return to Paris, and continued to inhabit the chateau of Cirey, in Champagne, a property of the marquis du Châtelet, where he and his wife, and their illustrious friend, lived for the space of six years in seclusion and laborious study. We have, from various sources, descriptions of the life he led at Cirey; not a little instructive from the light they throw on human nature, and on Voltaire's own character. Voltaire tells us, himself, in his "Fragment of Memoirs," that, weary of the idle, turbulent life led at Paris, of the pretensions of the silly, the cabals of the wicked, and persecutions of bigots, he resolved to pass some years in the country at the chateau of madame du Châtelet. This lady had received a careful education, was perfectly mistress of the Latin language, but her inclination led her to prefer the study of metaphysics and mathematics. Her ardour for the acquisition of knowledge was unspeakably great, and she longed for retirement, where she might dedicate her whole time to study. Voltaire taught her English: she read Leibnitz and Newton. Both she and her friend aspired to the prize given by the Academy of Science, for a treatise on fire; and their essays were mentioned with praise, though the prize was gained by the celebrated Euler. Voltaire was told, however, by an enlightened friend, that he would never be great in science. He was glad of this. The arguments and taste of madame du Châtelet, and his own love of all that was absolutely and demonstrably true, led him to cultivate abstruse science; but the bent of his genius and imagination, fertile of plot, situation, and development of passion, made him turn with delight to the composition of tragedies, the investigation of the philosophy of history, and the writing lighter productions, in which he gave full scope to his sarcastic spirit, his wit, and, we grieve to add, the impurity of his imagination: for this was the great defect of Voltaire, arising from his inability to appreciate the sublime, and his contempt of what he considered monkish virtues, that he loved to indulge in jests, the point of which lay in the grossest indecency. Having broken loose from the fetters of mathematics, he wrote "Alzire," "Mérope," "The Prodigal Child," and "Mahomet." He laboured at his "Essay on the Manners and Spirit of Nations;" he collected materials for the "History of the Age of Louis XIV.;" and he relaxed from these labours by writing the "Pucelle d'Orléans." One of his chief amusements, also, was bringing out his tragedies at his private theatre. He was a good actor, and an admirable teacher of the art.