ABSTRACT
Voltaire took refuge with the Duchesse du Maine while Mme du Chatelet returned to face her creditors. Voltaire observed the strictest incognito at Sceaux. It appears that this latest expedition into Germany caused Mme du Chatelet so much alarm that she used all her influence over Voltaire and her undoubted powers of intrigue to counteract the attractions of Frederick and to retain her poet in France. Consciously or unconsciously Voltaire fell in with Mme du Chatelet’s plans and allowed him to be metamorphosed for a third time into a courtier. He had several reasons for this temporary abandonment of his intransigeance towards authority. The confinement, the life in artificial light, the monotony, were beginning to irritate Voltaire and even to harm his health when fortunately Mme du Chatelet arrived at Sceaux, having settled her debt and calmed the indignation aroused by Voltaire’s remark.
