teig.

M. de Voltaire, who used to be M. Francois-Marie Arouet, was at this
time about forty, [Born 20th February, 1694; the younger of two sons:
Father, "Francois Arouet, a Notary of the Chatelet, ultimately Treasurer
of the Chamber of Accounts;" Mother, "Marguerite d'Aumart, of a noble
family of Poitou."] and had gone through various fortunes; a man, now
and henceforth, in a high degree conspicuous, and questionable to his
fellow-creatures. Clear knowledge of him ought, at this stage, to
be common; but unexpectedly it is not. What endless writing and
biographying there has been about this man; in which one still reads,
with a kind of lazy satisfaction, due to the subject, and to the French
genius in that department! But the man himself, and his environment and
practical aspects, what the actual physiognomy of his life and of him
can have been, is dark from beginning to ending; and much is left in an
ambiguous undecipherable condition to us. A proper History of Voltaire,
in which should be discoverable, luminous to human creatures, what he
was, what element he lived in, what work he did: this is still a problem
for the genius of France!--

His Father's name is known to us; the name of his Father's profession,
too, but not clearly the nature of it; still less his Father's
character, economic circumstances, physiognomy spiritual or social: not
the least possibility granted you of forming an image, however faint,
of that notable man and household, which distinguished itself to all the
earth by producing little Francois into the light of this sun. Of Madame
Arouet, who, or what, or how she was, nothing whatever is known. A human
reader, pestered continually with the Madame-Denises, Abbe-Mignots and
enigmatic nieces and nephews, would have wished to know, at least, what
children, besides Francois, Madame Arouet had: once for all, How many
children? Name them, with year of birth, year of death, according to the
church-registers: they all, at any rate, had that degree of history! No;
even that has not been done. Beneficent correspondents of my own make
answer, after some research, No register of the Arouets anywhere to
be had. The very name VOLTAIRE, if you ask whence came it? there is no
answer, or worse than none.--The fit "History" of this man, which might
be one of the shining Epics of his Century, and the lucid summary and
soul of any HISTORY France then had, but which would require almost a
French demi-god to do it, is