Encyclopaedia Americana: a popular dictionary of arts, sciences, literature, history, politics and biography, brought down to the present time : including a copious collection of original articles in American biography : on the basis of the seventh edition of the German Conversations-Lexicon (Volume 13).
- Date:
- 1830-33
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Encyclopaedia Americana: a popular dictionary of arts, sciences, literature, history, politics and biography, brought down to the present time : including a copious collection of original articles in American biography : on the basis of the seventh edition of the German Conversations-Lexicon (Volume 13). Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)
31/608
![however, Voltaire was not distinguished in comedy. Tiie Henriade has many striking passages, but wants true epic characters, and is faulty in its plan. Among his historical works, the SUde de Louis XIV et XV, and the Histoirc de Charles XII, the Essai surV Hisloire generale,sur les McRurs et VEsprit des JVations, abound in penetrating views. His merits are not those of thorough investigation, but of striking and happy description, and sagacious ob- servation. His prevailing defect is the ex- aggerated estimation of the superiority of the French over other modern nations. His philosophical romances, treatises, smaller poems, narratives, dialogues, &c., show a comprehensive spirit, and great felicity of execution. In the department of fugitive pieces, he is unique. As a prose writer, he is unequalled, so beauti- ful and polished is his expression, so co- pious his wit. Among all the French wri- ters, he, perhaps, displays, in the fullest degree, the peculiarities of his nation. The accomplished marchioness du C hate- let, as we have already said, was his inti- mate friend : hence the Lettres inedites de la Marq. du Chatelet et Supplement a la Correspondance de Voltaire avec le Roi de Prusse, etc., avec des JVotes histor. (Paris, 1818), is an important addition to his bi- ograj)hy.—Seeia Viede Voltaire par Con- dorcet; also La Vie de Voltaire par M. [Mercier] (Geneva, 1788); Examen des Ouvrages de M. de Voltaire par M. Linguet (Brussels, 1788); Vie littiraire de Voltaire ridigh par de Luchet. The abbe Du- vernet describes him more particularly as a man, and a private man, in his Vie de Voltaire suivie d''Anecdotes qui composent sa Vie piivh (Paris, 1797); see also M^- inoires sur Voltaire et sur ses Ouvrages par Wagnih-e et Longchamp, ses SecrHaires (1826, two vols.). Wagniere was directed by the empress Catharine,who bought Vol- taire's library, to arrange it in St. Peters- burg, as it had stood in Ferney. The Vie de Voltaire, by Mazure, is very partial. His works were published by Beaumar- chais, at Kehl, 1784, seq. in 70 vols. 4to and 8vo, and 92 vols. 12mo; and, by Pal- issot, with notes, at Paris, 1796, seq. The Pieces itiMites appeared at Paris in 1820. Since 1817, seven editions of the works of Voltaire have been published (the cheapest by Touquet, 1820). In 182.3, some unpublished works of his were found in the imperial hermitage, at Peters- burg: the most important are a bitter commentary upon Rousseau's Contrat Social, and a tale ; the latter has since been published. Dupont has lately pub- lished an edition of Voltaire's works, in 70 volumes. A tolerably complete, but per- haps not entirely impartial review of the numerous literaiy contests of Voltaire, is given in the Tahleau phUosophique de VEs- prit deM. de Voltaire (Geneva, 1771). VoLTERRA ; a town of Tuscany, twen- ty-four miles south-Avest of Florence, with 5000 inhabitants. It is tlie see of a bish- op, and has a public seminary of educa- tion. The ancient Volaterra was one of the twelve principal cities of Etruria, and had 100,000 inhabitants. Some Etruscan monuments still remain: among these are its walls, with a gate, dedicated to Hercules ; and the fish-pond, constructed of enormous blocks of stone. (See Etruria.) Volume (Latin volumen). The volume of a body has reference to the space which it occupies. To have a coirect idea of this, imagine a body immersed entirely in a liquid, which neither changes nor penetrates it. If it is now taken out, and we add new liquid, to raise the contents of the vessel as high as they were when the body was immersed, the amount of the newly-added liquid will give us the volume of the body. Thus we have a simple means of ascertaining the volume of small bodies, the irregularity of which presents some difficulty in the way of de- termining it by ordinaiy means. Volume must not be confounded with mass. On the volume also depends the difference of the absolute and specific gravity, (q. v.) VoLUMNiA. (See Coriolanus.) Volunteer, in military language ; one who serves in the army, or undertakes a particular duty without being obliged so to do : thus officers not unfrequently take part in a campaign, as volunteers. When an enterprise of peculiar danger is to be undertaken, as the assault of a formidable batteiy, the taking of a square, &c., a call is made for volunteers ; and those who survive receive rewards of money, or medals, swords, &c., or promotion. Some- times there are also bodies of troops con- sisting entirely of volunteers; e. g. the Prussian volunteer riflemen, attached to each battalion in the campaigns of 1813, '14 and '15, and the volunteer compa- nies of citizens raised, in 1794, in Eng- land. These mostly laid down their arms in 1801; but when the war broke out again in 1803, and the intention of the French to effect a landing was an- nounced, the inhabitants of Great Britain rose anew, and the ministers spoke of nearly 500,000 volunteers being in arms. Volutes. (See.^rcftt/edure,vol.i, p. 340.) VoN; a German preposition, meaning,](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21136828_0031.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
