"Voltaire got almost nothing by his Books, which he generally had to disavow, and denounce as surreptitious supposititious scandals, when some sharp-set Book-seller, in whose way he had laid the savory article as bait, chose to risk his ears for the profit of snatching and publishing it. Next to nothing by his Books; but by his fine finance-talent otherwise, he had become possessed of ample moneys. Which were so cunningly disposed, too, that he had resources in every Country; and no conceivable combination of confiscating Jesuits and dark fanatic Official Persons could throw him out of a livelihood, whithersoever he might be forced to run. A man that looks facts in the face; which is creditable of him. The vulgar call it avarice and the like, as their way is: but M. de Voltaire is convinced that effects will follow causes; and that it well beseems a lonely Ishmaelite, hunting his way through the howling wildernesses and confused ravenous populations of this world, to have money in his pocket. He died with a revenue of some 7,000 pounds a year, probably as good as 20,000 pounds at present; the richest literary man ever heard of hitherto, as well as the remarkablest in some other respects. But we have to mark the second phasis of his life [in which Friedrich now sees him], and how it grew out of this first one. "PHASIS SECOND (1728-1733).--Returning home as if quietly triumphant, with such a talent in him, and such a sanction put upon it and him by a neighboring Nation, and by all the world, Voltaire was warmly received, in his old aristocratic circles, by cultivated France generally; and now in 1728, in his thirty-second year, might begin to have definite outlooks of a sufficiently royal kind, in Literature and otherwise. Nor is he slow, far from it, to advance, to conquer and enjoy. He writes successful literature, falls in love with women of quality; encourages the indigent and humble; eclipses, and in case of need tramples down, the too proud. He elegizes poor Adrienne Lecouvreur, the Actress,--our poor friend the Comte de Saxe's female friend; who loyally emptied out her whole purse for him, 30,000 pounds in one sum, that he might try for Courland, and whether he could fall in love with her of the Swollen Cheek there; which proved impossible. Elegizes Adrienne, slightly, and even buries her under cloud of night: ready to protect unfortunate females of merit. Especially theatrical females; having much to do in the theatre, which we perceive to be the pulpit or real preaching-place of cultivated France in those years. All manner of verse, all manner of prose, he dashes off with surprising speed and grace: showers of light spray for the moment; and always some current of graver enterprise, _Siecle de Louis Quatorze_ or the like, going on beneath it. For he is a most diligent, swift, unresting man; and studies and learns amazingly in such a rackety existence. Victorious enough in some senses; defeat, in Literature, never visited him.