The letter is discusses a club, the Sun Down, in which Tart [sic] had been the first secretary and Grimké the last. Members chose topics to debate such as Voltaire, Linnaeus and David Hume’s History of England.

Voltaire writes that his distempers and bad eyes do not permit him to answer in the level of detail he had hoped. He writes that he knows nothing of the soul, adding that knowledge of it is the domain of young scholars and priests. He ends by saying that he has great regard for Boswell and would be delighted to show him his respect and obsequiousness (if he is still alive) the next time Boswell comes to Ferney.