independent of the profits of his writings, of which he always appears to have been careless.
His play of "Brutus" was the first fruit of his exile; and this he considered his most forcibly written tragedy. It breathed a spirit of freedom long unknown to the French stage, and set forth in eloquent language the rights of an oppressed people. After the performance of it, Fontenelle told the author that "he did not think him fitted for tragedy; that his style was too forcible, too lofty, too brilliant." "Then I must study your pastorals again," said Voltaire.
It was about this time that Voltaire, finding his former friend Suzanne, now Marquise de Gouvernet, inhabiting a fine house in a fashionable quarter of Paris, wished to renew his acquaintance with her. She had intimated no such wish; but he, who had made love to so many high-born ladies, might without presumption approach this butterfly Marquise with whom he had been so intimate when she was a chrysalis. When he presented himself at her house, a huge Swiss hall-porter inquired Voltaire's name, on learning which, he observed, in a tone by no means encouraging, that it was not on the Marquise's visitors' list. On returning home, Voltaire turned this rebuff to excellent account: he wrote to the Marquise a poetical epistle, of that half gay, half serious, and all graceful cast, in which he is unrivalled, and which is to this day among the most famous of his lighter poems.[1]
- ↑ This piece is not of a kind to which translation could do justice. The name by which it is known to French readers, "The You and the Thou," implies this. In the passages where he reverts to their former intimacy, he uses the Thou,—where he speaks of her present position, the You; and we have, of course, no equivalent pronouns of famili-
