The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1899-07-06
VIII. VOLTAIRE.

What, then, shall we think of Vol
/ taire? He was at least not an atheist
/ He acknowledged the being and affirm
ed the holiness of God. The gravamen
of the charge against him is that he did
/ evil that good might come; that he
aimed at religious reform by irreligious
means, and in an irreligious spirit; in
a word, that he was not merely a skep-
tic, but that he was scoffer. Rightly
or wrongly, this seems to be the preva-
lent view, and to most Englshmen
and Americans Voltaire is a synonym
of ribald blasphemy.
That he was eminent as a poet, a
! dramatist, novelist and a historian is
disregarded by those who shudder at
him as the man of sin, the high priest
of impiety, the especial enemy of the
church, the very anti-Christ of mod
ern days. There is, of course, a Smaller,
but not uninfiuential class that crowns
him with honor as scientist and phil
osopher, a pioneer of popular educa-
ton, champion of religious liberty, an
enlightened, courageous friend of man,
an illustrious and immortal benefactor
Voltaire lived in France, and in the
eighteenth century and it is as a
Frenchman of the eighteenth century
that he must be judged. That great
movement in favor of civil and religious
liberty which Protestants call the Ref
ormation had succeeded in North Ger
many and in England, but had been
overpowered in France. A stationary
church asserted its authority against
a progressive society. 1t was danger
Gus to oppose the church openly, and
so would-be reformers were driven into
the use of indirect methods, into the
use of anonymous publications, of sat
ire and of innuendo. These methods
were congenial to Voltaire's nature and
in them he became the greatest master
that ever lived. Macaulay says: "Of
all the intellectual weapons which have
ever been welded by man the most ter
rible was the mockery of Voltaire." He
compares the shafts of Voltaire's ridi-
cule to the arrows of Death himself
1t was the church-this ancient and
imposing institution, supported by all
the strength of an absolute monarchy
and imperious courts-that Voltaire de-
termined to overthrow. His purpose
called for the death-conquering spirit
of an apostle and martyr or for the
most consummate adroitness. Voltaire's
temperament and education led him to
choose the latter alternative. 1t is said
that when as young man he had
shown a somewhat reckless spirit of re-
form his father pointed to a figure of
Christ on the cross and said significant
ly: THAT is the fate of reformers."
Voltaire took the hint Carlyle says of
him: NO testimony will he seal with
his blood: scarcely any will he so much
as sign with ink" His publications
were largely anonymous, and when
they were not so any heterodox opin-
ions were advanced on the authority of
writer's of other ages. They were stat
ed in the most plausible and impressive
and then weakly and perfume
torily refuted or simply denounced as
heresies in ironical Difference to the au-
thority of the church. The style of Vol
taire is very much like the style of Ad-
olson, but the use that each of these
brilliant men made of his wit was very
different. Addison was a steady up
holder of the Christian religion and the
Christian church. Voltaire was a bit
-er opponent of both. He used all his
wonderful resources of wit, epigram.
nsinuation and allegory as freely
against the Bible and the church as
against other objects of his dislike He
poured his vitrolic scorn on many an
lncient error and on many a modern |
lbuse. but he also burned with ii many |
| beautiful and sacred symbol that a |
anger and more reverent mind would /
ave held in the deepest respect. He |
made many a hypocrite writhe beneath |
he lash of his sarcasm, but he gave |
litter pain to many pure and devout |
leart by travesties of Christian his
DRY and by aspersions of the charac- |
er and motives of saints and martyrs |
f prophets and apostles. He did not |
ven spare the central figure of Chris !
ian history. He had the audacity not