ered the seeds of genius. The use he made of riches might prevail
on envy itself to pardon him their acquirement. His pen and his purse
were ever at the service of the oppressed. Calas, an infirm old man,
living at Toulouse, was accused of having hung his son, to prevent his
becoming a Catholic. The Catholic population became inflamed, and the
young man was declared to be a martyr. The father was condemned to the
torture and the wheel, and died protesting his innocence. The family
of Calas was ruined and disgraced. Voltaire, assuring himself of the
innocence of the old man, determined to obtain justice for the family.
To this end he labored incessantly for three years. In all this time, he
said, a smile did not escape him for which he did not reproach himself
as for a crime. His efforts were successful. Nor was this the only cause
in which he was engaged on the side of the weak and the wronged against
the powerful and the persecuting. His whole life, though maligned as an
Infidel and a-scoffer, was one long act of benevolence. On learning that
a young niece of Corneille languished in a condition unworthy of his
name, Voltaire, in the most delicate manner, invited her to his house,
and she there received an education suitable to the rank that her birth
had marked lor her in society. "It is the duty of a soldier," he said,
"to succor the niece of his general."

Voltaire lived for a time at the Court of Frederick the Great of
Prussia, and for many years carried on a correspondence with that
monarch. He quarrelled with the king, and left the court in a passion.
An emissary was despatched to him to request an apology, who said he was
to carry back to the king his answer _verbatim_. Voltaire told him that
"the king might go to the devil!" On being asked if that was the message
he meant to be delivered! "Yes," he answered, "and add to it that I told
you that you might go there with him." In his "Memoirs," he has drawn
a most amusing picture of his Prussian Majesty. He, also says, "Priests
never entered the palace; and, in a word, Frederick lived without
religion, without a council, and without a court."

Wearied with his rambling and unsettled mode of living, Voltaire bought
an estate at Ferney, in the Pays des Gex, where he spent the last twenty
years of his life. He rebuilt the house, laid out gardens, kept a good
table, and had crowds of visitors from all parts, of Europe. Removed
from whatever could excite momentary or per