1807. ] 
carable of all of them is jealoufy. The 
venom of calumny, the {tiletto of fatire, 
the rutt of envy, have degraded a pro-~ 
teilion which has fomething of divinity 
init. Itis abfolutely falfe that I have 
been the ruin of any bookteller. 
Friend.—And fuppofe vou had rumed 
fome bookfellers that I could name, you 
would have done no bad ha for they 
are the pirates of literature. Authors 
are at perpetual war tie them, and 
to rob fuch is but making reprifals. 
Volt.—This -reafoning is more acute 
than honelt. However, I had to contett 
with a combination of booktfellers, print- 
ers, hawkers, publithers, and fubfcribers ; 
and fome of thefe, when vexed and 
tormented, I have lene to the dogs, ‘and 
with them they may growl] and bark for 
all I care for them. 
About this period of my life, if my 
memory ferves me, I {trove to become a: 
member of the French Academy. I was 
refufed admilfion-into the fociety, but all 
I regretted was the emoluments of it. 
My Temple of Tate (Temple du Goiit ) 
feemed to give difeaft to ane reader ; 
yet every body i ead it, and many readers 
even committed it to memory. As to 
ray works upon phyfics, (1 know not by 
what fatality it is,) none of the editions 
correct, but abound with errors of 
the prefs. You will agree with me, that 
my Hittory of Charles XIL. is a pleafing 
book. here is much amufement in it, 
and it may be fet in competition with the 
Alexander the Great of Quintus Curtius, 
A Swedith clergyman wrote a long dif- 
fertation to prove, as he faid, that. I was 
an arch har; but he gave the moft ftupid 
reafons for it that could be given. 
anfwer to his work was all that was read 
upon.the matter. The fame charge of 
want of veracity was brought avaintt my 
Univerfal Hiftory. I contefs that I did 
not lofe my time in enquiries about the 
truth of a number of eyents of little 
confequence; but 1 took particular pains 
to fet out ina proper light the faults of 
men ot fcience, of princes, of church- 
men, and of popes. My good friends, I 
have written gperas, and 1 hope heaven 
will forgive me for having done fo. They 
were wretched performances, and [ 
have been ingenyous enough to confefs 
they were fo. I was drawn into this 
{pecies of compofition, in order to have 
the fatisfaction of doiag fomething for 
the celebrated Rameau. [ was never 
able to ery down that compilation of 
apophthegins, or rather fophifms, fet 
forth by Pafeal; and my efforts. have 
been as ineffeciual in. that refpett as 
are 
Voltaire’s Literary Confefions. 
My 
353 
thofe. of that gcometrician ‘to derey’ 
poety. 
It was whit L was in exile in England, 
that I faid the fevereit things againtt 
France. It was neceflary for me, my° 
friends, that I fhould firive to curry fa- 
vour with the Englifh: but I have ever 
loved my country, though my country 
has proved fo ungrateful to me. The 
Age of Lewis XIV, is, 1 think, my beft 
work in prote, The catalogue of cele- 
brated writers, which is placed at the 
end of the latt volume, made a greats 
ftir, as you well know. It was faid to 
be a fatire from beginning to end, and 
this becaufe I did juftice, and dared to 
be impartial. I do not retract a fyllable 
of what I then faid ; and I do declare to 
you, that, were Ito undertake writing 
my opinion concerning the merits of the 
French writers of the, prefent day, I 
thould be as bold in the execution of 
fuch a work as I was atthattame. I had 
been collecting materials for this work 
for a Jength of Ce It was my endea~ 
your to form a well -proportioned whole 
out of the fcattered parts, and to repre~ 
fent, in proper colours and at one 
ftroke, what others had fpread over vo 
lumes. 
In writing the Hiftory of the Reign of 
Tewis XIV., I did not confine myfelf 
folely to sive the life of that prince. It 
was not the hiftory of his reign that I 
meant to write, but the hiftory of the hue 
man mind during the age when the 
haman mind appeared in its greateft 
iglory, I drew a picture of the great 
events of that time; the principal perfons 
of that time are brousht forward on the 
canvas, whilft the multitude are placed 
in the back-eround. Away with trifling 
narrative | potterity will difregard it. It 
is through this minutenefs of defeription 
that many a great work ‘is {poiled. It 
was my defign to charatterize the age, 
to fhew the rife of the revolution that 
took place in it, and to give’ what it 
would be intereftine to know far a cen- 
tury to come. This was what I was de- 
lirous to write, and whav [ have written.’ 
I took Dangean’s Memoirs for my guide 
as to the private hte of Lewis. This 
work is comprized in forty volumes, and 
I extraéied from it about forty pages in 
the whole. I profited by the informa- 
tion I derived from certain old courtiers, 
fervants: about the royal perfon, great 
lords, and. others; and I fet down the 
faéts in which they agreed. The’ reft: 
I lett to compilers of anecdotes and con- 
verfation. 
I was well. informed: concerning the. 
hutory 
