Voltaire was born François-Marie Arouet in Paris in 1694. He was raised with a Jesuit education (Latin, theology, rhetoric, and so on) but he quickly became a thorn in the side of the French establishment. He was a brilliant student who wrote extensively about the lavish corruption of 18th century French society. His blistering satires and critiques were largely directed at the decaying Catholic French monarchy and its rigid censorship laws as well as its self-aggrandizing ecclesiasticism. Voltaire is known to us today as the essential Enlightenment man. Victor Hugo said likened Voltaire to the whole of the 18th century -Voltaire contained within himself both a Renaissance and a Reformation. He carried on the skepticism of Montaigne and the humor Rabelais. He was a more potent enemy of superstition and religious fanaticism than either Erasmus
He had a rocky relationship with his father. As a young…
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Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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