Rousseau's "Confessions" were written in England at Wootton,
in Staffordshire, where he had taken refuge after his
revolutionary ideas incurred the displeasure of the
authorities in France. They were first published in 1782. From
this refuge he was pursued from place to place by his
delusions through miserable years, until he died, near Paris,
on July 2, 1778. In no circumstances or relation of his life
was Rousseau a pleasant spectacle. The "Confessions,"
unexpurgated, are often revolting to any sane mind, and have
been proved to be untrustworthy even as a record of fact. But
almost incredible baseness was coupled with extraordinary
gifts, and it is impossible to overestimate Rousseau's
influence upon the modern world, and upon its literature and
its whole point of view and way of thinking. (Rousseau,
biography: see FICTION.)
I am undertaking a task for which there is no example, and one which
will find no imitator. It is to exhibit a man in the whole truth of
nature; and the man whom I shall reveal is myself. Myself alone; for I
verily believe I am like no other living man. In this book I have hidden
nothing evil and added nothing good; and I challenge any man to say,
having unveiled his heart with equal sincerity, "I am better than he."
I was born at Geneva in 1712, son of Isaac Rousseau, watchmaker, and of
Susanne, his wife. My birth, the first of my misfortunes, cost my mother
her life, and I came into the world so weakly that I was not expected to
live. My father's sister lavished on me the tenderest care, and he,
disconsolate, loved me with extreme affection.
Like all children, but even more than others, I felt before I thought;
and my consciousness was first awakened by reading stories with my
father. Sometimes we read together until the birds were singing in the
morning light. These tales gave me a most precocious insight into human
passions, and the confused emotions which swept through me brought with
them the queerest and most romantic views of life. But when I was seven
we came to the end of my mother's old stock of romances, and we fell
back on Bossuet, Molière, Plutarch, Ovid, and the like. Plutarch went
far to cure me of novels; indeed, his "Lives" were the means of forming
that free and republican spirit, intolerant of servitude, which has been
my torment. To my aunt, who knew endless songs, and used to chant them
with a sweet, tiny thread of a voice, I owe my passion for music.
These, then, were my first affections. These formed that heart of mine,
so proud yet so tender; they fashioned that effeminate yet untamable
character, which has ever drifted between weakness and virtue. For I
have been in contradiction with myself, in such a way that abstinence
and fruition, pleasure and wisdom, have escaped me equally.
My father having left Geneva, I remained under the care of my uncle
Bernard, and was placed, with his son of my own age, in the house of M.
Lambercier, protestant minister at Bossey, to learn all the trivialities
that are called education. Here I gained my keen love of country
pleasures, and tasted, with my cousin, the delights of simple
friendship. But a cruel punishment for a fault which I had not
committed, put an end to my childish simplicity, and soon I left Bossey
without regret. There followed two or three years of indolence at
Geneva.
After a brief and luckless trial of a notary's office I was apprenticed
to an engraver, a petty tyrant, whose injustice taught me to lie and to
steal. Restless, dissatisfied, and in perpetual terror of my master's
savagery, I here reached my sixteenth year. But one day, finding the
city gates closed on my return from a country excursion, I determined,
rather than face the inevitable thrashing, to seek my fortune in the
unknown world.
_Madame de Warens_
How fair were the illusions of freedom and of the future! I asked
little--only a manor where I should be the favourite of the lord of the
land, his daughter's lover, her brother's friend, and protector of the
neighbourhood. I roamed the countryside, sleeping at nights in
hospitable cottages, and on arriving at Confignon I called, out of
curiosity, on M. de Ponteverre, the parish priest. He gave me a dinner
which convinced me, even more than his arguments, of the advantages of
the catholic faith; and I was willing enough to set off, with his
introduction, to Annecy. Here I was to seek Mme. de Warens, a recent
convert, who was in receipt of a pension from the King of Sardinia. I
was assured that her benevolence would support me for the present. Three
days later I was at Annecy.
This introduction fixed my character and destiny. I was now in my
sixteenth year, doubtless of engaging though not striking appearance; I
had the timidity of a loving nature, always afraid of giving offence;
and I was quite without knowledge of the world or of manners. I arrived
on Palm Sunday, 1728. Mme. de Warens had left the house for church; I
ran after her, saw her, spoke to her--how well do I remember the place,
so often in later days wet with my tears and covered with kisses!
I saw an enchanting form, a countenance full of graciousness, a dazzling
colour, blue eyes beaming kindness; you may imagine that my conversion
was from that moment decided. Smiling, she read the good priest's
letter, and sent me back to the house for breakfast.
Louise Éléonore de Warens, daughter of a noble family of Vevai, in the
Vaud country, had early married M. de Warens, of Lausanne. The marriage
was childless and otherwise unfortunate; and the young wife, exasperated
by some domestic difficulty, had abandoned her husband and her country,
and crossing the lake, had thrown herself at the feet of the king. He
took her under his protection, gave her a moderate pension, and for fear
of scandal sent her to Annecy, where she renounced her errors at the
Convent of the Visitation.
She had been six years at Annecy when I met her, and was now
twenty-eight years of age. Her beauty was still in its first radiance,
and her smile was angelic. She was short of stature, but it was
impossible to imagine more beautiful features or hands. Her education
had been very desultory; she had learned more from lovers than from
teachers. She had a strong taste for empirical medicine and for alchemy,
and was always compounding elixirs, tinctures and balms, some of which
she regarded as valuable secrets. So it was that charlatans, trading on
her weakness, made her consume, amid drugs and furnaces, a talent and a
spirit which might have distinguished her in the highest societies. Yet
her loving and sweet character, her compassion for the unhappy, her
inexhaustible goodness and her open and gay humour never changed; and
even when old age was coming on, in the midst of poverty and varied
misfortunes, her inward serenity preserved to the end the charming
gaiety of her youth. All her mistakes arose from a restless activity
which demanded incessant occupation. She thirsted, not for intrigues,
but for enterprises.
Well, the first sight of Mme. de Warens inspired me not only with the
liveliest attachment, but with an entire trust which was never
disappointed. Her presence filled my whole being with peace and
confidence.
_Three Years in Turin_
My situation was discussed with the Bishop, and it was decided that I
should go to Turin and remain for a time at an institution devoted to
the instruction of catechumens. Thither I went, regarding myself as the
pupil, the friend, and almost the lover, of Mme. de Warens. The great
doors closed upon me, and here I was instructed for several weeks in
very indifferent company. At length, having been received into the
church, I found myself in the street with twenty francs in my pocket,
and the counsel that I should be a good Christian.
I took a lodging in Turin, and was presently introduced, by the kindness
of my hostess, to the service of a countess. But this lady died shortly
afterwards, and I left her house bearing with me lasting remorse for an
atrocious action: I had accused a fellow-servant of a theft which I had
myself committed, and thus may very well have caused the poor child's
ruin.
Returning to my old lodging, I spent my days in wandering about town,
often offending the public by my depravities. But I had kept certain
acquaintances made during my situation with the countess, and one of
these, a M. Gaime, whom I sometimes visited, gave me most valuable
instructions in the principles of morals. He was a priest, and one of
the most honest men I have known. I had cherished false ideas of life;
he gave me a true picture of it, and showed me that happiness depends
only on wisdom, and that wisdom is to be found in every rank. He used to
say that if everyone could read the hearts of others, most would wish to
descend in the social scale. This M. Gaime is the original, in large
part, of my vicar of Savoy.
Then followed a new situation in the house of the Count de Gouvon,
where, nominally a footman, I was soon treated more as a pupil or even
as a favourite. His son, a priest, did his best to teach me Latin, and I
have since realised that it was the purpose of this noble family, who
had considerable political ambition, to train a talented dependent who
might serve them in offices of great responsibility. But my fatal
inconstancy frustrated this good fortune, my flagrant disobediences led
to my dismissal, and presently I was on the road to Geneva with a gay
lad from thence who had found me out in Turin.
I happened to own a mechanical toy, a little fountain, and our mad
project was nothing less than to pay our way throughout the world by
showing its performances in every village. We started in the highest
spirits, but the fountain was never remunerative, and soon its works
went wrong. This threw no gloom over our merry, fantastic journey, and
it was only when Annecy was near that I became a little thoughtful, for
my benefactress supposed that my last place had established me for life.
We entered the little town and parted, and I came trembling to her door.
The adorable woman showed little surprise, and no sorrow. I told her my
story, and was forgiven. Henceforth her home was mine.
_Seeking a Career_
The house was an old one, but spacious and comfortable, and the window
of my room looked out, over garden and stream, to the open country. The
ménage was by no means magnificent, but was abundant in a patriarchal
way; Madame de Warens had no idea of economy, and with her hospitalities
and speculations was ever running more deeply into debt. The household,
besides herself and me, consisted of housemaid, cook, and a footman
named Claude Anet.
From the first day, the sweetest familiarity reigned our intercourse.
She called me "Little one," I called her my little mother, and these
names express the relation of our hearts. She sought always my good,
never her own pleasure; she was deeply attached to me, and lavished on
me her maternal caresses. I was now about nineteen years old, but was
only occupied about the house in writing for her, or in helping her in
her pharmaceutical experiments.
But madame was thinking of my future, and sent me on some pretext to see
M. d'Aubonne, a relative of hers, to find out what might be made of me.
His report of me was, that I was a poor-spirited creature, narrow,
ignorant, and clownish, and that the career of village priest was the
best that could be hoped for. Once more, therefore, I was set to Latin
at the seminary; but after some months I was returned by the bishop and
the rector as incapable of learning, though a passably well-conducted
youth. In the meantime I had been taken with a strong taste for music,
and it was arranged that I should spend the winter at the house of M. le
Maitre, director of music at the cathedral; he was a young man of great
talent and of high spirits, and lived only twenty paces from my little
mother. There I spent one of the most pleasant times of my life. But it
was cut short by a quarrel between Le Maitre and the cathedral chapter,
who had, as he thought, put a slight upon him. His revenge was to desert
his post on the eve of the elaborate Easter services, and madame desired
me to assist him in his flight. I was to attend him to Lyons, and remain
with him as long as he should need me. Her purpose was, as I have since
learned, to detach me from a plausible adventurer, M. Venture, a man of
great musical talent who had turned up at Annecy, and had engaged my
fancy. Our flight was successful. But on the second day after our
arrival at Lyons Le Maitre fell ill with a sudden seizure in the street,
and I, after telling the bystanders the name of his inn, and begging
them to carry him thither, slipped round the nearest corner and
disappeared. Le Maitre was deserted at his worst need by the only friend
on whom he had to count. I returned at once to Annecy, only to find that
madame had left for Paris.
M. Venture, however, was still there, and had turned the heads of all
the ladies in the place, and for a time I shared his lodging. Then,
after travelling with Merceret, the housemaid, as far as her home at
Fribourg-for she had to return thither and could find no other
attendant--I turned aside to Lausanne, with the idea of seeing the lake.
I arrived here without a penny, and it occurred to me to play Venture's
game on my own account. I took a false name, called myself a Parisian,
and having secured a lodging, set up as a teacher of music, though I
knew next to nothing of the art. There was a professor of law in the
town who was an amateur of music, and held concert parties in his house;
to this man I had the effrontry to propose a symphony of my own. I
worked a fortnight at this production, wrote out the instrumental parts,
and on the appointed evening stood up before the orchestra and audience,
tapped my desk, raised by baton, and--never since music began has there
been such an orgy of discords. The musicians could hardly sit in their
chairs for laughing, yet played even louder and louder as the fun took
hold of them; the audience sought to stop their ears; and I, sweat
pouring down my face, conducted this atrocity to the end. But the end
was a little minuet which Venture had taught me; I had appended it to my
symphony, calling it my own work. Its magic put the whole room in good
humour, and I was feliciated on my taste in melody. Next day one of my
orchestra came to see me, and in my despair and broken spirit I told him
my whole story. By nightfall it was known to all Lausanne. But at
Neufchâtel, through the next winter, I gradually learned music by
teaching it.
My next occupation was that of interpreter to a Greek prelate and
archimandrite of Jerusalem, whom I met when dining in a little
restaurant. He was collecting money throughout Europe for the
restoration of the Holy Sepulchre; and accompanying him from city to
city, I was of much service to him, even addressing the Senate at Berne
on behalf of his project. Unfortunately for my employer, he addressed
himself to the Marquis de Bonac, who had been ambassador to the Porte,
and knew all about the Holy Sepulchre. I don't know what passed at their
interview, but the archimandrite disappeared and I was detained. In my
desolation I told the marquis the history of my life, and by him was
sent to Paris, with plenty of money in my pocket, to enter the service
of a young friend of his in the army. My first sight of the city was a
disappointment which I have never got over, and the proposed engagement
fell through. Coming to the end of my resources, I set out by way of
Lyons, where I suffered the extremity of poverty, to find Mme. de
Warens, who was now, as I learned, at Chambéri. I came to her house and
found the intendant-general with her. Without addressing me, she said,
"Here, sir, he is; protect him as long as he deserves it, and his future
is assured." And to me, "My child, you belong to the king." And thus I
became a secretary in the ordnance survey. After five years of follies
and sufferings since I had left Geneva, I began to earn an honest
living.
_Our Little Circle_
It was in 1732, and I was nearly twenty-one years old, when I began the
life of the office. I lived with the little mother in a dismal house,
which she rented because it belonged to the financial secretary who
controlled her pension. The faithful Claude Anet was still with her, and
shortly after my return I learned accidentally that their relation was
closer than I had ever dreamed of. In a fit of temper his mistress had
taunted him outrageously. The poor fellow, in despair, had taken
laudanum; and madame, in her terror and distress, told me the whole
story. We brought him round, and things went on as before, but it was
hard to me to know that anyone was more intimate with her than myself.
My passion for music increased this year until I could hardly take
interest in anything else, and at last the work at the office grew so
intolerable to me that I determined to resign my place. I extorted an
unwilling permission from madame, said good-bye to my chief, and threw
myself into the teaching of music.
I soon had as many pupils as I needed, and the constant intercourse with
these ladies was very pleasant to me. But from the stories which I
carried home of our interviews the little mother apprehended dangers of
which I was not at that time conscious. The course which she took was a
singular one. She had rented a little garden outside the town, and here
she invited me to spend the day with her. Thither we went, and from the
drift of her conversation, which was full of good sense and kindliest
warnings, I gradually perceived the degree of her goodness towards me.
The compact involved conditions, and my answer was to be given on that
day week.
Thus was established among the three of us a society to which there is
perhaps no parallel. All our wishes, our cares, our interests were in
common. If one of us was missing from the dinner-table, or a fourth was
present, all seemed out of order. But our little circle was broken all
too soon. Claude Anet, on a botanical excursion, fell a victim to
pleurisy, and died, notwithstanding all her care. He had been a most
watchful economist of her pension and a restraint on her enterprises,
and his loss was felt not only in our diminished party, but also in the
wasting of her resources. For the next three years these went from bad
to worse. Unfortunately, the life to which I had taken, of drifting from
one interest to another--now literature, now chess, now a journey, now
music--brought in nothing and cost a good deal; and to complete our
anxieties, I fell ill nearly to death. Her care and utter devotion saved
me, and from that time our very existence was in common.
_Les Charmettes_
I was ordered to the country. We found near Chambéri a little house, Les
Charmettes, set in a garden among trees, as retired and solitary a home
as if it had been a hundred miles from the town. There we took up a new
life towards the autumn of 1736; there began the brief happiness of my
existence. We were all in all to one another; together we roamed the
country, worked in the garden, gathered fruit and flowers, lay under the
trees and listened to the birds. Golden hours, your memory is my only
treasure!
Even a sudden illness, which affected my heart so that its pulse has
from that time incessantly throbbed like a drum in my ears, and has made
me a constant sufferer from insomnia, turned out to be a heavenly
blessing. Thinking myself a dead man, I only then began to live, and
applied myself very eagerly to learning. With my little mother as my
teacher, I turned to the study of religion. I sought books, and
philosophy, the sciences, and Latin followed in their turn. Nature,
learning, leisure, and our ineffably sweet companionship--I thought,
poor fool, that these joys would be with me to the end. It was otherwise
decreed.
My bodily condition has become pitiable, and it was determined that I
should go to Montpellier to consult a physician. I fell in, on the way
thither, with the Marquis de Torignan and his party, who were travelling
in the same direction. We struck up acquaintance, and I joined them,
taking an assumed name, and giving myself out for an Englishman.
Becoming intimate with a Madame de Larnage, who was among them, I
continued to travel with her day by day, after the others had reached
their destination. She was a woman of infinite charm. Mme. de Warens was
forgotten utterly, and I willingly agreed to settle down in her
vicinity, after fulfilling the purpose of my journey to Montpellier.
However, after two pleasurable months in that city, when I found myself
at the stage where the road divided--one road going to Mme. de Larnage,
the other to Les Charmettes--I balanced love against pleasure, and
finding an equipoise, I decided by reason.
The little mother knew by my letter at what hour I should arrive. I came
to the garden; no one came out to meet me. I entered; the servants
seemed surprised to see me. I ran upstairs and found her; her welcome
was restrained and cold. The truth burst upon me. My place was taken!
Darkness flooded my soul, and from that moment onward my sensibilities
have been but half-alive. I took a situation as tutor in a private
family, but all my thoughts were of Charmettes and of our innocent life
together, now gone for ever. O dreadful illusion of human destiny!
_The Gathering Gloom_
I take up my pen again, after an interval of two years, to add a sequel
to my confessions. How different is the picture now! For thirty years
fate had favoured my inclinations, but for the second thirty, which I
must try to sketch, she has ground me in the mortar of the most
appalling afflictions.
This second part must inevitably be inferior, in every respect, to the
first. For I wrote, before, with pleasure and at ease; but now my
decaying memory and enfeebled brain have made me almost incapable of
work, and I have nothing to tell of but treacheries, perfidies, and
torturing memories. The walls around me have ears; I am encompassed by
spies and vigilant enemies. Racked with anxiety and fear, I scribble
page after page without revising them. An immense conspiracy surrounds
me....
[These delusions of suspicion are perhaps the most characteristic
symptoms of insanity. They colour so deeply the entire texture of
Rousseau's prolix second part as to make it not only unreliable, but
almost unreadable. Only its human interest gives value to the first
part; from the second part human interest is totally absent. The unhappy
creature, besotted with intellectual pride, was already insane, inhuman;
and this morbid condition had been aggravated by years of brooding
rancour before he wrote this miserable indictment of men who had done
their best to befriend him.--ED.]
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