Voltaire

His proper name was François Marie Arouet. The word Voltaire is simply an anagram of Arouet L. I. (le jeune). Thus have we Stella, Astrophel (q.v.), Vanessa and Cadenus (q.v.), and a host of other names in anagrams.

Voltaire, the infidel, built the church at Ferney, which has this inscription: “Dco crexit Voltaire.” Cowper alludes to this anomaly in the following lines:

“Nor he who, for the bane of thousands born,

Built God a church, and laughed His Word to scorn.”

Voltaire. Dr. Young said of him—

Thou art so witty, profligate and thin,

Thou seemʹst a Milton, with his Death and Sin.”

An excellent comparison between Voltaire and Gibbon is given by Byron in Childe Harold, canto iii. 106, 107.

The German Voltaire. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1838).

Christoph Martin Wieland (1733–1813).

The Polish Voltaire. Ignatius Krasicki (1774–1801).

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.

Voltaire

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