How did the sculptor, Voltaire, keep you quiet and posed In an arm chair, just think, at your busiest age we are told, Being better than seventy? How did he manage to stay you From hopping through Europe for long enough time for his work, Which shows you in marble, the look and the smile and the nose, The filleted brow very bald, the thin little hands, The posture pontifical, face imperturbable, smile so serene. How did the sculptor detain you, you ever so restless, You ever so driven by princes and priests? So I stand here Enwrapped of this face of you, frail little frame of you, And think of your work--how nothing could balk you Or quench you or damp you. How you twisted and turned, Emerged from the fingers of malice, emerged with a laugh, Kept Europe in laughter, in turmoil, in fear For your eighty-four years! And they say of you still You were light and a mocker! You should have been solemn, And argued with monkeys and swine, speaking truthfully always. Nay, truthful with whom, to what end? With a breed such as lived In your day and your place? It was never their due! Truth for the truthful and true, and a lie for the liar if need be-- A board out of plumb for a place out of plumb, for the hypocrite flashes Of lightning or rods red hot for thrusting in tortuous places. Well, this was your way, you lived out the genius God gave you. And they hated you for it, hunted you all over Europe-- Why should they not hate you? Why should you not follow your light? But wherever they drove you, you climbed to a place more satiric. Did France bar her door? Geneva remained--good enough! Les Delices close to some several cantons, you know. Would they lay hands upon you? I fancy you laughing, You stand at your door and step into Vaud by one path; You stand at your door and step by another to France-- Such safe jurisdictions, in truth, as the Illinois rowdies Step from county to county ahead of the frustrate policeman. And here you have printers to print what you write and a house For the acting of plays, La Pucelle, Orphelin. O busy Voltaire, never resting. ... So England conservative, England of Southey and Burke, The fox-hunting squires, the England of Church and of State, The England half mule and half ox, writes you down, O Voltaire: The quack grass of popery flourished in France, you essayed To plow up the tangle, and harrow the roots from the soil. It took a good ploughman to plow it, a ploughman of laughter, A ploughman who laughed when the plow struck the roots, and your breast Was thrown on the handles.