THE STORY OF PHILOSOPHY2 The Lives and Opinions

i 5 6 THE STORY OF PHILOSOPHY
the horses that filled the royal stables, Frangois remarked how much more
sensible it would have been to dismiss half the asses that filled the royal
court. At last all the bright and naughty things whispered about Paris
were fathered upon him; and it was his ill luck that these included two
poems accusing the Regent of desiring to usurp the throne. The Regent
raged; and meeting the youth in the park one day, said to him: "M.
Arouet, I will wager that I can show you something that you have never
seen before." "What is that?" "The inside of the Bastille." Arouet saw
it the next day, April 16, 1717.
While in the Bastille he adopted, for some unknown reason, the penname
of Voltaire, 17 and became a poet in earnest and at length. Before
he had served eleven months he had written a long and not unworthy
epic, the Henriade, telling the story of Henry of Navarre. Then the
Regent, having discovered, perhaps, that he had imprisoned an innocent
man, released him and gave him a pension; whereupon Voltaire wrote
thanking him for so taking care of his board, and begging permission
hereafter to take care of his lodging himself.
He passed now almost with a bound from the prison to the stage. His
tragedy, CSdipe, was produced in 1718, and broke all the records of Paris
by running for forty-five consecutive nights. His old father, come to
upbraid him, sat in a box, and covered his joy by grumbling, at every
hit, "Oh, the rascal! the rascal!" When the poet Fontenelle met Voltaire
after the play and damned it with high praise, saying it was "too brilliant
for tragedy," Voltaire replied, smiling, "I must re-read your pastorals." 18
The youth was in no mood for caution or for courtesy; had he not put
into the play itself these reckless lines?
Our priests are not what simple folk suppose;
Thetr learning is but our credulity. (Act iv, sc. z);
and into the mouth of Araspe this epoch-making challenge?
Let us trust to ourselves, see all with our own eyes;
Let these be our oracles, our tripods and our gods, (ii, 5)
The play netted Voltaire 4000 francs, which he proceeded to invest
with a wisdom unheard of in literary men; through all his tribulations
he kept the art not merely of making a spacious income, but of putting
it to work; he respected the classic adage that one must live before one
can philosophize. In 1729 he bought up all the tickets in a poorly
planned government lottery, and made a large sum, much to the anger
of the Government. But as he became rich he became ever more generous;
and a growing circle cf proteges gathered about him as he passed into
the afternoon of life.
1T
Carlyle thought it an anagram for A-r-o-u-e-t L ;. (le jeune, the younger) . But
the name seems to have occurred among the family of Voltaire's mother.
'"Robertson, 67.