French Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher famous for his wit, his criticism of Christianityespecially the Roman Catholic Churchas well as his advocacy of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and separation of church and state
French novelist, official, Freemason and army general, best known for writing the epistolary novel Les Liaisons dangereuses .
A unique case in French literature, he was for a long time considered to be as scandalous a writer as the Marquis de Sade or Restif de La Bretonne
