaumelle had in his possession autograph letters of Madame de Maintenon which would have been of infinite value to the author of “The Century of Louis XIV.” At their first interview Voltaire had asked to look at them; and La Beaumelle had made excuses. The persevering Voltaire tried again and again to attain his aim; and at last after a furious interview, the two parted for ever, La Beaumelle crying bitterly that his hatred would long outlive Voltaire’s verses. Voltaire had not obtained the de Maintenon letters; and La Beaumelle, after leaving Berlin in May, 1752, revenged himself on his enemy by bringing out a pirated edition of “Louis XIV.” which positively ran parallel to Voltaire’s own, and to which La Beaumelle added “Remarks” offensive to the author and dealing also, with a dangerous freedom, with the Royal Family of France.
To be sure, Voltaire was fair game; but the House of Bourbon!
In a very little while M. La Beaumelle was expiating his imprudence in prison.
Throughout the affair Voltaire seems only to have taken offence, and the audacious Beaumelle to have given it. He was nothing after all. He might rot in the Bastille and be forgotten. He had no significance, except that Maupertuis defended him.
In the spring of 1752, while the affair of the “Pensées” was amusing Berlin, events of importance to Voltaire had occurred both in Paris and in the King’s entourage in Berlin.
On February 24th, “Rome Sauvée,” much altered and improved by its author, was successfully performed in Paris through the exertions of d’Argental and Madame Denis. The niece, not content with superintending Uncle Voltaire’s plays, had written one herself called “The Punished Coquette.” Voltaire was in agonies for fear the thing should be a failure; but his feelings were spared and it was not performed.
On March 2d, Lord Tyrconnel died in Berlin, and on March 4th Darget left the King’s service; nominally, and perhaps in part really, for his health’s sake. But he was glad to go, and he came back no more. Voltaire lost in him a very faithful friend. “I ought to go too,” he wrote thoughtfully.
Then Longchamp had been triumphantly discovered by Madame Denis committing the unpardonable sin of copying his master’s manuscripts with two accomplices who had been servants in the employ of Madame du Châtelet. Madame Denis abused him for her own satisfaction, and exposed him for his master’s.
Was it only because Longchamp knew too much and had in his possession dangerous writings which were more likely to be coaxed than to be scolded out of him, that his master wrote to him very gently and offered pardon in return for the truth? The goodness and generosity which made all his servants love him must have had some foundation in fact. On March 30th of this 1752, Longchamp replied penitently and burnt the copies he had made. Voltaire gave him a handsome sum of money over and above the wages due to him, and Longchamp became a map and chart dealer. Twenty-six years later he came to see his old master, when he was on his last visit to Paris.