Influences
Because this work was written late in the author's life, coupled with the fact that it is compiled of articles written over an extended period of time, the work had many influences, which noticeably change, depending on the theme which the article addresses.
The first major influence on the Philosophical Dictionary is Voltaire's visit to England, which gave him the opportunity to compare the problems in France with a place that had free press and to become better acquainted with important and influential thinkers such as Locke and Newton. Newtonian theory is influential in many of the articles that deal with tolerance stating that if we "do not know the essence of things we will not persecute others", for those things.
The Calas affair was an event that shaped Voltaire during the creation of the Philosophical Dictionary. Jean Calas was a Calvinist who was wrongfully convicted of killing his son. This occurred because there had been a rumour that the murder was fueled by Calas' son conversion to Catholicism. David de Beaudrige, who was in charge of the case, upon hearing this rumour, had the Calas family arrested without inquiry. Voltaire used this theme in the Philosophical Dictionary to fight against the Catholic Church.
Read more about this topic: Dictionnaire Philosophique
Famous quotes containing the word influences:
“Leadership does not always wear the harness of compromise. Once and again one of those great influences which we call a Cause arises in the midst of a nation. Men of strenuous minds and high ideals come forward.... The attacks they sustain are more cruel than the collision of arms.... Friends desert and despise them.... They stand alone and oftentimes are made bitter by their isolation.... They are doing nothing less than defy public opinion, and shall they convert it by blows. Yes.”
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“Without looking, then, to those extraordinary social influences which are now acting in precisely this direction, but only at what is inevitably doing around us, I think we must regard the land as a commanding and increasing power on the citizen, the sanative and Americanizing influence, which promises to disclose new virtues for ages to come.”
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“The tourist who moves about to see and hear and open himself to all the influences of the places which condense centuries of human greatness is only a man in search of excellence.”
—Max Lerner (b. 1902)