Anyone got much to say about this? Worth a read?

It's only very short but why not. Sharp and humorous also, so not a slog. Quite unsubtle in its philosophical meaning and Voltaire is Voltaire you probably know much about him already. It's probably what you're expecting it to be.

>>9816938
Eh Voltaire seems like a prick desu. And he's such a meme. Apart from running into a synopsis of Candide in a show the only things I'd really heard of him was his HRE meme and the "Humanity will be safe only when the last lawyer has been strangled by the entrails of the last priest"

Dunno man. What other ideas did he have?

>>9816933
I honestly hate it. I get the point of it and appreciate its historical significance but I can't fathom reading it for fun. The prose is atrocious. It's like reading a comic book.

>>9816952
Childhood is idolising Voltaire.
Adolescence is realising Voltaire throws the sand against the wind and the wind blows it back again.
Adulthood is realising Voltaire did nothing wrong.

https://www.whitman.edu/VSA/trois.imposteurs.html

Since Reverend Doctors now declare
That clerks and people must prepare
To doubt if Adam ever were;
To hold the flood a local scare;
To argue, though the stolid stare,
That everything had happened ere
The prophets to its happening sware;
That David was no giant-slayer,
Nor one to call a God-obeyer
In certain details we could spare,
But rather was a debonair
Shrewd bandit, skilled as banjo-player:
That Solomon sang the fleshly Fair,
And gave the Church no thought whate'er;
That Esther with her royal wear,
And Mordecai, the son of Jair,
And Joshua's triumphs, Job's despair,
And Balaam's ass's bitter blare;
Nebuchadnezzar's furnace-flare,
And Daniel and the den affair,
And other stories rich and rare,
Were writ to make old doctrine wear
Something of a romantic air:
That the Nain widow's only heir,
And Lazarus with cadaverous glare
(As done in oils by Piombo's care)
Did not return from Sheol's lair:
That Jael set a fiendish snare,
That Pontius Pilate acted square,
That never a sword cut Malchus' ear
And (but for shame I must forbear)
That -- -- did not reappear! . . .
- Since thus they hint, nor turn a hair,
All churchgoing will I forswear,
And sit on Sundays in my chair,
And read that moderate man Voltaire.

Slightly funny, a bit philosophical and has some memorable quotes. It's worth a read in my opinion.

>>9816933
>tend your garden
Was Voltaire the original Jordan Peterson?

Tried reading it in both French and English if I recalled. Didn't care for it at the time I was reading it.

>>9816933
Worth reading just for its historical significance. Can easily get through it in a day

>>9816933
Reminded me a lot of Quixote, for what it's worth. Funny, a little bit violent, very picaresque. Memorable characters, too. Definitely worth a read, especially considering how brief it is. Voltaire wrote the first draft in 3 days, and most printings clock in under 100 pages.