VOLTAIRE, the assumed name of FRANcOis MARIE AROUET, a French poet, historian and philosopher; born in Chatenay, near Paris, in 1694. He was educated by the Jesuits at the College of Louis le Grand, and already showed so clearly the characteristics which marked him through life, that one of his teachers foretold his eminence as the "Coryphde du Deisme." He was early introduced at the Salon of Ninon de l'Enclos, and be came familiar with some of the most distinguished persons of the time. Ninon, pleased with his remarkable in telligence and liveliness, left him a legacy of 2,000 francs, to buy books. His father's ambition was that he should be come, not author, but lawyer and judge; and to break off his associations in Paris, sent him away in 1713, as page to the Marquis de Chateauneuf, ambassador to Holland. He was soon sent home, how ever, after getting into trouble about a love affair, and was next placed with a lawyer. Quickly and finally escaping this attempt to tame and train him for official life, he soon appeared in Paris again, and from that time he pursued his course as a literary man.
In 1716 he was committed to the Bas tille, on suspicion of being the author of a satirical poem on Louis XIV., and re mained there a year. His first literary work of mark was the tragedy of "Edipe," which, with much difficulty, he got represented in 1718. During a visit to Brussels in 1721, he was introduced to Rosseau, but this interview made enemies of them forever. He was sent to the Bastille a second time, in conse quence of a quarrel at the Duke de Sully's house, and after his release, spent three years in England, where the prev alence of free-thinking made an atmos phere congenial to him. Here, in 1728, he published his celebrated epic poem, "La Henriade," under the title of "La Ligue," and applied himself to other literary labors. He rose speedily to the summit of renown as an epic poet; was courted in all the higher circles; and when he returned to France, he found himself a sort of national idol among the French. After the publication of several plans, he retired, about 1735, to Château de Cirey, near Vassy, in Champagne, be longing to the Marchioness du Chaelet, a lady celebrated for her love of mathe matics and abstruse sciences, and who read Leibnitz and Newton in the original Latin. During the several years of his residence with Mme. du Chatelet, a con nection which Lord Brougham defends as entirely Platonic, he wrote, between other works, his "Elements of the Phil osophy of Newton," in which he ex plained the theories of the great dis coverer, with clearness, elegance, and learning, though perhaps not always with accuracy. A new epoch opened in his life, when, in 1736, he was flattered by a letter from Frederick, Prince-royal of Prussia, afterward Frederick the Great. These two remarkable men first met after the accession of Frederick to the throne in 1740. The meeting was at a château near Cleves, and a second took place soon after at Berlin. The first Silesian war separated them, and Vol taire returned to Holland. They con tinued, however, to correspond. For a while, in 1746, Voltaire removed to Paris, where he received the appointment of historiographer of France and gentleman of the king's bed chamber. He was at the same time received at the Academy.
Soon losing favor at the court, he ac cepted, in 1750, the often renewed invita tion of Frederick II. to settle at his court. Frederick received him with transports of joy. He was lodged in the apartments of the Marshal de Saxe; the king's cooks, servants, and horses were placed at his disposal; he was granted a pension of $4,000; and he and the king studied together for two hours a day, while he was welcomed to the king's table in the evening. At first the con nection seemed a charming one, but Vol taire soon learned by demonstration, not only that courts are wearisome places, but that Frederick of Prussia and Francois Arouet were too much like each other to become real friends. Their in timacy, chiefly fruitful in jealousies, dis sensions, and all kinds of uneasiness, ended after three years by the flight of Voltaire. At Frankfort he was joined by his niece, Mme. Denis; and at the same city he was arrested by the Prussian res ident, and detained till a volume of Frederick's poems was given up. After a short stay at Colmar, and some trouble about his "Essay on Morals" he settled with Madame Denis at Ferney, then a mere hamlet, near the Genevese terri tory. There he passed the last 20 years of his life, unwearied in writing, and at the same time active in promoting the in terests of the little village, which, under his fostering care, grew up into a neat little town, and became the seat of a flourishing colony of watchmakers.
As the home of Voltaire, Ferney be came a center of attraction for the most distinguished persons of all countries. Voltaire carried on correspondence with Frederick the Great and Catherine II. of Russia; pleaded eloquently and suc cessfully for the Calas family; educated the grand-niece of Corneille, and gave her a marriage portion; and offered Rousseau an asylum. His books and his speculation in the funds had made him enormously rich, but he spent nobly his fortune, and the fugitives from the civil troubles of Geneva and other towns always found an asylum beneath his roof. At the age of 84, yielding to the impor tunity of his niece, he once more visited Paris, where he brought out a new tragedy, "Irene." His whole journey and his reception there was one continuous splendid triumph. He was everywhere attended by crowds; occupied the direc tor's seat at the Academy, was crowned at the theater; and then exhausted by the excitement and loss of sleep, took opiates, and, after great suffering, fell into a lethargy, and so died, May 30, 1778. Among his latest words were these: "I die worshiping God, loving my friends, not hating my enemies, but detesting superstition." The cure of St. Sulpice refused the rites of burial, and the body of the "great mocker" was interred by night in the abbey of Sullieres, whence it was removed at the Revolution and de posited in the Pantheon. The works of Voltaire in the most complete editions, fill 70 volumes, 8vo. In addition to those already named, are the plays, "Zaire,' "Mahomet," "Merope," and "Oreste"; the too celebrated poem "La Pucelle"; the "Story of Charles XII."; the "Cen tury of Louis XIV."; the "Essay upon the Morals and Wit of Nations"; the satirical novel, "Candide, the Optimist"; and the "Dictionary of Philosophy."