# Voltaire quote **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 1, 2001, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voltaire-quote/74434 "2001-08-01T03:31:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![City\_Gent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a87d85/32.png) [@City\_Gent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/City_Gent)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2001, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voltaire-quote/74434/1 "2001-08-01T03:31:43Z")
Voltaire: > [@](#): > > I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it. Everyone knows this one; it’s even on at least one Doper’s sig line. Now I like Voltaire as much as the next guy, but this quote has always struck me as bombast. He will defend my right to free speech; OK, I appreciate it. But _to the death?_ Come on. Is he saying that if I wanted to march into Tienanmen Square and accuse Jiang Zemin of being a reactionary fellow-traveler that he would _literally take a bullet for me_ when the People’s Army showed up? I don’t know what I’m looking for here. It just always bugs me when I see it quoted by the obviously non-militant, that’s all. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2001, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voltaire-quote/74434/2 "2001-08-01T03:52:34Z")
Though often quoted, there is no documented proof that Voltaire ever actually said or wrote this. However, he did write this: “history is a bag of tricks we play on the dead.” A much more useful quote. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Lao](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/2bfe46/32.png) [@Dr.Lao](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Lao)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2001, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voltaire-quote/74434/3 "2001-08-01T04:46:28Z")
**Slithy Tove** is right. Voltaire never said or wrote it. Evelyn Beatrice Hall wrote it in her work _Friends of Voltaire_ as the epitome of Voltaire’s beliefs. She later said it was a paraphrase of the line “Think for yourselves and let others enjoy the privilege to do so too.” from Voltaire’s _Essay on Tolerance_. So it appears a few liberties were taken in the paraphrase. ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2001, 10:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voltaire-quote/74434/4 "2001-08-01T10:43:14Z")
I personally prefer the following: _Écartons ces romans qu’on appelle systèmes, Et pour nous éléver descendons dans nous-mêmes._ (Let’s put those novels we call systems back on the shelves, And to lift ourselves up, let us descend into ourselves.) ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2001, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voltaire-quote/74434/5 "2001-08-01T11:55:40Z")
“I disagree with what you say, but I will defend to my extreme inconvenience your right to say so.” Naaah, hasn’t got the same ring. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2001, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voltaire-quote/74434/6 "2001-08-03T03:53:50Z")
A friend of mine with Microsoft Bookshelf 98 found this: > [@](#): > > in February 1770, Voltaire wrote to M. le Riche: “Monsieur l’Abbe, I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to write.” > > The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations is licensed from Columbia University Press. Copyright 1993, 1995 by Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2001, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voltaire-quote/74434/7 "2001-08-03T05:03:40Z")
According to Jacques Barzun, in _From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life_, Voltaire never said it at all. From p. 361: > [@](#): > > ‘Nor did he write to Helvetius “I wholly disapprove of what you say-and will defend to the death your right to say it”; a 20C woman biographer said it for him.’\* Here is the footnote referred to (p. 814): > [@](#): > > E. Beatrice Hall, writing as S.G. Tallentyre in _The Friends of Voltaire_, L., 1906, p. 199 and, slightly modified in _Voltaire in His Letters_, L., 1919, p. 65. ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2001, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voltaire-quote/74434/8 "2001-08-03T05:06:05Z")
Well, that’ll teach me not to read the entire thread before posting. But I have the cites!