Delivered at Paris, May 30, 1878, the hundredth anniversary of
Voltaire’s death.
A hundred years ago today a man died. He died immortal. He departed
laden with years, laden with works, laden with the most illustrious and
the most fearful of responsibilities, the responsibility of the human
conscience informed and rectified. He went cursed and blessed, cursed
by the past, blessed by the future; and these, gentlemen, are the two
superb forms of glory. On his death bed he had, on the one hand, the
acclaim of contemporaries and of posterity; on the other, that triumph
of hooting and of hate which the implacable past bestows upon those
who have combatted it. He was more than a man; he was an age. He had
exercised a function and fulfilled a mission. He had been evidently
chosen for the work which he had done, by the supreme will, which
manifests itself as visibly in the laws of destiny as in the laws of
nature.
The eighty-four years which this man lived occupy the interval that
separates the monarchy at its apogee from the revolution at its dawn.
When he was born Louis XIV still reigned, when he died Louis XVI
reigned already; so that his cradle could see the last rays of the
great throne, and his coffin the first gleams from the great abyss.
[Applause.]
Before going further, let us come to an understanding, gentlemen, upon
the word abyss. There are good abysses: such are the abysses in which
evil is engulfed. [Bravo!]
Gentlemen, since I have interrupted myself, allow me to complete my
thought. No word imprudent or unsound will be pronounced here. We are
here to perform an act of civilization. We are here to make affirmation
of progress, to pay respect to philosophers for the benefits of
philosophy, to bring to the eighteenth century the testimony of the
nineteenth, to honor magnanimous combatants and good servants, to
felicitate the noble effort of peoples, industry, science, the valiant
march in advance, the toil to cement human accord; in one word, to
glorify peace, that sublime, universal desire. Peace is the virtue
of civilization; war is its crime. [Applause.] We are here, at this
grand moment, in this solemn hour to bow religiously before the moral
law, and to say to the world, which hears France, this: There is only
one power, conscience in the service of justice; and there is only
one glory, genius in the service of truth. [Movement.] That said, I
continue.
Before the revolution, gentlemen, the social structure was this:
At the base, the people:
Above the people, religion represented by the clergy;
By the side of religion, justice represented by the magistracy.
And, at that period of human society, what was the people? It was
ignorance. What was religion? It was intolerance. And what was justice?
It was injustice. Am I going too far in my words? Judge.