The Works of Voltaire/Volume 36/To the King of Prussia on his Accession
To the King of Prussia on His Accession to the Throne.
At length arrives the blest auspicious day,
Which sheds its kindest influence on thee;
A day which fills thee only with dismay,
Whilst others wish thy exalted state to see.
Fly hence you fanatic, ye fraudful bands,
Ye persecutors, who enslave the mind;
Whose souls implacable and frantic hands,
Delight in carnage, and destruction find.
Shall odious calumny still lift her head?
Monster thou didst, with cursed rage inspired,
On famed Descartes and Bayle thy venom shed,
On Wolfe who Leibnitz to approach aspired.
You from the sacred altar took a sword,
Whose point you turned against each far-famed sage;
By the same weapon shall your breast be gored,
Your blood shall expiate your frantic rage.
He strikes, you die, his arm asserts truth's cause;
Truth is restored, and error disappears;
Philosophy is freed from tyrant laws,
The face of nature glorious freedom cheers.
And you, your odious rules, by Borgia taught,
The art in governing mankind to oppress;
The art of crimes with vilest maxims fraught,
The art which tyrants openly profess.
May you to oblivion ever be consigned,
With too much ease men learn the dangerous art
The crafts of policy show a narrow mind.
The best of statesmen has a generous heart.
The annals of all nations amply show,
That tyrants never tasted sweet repose,
But suffer all their lives unceasing woe,
As they on others bring a load of woes.
They died with infamy, they died with rage,
But Trajan, Titus, Antoninus wise;
The ornaments and blessings of their age
Lived blest, and calmly closed their dying eyes.
In thee those heroes shall again arise,
Virtue with happiness shall still be crowned;
You may with justice claim fair virtue's prize,
Since in you every royal virtue's found.
Upon the throne we now behold a sage,
A blessing which men rarely can obtain;
He who is able to instruct the age,
Is doubtless worthy o'er mankind to reign.
Presumptuous ignorance long has spurned the head
Of patient merit, which defenceless lay;
The fury dared on sciences to tread,
And virtue's self was forced to bear her sway.
Immersed in soft delights, the courtly train
Think man was never born the truth to know;
All knowledge they despise as weak and vain,
Though science can content of mind bestow.
Dunces to truth can scarcely ope their eyes,
Their souls are wrapt in darkness black as night;
Behold a northern Solomon arise,
Approach barbarians to the source of light.