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Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow FROM LOVE TO FRIENDSHIP. - The Works of Voltaire, Vol. X The Dramatic Works Part 1 (Zaire, Caesar, The Prodigal, Prefaces) and Part II (The Lisbon Earthquake and Other Poems).

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FROM LOVE TO FRIENDSHIP. - Voltaire, The Works of Voltaire, Vol. X The Dramatic Works Part 1 (Zaire, Caesar, The Prodigal, Prefaces) and Part II (The Lisbon Earthquake and Other Poems). [1901]

Edition used:

From The Works of Voltaire, A Contemporary Version, (New York: E.R. DuMont, 1901), A Critique and Biography by John Morley, notes by Tobias Smollett, trans. William F. Fleming. Vol. X The Dramatic Works Part 1 (Zaire, Caesar, The Prodigal, Prefaces) and Part II (The Lisbon Earthquake and Other Poems).

Part of: The Works of Voltaire. A Contemporary Version, in 21 vols.

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FROM LOVE TO FRIENDSHIP.

  • If you would have me love once more,
  • The blissful age of love restore;
  • From wine’s free joys, and lovers’ cares,
  • Relentless time, who no man spares,
  • Urges me quickly to retire,
  • And no more to such bliss aspire.
  • From such austerity exact,
  • Let’s, if we can, some good extract;
  • Whose way of thinking with his age
  • Suits not, can ne’er be deemed a sage.
  • Let sprightly youth its follies gay,
  • Its follies amiable display;
  • Life to two moments is confined,
  • Let one to wisdom be consigned.
  • You sweet delusions of my mind,
  • Still to my ruling passion kind,
  • Which always brought a sure relief
  • To life’s accurst companion, grief.
  • Will you forever from me fly,
  • And must I joyless, friendless die?
  • No mortal e’er resigns his breath
  • I see, without a double death;
  • Who loves, and is beloved no more,
  • His hapless fate may well deplore;
  • Life’s loss may easily be borne,
  • Of love bereft man is forlorn.
  • ’Twas thus those pleasures I lamented,
  • Which I so oft in youth repented;
  • My soul replete with soft desire,
  • Vainly regretted youthful fire.
  • But friendship then, celestial maid,
  • From heaven descended to my aid;
  • Less lively than the amorous flame,
  • Although her tenderness the same.
  • The charms of friendship I admired,
  • My soul was with new beauty fired;
  • I then made one in friendship’s train,
  • But destitute of love, complain.