History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 16 [98]
than we should fancy. ["Letter from a Marquis;" "Letter from Mr. T--- to M. S---" (Mr. T. lives in London;--"JE TRAVERSE LE Queen's Square, ET JE RENCONTRE NOTRE AMI D---: 'AVEZ-VOUS LA l'Appel au Public?' DIT-IL"--); "Letter by Euler in the Berlin Gazette," &c. &c. (in Maupertuisiana ).] Voltaire, for above a month past, had been fully aware of the case (24th July, 1752, writing to Niece, "heard yesterday"); not without commentary to oneself and others. Voltaire, with a kind of love to Konig, and a very real hatred to Maupertuis and to oppression generally, took pen himself, among the others (Konig's APPEAL just out),--could not help doing it, though he had better not! The following small Piece is perhaps the one, if there be one, still worth resuscitating from the Inane Kingdoms. Appeared in the BIBLIOTHEQUE RAISONNEE (mild-shining Quarterly Review of those days), JULY-SEPTEMBER Number.
"ANSWER FROM [VERY PRIVATELY VOLTAIRE, CALLING HIMSELF] A BERLIN ACADEMICIAN TO A PARIS ONE.
"BERLIN, 18th SEPTEMBER, 1752. This is the exact truth, in reply to your inquiry. M. Moreau de Maupertuis in a Pamphlet entitled ESSAI DE COSMOLOGIE, pretended that the only proof of the Existence of God is the circumstance that AR+nRB is a Minimum. [ONLY proof: ^??????^ (p.212 Book XVI)
VOILA!] He asserts that in all possible cases, 'Action is a Minimum,' what has been demonstrated false; and he says, 'He discovered this Law of Minimum,' what is not less false.
"M. Konig, as well as other Mathematicians, wrote against this strange assertion; and, among other things, M. Konig cited some sentences of a Letter by Leibnitz, in which that great man says, He has observed 'that, in the modifications of motion, the Action usually becomes either a Maximum or else a Minimum.'
"M. Moreau de Maupertuis imagined that, by producing this Fragment, it had been intended to snatch from him the glory of his pretended discovery,--though Leibnitz says precisely the contrary of what he advances. He forced some pensioned members of the Academy, who are dependent on him, to summon M. Koinig"-- As we know too well; and cannot bear to have repeated to us, even in the briefest and spiciest form! "Sentence (JUGEMENT) on M. Konig, which declares him guilty of having assaulted the glory of the Sieur Moreau Maupertuis by FORGING a Leibnitz Letter.--Wrote then, and made write, to her Serene Highness the Princess of Orange, who was indignant at so insolent"-- ... and in fine,
"Thus the Sieur Moreau Maupertuis has been convicted, in the face of Scientific Europe, not only of plagiarism and blunder, but of having abused his place to suppress free discussion, and to persecute an honest man who had no crime but that of not being of his opinion. Several members of our Academy have protested against so crying a procedure; and would leave the Academy, were it not for fear of displeasing the King, who is protector of it." [ OEuvres de Voltaire, lxiii. 227 (in Maupertuisiana, No. xvi).]
King Friedrich's position, in the middle of all this, was becoming uncomfortable. Of the controversy he understood, or cared to understand, nothing; had to believe steadily that his Academy must be right; that Konig was some loose bird, envious of an eagle Maupertuis, sitting aloft on his high Academic perch: this Friedrich took for the truth of the matter;--and could not let himself imagine that his sublime Perpetual President, who was usually very prudent and Jove-like, had been led, by his truculent vanity (which Friedrich knew to be immense in the man, though kept well out of sight), into such playing of fantastic tricks before high Heaven and other on-lookers. This view of the matter had hitherto been Friedrich's; nor do I know that he ever inwardly departed from it;--as outwardly he, for certain, never did; standing, King-like, clear always for his Perpetual President, till this hurricane of Pamphlets blew by. Voltaire's little Piece, therefore, was the unwelcomest
"ANSWER FROM [VERY PRIVATELY VOLTAIRE, CALLING HIMSELF] A BERLIN ACADEMICIAN TO A PARIS ONE.
"BERLIN, 18th SEPTEMBER, 1752. This is the exact truth, in reply to your inquiry. M. Moreau de Maupertuis in a Pamphlet entitled ESSAI DE COSMOLOGIE, pretended that the only proof of the Existence of God is the circumstance that AR+nRB is a Minimum. [ONLY proof: ^??????^ (p.212 Book XVI)
VOILA!] He asserts that in all possible cases, 'Action is a Minimum,' what has been demonstrated false; and he says, 'He discovered this Law of Minimum,' what is not less false.
"M. Konig, as well as other Mathematicians, wrote against this strange assertion; and, among other things, M. Konig cited some sentences of a Letter by Leibnitz, in which that great man says, He has observed 'that, in the modifications of motion, the Action usually becomes either a Maximum or else a Minimum.'
"M. Moreau de Maupertuis imagined that, by producing this Fragment, it had been intended to snatch from him the glory of his pretended discovery,--though Leibnitz says precisely the contrary of what he advances. He forced some pensioned members of the Academy, who are dependent on him, to summon M. Koinig"-- As we know too well; and cannot bear to have repeated to us, even in the briefest and spiciest form! "Sentence (JUGEMENT) on M. Konig, which declares him guilty of having assaulted the glory of the Sieur Moreau Maupertuis by FORGING a Leibnitz Letter.--Wrote then, and made write, to her Serene Highness the Princess of Orange, who was indignant at so insolent"-- ... and in fine,
"Thus the Sieur Moreau Maupertuis has been convicted, in the face of Scientific Europe, not only of plagiarism and blunder, but of having abused his place to suppress free discussion, and to persecute an honest man who had no crime but that of not being of his opinion. Several members of our Academy have protested against so crying a procedure; and would leave the Academy, were it not for fear of displeasing the King, who is protector of it." [
King Friedrich's position, in the middle of all this, was becoming uncomfortable. Of the controversy he understood, or cared to understand, nothing; had to believe steadily that his Academy must be right; that Konig was some loose bird, envious of an eagle Maupertuis, sitting aloft on his high Academic perch: this Friedrich took for the truth of the matter;--and could not let himself imagine that his sublime Perpetual President, who was usually very prudent and Jove-like, had been led, by his truculent vanity (which Friedrich knew to be immense in the man, though kept well out of sight), into such playing of fantastic tricks before high Heaven and other on-lookers. This view of the matter had hitherto been Friedrich's; nor do I know that he ever inwardly departed from it;--as outwardly he, for certain, never did; standing, King-like, clear always for his Perpetual President, till this hurricane of Pamphlets blew by. Voltaire's little Piece, therefore, was the unwelcomest