escaped from the territory of the royal "Solomon" (1753), and
attracted to Switzerland by its spirit of toleration, found himself
in 1755 tenant of the chateau which he named Les Delices, near Geneva,
his "summer palace," and that of Monrion, his "winter palace," in
the neighbourhood of Lausanne. His pen was busy: the tragedy
_L'Orphelin de la Chine_, tales, fugitive verses, the poem on the
earthquake at Lisbon, with its doubtful assertion of Providence as
a slender counterpoise to the certainty of innumerable evils in the
world, pursued one another in varied succession. Still keeping in
his hands Les Delices, he purchased in 1758 the chateau and demesne
of Ferney on French soil, and became a kind of prince and patriarch,
a territorial lord, wisely benevolent to the little community which
he made to flourish around him, and at the same time the intellectual
potentate of Europe.

Never had his brain been more alert and indefatigable. The years from
1760 to 1778 were years of incessant activity. Tragedy, comedy, opera,
epistles, satires, tales in verse, _La Pucelle_,[1] _Le Pauvre
Diable_ (admirable in its malignity), literary criticism, a
commentary on Corneille (published for the benefit of the great
dramatist's grandniece), brilliant tales in prose, the _Essai sur
les Moeurs et l'Esprit des Nations_, the _Histoire de l'Empire de
Russie sous Pierre le Grand_, with other voluminous historical works,
innumerable writings in philosophy, in religious polemics, including
many articles of the _Dictionnaire Philosophique_, in politics, in
jurisprudence, a vast correspondence which extended his influence
over the whole of Europe--these are but a part of the achievement
of a sexagenarian progressing to become an octogenarian.

[Footnote 1: First authorised edition, 1762; surreptitiously printed,
1755.]

His work was before all else a warfare against intolerance and in
favour of free thought. The grand enemy of intellectual liberty
Voltaire saw in the superstition of the Church; his word of command
was short and uncompromising--_Ecrasez l'Infame_. Jean Calas, a
Protestant of Toulouse, falsely accused of the murder of his son,
who was alleged to have been converted to the Roman communion, was
tortured and broken on the wheel. Voltaire, with incredible zeal,
took up the victim's cause, and finally established the dead man's
innocence. Sirven, a Protestant, declared guilty of the murder of
his Roman Catholic daughter, was begga