The variety of difputes he has had with men of letters, has brought on him a thousand different attacks, and many of them not ill-founded. He has been often reproached with his avaricious manner of printing his works, and with great juftice; fince there is fcarce a piece he has wrote, but what he has fold to different bookfellers incorrectly wrote: when the fale is pretty well over, out come advertisements and letters of the villainy of bookfellers ftealing his manufcripts, and promifing more correct editions. M. de Voltaire is certainly a writer of great vanity indeed he has fome reafon to be vain; for, befides the friendship of monarchs and the acquaintance of princes and the great, he has by writing gained a fortune of near two thousand pounds a year. He has certainly been the author of several very generous actions; among others, his treatment of the great Corneille's grand-daughter is very meritorious. M. le Brun, fecretary to the prince of Condé, wrote to him, recommending the remains of the family of the great Corneille, the reformer, the creator of the French theatre, and particularly a grand-daughter of that illuftrious man; at the fame time infcribing an ode to him. M. de Voltaire with pleasure embraced the opportunity of doing good to a family fo eminent for genius, and wrote the following letter to M. le Brun.

"Had I gone about compofing an answer in fuch fine verfes as yours, four months would have been the fooneft you could have heard from me; I must therefore tell you, in plain profe, how much I admire your ode, and am pleased with your propofal. A veteran of the great Corneille fhould by no means turn

his back on his general's grand daughter; but, after building feats and churches, and with poor relations on my hands to maintain, finall is the refidue to affift, as one would with, a perfon whom the greateft men of the kingdom alone hould have taken under their patronage. As for me, age is come upon me; but I have a niece, who delights in all the arts, and in fome of which he is not unexpert. If the perfon you fpeak of, and whom unquestionably you know, will accept of the most decent education with my niece, she will take a mother's care of her, and I will endeavour to be a father to her; at least, the fhould be no manner of expence or charge to her own. Her travelling charges fhall be defrayed to Lyons, and let her be configned to Mr. Tronchin of that city, who will forward her to my feat; or one of her own fex fhall meet her there, with my equipage. If this fuits, I only wait her orders; and I hope fhall, to the end of my life, thank you for giving me an opportunity of doing what should have been done by M. de Fontenelle. One branch of the young lady's education will be, to fee us fometimes act a play of her grand-father's; and we shall set her to embroider the arguments of

Cinna and the Cid..

I have the honour to be, &c.

VOLTAIRE. Voltaire was for fome years an intimate favourite with the king of Pruflia, to whom the king of France yielded his allegiance as a subject; and at the fame time the celebrated mathematician Maupertuis was in that monarch's good graces. Voltaire eyed him as a rival, and left no stone unturned to ruin him with

the king; his attempts however

failed,

failed, and, having ufed no very honourable means, the king banished him for his practices; and finding he had carried away a copy of his poems, arrefted him in his way to France, and recovered the cafket which contained them. Voltaire, however, had another copy, which he afterwards published, against the king's inclinations, under the title of Philofophe fans Souci. But as feveral of them contained the most pernicious opinions in regard to religion and againft the immortality of the foul, the king ordered them to be burnt by the common hangman at Berlin, as they ill-became a monarch who profeffed being at the head of the proteftant intereft in Germany. His majesty not long fince wrote the following very fpirited character of this extraordinary Frenchman: "M. de Voltaire is below the ftature of tali men, or, in other words, he is a little above thofe of a middling fize; he is extremely thin, and of an aduft temperament, hot and atrabilious; his vifage is meagre, his aspect ardent and penetrating, and there is a malignant quickness in his eye: the fame fire that animates his works, appears in his actions, which are lively even to abfurdity. He is a kind of meteor, perpetually coming and going with a quick motion, and a fparkling light that dazzles our eyes. A man thus conftituted, cannot fail of being a valetudinarian; the blade eats away the fcabbard; gay by complexion, grave by regimen; open without franknefs, polite without refinement, fociable without friends: he knows the world, and he forgets it; in the morning he is Ariftippus, and Diogenes at night; he loves grandeur, and defpifes the great; with his

fuperiors, his carriage is eafy; but with his equals, conftrained; he is first polite, then cold, then disgusting. He loves the court, yet makes himself weary of it; he has fenfibi lity without connections, and is voluptuous without paffion. He is attached to nothing by choice, but to every thing by inconftancy. As he reafons without principle, his reafon has its fits like the folly of others. He has a clear head and a corrupt heart; he thinks of every thing, and treats every thing with derifion. He is a libertine, without a conftitution for pleasure; and he knows how to moralize, without morality. His vanity is exceffive, but his avarice is yet greater than his vanity; he therefore writes lefs for reputation than for money, for which he may be faid both to hunger and thirst. He is in hafte to work, that he may be in hafte to live: he was made to enjoy, and he determines only to hoard: fuch is the man, and fuch is the author. There is no poet in the world whose verfes coft him fo little labour; but this facility of compofition hurts him, because he abufes it; as there is but little for labour to fupply, he is content that little fhould be wanting, and therefore almost all his pieces are unfinished. But though he is an eafy and elegant writer of poetry, yet his principal excellence would be hiftory, if he made fewer reflections, and drew no parallels; in both of which, however, he has fometimes been very happy. In his laft work he has imitated the manner of Bayle, of whom, even in his cenfure of him, he has exhibited a copy. It has long been said, that for a writer to be without passion and without prejudice, he must have neither religion nor country; and

in this refpect M. de Voltaire has made great advances towards perfection. He cannot be accufed of being a partifan to his nation; he appears, on the contrary, to be infected with a fpecies of madnels fomewhat like that of old men, who are always extolling the time paft, and bitterly complaining of the prefent. Voltaire is always diffatisfied with his own country, and lavish in his praife of thofe that are a thoufand leagues off. As to religion, he is in that refpect evidently undeter mined; and he would certainly be the neutral and impartial being fo much defired for an author, but for a little leaven of Anti-Janfenifm which appears fomewhat too plainly distinguished in his works. Voltaire has much foreign and much French literature; nor is he deficient in that

mixed erudition which is now fo much in fashion. He is a politician, a naturalift, a geometrician, or whatever elfe he pleafes; but he is always fuperficial, because he is not able to be deep. He could not, however, flourish as he does upon thefe fubjects, without great ingenuity. His tafte is rather delicate than juft; he is an ingenious fatirift, a bad critic, and a dabbler in the abftracted fciences. Imagination is his element, and yet, ftrange as it is, he has no invention. He is reproached with continually paffing from one extreme to another; now a Philanthropist, then a Cynic; no v an excelfive encomiaft, then an outrageous fatirift. In one word, Voltaire would fain be an extraordinary man; and an extraordinary man he most certainly is !"

GENTLEMEN,

Bridgnorth, July 10, 1764.

Courage and inflexible conftancy

formed the basis of this monarch's character. In his tendereft years he gave inftances of both. When he was yet fcarce feven years old, being at dinner with the queen his mother, intending to give a bir of bread to a great dog he was fond of, this hungry animal fapt foo greedily at the morfel, and bit his hand in a terrible manner. The August, 1764.

I am, your's, &C.

They thought he was taken ill, and fo repeated their felicitations. But all was in vain, though the poor child was already grown pale with the loss of blood. An officer who attended at table, at laft perceived it; for Charles would fooner have died than betrayed his dog, whom he knew intended no injury.

At another time, when in the fmall pox, and his cafe appeared dangerous, he grew one day very unealy in his bed, and a gentleman who watched him, defirous of covering him up clofe, received from the patient a violent box on his ear. Some hours after obferving the prince more calm, he entreated to know how he had incurred his difpleasure, or what he had done to have merited a blow. A blow, replied Charles, I don't remember any thing of it; I remember, indeed, that I thought myself in the battle of Arbela, fighting for Darius, where I gave Alexander a blow, which brought him to the ground.

What is related of the journies of this prince is no lefs aftonishing. He has fometimes been on horfeback for four and twenty hours fucceffively, and thus traversed the greatest part of his kingdom. At laft none of his officers were found capable of following him; he thus confequently rode the greateft part of thefe journies quite alone, without taking a moment's repofe, and without any other fubfiftence but a bit of bread. In one of these rapid courfes, he underwent an adventure fingular enough. Riding thus poft one day, all alone, he had the misfortune to have his horfe fall dead under him. This might have embarraffed an ordinary man, but it gave Charles no

fort of uneafinefs. Sure of finding another horfe, but not equally fo of meeting with a good faddle and piftols, he ungirds his horfe, claps the whole equipage on his own back, and thus accoutred, marches on to the next inn, which by good fortune was not far off. Entering the ftable, he here found an horfe entirely to his mind; fo, without further ceremony, he clapped on his faddle and houfing with great compofure, and was just going to mount, when the gentleman who owned the horfe was apprized of a ftranger's going to fteal his property out of the ftable. Upon afking the king, whom he had never feen, bluntly, how he prefumed to meddle with his horfe, Charles cooly replied, fqueezing in his lips, which was his ufual custom, that he took the horse because he wanted one; for you fee, continued he, if I have none, I shall be obliged to carry the faddle myfelf. This anfwer did not feem at all fatisfactory to the gentleman, who inftantly drew his fword. In this the king was not much behind hand with him, and to it they were going, when the guards, by this time, came up, and teftified that furprize which was natural, to fee arms in the hand of a fubject against his king. Imagine whether the gentleman was lefs furprized than they at his unpremeditated difobedience. His aftonishment, however, was foon diffipated by the king, who, taking him by the hand, affured him he was a brave fellow, and himself would take care he should be provided for. This promife was afterwards fulfilled; for the king af terwards made him a captain.

COMPENDIOUS

THE two kings feemed to be equally fatisfied and at eafe. Philip had confiderable claims on Richard, on account of the fuccours furnished to him in his father's time; but, upon his declaring frankly that it would be very inconvenient for him to comply with them at that juncture, Philip very generously paffed it by. They then concluded an alliance as kings, and fwore perpetual fidelity as friends, without confidering that their manners were too much alike for any oaths to reftrain, or leagues to bind, them. They were in their perfons tall, well-made, and robust men; active, brave, magnificent, free in their difcourfe, and full of a fprightly kind of wit, that however bordered upon levity: their vices alfo were much the fame, for they were ambitious in a fupreme degree, hafty in their tempers, addicted to women, avaricious, or rather greedy of money, that they might fquander; and, in fine, immoderately fond of praife, and ready to run any hazard to acquire it. The expedition to the Holy Land appeared to these princes an enterprize that was to cover them with immortal glory; and having once entertained this notion, they could neither of them be brought to confider it in another light. Some of the wifeft men in his council laboured to undeceive Philip, and to diffuade him from going in perfon; but his mother, and the cardinal of Rheims, out of an ambitious defire of governing in his abfence, fruftrated their intention. He took, however, the precantion of limiting their authority by an inftrument, to which he gave the name and form

of a Teftament, and appointed overfeers to look to its execution, which they did not expect. Before his departure he received the homage of the queen dowager of England for the duchy of Guienne, which the held in her own right; and, to defray the expences of this prodigious armament, expofed to fale the great charge of his houthold, the domain. of the crown, and whatever elfe would fetch money. All things being adjufted the two kings marched with their armies as far as Lyons; and there Philip took the route of the Alps, in order to embark at Genoa, and Richard proceeded to the coaft in order to meet his fleet, which was appointed to rendezvous at Marseilles, under a folemn engagement to meet again in Sicily, and to proceed from thence, in conjunction, to the coaft of Syria.

Tancred was at that time in poffeffion of that ifland, with the regal title; but he was held to be an intruder in prejudice to Conftance, the wife of the emperor Henry, with whom Philip was in clofe alliance: on the other hand, he held the queen dowager Joan close prifoner, who was king Richard's fifter, and confequently had no great reafon to be fond of fuch guefts. Philip arrived first, and was tolerably well treated, and behaved civilly on his fide. When Richard arrived, he demanded that his fifter fhould be prefently fent him, and full fatisfaction for the large legacies left to his father by the deceafed king of Sicily, which Tancred laboured to decline. Upon this Richard attacked the city of Meffina, and was very near coming to a rupture with king Philip, 3 H 2

who,