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 (vōl-târ′, vŏl-, vôl-tĕr′) Pen name of François Marie Arouet. 1694-1778.
French philosopher and writer whose works often attack injustice and intolerance. He wrote the satirical novel Candide (1759) and the Philosophical Dictionary (1764).


(vɒlˈtɛə; vəʊl-; French vɔltɛr)
(Biography) pseudonym of François Marie Arouet. 1694–1778, French writer, whose outspoken belief in religious, political, and social liberty made him the embodiment of the 18th-century Enlightenment. His major works include Lettres philosophiques (1734) and the satire Candide (1759). He also wrote plays, such as Zaïre (1732), poems, and scientific studies. He suffered several periods of banishment for his radical views
Volˈtairean, Volˈtairian adj, n


(voʊlˈtɛər, vɒl-)

(François Marie Arouet), 1694–1778, French writer and philosopher.
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Noun1.Voltaire - French writer who was the embodiment of 18th century Enlightenment (1694-1778)Voltaire - French writer who was the embodiment of 18th century Enlightenment (1694-1778)
References in classic literature ?
Quaint enough, but certainly no instance of anybody's wit, is the account of how a French translation of a play of Vanbrugh--not architect of Blenheim only, but accomplished in many other ways--appeared at the Odeon, in 1862, with all fitting raptures, as a posthumous work of Voltaire recently discovered.
As to his religious notions-- why, as Voltaire said, incantations will destroy a flock of sheep if administered with a certain quantity of arsenic.
Nevertheless, Voltaire said of this city, that "before Louis XIV., it possessed but four fine monuments": the dome of the Sorbonne, the Val-de-Grâce, the modern Louvre, and I know not what the fourth was--the Luxembourg, perhaps.
His favorite poets were Horace and Pope; his chosen philosophers, Hobbes and Voltaire. He took his exercise and his fresh air under protest; and always walked the same distance to a yard, on the ugliest high-road in the neighborhood.