Unpublished letter of Voltaire to madame du Barry--Reply of the countess--The
marechale de Mirepoix--Her first interview with madame du Barry--Anecdote of
the diamonds of madame de Mirepoix-- The king pays for them--Singular
gratitude of the marechale--The portfolio, and an unpublished letter of the
marquise de Pompadour
By the way in which the king continued to speak to me of M. de Voltaire, I clearly
saw how right the duke was in advising me to read the letter myself before I
showed it to my august protector. I could not read it until the next day, and found
it conceived in the following terms:--
"MADAME LA COMTESSE:--I feel myself urged by an extreme desire to have an
explanation with you, after the receipt of a letter which M. the duc d'Aiguillon
wrote to me last year. This nobleman, nephew of a gentleman, as celebrated for
the name he bears as by his own reputation, and who has been my friend for
more than sixty years, has communicated to me the pain which had been caused
you by a certain piece of poetry, of my writing as was stated, and in which my
style was recognised. Alas! madame, ever since the most foolish desire in the
world has excited me to commit a great deal of idle trash to paper, not a month, a
week, nay, even a day passes in which I am not accused and convicted of some
great enormity; that is to say, the malicious author of all sorts of turpitudes and
extravagancies. Eh! mon Dieu, the entire life-time of ten men would not be
sufficient to write all with which I am charged, to my unutterable despair in this
world, and to my eternal damnation in that which is to come.
"It is no doubt, much to die in final impenitence; altho' hell may contain all the
honest men of antiquity and a great portion of those of our times; and paradise
would not be much to hope for if we must find ourselves face to face with
messieurs Freron, Nonatte, Patouillet, Abraham Chauneix, and other saints cut
out of the same cloth. But how much more severe would it be to sustain your
anger! The hatred of the Graces brings down misfortune on men of letters; and
when he embroils himself with Venus and the Muses he is a lost being; as, for
instance, M. Dorat, who incessantly slanders his mistresses, and writes nothing
but puerilities.
"I have been very cautious, in my long career, how I committed such a fault. If
perchance I have lightly assailed the common cry of scribblers or pendants who
were worthless, I have never ceased to burn incense on the altars of the ladies;
them I have always sung when I--could not do otherwise. Independently,
madame, of the profound respect I bear all your sex I profess a particular regard
towards all those who approach our sovereign, and whom he invests with his
confidence: in this I prove myself no less a faithful subject than a gallant
Frenchman; and I venerate the God I serve in his constant friendships as I would
do in his caprices. Thus I was far from outraging and insulting you still more
grievously by composing a hateful work which I detest with my whole heart, and
which makes me shed tears of blood when I think that people did not blush to
attribute it to me.
