Voltaire
French writer and philosopher of the Enlightenment · 1694–1778
Voltaire, born François-Marie Arouet, was a French writer, satirist and historian. He campaigned against religious intolerance and censorship and corresponded with monarchs he hoped would carry out enlightened reforms.
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Estimated from their documented words and actions. A simplification, not a verdict.
No strong recorded view; looked to strong reforming monarchs rather than regional bodies.
Backed enlightened absolutism, advising Frederick II of Prussia and Catherine II of Russia, not popular rule.
Campaigned against censorship and judicial abuses, as in the Calas affair.
A cosmopolitan writer who admired English institutions and saw himself as a citizen of the republic of letters.
Satirised war and its glorification in Candide.
Cosmopolitan in outlook, though his writings contain hostile remarks about Jews.
Defended wealth and luxury in Le Mondain and accumulated a large private fortune.
Generally favoured commercial freedom, though he supported royal reforms.
His Letters on the English praised trade for making England rich and free.
A deist who attacked the Catholic Church's power with the slogan 'écrasez l'infâme'.
By eighteenth-century standards a leading reformer against intolerance, torture and clerical privilege.
Popularised Newtonian science in France and championed reason and scientific progress.