220 n.] Could there be a phenomenon more indisputably of bramble nature?
"He had no success at Berlin, in spite of his merits; could not come near the King at all; but assiduously frequented Maupertuis, the flower of human thinkers in that era,--who was very humane to him in consequence. 'How is it, O flower of human thinkers, that Icannot get on with his Majesty, or make the least way?' (HELAS, MONSIEUR, you have enemies!' answered he of the red wig; and told La Beaumelle (hear it, ye Heavens), That M. de Voltaire had called his Majesty's attention to the PENSEE given above, one evening at Supper Royal; 'heard it myself, Monsieur--husht!' Upon which--"'Upon which, see, paltry La Beaumelle has become my enemy for life!' shrieks Voltaire many times afterwards: 'And it was false, Ideclare to Heaven, and again declare; it was not I, it was D'Argens quizzing me about it, that called his Majesty's attention to that PENSEE of Blockhead La Beaumelle,--you treacherous Perpetual President, stirring up enemies against me, and betraying secrets of the King's table.' Sorrow on your red wig, and you!--It is certain La Beaumelle, soon after this, left Berlin: not in love with Voltaire. And there soon appeared, at Franfurt-on-Mayn, a Pirate Edition of our brand-new SIECLE DE LOUIS QUATORZE (with Annotations scurrilous and flimsy);--La Beaumelle the professed Perpetrator;'who received for the job 7 pounds 10s. net!' [Ib. xx.] asseverates the well-informed Voltaire. Oh, M. de Voltaire, and why not leave it to him, then? Poor devil, he got put into the Bastille too, by and by; Royal Persons being touched by some of his stupid foot-notes.
"La Beaumelle had a long course of it, up and down the world, in and out of the Bastille; writing much, with inconsiderable recompense, and always in a wooden manure worthy of his First vocation in the Geneva time. 'A man of pleasing physiognomy,' says Formey, 'and expressed himself well. I received his visit 14th January, 1752,'--to which latter small circumstance (welcome as a fixed date to us here) La Beaumelle's Biography is now pretty much reduced for mankind. [Formey, ii. 221.] He continued Maupertuis's adorer: and was not a bad creature, only a dull wooden one, with obstinate temper. A LIFE OF MAUPERTUIS of his writing was sent forth lately, [ Vie de Maupertuis (cited above), Paris, 1866.] after lying hidden a hundred years: but it is dull, dead, painfully ligneous, like all the rest; and of new or of pleasant tells us nothing.
"His enmity to M. de Voltaire did prove perpetual:--a bramble that might have been dealt with by fingers, or by fingers and scissors, but could not by axes, and their hewing and brandishing. 'This is the ninety-fifth anonymous Calumny of La Beaumelle's, this that you have sent me!' says Voltaire once. The first stroke or two had torn the bramble quite on end: 'He says he will pursue you to Hell even,' writes one of the Voltaire kind friends from Frankfurt, on that 7 pounds 10s. business. 'A L'ENFER?' answers M. de Voltaire, with a toss: 'Well, I should think so, he, and at a good rate of speed. But whether he will find me there, must be a question!'
If you want to have an insignificant accidental fellow trouble you all your days, this is the way of handling him when he first catches hold."ABBE DE PRADES.--"De Prades, 'Abbe de Prades, Reader to the King,'
though happily not an enemy of Voltaire's, is in some sort La Beaumelle's counterpart, or brother with a difference; concerning whom also, one wants only to know the exact date of his arrival.
As La Beaumelle felt too strait-tied in the Geneva vestures (where it had been good for him to adjust himself, and stay); so did De Prades in the Sorbonne ditto,--and burst out, on taking Orders, not into eloquent Preachings or edifying Devotional Exercises; but into loud blurts of mere heresy and heterodoxy. Blurts which were very loud, and I believe very stupid; which failed of being sublime even to the Philosophic world; and kindled the Sorbonne into burning his Book, and almost burning himself, had not he at once run for it.
"Ran to Holland, and there continued blurting more at large,--decidedly stupid for most part, thinks Voltaire, 'but with glorious Passages, worth your Majesty's attention;'--upon which, D'Alembert too helping, poor De Prades was invited to the Readership, vacant by La Mettrie's eagle-pie; and came gladly, and stayed. At what date? one occasionally asks: for there are Royal Letters, dateless, but written in his hand, that raise such question in the utter dimness otherwise. Date is 'September, 1752.' [Preuss, i. 368; ii.
115.] Farther question one does not ask about De Prades. Rather an emphatic intrusive kind of fellow, I should guess;--wrote, he, not Friedrich, that ABRIDGMENT OF PLEURY'S ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY, and other the like dreary Pieces, which used to be inflicted on mankind as Friedrich's.
"For the rest, having place and small pension,--not, like La Beaumelle, obliged to pirate and annotate for 7 pounds 10s.--he went on steadily, a good while; got a Canonry of Glogau [small Catholic benefice, bad if it was not better than its now occupant];--and unluckily, in the Seven-Years-War time, fell into treasonous Correspondence with his countrymen; which it was feared might be fatal, when found out. But no, not fatal. Friedrich did lock him in Magdeburg for some months; then let him out: 'Home to Glogau, sirrah; stick to your Canonry henceforth, and let us hear no more of you at all!' Which shall be his fate in these pages also."Good, my friend; no more of him, then! Only recollect "September, 1752," if dateless Royal Letters in De Prades's hand turn up.
Chapter X.
DEMON NEWSWRITER, OF 1752.
It must be owned, the King's French Colony of Wits were a sorry set of people. They tempt one to ask, What is the good of wit, then, if this be it? Here are people sparkling with wit, and have not understanding enough to discern what lies under their nose.