Litchfield enquirer., 1881-07-28

The greatest name m tnc~1 Iiterature Oi tDe Eighteenth Century is that of Voltaire. The 'tPope of Ferney," as some one called him, dominated over the intellect of continental Europe throughout the third quarter of that century. if not without rivals, still without an equal The two most renowned sovereign of 1 the time, Frederick the Great of Prussia and Catherine II of Russia, delighted to call themselves his pupils. The French govern ment feared almost as much as it hated him. No JneR literary man, before or since, has gained such influence over the intelligent public of the continent as Voltaire. He was the most voluminous as we'll as the most pop ular writer of period destitute of writers of the first rank. He wrote the best tragedies, | the best comedies, the most readable histo- ries, of any man of his time. He wrote an epic poem which was considered in France and Germany finer than the Paradise Lost. He popularized the science of Newton, till then little known and less esteemed on the continent. He wrote the keenest epigrams of regime tempered by epimrams." He showered pamphlets on a country where pam phlet was often bombshell. In him were the irrepressible ''enterprse" of dozen ''able editors" of our day.
 Above all Voltaire occupied vastly more independent position than any writer of his time. Hard experience had taught him that the court even of friendly prince of the ab- solutist type then prevailing was too confined sphere for him 1; and he established himself on the confines of France, just over the line from Switzerland, so that he was practically no longer in danger of the Bastile. He was man of wealth, laded proprietor, the lord of countship, in short more completely his own master than any other literary man on the continent of Europe. There was granted him, too, freedom of speech allowed no ether French subject, and totally out of keep ing with the habits of the tile.
 On the other hand, though all but univer sal genius, Voltaire was first class in nothing. His tragedies are inferior to the tragedies of Racine his comedies. to tine comedies of Moliere. His epic poem is all hut forgotten his histories rank hardly above the histories of Goldsmith. His science was good second hand science, but keeps no permanent place. His lighter work which is perhaps the nearest first class of anything he did-has passed out of fashion.
 He had the gravest faults of character Born in an evil time, he had the faults of his time in all exaggerated degree. He is entire ly lacking in that purity, that dignity, that self restraint, that stern regard for truth. on which the reformer of the Nineteenth Century brides himself. He was liar, an adultery, a datterer. He dsavowed any work of his whenever he found It convenient to do so of the Romish communion at the very time that he was laboring hardest to overthrow that church. So far was he from having the spirit of the martyr that he prided himself on the cunning with which he avoided the mar. tyrdom to which his acts entitled him. No other age could have produced such 8 man. In no other age could such a man have exer- ted so wonderful an influence.
 It is Voltaires war on the Romish church that is the chief feature of hls career. Though educated in Jesuit College, an an- tagonism early sprang up, which went on in- tensifying during his more than sixty years of literary work, till at last it became the chief end of his existence to crush the corrupt prosecuting hierarchy from whose tyranny he had himself suffered much and had seen others suffer even death by torture French Catho- licism in Voltaire's day very queer thing. One might almost say that the Eighteenth Century found it religion and left it superstition. The Huguenot Church had dwindled to persecuted remnant. The apostasy of Henry W had ruined their chance of becoming the national church; Richlieu had broken their political power; and the ter riable prosecutions under Louis XIV had scat. tered and almost annihlated them. The real opposition to the French hierarchy no longer came from Calvinisrn. The chief enemies of the church were the philosophers" chief among the philosophers was Voltaire The political and religious atmosphere of Voltaire's youth was an atmosphere of scepticism and insincerity. Church and State were rotten together. In no society was ridicule ever SO powerful as in the French society of the peri od; and Voltare's chief effort was to turn the church to ridicufe.
 But Voltaire did much nobler work: he showed up the horrible injustice of the bigot- " he co mbated, in repeated legal trials, and in such manner that not only all France but all Europe could not but see how hateful it was. The most noted of these cases was that of the Calas family. In 1761 the eldest son of Protestant family of that name in Toulouse committed suicide. The story start- ed at once that the family had killed him to prevent his turning Catholic. There Was no proof of this; but the bigoted msgistracy of the city subjected the elder Calas to the most horrible torture to make him confess his guilt, He not only suffered torture with constancy, but was finally broken on the wheel, and died in lingering agony maintaining his inno- cence to the last. His fortitude saved the lives of his family, for there was really no evidence against anyone hut their property
 
 was conhscated and they were scattered in ut ter povertyand overwhelmed with ieneminy.
 It was then that Votaire first heard of the case Examing into the facts and becoming convinced that Jean Caas was innocent. he set in motion law proceedings for rehearing of the case at Paris to rehabiitatc the naue of Calas Pressure had to be brought oa the government. however. to make them grant the new trial which could only be done on order of the royal council. Voltaire aroused public opinion in Protestant England and Germany. A subscription was taken up for the Calas family in the former country headed by the name of Queen Charlotte, followed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, ten bishops and seventy y-nine temporal lords. The En-