You already know two excerpts of this - Voltaire on Shakespeare and on Doctor Johnson - but I decided to transcribe the full hilarity for you. It shows why Boswell was the gatecrasher of international celebrities of his time, and it gives a great, vivid impression of what Voltaire was like in his 70s.
First, here's Boswell's letter about the meeting to his friend William Temple:
And whence do I now write to you, my friend? From the chateau of Monsieur de Voltaire. I had a letter for him from a Swiss colonel at The Hague. I came hither Monday and was presented to him. He received me with dignity and the air of a man who has been much in the world which a Frenchman acquires to perfection. I saw him for about half an hour before dinner. He was not in spirits. Yet he gave me some brilliant sallies. He did not dine with us, and I was obliged to poist away immediately after dinner, because the gates of Geneva shut before five and Ferney is a good hour from Town. I was by no means satisfied to have been so little time with the monarch of French literature. A happy scheme sprung up in my adventurous mind. Madame Denis, the niece of Monsieur de Voltaire, had been extremely good to me. She is fond of our language. I wrote her a letter in English begging her interest to obtain fo rme the privilege of lodging a night under the roof of Monsieur de Voltaire, who, in opposition to our sun, rises in the evening. I was in the finest humour, and my letter was full of wit. I told her, 'I am a hardy and vigorous Scot. You may mount me to the highest and coldest garret. I shall not even refuse to sleep upon two stairs in the bedchamber of your maid. I saw her pass through the room where we sat before dinner."
I sent my letter on Tuesday by an express. It was shown to Monsieur de Voltaire, who with his own hand wrote this answer in the character of Madame Denis: "You will do us much honour and pleasure. We have few beds. But you will not sleep on two chairs. My uncle, though very sick, hath guessed at your merit. I know it better; for I habve seen you longer." Temple, I am your most obedient. How do you find yourself? Have you got such a thing as an old friend in this world? Is he to be valued or is he not?
I returned yesterday to this enchanted castle. The magician appeared a very little before dinner. But in the evening he came into the drawing-room in great spirits. I placed myself by him. I touched the keys in unison with his imagination. I wish you had heard the music. He was all brilliance. He gave me continues flashes of wit. I got him to speak English, which he does to a degree that made m now and then start up and cry, 'Upon my soul this is astonishing!' When he talked our language he was animated with the soul of a Briton. He had bold flights. He had humour. He ahd an extravagance; he had a forcible oddity of style that the most comical of our dramatis personae could not have exceeded. He swore bloodily, as was the fashion when he was in England. He hummed a ballad; he repeated nonsense. Then he talked of our Constitution with a noble enthusiasm. I was proud to hear thi sform the mouth of an illustrious Frenchman. At last we came upon religion. Then he did rage. The company went to supper. Monsieur de Voltaire and I remained in the drawing-room with a great Bible before us, and if ever two mortal men disputed with vehemence, we did. Yes, upon that occasion he was one individual and I another. For a certain portion of time there was a fair opposition between Voltaire and Boswell. The daring bursts of his ridicule confounded my undrstanding. He stood like an orator of ancient Rome. Tully was never more agitated than he was. He went too far. His aged frame trembled beneath him. He cried, "Oh, I am very sick; my head turns round," and he let himself gently fall upon an easy chair. He recovered. I resumed our conversation, but changed the tone. I talked to him serious and earnest. I demanded of him an honest confession of his real sentiments. He gave it me with candour and with a mild eloquence which touched my heart. I did not believe him capable of thinking in the manner that he declared to me was "From the bottom of his heart". He expressed his veneration - his love - of the Supreme Being, an dhis entire resignation to the will of Hm who is All-Wise. He expressed his desire to resemble the author of Goodness by being good hiomself. His sentiments go no farther. He does not inflame his mind with grand hopes of the immortality of the soul. He says it may be, but he knows nothing of it. And his mind is in perfect tranquility. I was moved; I was sorry. I doubted his sincereity. I alled to him with emotion, 'Are you sincere?' He answered, 'Before God, I am.'
Temple, was not this an interesting scene? Wold a journey form Scotland to Ferney have been too much to obtain such a remarkable interview? I have given you the great lines. The whole conversation of the evening is fully recorded, and I look upon it as an invaluable treasure. One day the public shall have it. It is a present highly worthy of their attention. I told Monsieur de Voltaire that I had written eight quarto pages of what he had said. He smiled and seemed pleased.
Now, Boswell's notes from the conversations as quoted in John Wain's "Best of Boswell" edition of the diaries; he also notes whether they were talking English or French.
Thursday 27 December 1764 yes, Boswell invited himself over to Voltaire's for just after Christmas - Notes on V'oltaire's English conversation:
VOLTAIRE: Shakespeare has often two good lines, never six. A madman, by G-d, a buffoon at Bartholommew Fair. No play of his own, all old stories. Chess. “I shall lose, by G-d, by all the saints in Paradise. Ah, here I am risind on a black ram, like a whore as I am. – Falstaff from the Spaniards. BOSWELL: I’ll tell you why we admire Shakespeare. VOLTAIRE: Because you have no taste. BOSWELL: But, Sir – VOLTAIRE: Et penitus toto divisos orbe Britannos – all Europe is against you. So you are wrong. BOSWELL: But this is because we have the most grand imagination. VOLTAIRE: The most wild. Pope drives a chaise with a couple of neat trim nags but Dryden a coach and six, with postillions and all." Repeated well some passages of Dryden. BOSWELL: Whata is memory? Where lodge all our ideas? VOLTAIRE: As Thomson says, where sleeps the winds when it is calm? Thomson was a great painter. Milton, many beauties and many faujlts, as there is nothing perfect in this damned world. His imitators are unintelligible. BOSWELL: What do you think of our comedy? VOLTAIRE: A great deal of wit, a great deal of plot, and a great deal of bawdy-houses. BOSWELL. You speak good English. VOLTAIRE. Oho! I have scraps of Latin for the vicar. - Addison is a great genius. His character shines in his writings. - Dr. Clarke was a metaphysical clock. A prud priest. He thought he had all by demonstration; and he who thinks so is a madman. BOSWELL: Johnson is a most orthodox man, but very learned; has much genius and much worth. VOLTAIRE: He is then a dog. A superstitious dog. No worthy man was ever superstitious. BOSWELL: He said the King of Prussia wrote like your footboy. VOLTAIRE. He is a sensible man. - Will you go and see the Pretender* at Rome? BOSWELL: No. It is high treason. VOLTAIRE: I promise you I shall not tell your king of you. I shall not betray you. You would see a bigot: a poor being. BOSWELL: His son is worse. He is drunk every day. He kicks women and he ought to be kicked. VOLTAIRE: Homer was the only man who took it into his head to write twelve thousand verses upon two or three battles. - It is diverting to hear them say OLD ENGLAND. BOSWELL: Sir, "Old England", "Old Scotland", and "Old France" have experienced a quite different effect from that.
*The current Stuart claimant of the British throne. Over to Mildred for more.
Thursday 27th December. Notes on Voltaire's conversation, original partly in French.
VOLTAIRE: You have the better government. If it gets bad, heave it into the ocean; that's why you have the ocean all about you. You are the slaves of laws. The French are slaves of men. In France every man is either an anvil or a hammer; he is a beater or must be beaten. BOSWELL. Yet it is a light, a genteel hammer. VOLTAIRE: Yes, a pocket hammer. We are too mean for our governors to cut off our heads. We are on the earth; they trample us.
Saturday 29th December. Notes on Voltaire's English Conversation.
BOSWELL: When I came to see you, I thought to see a very great, but a very bad man. VOLTAIRE: You are a very sincere. BOSWELL: Yes, but the same sincerity makes me own that I find the contrary. Only, your Dictionaire philosophique troubles me. For instance, Ame, the soul - " VOLTAIRE: That was a good article. BOSWELL: No. Excuse me. Is it - immortality - not a pleasing imagination? Is it not more noble? VOLTAIRE: Yes. You have a noble desire to be King of Europe. You say, 'I wish it, and I ask your protection in continuing to wish it.' But it is not probable. BOSWELL: No, but all cannot be the one, and may be the other. Like Cato, we all say, 'It must be so', till we possess immortality itself. VOLTAIRE: But before we say that this soul will exist, let us know what it is. I know not the cause. I cannot judge. I cannot be a juryman. Cicero says, poitus opiandum quam probandum. We are ignorant beings. We are the puppets of Providence I am a poor Punch. BOSWELL: Would you have no public worship? VOLTAIRE: Yes, with all my heart. Let us meet four times a year in a great temble with music, and thank God for all his gifts. There is one sun. There is one God. Let us have one religion. Then all of mankind will be brethren. BOSWELL: May I write in English, and you'll answer. VOLTAIRE: Yes. Farewell.
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Meeting Voltaire: as documented by James Boswell
Date: 2020-10-10 08:24 am (UTC)First, here's Boswell's letter about the meeting to his friend William Temple:
And whence do I now write to you, my friend? From the chateau of Monsieur de Voltaire. I had a letter for him from a Swiss colonel at The Hague. I came hither Monday and was presented to him. He received me with dignity and the air of a man who has been much in the world which a Frenchman acquires to perfection. I saw him for about half an hour before dinner. He was not in spirits. Yet he gave me some brilliant sallies. He did not dine with us, and I was obliged to poist away immediately after dinner, because the gates of Geneva shut before five and Ferney is a good hour from Town. I was by no means satisfied to have been so little time with the monarch of French literature. A happy scheme sprung up in my adventurous mind. Madame Denis, the niece of Monsieur de Voltaire, had been extremely good to me. She is fond of our language. I wrote her a letter in English begging her interest to obtain fo rme the privilege of lodging a night under the roof of Monsieur de Voltaire, who, in opposition to our sun, rises in the evening. I was in the finest humour, and my letter was full of wit. I told her, 'I am a hardy and vigorous Scot. You may mount me to the highest and coldest garret. I shall not even refuse to sleep upon two stairs in the bedchamber of your maid. I saw her pass through the room where we sat before dinner."
I sent my letter on Tuesday by an express. It was shown to Monsieur de Voltaire, who with his own hand wrote this answer in the character of Madame Denis: "You will do us much honour and pleasure. We have few beds. But you will not sleep on two chairs. My uncle, though very sick, hath guessed at your merit. I know it better; for I habve seen you longer." Temple, I am your most obedient. How do you find yourself? Have you got such a thing as an old friend in this world? Is he to be valued or is he not?
I returned yesterday to this enchanted castle. The magician appeared a very little before dinner. But in the evening he came into the drawing-room in great spirits. I placed myself by him. I touched the keys in unison with his imagination. I wish you had heard the music. He was all brilliance. He gave me continues flashes of wit. I got him to speak English, which he does to a degree that made m now and then start up and cry, 'Upon my soul this is astonishing!' When he talked our language he was animated with the soul of a Briton. He had bold flights. He had humour. He ahd an extravagance; he had a forcible oddity of style that the most comical of our dramatis personae could not have exceeded. He swore bloodily, as was the fashion when he was in England. He hummed a ballad; he repeated nonsense. Then he talked of our Constitution with a noble enthusiasm. I was proud to hear thi sform the mouth of an illustrious Frenchman. At last we came upon religion. Then he did rage. The company went to supper. Monsieur de Voltaire and I remained in the drawing-room with a great Bible before us, and if ever two mortal men disputed with vehemence, we did. Yes, upon that occasion he was one individual and I another. For a certain portion of time there was a fair opposition between Voltaire and Boswell. The daring bursts of his ridicule confounded my undrstanding. He stood like an orator of ancient Rome. Tully was never more agitated than he was. He went too far. His aged frame trembled beneath him. He cried, "Oh, I am very sick; my head turns round," and he let himself gently fall upon an easy chair. He recovered. I resumed our conversation, but changed the tone. I talked to him serious and earnest. I demanded of him an honest confession of his real sentiments. He gave it me with candour and with a mild eloquence which touched my heart. I did not believe him capable of thinking in the manner that he declared to me was "From the bottom of his heart". He expressed his veneration - his love - of the Supreme Being, an dhis entire resignation to the will of Hm who is All-Wise. He expressed his desire to resemble the author of Goodness by being good hiomself. His sentiments go no farther. He does not inflame his mind with grand hopes of the immortality of the soul. He says it may be, but he knows nothing of it. And his mind is in perfect tranquility. I was moved; I was sorry. I doubted his sincereity. I alled to him with emotion, 'Are you sincere?' He answered, 'Before God, I am.'
Temple, was not this an interesting scene? Wold a journey form Scotland to Ferney have been too much to obtain such a remarkable interview? I have given you the great lines. The whole conversation of the evening is fully recorded, and I look upon it as an invaluable treasure. One day the public shall have it. It is a present highly worthy of their attention. I told Monsieur de Voltaire that I had written eight quarto pages of what he had said. He smiled and seemed pleased.
Now, Boswell's notes from the conversations as quoted in John Wain's "Best of Boswell" edition of the diaries; he also notes whether they were talking English or French.
Thursday 27 December 1764 yes, Boswell invited himself over to Voltaire's for just after Christmas - Notes on V'oltaire's English conversation:
VOLTAIRE: Shakespeare has often two good lines, never six. A madman, by G-d, a buffoon at Bartholommew Fair. No play of his own, all old stories.
Chess. “I shall lose, by G-d, by all the saints in Paradise. Ah, here I am risind on a black ram, like a whore as I am. –
Falstaff from the Spaniards.
BOSWELL: I’ll tell you why we admire Shakespeare.
VOLTAIRE: Because you have no taste.
BOSWELL: But, Sir –
VOLTAIRE: Et penitus toto divisos orbe Britannos – all Europe is against you. So you are wrong.
BOSWELL: But this is because we have the most grand imagination.
VOLTAIRE: The most wild. Pope drives a chaise with a couple of neat trim nags but Dryden a coach and six, with postillions and all." Repeated well some passages of Dryden.
BOSWELL: Whata is memory? Where lodge all our ideas?
VOLTAIRE: As Thomson says, where sleeps the winds when it is calm? Thomson was a great painter. Milton, many beauties and many faujlts, as there is nothing perfect in this damned world. His imitators are unintelligible.
BOSWELL: What do you think of our comedy?
VOLTAIRE: A great deal of wit, a great deal of plot, and a great deal of bawdy-houses.
BOSWELL. You speak good English.
VOLTAIRE. Oho! I have scraps of Latin for the vicar. - Addison is a great genius. His character shines in his writings. - Dr. Clarke was a metaphysical clock. A prud priest. He thought he had all by demonstration; and he who thinks so is a madman.
BOSWELL: Johnson is a most orthodox man, but very learned; has much genius and much worth.
VOLTAIRE: He is then a dog. A superstitious dog. No worthy man was ever superstitious.
BOSWELL: He said the King of Prussia wrote like your footboy.
VOLTAIRE. He is a sensible man. - Will you go and see the Pretender* at Rome?
BOSWELL: No. It is high treason.
VOLTAIRE: I promise you I shall not tell your king of you. I shall not betray you. You would see a bigot: a poor being.
BOSWELL: His son is worse. He is drunk every day. He kicks women and he ought to be kicked.
VOLTAIRE: Homer was the only man who took it into his head to write twelve thousand verses upon two or three battles. - It is diverting to hear them say OLD ENGLAND.
BOSWELL: Sir, "Old England", "Old Scotland", and "Old France" have experienced a quite different effect from that.
*The current Stuart claimant of the British throne. Over to Mildred for more.
Thursday 27th December. Notes on Voltaire's conversation, original partly in French.
VOLTAIRE: You have the better government. If it gets bad, heave it into the ocean; that's why you have the ocean all about you. You are the slaves of laws. The French are slaves of men. In France every man is either an anvil or a hammer; he is a beater or must be beaten.
BOSWELL. Yet it is a light, a genteel hammer.
VOLTAIRE: Yes, a pocket hammer. We are too mean for our governors to cut off our heads. We are on the earth; they trample us.
Saturday 29th December. Notes on Voltaire's English Conversation.
BOSWELL: When I came to see you, I thought to see a very great, but a very bad man.
VOLTAIRE: You are a very sincere.
BOSWELL: Yes, but the same sincerity makes me own that I find the contrary. Only, your Dictionaire philosophique troubles me. For instance, Ame, the soul - "
VOLTAIRE: That was a good article.
BOSWELL: No. Excuse me. Is it - immortality - not a pleasing imagination? Is it not more noble?
VOLTAIRE: Yes. You have a noble desire to be King of Europe. You say, 'I wish it, and I ask your protection in continuing to wish it.' But it is not probable.
BOSWELL: No, but all cannot be the one, and may be the other. Like Cato, we all say, 'It must be so', till we possess immortality itself.
VOLTAIRE: But before we say that this soul will exist, let us know what it is. I know not the cause. I cannot judge. I cannot be a juryman. Cicero says, poitus opiandum quam probandum. We are ignorant beings. We are the puppets of Providence I am a poor Punch.
BOSWELL: Would you have no public worship?
VOLTAIRE: Yes, with all my heart. Let us meet four times a year in a great temble with music, and thank God for all his gifts. There is one sun. There is one God. Let us have one religion. Then all of mankind will be brethren.
BOSWELL: May I write in English, and you'll answer.
VOLTAIRE: Yes. Farewell.