FRACTIONS OF EVENTS AND INDICATIONS, FROM VOLTAIRE HIMSELF, IN THIS TIME; MORE OR LESS ILLUMINATIVE WHEN REDUCED TO ORDER.
Here, selected from more, are a few "fire-flies,"—not dancing or distracted, but authentic all, and stuck each on its spit; shedding a feeble glimmer over the physiognomy of those Fifteen caliginous Months, to an imagination that is diligent. Fractional utterances of Voltaire to Friedrich and others (in abridged form, abridgment indicated): the exact dates are oftenest irretrievably gone; but the glimmer of light is indisputable, all the more as, on Voltaire's part, it is mostly involuntary. Grouping and sequence must be other than that of Time.
POTSDAM, 5th JUNE, 1751.—King is off on that Ost-Friesland jaunt; Voltaire at Potsdam, "at what they call the Marquisat," in complete solitude,—preparing to die before long,—sends his Majesty some poor trifles of Scribbling, proofs of my love, Sire: "since I live solitary, when you are not at Potsdam, it would seem I came for you only" (note that, your Majesty)!... "But in return for the rags here sent, I expect the Sixth Canto of your ART [ART DE LA GUERRE, one of the Two pupil-and-schoolmaster "Specimens" mentioned above]; I expect the ROOF to the Temple of Mars. It is for you, alone of men, to build that Temple; as it was for Ovid to sing of Love, and for Horace to give an ART OF POETRY." (Laying it on pretty thick!)...
Then again, later (after severe study, ferula in hand): "Sire, I return your Majesty your Six Cantos; I surrender at discretion (LUI LAISSE CARTE-BLANCHE) on that question of 'VICTOIRE.' The whole Poem is worthy of you: if I had made this Journey only to see a thing so unique, I ought not to regret my Country."... And again (still no date): "GRAND DIEU! is not all that [HISTORY OF THE GREAT ELECTOR, by your Majesty, which I am devouring with such appetite] neat, elegant, precise, and, above all, philosophical!"—"Sire, you are adorable; I will pass my days at your feet. Oh, never make game of me (DES NICHES)!" Has he been at that, say you! "If the Kings of Denmark, Portugal, Spain, &c. did it, I should not care a pin; they are only Kings. But you are the greatest man that perhaps ever reigned." [[In—OEuvres de Frederic,—xxii. 271, 273.]
IS ON LEAVE OF ABSENCE, NEAR BY; WISHES TO BE CALLED AGAIN (No date).—"Sire, if you like free criticism, if you tolerate sincere praises, if you wish to perfect a Work [ART DE LA GUERRE, or some other as sublime], which you alone in Europe are capable of doing, you have only to bid a Hermit come upstairs. At your orders for all his life." [Ib. 261.]
IN BERLIN PALACE: PLEASE DON'T TURN ME OUT! (No date)—... "Next to you, I love work and retirement. Nobody whatever complains of me. I ask of your Majesty, in order to keep unaltered the happiness I owe to you, this favor, Not to turn me out of the Apartment you deigned to give me at Berlin, till I go for Paris [always talking of that]. If I were to leave it, they would put in the Gazettes that I"—Oh, what would n't they put in, of one that, belonging to King Friedrich, lives as it were in the Disc of the Sun, conspicuous to everybody!—"I will go out [of the Apartment] when some Prince, with a Suite needing it to lodge in, comes; and then the thing will be honorable. Chasot [gone to Paris] has been talking"—unguarded things of me!"I have not uttered the least complaint of Chasot: I never will of Chasot, nor of those who have set him on [Maupertuis belike]: I forgive everything, I!" [Ib. 270.]
ROTHENBURG IS ILL; VOLTAIRE HAS BEEN TO SEE HIM ("Berlin, 14th," no month; year, too surely, 1751, as we shall find! Letter is IN VERSE).—"Lieberkuhn was going to kill poor Rothenburg; to send him off to Pluto,—for liking his dish a little;—monster Lieberkuhn! But Doctor Joyous," your reader, La Mettrie,—led by, need I say whom?—"has brought him back to us:—think of Lieberkuhn's solemn stare! Pretty contrasts, those, of sublime Quacksalverism, with Sense under the mask of Folly. May the haemorrhoidal vein"—follows HERE, note it, exquisite reader, that of "CUL DE MON HEROS," cited above!—...
And then (a day or two after; King too haemorrhoidal to come twenty miles, but anxious to know): "Sire, no doubt Doctor Joyous (LE MEDECIN JOYEUX) has informed your Majesty that when we arrived, the Patient was sleeping tranquil; and Cothenius assured us, in Latin, that there was no danger. I know not what has passed since, but I am persuaded your Majesty approves my journey" (of a street or two),—MUST you speak of it, then!
GOES TO AN EVENING-PARTY NOW AND THEN (To Niece Denis).—... "Madame Tyrconnel [French Excellency's Wife] has plenty of fine people at her house on an evening; perhaps too many" (one of the first houses in Berlin, this of my Lord Tyrcannel's, which we frequent a good deal).... "Madame got very well through her part of ANDROMAQUE [in those old play-acting times of ours]: never saw actresses with finer eyes,"—how should you!
"As to Milord Tyrconnel, he is an Anglais of dignity,"—Irish in reality, and a thought blusterous. "He has a condensed (SERRE) caustic way of talk; and I know not what of frank which one finds in the English, and does not usually find in persons of his trade. French Tragedies played at Berlin, I myself taking part; an Englishman Envoy of France there: strange circumstances these, are n't they?" [To D'Argental this (—OEuvres de Voltaire,—lxxiv. 289).] Yes, that latter especially; and Milord Marischal our Prussian Envoy with you! Which the English note, sulkily, as a weather-symptom.
AT POTSDAM, BIG DEVILS OF GRENADIERS (No date).—... "But, Sire, one is n't always perched on the summit of Parnassus; one is a man. There are sicknesses about; I did not bring an athlete's health to these parts; and the scorbutic humor which is eating my life renders me truly, of all that are sick, the sickest. I am absolutely alone from morning till night. My one solace is the necessary pleasure of taking the air, I bethink me of walking, and clearing my head a little, in your Gardens at Potsdam. I fancy it is a permitted thing; I present myself, musing;—I find huge devils of Grenadiers, who clap bayonets in my belly, who cry FURT, SACRAMENT, and DER KONIG [OFF, SACKERMENT, THE KING, quite tolerably spelt]! And I take to my heels, as Austrians and Saxons would do before them. Have you ever read, that in Titus's or Marcus-Aurelius's Gardens, a poor devil of a Gaulish Poet"—In short, it shall be mended. [—OEuvres de Frederic,—xxii. 273.]
HAVE BEEN LAYING IT ON TOO THICK (No date; IN VERSE).—"Marcus Aurelius was wont to"—(Well, we know who that is: What of Marcus, then?)—"A certain lover of his glory [STILL IN VERSE] spoke once, at Supper, of a magnanimity of Marcus's;—at which Marcus [flattery too thick] rather gloomed, and sat quite silent,—which was another fine saying of his [ENDS VERSE, STARTS PROSE]:—
"Pardon, Sire, some hearts that are full of you! To justify myself, I dare supplicate your Majesty to give one glance at this Letter (lines pencil-marked), which has just come from M. de Chauvelin, Nephew of the famous GARDE-DES-SCEAUX. Your Majesty cannot gloom at him, writing these from the fulness of his heart; nor at me, who"—Pooh; no, then! Perhaps do you a NICHE again,—poor restless fellow! [Ib. 280.]
POTSDAM PALACE (No date): SIRE, NZAY I CHANGE MY ROOM?... "I ascend to your antechambers, to find some one by whom I may ask permission to speak with you. I find nobody: I have to return:" and what I wanted was this, "your protection for my SIECLE DE LOUIS QUATORZE, which I am about to print in Berlin." Surely,—but also this:—
"I am unwell, I am a sick man born. And withal I am obliged to work, almost as much as your Majesty. I pass the whole day alone. If you would permit that I might shift to the Apartment next the one I have,—to that where General Bredow slept last winter,—I should work more commodiously. My Secretary (Collini) and I could work together there. I should have a little more sun, which is a great point for me.—Only the whim of a sick man, perhaps! Well, even so, your Majesty will have pity on it. You promised to make me happy." [—OEuvres de Frederic,—xxii. 277.]
I SUSPECT THAT I AM SUSPECTED (No date).—"Sire, if I am not brief, forgive me. Yesterday the faithful D'Arget told me with sorrow that in Paris people were talking of your Poem." Horrible; but, O Sire,—me?—"I showed him the eighteen Letters that I received yesterday. They are from Cadiz," all about Finance, no blabbing there! "Permit me to send you now the last six from my Niece, numbered by her own hand [no forgery, no suppression]; deign to cast your eyes on the places I have underlined, where she speaks of your Majesty, of D'Argens, of Potsdam, of D'Ammon" (to whom she can't be Phyllis, innocent being)!-MON CHER VOLTAIRE, must I again do some NICHE upon you, then? Tie some tin-canister to your too-sensitive tail? What an element you inhabit within that poor skin of yours! [Ib. 269.]
MAJESTY INVITES US TO A LITERARY CHRISTENING, POTSDAM (No date. These "Six Twins" are the "ART DE LA GUERRE," in Six Chants; part of that revised Edition which is getting printed "AU DONJON DU CHATEAU;" time must be, well on in 1751). Friedrich writes to Voltaire:—
"I have just been brought to bed of Six Twins; which require to be baptized, in the name of Apollo, in the waters of Hippocrene. LA HENRIADE is requested to become godmother: you will have the goodness to bring her, this evening at five, to the Father's Apartment. D'Arget LUCINA will be there; and the Imagination of MAN-A-MACHINE will hold the poor infants over the Font." [Ib. 266.]
DEIGN TO SAY IF I HAVE OFFENDED.—... "As they write to me from Paris that I am in disgrace with you, I dare to beg very earnestly that you will deign to say if I have displeased in anything! May go wrong by ignorance or from over-zeal; but with my heart never! I live in the profoundest retreat; giving to study my whole"—"Your assurances once vouchsafed [famous Document of August 23d]. I write only to my Niece. I" (a page more of this)—have my sorrows and merits, and absolutely no silence at all! [—OEuvres de Frederic,—xxii. 289.] "In the gift of Speech he is the most brilliant of mankind," said Smelfungus; but in the gift of Silence what a deficiency! Friedrich will have to do that for Two, it would seem.
BERLIN, 28th DECEMBER, 1751: LOUIS QUATORZE; AND DEATH OF ROTHENBURG.—"Our LOUIS QUATORZE is out. But, Heavens, see, your Majesty: a Pirate Printer, at Frankfurt-on-Oder, has been going on parallel with us, all the while; and here is his foul blotch of an Edition on sale, too! Bielfeld," fantastic fellow, "had proof-sheets; Bielfeld sent them to a Professor there, though I don't blame Bielfeld: result too evident. Protect me, your Majesty; Order all wagons, especially wagons for Leipzig, to be stopped, to be searched, and the Books thrown out,—it costs you but a word!"
Quite a simple thing: "All Prussia to the rescue!" thinks an ardent Proprietor of these Proof-sheets. But then, next day, hears that Rothenburg is dead. That the silent Rothenburg lay dying, while the vocal Voltaire was writing these fooleries, to a King sunk in grief. "Repent, be sorry, be ashamed!" he says to himself; and does instantly try;—but with little success; Frankfurt-on-Oder, with its Bielfeld proof-sheets, still jangling along, contemptibly audible, for some time. [Ib. 285-287.] And afterwards, from Frankfurt-on-Mayn new sorrow rises on LOUIS QUATORZE, as will be seen.—Friedrich's grief for Rothenburg was deep and severe; "he had visited him that last night," say the Books; "and quitted his bedside, silent, and all in tears." It is mainly what of Biography the silent Rothenburg now has.
From the current Narratives, as they are called, readers will recollect, out of this Voltaire Period, two small particles of Event amid such an ocean of noisy froth,—two and hardly more: that of the "Orange-Skin," and that of the "Dirty Linen." Let us put these two on their basis; and pass on:—
THE ORANGE-SKIN (Potsdam, 2d September, 1751, to Niece Denis)—Good Heavens, MON ENFANT, what is this I hear (through the great Dionysius' Ear I maintain, at such expense to myself)!... "La Mettrie, a man of no consequence, who talks familiarly with the King after their reading; and with me too, now and then: La Mettrie swore to me, that, speaking to the King, one of those days, of my supposed favor, and the bit of jealousy it excites, the King answered him: "I shall want him still about a year:—you squeeze the orange, you throw away the skin (ON EN JETTE LECORCE)!'" Here is a pretty bit of babble (lie, most likely, and bit of mischievous fun) from Dr. Joyous. "It cannot be true, No! And yet—and yet—?" Words cannot express the agonizing doubts, the questionings, occasionally the horror of Voltaire: poor sick soul, keeping a Dionysius'-Ear to boot! This blurt of La Mettrie's goes through him like a shot of electricity through an elderly sick Household-Cat; and he speaks of it again and ever again,—though we will not farther.
DIRTY LINEN (Potsdam, 24th July, 1752, To Niece Denis).—... "Maupertuis has discreetly set the rumor going, that I found the King's Works very bad; that I said to some one, on Verses from the King coming in, 'Will he never tire, then, of sending me his dirty linen to wash?' You obliging Maupertuis!"
Rumor says, it was General Mannstein, once Aide-de-Camp in Russia, who had come to have his WORK ON RUSSIA revised (excellent Work, often quoted by us [Did get out at last,—in England, through Lord Marischal and David Hume: see PREFACE to it (London, 1760).]), when the unfortunate Royal Verses came. Perhaps M. de Voltaire did say it:—why not, had it only been prudent? He really likes those Verses much more than I; but knows well enough, SUB ROSA, what kind of Verses they are. This also is a horrible suspicion; that the King should hear of this,—as doubtless the King did, though without going delirious upon it at all. ["To Niece Denis," dates as above (—OEuvres de Voltaire,—lxxiv. 408, lxxv. 17).] Thank YOU, my Perpetual President, not the less!—
OF MAUPERTUIS, IN SUCCESSIVE PHASES.—... "Maupertuis is not of very engaging ways; he takes my dimensions harshly with his quadrant: it is said there enters something of envy into his DATA. ... A somewhat surly gentleman; not too sociable; and, truth to say, considerably sunk here [ASSEZ BAISSE, my D'Argental].
... "I endure Maupertuis, not having been able to soften him. In all countries there are insociable fellows, with whom you are obliged to live, though it is difficult. He has never forgiven me for"—omitting to cite him, &c.—At Paris he had got the Academy of Sciences into trouble, and himself into general dislike (DETESTER); then came this Berlin offer. "Old Fleuri, when Maupertuis called to take leave, repeated that verse of Virgil, NEC TIBI REGNANDI VENIAT TAM DIRA CUPIDO. Fleuri might have whispered as much to himself: but he was a mild sovereign lord, and reigned in a gentle polite manner. I swear to you, Maupertuis does not, in his shop [the Academy here]—where, God be thanked, I never go.
"He has printed a little Pamphlet on Happiness (SUR LE BONHEUR); it is very dry and miserable. Reminds you of Advertisements for things lost,—so poor a chance of finding them again. Happiness is not what he gives to those who read him, to those who live with him; he is not himself happy, and would be sorry that others were [to Niece Denis this].
... "A very sweet life here, Madame [Madame d'Argental, an outside party]: it would have been more so, if Maupertuis had liked. The wish to please, is no part of his geometrical studies; the problem of being agreeable to live with, is not one he has solved." [—OEuvres de Voltaire,—lxxiv. 330, 504 (4th May, 1751, and 14th March, 1752), to the D'Argentals; to Niece Denis (6th November, 1750, and 24th August, 1751), lxxiv. 250, 385.]—Add this Anecdote, which is probably D'Arget's, and worth credit:—
"Voltaire had dinner-party, Maupertuis one of them; party still in the drawing-room, dinner just coming up. 'President, your Book, SUR LE BONHEUR, has given me pleasure,' said Voltaire, politely [very politely, considering what we have just read]; given me pleasure,—a few obscurities excepted, of which we will talk together some evening.' 'Obscurities?' said Maupertuis, in a gloomy arbitrary tone: 'There may be such for you, Monsieur!' Voltaire laid his hand on the President's shoulder [yellow wig near by], looked at him in silence, with many-twinkling glance, gayety the topmost expression, but by no means the sole one: 'President, I esteem you, JE VOUS ESTIME, MON PRESIDENT: you are brave; you want war: we will have it. But, in the mean while, let us eat the King's roast meat.'" [Duvernet (2d FORM of him, always, p. 176.]
Friedrich's Answers to these Voltaire Letters, if he wrote any, are all gone. Probably he answered almost nothing; what we have of his relates always to specific business, receipt of LOUIS QUATORZE, and the like; and is always in friendly tone. Handsomely keeping Silence for Two! Here is a snatch from him, on neutral figures and movements of the time:—
FRIEDRICH TO WIILHELMINA (November 17th, 1751).—"I think the Margraf of Anspach will not have stayed long with you. He is not made to taste the sweets of society: his passion for hunting, and the tippling life he leads this long time, throw him out when he comes among reasonable persons.... "I expect my Sister of Brunswick, with the Duke and their eldest Girl, the 4th of next month,"—to Carnival here. "It is seven years since the Queen (our Mamma) has seen her. She holds a small Board of Wit at Brunswick; of which your Doctor [Doctor Superville, Dutch-French, whose perennial merit now is, That he did not burn Wilhelmina's MEMOIRS, but left them safe to posterity, for long centuries],—of which your Doctor is the director and oracle. You would burst outright into laughing when she speaks of those matters. Her natural vivacity and haste has not left her time to get to the bottom of anything; she skips continually from one subject to the other, and gives twenty decisions in a minute." [—OEuvres de Frederic,—xxvii. i. 202:—On Superville, see Preuss's Note, ib. 56.]
About a month before Rothenburg's death, which was so tragical to Friedrich, there had fallen out, with a hideous dash of farce in it, the death of La Mettrie. Here are Two Accounts, by different hands,—which represent to us an immensity of babble in the then Voltaire circle.
LA METTRIE DIES.—Two Accounts: 1. King Friedrich's: to Wilhelmina. "21st November, 1751.... We have lost poor La Mettrie. He died for a piece of fun: ate, out of banter, a whole pheasant-pie; had a horrible indigestion; took it into his head to have blood let, and convince the German Doctors that bleeding was good in indigestion. But it succeeded ill with him: he took a violent fever, which passed into putrid; and carried him off. He is regretted by all that knew him. He was gay; BON DIABLE, good Doctor, and very bad Author: by avoiding to read his Books, one could manage to be well content with himself." [Ib. xxvii. i. 203.]
2. Voltaire's: to Niece Denis (NOT his first to her): Potsdam, 24th December, 1751.... "No end to my astonishment. Milord Tyrconnel," always ailing (died here himself), "sends to ask La Mettrie to come and see him, to cure him or amuse him. The King grudges to part with his Reader, who makes him laugh. La Mettrie sets out; arrives at his Patient's just when Madame Tyrconnel is sitting down to table: he eats and drinks, talks and laughs more than all the guests; when he has got crammed (EN A JUSQU'AU MENTON), they bring him a pie, of eagle disguised as pheasant, which had arrived from the North, plenty of bad lard, pork-hash and ginger in it; my gentleman eats the whole pie, and dies next day at Lord Tyrconnel's, assisted by two Doctors," Cothenius and Lieberkuhn, "whom he used to mock at.... How I should have liked to ask him, at the article of death, about that Orange-skin!" [—OEuvres de Voltaire,—lxxiv. 439, 450.]
Add this trait too, from authentic Nicolai, to complete the matter: "An Irish Priest, Father Macmahon, Tyrconnel's Chaplain [more power to him], wanted to convert La Mettrie: he pushed into the sick-room;—encouraged by some who wished to make La Mettrie contemptible to Friedrich [the charitable souls]. La Mettrie would have nothing to do with this Priest and his talk; who, however, still sat and waited. La Mettrie, in a twinge of agony, cried out, 'JESUS MARIE!' 'AH, VOUS VOILA ENFIN RETOURNE A CES NOMS CONSOLATEURS!' exclaimed the Irishman. To which La Mettrie answered (in polite language, to the effect), 'Bother you!' and expired a few minutes after." [Nicolai,—Anekdoten,—i. 20 n.]
Enough of this poor madcap. Friedrich's ELOGE of him, read to the Academy some time after, it was generally thought (and with great justice), might as well have been spared. The Piece has nothing noisy, nothing untrue; but what has it of importance? And surely the subject was questionable, or more. La Mettrie might have done without Eulogy from a King of men.
... "He had been used to put himself at once on the most familiar footing with the King [says Thiebault, UNbelievable]. Entered the King's apartment as he would that of a friend; plunged down whenever he liked, which was often, and lay upon the sofas; if it was warm, took off his stock, unbuttoned his waistcoat, flung his periwig on the floor;" [Thiebault, v. 405 (calls him "La Metherie;" knows, as usual, nothing).]—highly probable, thinks stupid Thiebault!
"The truth is," says Nicolai, "the King put no real value on La Mettrie. He considered him as a merry-andrew fellow, who might amuse you, when half seas-over (ENTRE DEUX VINS). De la Mettrie showed himself unworthy of any favor he had. Not only did he babble, and repeat about Town what he heard at the King's table; but he told everything in a false way, and with malicious twists and additions. This he especially did at Lord Tyrconnel, the then French Ambassador's table, where at last he died." [Nicolai,—Anekdoten,—i. 20.] But could not take the ORANGE-SKIN along with him; alas, no!—
On the whole, be not too severe on poor Voltaire! He is very fidgety, noisy; something of a pickthank, of a wheedler; but, above all, he is scorbutic, dyspeptic; hag-ridden, as soul seldom was; and (in his oblique way) APPEALS to Friedrich and us,—not in vain. And, in short, we perceive, after the First Act of the Piece, beginning in preternatural radiances, ending in whirlwinds of flaming soot, he has been getting on with his Second Act better than could be expected. Gyrating again among the bright planets, circum-jovial moons, in the Court Firmament; is again in favor, and might—Alas, he had his FELLOW-moons, his Maupertuis above all! Incurable that Maupertuis misery; gets worse and worse, steadily from the first day. No smallest entity that intervenes, not even a wandering La Beaumelle with his Book of PENSEES, but is capable of worsening it. Take this of Smelfungus; this Pair of Cabinet Sketches,—"hasty outlines; extant chiefly," he declares, "by Voltaire's blame:"—
LA BEAUMELLE.—"Voltaire has a fatal talent of getting into I quarrels with insignificant accidental people; and instead of silently, with cautious finger, disengaging any bramble that catches to him, and thankfully passing on, attacks it indignantly with potent steel implements, wood-axes, war-axes; brandishing and hewing;—till he has stirred up a whole wilderness of bramble-bush, and is himself bramble-chips all over. M. Angliviel de la Beaumelle, for example, was nothing but a bramble: some conceited Licentiate of Theology, who, finding the Presbytery of Geneva too narrow a field, had gone to Copenhagen, as Professor of Rhetoric or some such thing; and, finding that field also too narrow, and not to be widened by attempts at Literature, MES PENSEES and the like, in such barbarous Country",—had now [end of 1751] come to Berlin; and has Presentation copies of MES PENSEES, OU LE QU'EN DIRA-T-ON, flying right and left, in hopes of doing better there. Of these PENSEES (Thoughts so called) I will give but one specimen" (another, that of "King Friedrich a common man," being carefully suppressed in the Berlin Copies, of La Beaumelle's distributing):—
"There have been greater Poets than Voltaire; there was never any so well recompensed: and why? Because Taste (GOUT, inclination) sets no limits to its recompenses. The King of Prussia overloads men of talent with his benefits for precisely the reasons which induce a little German Prince to overload with benefits a buffoon or a dwarf." [—OEuvres de Voltaire,—xxvii. 220 n.] Could there be a phenomenon more indisputably of bramble nature?
"He had no success at Berlin, in spite of his merits; could not come near the King at all; but assiduously frequented Maupertuis, the flower of human thinkers in that era,—who was very humane to him in consequence. 'How is it, O flower of human thinkers, that I cannot get on with his Majesty, or make the least way?' (HELAS, MONSIEUR, you have enemies!' answered he of the red wig; and told La Beaumelle (hear it, ye Heavens), That M. de Voltaire had called his Majesty's attention to the PENSEE given above, one evening at Supper Royal; 'heard it myself, Monsieur—husht!' Upon which—
"'Upon which, see, paltry La Beaumelle has become my enemy for life!' shrieks Voltaire many times afterwards: 'And it was false, I declare to Heaven, and again declare; it was not I, it was D'Argens quizzing me about it, that called his Majesty's attention to that PENSEE of Blockhead La Beaumelle,—you treacherous Perpetual President, stirring up enemies against me, and betraying secrets of the King's table.' Sorrow on your red wig, and you!—It is certain La Beaumelle, soon after this, left Berlin: not in love with Voltaire. And there soon appeared, at Franfurt-on-Mayn, a Pirate Edition of our brand-new SIECLE DE LOUIS QUATORZE (with Annotations scurrilous and flimsy);—La Beaumelle the professed Perpetrator; 'who received for the job 7 pounds 10s. net!' [Ib. xx.] asseverates the well-informed Voltaire. Oh, M. de Voltaire, and why not leave it to him, then? Poor devil, he got put into the Bastille too, by and by; Royal Persons being touched by some of his stupid foot-notes.
"La Beaumelle had a long course of it, up and down the world, in and out of the Bastille; writing much, with inconsiderable recompense, and always in a wooden manure worthy of his First vocation in the Geneva time. 'A man of pleasing physiognomy,' says Formey, 'and expressed himself well. I received his visit 14th January, 1752,'—to which latter small circumstance (welcome as a fixed date to us here) La Beaumelle's Biography is now pretty much reduced for mankind. [Formey, ii. 221.] He continued Maupertuis's adorer: and was not a bad creature, only a dull wooden one, with obstinate temper. A LIFE OF MAUPERTUIS of his writing was sent forth lately, [—Vie de Maupertuis—(cited above), Paris, 1866.] after lying hidden a hundred years: but it is dull, dead, painfully ligneous, like all the rest; and of new or of pleasant tells us nothing.
"His enmity to M. de Voltaire did prove perpetual:—a bramble that might have been dealt with by fingers, or by fingers and scissors, but could not by axes, and their hewing and brandishing. 'This is the ninety-fifth anonymous Calumny of La Beaumelle's, this that you have sent me!' says Voltaire once. The first stroke or two had torn the bramble quite on end: 'He says he will pursue you to Hell even,' writes one of the Voltaire kind friends from Frankfurt, on that 7 pounds 10s. business. 'A L'ENFER?' answers M. de Voltaire, with a toss: 'Well, I should think so, he, and at a good rate of speed. But whether he will find me there, must be a question!' If you want to have an insignificant accidental fellow trouble you all your days, this is the way of handling him when he first catches hold."
ABBE DE PRADES.—"De Prades, 'Abbe de Prades, Reader to the King,' though happily not an enemy of Voltaire's, is in some sort La Beaumelle's counterpart, or brother with a difference; concerning whom also, one wants only to know the exact date of his arrival. As La Beaumelle felt too strait-tied in the Geneva vestures (where it had been good for him to adjust himself, and stay); so did De Prades in the Sorbonne ditto,—and burst out, on taking Orders, not into eloquent Preachings or edifying Devotional Exercises; but into loud blurts of mere heresy and heterodoxy. Blurts which were very loud, and I believe very stupid; which failed of being sublime even to the Philosophic world; and kindled the Sorbonne into burning his Book, and almost burning himself, had not he at once run for it.
"Ran to Holland, and there continued blurting more at large,—decidedly stupid for most part, thinks Voltaire, 'but with glorious Passages, worth your Majesty's attention;'—upon which, D'Alembert too helping, poor De Prades was invited to the Readership, vacant by La Mettrie's eagle-pie; and came gladly, and stayed. At what date? one occasionally asks: for there are Royal Letters, dateless, but written in his hand, that raise such question in the utter dimness otherwise. Date is 'September, 1752.' [Preuss, i. 368; ii. 115.] Farther question one does not ask about De Prades. Rather an emphatic intrusive kind of fellow, I should guess;—wrote, he, not Friedrich, that ABRIDGMENT OF PLEURY'S ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY, and other the like dreary Pieces, which used to be inflicted on mankind as Friedrich's.
"For the rest, having place and small pension,—not, like La Beaumelle, obliged to pirate and annotate for 7 pounds 10s.—he went on steadily, a good while; got a Canonry of Glogau [small Catholic benefice, bad if it was not better than its now occupant];—and unluckily, in the Seven-Years-War time, fell into treasonous Correspondence with his countrymen; which it was feared might be fatal, when found out. But no, not fatal. Friedrich did lock him in Magdeburg for some months; then let him out: 'Home to Glogau, sirrah; stick to your Canonry henceforth, and let us hear no more of you at all!' Which shall be his fate in these pages also."
Good, my friend; no more of him, then! Only recollect "September, 1752," if dateless Royal Letters in De Prades's hand turn up.
