With the authorities at Geneva Voltaire had got into dispute, owing to
his attempt to establish a private theatre in the territory still
dominated by the ghost of Calvin. Moreover, he was continually reminding
them of Servetus. When D'Alembert's article on Geneva appeared the
citizens were enraged, and Voltaire thought proper to also purchase an
estate near Lausanne, in the Vaud Canton, which was somewhat less
austere in theatrical matters. Here Gibbon was also residing at the
time.
Stupid stories have been told of Gibbon's attempts to see Voltaire, and
of their mutual laughter at each other's ugliness. Voltaire is said to
have refused himself to the young Englishman, which is very unlikely,
and that he replied: "You are like the Christian God: he permits one to
eat and drink, but will never show himself." It is said that he got
Voltaire's mare let loose on purpose to see the old man chase after him.
Voltaire sent a servant to charge him twelve sous for seeing the great
beast, whereupon he gave twenty-four, with the remark, "that will pay
for a second visit." Gibbon himself, speaking of the winter of 1757-58,
which he spent in the neighborhood of Lausanne, says: "My desire of
beholding Voltaire, whom I then rated above his real magnitude, was
easily gratified. He received me with civility as an English youth, but
I cannot boast of any peculiar notice or distinction. The highest
gratification which I derived from Voltaire's residence at Lausanne was
the uncommon circumstance of hearing a great poet declaim his own
productions on the stage. He had formed a company of gentlemen and
ladies, some of whom were not destitute of talents. My ardor, which soon
became conspicuous, seldom failed of procuring me a ticket.... The wit
and philosophy of Voltaire, his table and theatre, refined in a visible
degree the manners of Lausanne; and, however addicted to study, I
enjoyed my share of the amusements of society."
This taste for directing theatrical representations was shared, perhaps
we might say followed, by his great German admirer Goethe. It was
Voltaire's relaxation. One of his most particular friends was the great
actor Le Kain. The drama was with him an instrument of education. He
believed it to be a means both of softening and refining manners, and
also of dispersing intolerance and superstition.
Voltaire soon afterwards purchased a third estate at Ferney, just a
little over the French border, and here, eventually, he lived _en grande
seigneur_, and was known as the "patriarch of Ferney." A philosopher, he
said, with hounds at his heels, like a fox should never trust to one
hole. Accordingly, he had within easy distance the choice of three
distinct governments wherein to find a place of refuge, for, as Carlyle
remarks, he "had to keep his eyes open and always have covert within
reach, under pain of being torn to pieces, while he went about in the
flesh, or rather in the bones, poor lean being." He now had wealth,
independence, and an assurance of safety, and had come to that time of
life when most men who are able think they may fairly retire from their
labors. But now was the time when he, casting aside all other pleasures
and ambitions, threw himself with unflagging energy and unsurpassed
industry into the great task of his life. It was from Ferney he issued
all the remarkable works of his later years.
At Ferney, the old church obstructing his view of the Alps, he built a
new one, and got into trouble for doing so. He had inscribed on it, "Deo
erexit Voltaire, 1761," a phrase which betrayed rather patronage than
devotion.
"It is," he remarked, "the only church dedicated to God alone; all the
others are dedicated to saints. For my part, I would rather worship the
master than the valets." On another occasion, he said: "Yes, I adore
God; but not monsieur his son, and madame his mother." It was observed
of the inscription that he had only a single word between himself and
God. From the wall of his church he also built a tomb for himself. "The
wicked will say that I am neither inside nor outside," he remarked. Of
the church he remarked: "The wicked will say, no doubt, that I am
building this church in order to throw down the one which conceals a
beautiful prospect, and to have a grand avenue; but I let the impious
talk, and go on working out my salvation." If the wicked made the
remarks predicted, they doubtless spoke the truth. It was even reported
that Voltaire personally superintended the removal of the old ruinous
one, saying, "Take away that gibbet" when pointing to the crucifix. The
_cure_ of Moens, the parish adjoining Ferney, cited Voltaire before the
ecclesiastical official of Gex as guilty of impiety and sacrilege, and
Wagniere, Voltaire's secretary, says: "Those gentlemen indulged the
confident hope that M. de Voltaire would be burned, or at least hanged,
for the greater glory of God and the edification of the faithful. This
they said publicly." Voltaire was enabled to strike terror to his
persecutor by producing a royal ordinance of 1627 forbidding a _cure_ to
serve either as prosecutor or judge in such cases. The church remains,
but the celebrated inscription was effaced during the Restoration of the
Monarchy.
Ferney became an asylum for the oppressed both from France and
Switzerland. Many of these Voltaire located in and about his chateau,
but, as their number increased, he built nice stone houses, and, in a
little time, the miserable hamlet which before his arrival had been a
wilderness, became a prosperous colony of twelve hundred individuals and
a veritable free State. There were both Protestants and Catholics among
them, but such was the unanimity in which they lived under his
protection, that we are told no one could conceive that different
religions existed among them. Among this colony he established the
manufacture of weaving and of watches, by means of which his people
presently became wealthy; the Empress Catherine II., even when engaged
in her Turkish campaigns, paying her _bon ami_ Voltaire the compliment
of assisting the Ferney colony by an order for watches to the value of
some thousand roubles. He pushed the work of his colonists into repute
throughout the world, and was justified in saying to the Duke of
Richelieu, "Give me a fair chance, and I am the man to build a city."
Though everywhere maligned as an infidel and a scoffer, his life was one
long act of benevolence. The watches of Ferney became known as those of
Geneva. "Fifteen years ago," said a visitor, "there were barely at
Ferney three or four cottages and forty inhabitants; now it is
astonishing to see a numerous and civilised colony, a theatre, and more
than a hundred pretty houses." "His charities," says General Hamley,
"were munificent. When the Order of Jesuits was suppressed he took one
of the body, Father Adam, into his house, and made him his almoner, a
post which was far from being a sinecure." Hearing that Mademoiselle
Corneille, the grandniece of the poet, was in poverty, Voltaire, in the
most delicate manner, invited her to his house, treated her as a
relation, and gave her an education suitable to her descent. "It is," he
said, "the duty of an old soldier to be useful to the daughter of his
general." That she might not feel under personal obligation, he devoted
to her dowry the profits of his _Commentaries on Corneille_.
"A description is given of him in his last days at Ferney, seated under
a vine, on the occasion of a _fete_, and receiving the congratulations
and complimentary gifts of his tenantry and neighbors, when a young
lady, whom he had adopted, brought him in a basket a pair of white doves
with pink beaks, as her offering. He afterwards entertained about 200
guests at a splendid repast, followed by illuminations, songs, and
dances, and was himself so carried away in an access of gaiety as to
throw his hat into the air. But his merriment ended in a tempest of
wrath; for learning, in the course of the evening, that the two doves
which had figured so prettily in the _fete_ had been killed for the
table, his indignation at the stolid cruelty which could shed the blood
of the creatures they had all just admired and caressed, knew no
bounds."
Diderot, who shares with Voltaire the glory of being the intellectual
landmark of last century, and who equalled him as an artist and excelled
him as a philosopher, only met Voltaire a little before his death. The
fame of Voltaire's wealth had kept him from Ferney. Speaking of Voltaire
in old age, Diderot says: "He is like one of those old haunted castles,
which are falling into ruins in every part; but you easily perceive that
it is inhabited by some ancient magician." Diderot was the better
critic, and controverted the patriarch as to the merits of Shakespeare,
whom he compared to the statue of Saint Christopher at Notre
Dame--unshapely and rude; but: such a colossus that ordinary petty men
could pass between his legs without touching him.
Late in life, Voltaire adopted Reine Philiberte de Vericourt, a young
girl of noble but poor family, whom he had rescued from a convent life,
installed in his own house, and married to the Marquis de Villette. Her
pet name was _Belle et Bonne_, and no one had more to do with the
happiness of the last years of Voltaire than she. She watched by the
dying Voltaire's bedside, and Lady Morgan thus records her report: "To
his last moment everything he said and did breathed the benevolence and
goodness of his character. All announced in him tranquility, peace,
resignation; except a little moment of ill-humor which he showed to the
_cure_ of St. Sulpice when he begged him to withdraw, and said, 'Let me
die in peace.'"
Voltaire himself wrote to Mme. du Deffand: "They say sometimes of a man,
'He died like a dog'; but, truly, a dog is very happy to die without all
the ceremony with which they persecute the last moments of our lives. If
they had a little charity for us, they would let us die without saying
anything about it. The worst is that we are then surrounded by
hypocrites, who worry us to make us think as they do not in the least
think; or else by imbeciles, who desire us to be as stupid as they are.
All this is very disgusting. The only pleasure of life at Geneva is that
people can die there as they like; many worthy persons summon no priest
at all. People kill themselves if they please, without any one
objecting; or they await the last moment, and no one troubles them about
it."
Under suffering, age, and impending death, Voltaire's bearing, as
Carlyle acknowledges, "one must say is rather beautiful." Voltaire had
all his life "enjoyed" bad health. He had always a feeble constitution,
and was a confirmed invalid for the greater part of his life, suffering
from bladder disorder, and a variety of other diseases that would have
soon finished an ordinary man. We may say he was sustained by his work,
which was ever gay, even when most pessimistic. "My eyes are as red as a
drunkard's," he writes, "and I have not the honor to be one." His wit
lasted in old age. A visitor to Ferney, hearing him praise Haller
enthusiastically, told him that Haller did not do him equal justice.
"Ah," said Voltaire, lightly, "perhaps we are both mistaken." To Bailly,
the astronomer, he wrote, at the age of eighty-one: "A hundred thanks
for the book of medicine which you sent me, together with your own
[_History of Ancient Astronomy_], when I was very unwell. I have not
opened the first. The second I have read and feel much better." He kept
himself at work with coffee. His interest was ever in his work. At the
very last, the new dictionary he had proposed to the Academy was on his
mind; it was not proceeding as rapidly as his indefatigable spirit
desired. "J'ai fait un pen de bien; c'est mon meilleur ouvrage"--"I have
done a little good; that is my best work," was one of his latest
utterances.
His physicians gave their opinion that he might have lived even longer
than he did had he not been lured to Paris by his niece (unprepossessing
Madame Denis) to superintend the production of his last tragedy _Irene_.
Asked at the barrier if there was anything contraband in the carriage,
he replied, "Only myself." On entering Paris he received a shock in the
news that his friend Le Kain, the actor, had been buried the day before.
He was visited by Benjamin Franklin, who brought his grandson, whom they
desired to kneel for the patriarch's blessing. Pronouncing in English
the words, "God, Liberty, Toleration"--"this," said Voltaire, "is the
most suitable benediction for the grandson of Franklin." Poems,
addresses and deputations came thick upon him, and his hotel was
thronged with visitors of rank and eminence. The popular voice hailed
the aged patriarch, especially as the defender of Calas, the apostle of
universal toleration; and this title was more gratifying to him than any
other.
In one house where Voltaire called on his last visit to Paris, the
mistress reproached him for the obstinacy with which, in extreme old age
(over eighty-three), he continued to assail the Church and its beliefs.
"Be moderate and generous," said she, "after the victory. What can you
fear now from such adversaries? The fanatics are prostrate (_a terre_).
They can no longer injure. Their reign is over." Voltaire replied: "You
are in error, madame; it is a fire that is covered but not extinguished.
Those fanatics, those Tartuffes, are mad dogs. They are muzzled, but
they have not lost their teeth. It is true they bite no more; but on the
first opportunity, if their teeth are not drawn, you will see if they
will not bite." All that one man could do was done by Voltaire. More
than any other, he helped to muzzle the mad dog of religious
intolerance, lassoing it dexterously with his finespun silken thread,
since replaced by a stronger cord. But the beast even yet is not dead;
its teeth are not all drawn. Give it a chance and it will still bite.
What we have to thank Voltaire for is, that he has left works which, as
he himself said, are "scissors and files to file the teeth and pare the
talons of the monsters."
Voltaire was, as he said, stifled in roses. He sat up at night
perfecting _Irene_, and his unwearied activity induced him at his great
age to begin a Dictionary upon a novel plan which he prevailed upon the
French Academy to take up. At the performance of his tragedy he was
crowned with laurel in his box, amid the plaudits of the audience. To
keep himself up under the excitement, he exceeded even his usual excess
of coffee. These labors and dissipation brought on spitting of blood,
and sleeplessness, to obviate which he took opium. Condorcet says the
servant mistook one of the doses, which threw him into a state of
lethargy, from which he never recovered. He lingered for some time, but
at length expired on the 30th of May, 1778, in his eighty-fourth year.
Of course lying tales of dying horrors were floated, and disbelieved in
by all who knew him. He wished to rest in his own churchyard, and let
the _abbe_ Gaultier and the _cure_ de St. Sulpice squabble as to who
should have, the honor of his conversion. His secretary, being alone
with him, begged him to state what his view continued to be when he
believed himself dying; and received this written declaration: "I die
adoring God, loving my friends, not hating my enemies, detesting
superstition"--"Je meurs eti adorant dieu, en aimant mes amis, en ne
baissant pas mes ennemis, de testant superstition." This dying
declaration may be seen at the _Bibliotheque Nationale_, Paris (Fr.
11,460), written, signed and dated by him in a still firm hand,
February, 1778.
Into the stories told of Voltaire's dying moments and many similar
legends, my colleague, Mr. G. W. Foote, has fully entered in his
_Infidel Deathbeds_. He quotes the following extract from a letter by
Dr. Burard, who, as assistant physician, was constantly about Voltaire
in his last moments:
"I feel happy in being able, while paying homage to truth, to destroy
the effect of the lying stories which have been told respecting the last
moments of Mons. de Voltaire. I was, by office, one of those who were
appointed to watch the whole progress of his illness, with MM.
Tron-chin, Lorry, and Try, his medical attendants. I never left him for
an instant during his last moments, and I can certify that we invariably
observed in him the same strength of character, though his disease was
necessarily attended with horrible pain. (Here follow the details of his
case.) We positively forbade him to speak, in order to prevent the
increase of a spitting of blood, with which he was attacked; still he
continued to communicate with us by means of little cards, on which he
wrote his questions; we replied to him verbally, and if he was not
satisfied, he always made his observations to us in writing. He
therefore retained his faculties up to the last moment, and the
fooleries which have been attributed to him are deserving of the
greatest contempt. It could not even be said that such or such person
had related any circnmstance of his death, as being witness to it; for
at the last, admission to his chamber was forbidden to any person. Those
who came to obtain intelligence respecting the patient, waited in the
saloon, and other apartments at hand. The proposition, therefore, which
has been put in the mouth of Marshal Richelieu is as unfounded as the
rest.
"Paris, April 3rd, 1819.
"(Signed) Burard."
The actual facts are thus told by Mr. Parton: "Ten minutes before he
breathed his last he roused from his slumber, took the hand of his
valet, pressed it, and said to him: 'Adieu, my dear Morand; I am dying.'
These were his last words."
D'Alembert, in a letter to Frederick, written after Voltaire's death,
thus recorded the impression made on him by the dying man. Having
described the stupefying effects of the opium which left his head clear
only for brief intervals, D'Alembert, who saw him during one of them,
proceeds: "He recognised me and even spoke to me some friendly words.
But the moment after he fell back into his state of stupor, for he was
almost always dying. He awoke only to complain and to say 'he had come
to Paris to die.'" Throughout his illness, D'Alembert adds, "he
exhibited, to the extent which his condition permitted, much tranquility
of mind, although he seemed to regret life. I saw him again the day
before his death, and to some friendly words of mine he replied,
pressing my hand, 'You are my consolation.'"
It is certain the heads of the French Church did not consider that
Voltaire had made a death-bed conversion, for they refused his body
burial in consecrated ground. They had anathematised him when alive and
proscribed him when dead. He had prepared a tomb for himself under the
sky, where he had grown old and done good, but he was cheated out of his
rights, and it was decided that he who built the church had no right to
have his bones bleach in the cemetery. Letters were sent to the Bishop
of Annecy, in whose diocese Ferney was, enjoining him to prohibit the
_cure_ thereof from giving Voltaire's remains Christian burial in his
own churchyard. Voltaire's nephew, the _abbe_ Mignot, held a ruined
abbey at Scillieres, in Champagne, a hundred miles or so from Paris; and
here the body was secretly hurried off and interred. On the very day of
interment the Bishop of the diocese wrote to the Prior forbidding the
burial. There was even some talk of having the body exhumed, and the
clergy clamored for the expulsion of the Prior. Grimm relates that "the
players were forbidden to act M. de Voltaire's pieces till further
orders, the editors of the public papers to speak of his death in any
terms, either favorable or unfavorable, and the preceptors of the
colleges to suffer any of their scholars to learn his verses."
In 1791, by a decree of the National Assembly and amid the acclamation
of the people, his body was brought and placed in the Pantheon, where it
rested beside that of Rousseau. At the Restoration in 1814 some bigoted
Royalist stole away the bones, which were thrown into a hole with lime
poured on them.
In person Voltaire was always slim, with the long head which, Carlyle
says, "is the best sign of intelligence." His thinness is commemorated
by the poor but well-known epigram attributed to Young, and identifying
him at once with "Satan, Death, and Sin." In old age he became a mere
skeleton, with eyes of great brilliancy peering beneath his wig. He was
sober and temperate save in coffee, which he drank as inveterately as
Johnson did tea. Conversation and literature were, as with Johnson, the
gods of his idolatry.