o(/w?'rer= trouver étrange

comme : see note on p. 15, 1. 24.

1.32. Zerdnst, Zerdusht, Zarathustra ('Golden Splendour "). eommonly called Zoroaster, was the more or less legendary founder of the national religion of Persia, now follo-ncd by the Parsees. Persian tradition places liim in the sixth century B. c.

1. 35. grand lama : the ' dalai-lama ' ; the spiritual head of the Buddhists of China, and under Chinese control the temporal ruler of ïhibet. It will be noticed that in Voltaire's time there was much similarity between the position of the Grand Lama and that of the Pope.

Page 10. 1. 7. fait condamner. See Siècle de Louis XIV, c. 35 : ' Les Jansénistes écrivirent quelques libelles. Le pajie fut inflexible : il cassa par un bref toutes les résolutions de l'assemblée et manda aux évêques de se rétracter. Il y avait là de quoi séparer à jamais l'Église de France de celle de Rcme.'

1. 27. "une place de valet. Literary men in France as in England were till the middlc of the eighteenth century largely dépendent on the generosity of their wealthy ' patrons '. Voltaire himself, though a vealthy man, was a Gentleman of the Bedchamber to the King of France — 'l'espèce la plus inutile de toute la cour,' he says in lus ^lémoires — and a Chamberlain of the king of Prussia.

I. 35. r Académie. L'Académie française was founded in 1634 by Richelieu. It consists of forty members distinguished in some l)ranch of literature. On the death of one of the number the reraainder eloct a new colleaguc, and membership is usually regarded as the highcst literary honour attainabic. Four other Académies hâve since been formed, one of wliich, the Académie des Sciences, is mentioned in Micromégas, p. 111, 1. 37; but none has quite the réputation of the ' Académie '.

Page 11. 1.8. ménage le vautour. It is the same figure that La Fontaine hnd used in lus fable of Les Animaux malades de la Peste : —

On n'osa trop approfondir Du tigre, ni do l'ours, ni des autres puissances, Les moins pardonnables offenses,

. . . On cria haro sur le baudet.

1. 10. pntrails de femmes. Tlic custom of drawing the litorai\v portrait of oneself or ono's frk-nds — or eneniies — arote amoug tlie ' Précieuses ' earl>' in tlio reign of l^ouis XIV, and was adopted in novels, plays, and even sermons. Tlie finest examples arc in Les Caractères of La Bruyère (1687). Tliey had ceased to be fasliionablc when Voltaire -nrote, but there are traces of the habit in the sketch of the ministcr, p. 14, and in Micromégas, c. ii, ' le secrétaire.'

Page 12. 1. 14. pratiquer= fréquenter.

1. 16. 'prétendaient. Prétenire lias not the same sensé tliat ' prétend ' usually bears in English. Hère it implies presumption. In Zadig, p. 34, 1. 13, it means ' assert ' (cf. ' le prétendu animal,' p. 103, 1. 14), in p. 26, 1. 8, 'aspire.' In Mkromigas, p. 103, 1. 31, it implies intention, and p. 108, 1. 9, the assertion of a right. Cf. the note on prétendants, Zadig, p. 56, 1. 12.

Page 13. 1. 18. homme nouveau: celui qui a fait fortune, qui n'a pas de naissance; nouveaux riches, parvenus ; cf. Lat. homo novus. 1. 33. griefs : motifs que l'on a de se plaindre.

Page 14. 1. 4. de toutes coideurs. Voltaire is thinking of the scarlet, violet, black, brown, and wliite of the varions ecclesiastical dresses.

1. 17. Un petit vieillard is probably Cardinal Fleur}', who became Louis XV's chief minister in 1726, when he was in his seventy-third year,and directed the aflfairs of State for seventcen years.

Page 15. 1. 24. Comme for comment is now found chiefly in exclamations, as ' comme il y va ! ' Its use was more extended in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. See Micromégas, p. 103, 1. 4, and above, p. 9, 1. 27.

1. 32. si tout n'est pas bien. See note on Memnon, p. 92, 1. 19.

Pa(!E 16. 1. 10. furlupinade: mauvaise plaisanterie dans le goût de Turlupin, acteur comique de 1583 à 1634, dont le vrai nom est Belleville.

1. 12. Zoroastre : see note on Zerdvst, p. 9. 1. 32. Le litre de Zoroastre, called on p. 21, 1. 12, le livre du Zend, usually the Zendavesta or Avesta-u-Zend, 'the Law and the Commentary,' is the sacred book of the ancient Persians, but the ascription to Zoroaster is erroneous. Voltaire's quotations are playful fictions, for tliough nianuscripts had recently been brought to Western Europe, the language was then unknown.