Rousseau Part 22

[42] Choderlos de La Clos: 1741-1803.

[43] Journal, iv. 496. (Ed. Charpentier, 1857.)

[44] _Nouv. Hel._, III. xiv. 48.

[45] _E.g._ Letters, 40-46.

[46] Madame de Stael (1765-1817), in her _Lettres sur les ecrits et le caractere de J.J. Rousseau_, written when she was twenty, and her first work of any pretensions. _Oeuv._, i. 41. Ed. 1820.

[47] Nowhere more pungently than in a little piece of some half-dozen pages, headed, _Prediction tiree d'un vieux Ma.n.u.scrit_, the form of which is borrowed from Grimm's squib in the dispute about French music, _Le pet.i.t Prophete de Boehmischbroda_, though it seems to me to be superior to Grimm in pointedness. Here are a few verses from the supposed prophecy of the man who should come--and of what he should do. "Et la mult.i.tude courra sur ses pas et plusieurs croiront en lui.

Et il leur dira: Vous etes des scelerats et des fripons, vos femmes sont toutes des femmes perdues, et je viens vivre parmi vous. Et il ajoutera tous les hommes sont vertueux dans le pays ou je suis ne, et je n'habiterai jamais le pays ou je suis ne.... Et il dira aussi qu'il est impossible d'avoir des moeurs, et de lire des Romans, et il fera un Roman; et dans son Roman le vice sera en action et la vertu en paroles, et ses personages seront forcenes d'amour et de philosophie.

Et dans son Roman on apprendra l'art de suborner philosophiquement une jeune fille. Et l'Ecoliere perdra toute honte et toute pudeur, et elle fera avec son maitre des sottises et des maximes.... Et le bel Ami etant dans un Bateau seul avec sa Maitresse voudra le jetter dans l'eau et se precipiter avec elle. Et ils appelleront tout cela de la Philosophie et de la Vertu," and so on, humorously enough in its way.

[48] See pa.s.sages in Goncourt's _La Femme au 18ieme siecle_, p. 380.

[49] Musset-Pathay, II. 361. See Madame Roland's _Mem._, i. 207.

[50] _Corr._, March 3, and March 19, 1761. The criticisms of Ximenes, a thoroughly mediocre person in all respects, were entirely literary, and were directed against the too strained and highly coloured quality of the phrases--"baisers acres"--among them.

[51] _Nouv. Hel._, V. v. 115.

[52] VI. vii.

[53] VI. vi.

[54] Michelet's _Louis XV. et Louis XVI._, p. 58.

[55] See Hettner's _Literaturgeschichte_, II. 486.

[56] IV. xi.

[57] IV. xvii. See vol. iii. 423.

[58] In 1816. Moore's _Life_, iii. 247; also 285. And the note to the stanzas in the Third Canto,--a note curious for a slight admixture of transcendentalism, so rare a thing with Byron, who, sentimental though he was, usually rejoiced in a truly Voltairean common sense.

[59] "The present fashion in France, of pa.s.sing some time in the country, is new; at this time of the year, and for many weeks past, Paris is, comparatively speaking, empty. Everybody who has a country seat is at it, and such as have none visit others who have. This remarkable revolution in the French manners is certainly one of the best customs they have taken from England; and its introduction was effected the easier, being a.s.sisted by the magic of Rousseau's writings. Mankind are much indebted to that splendid genius, who, when living, was hunted from country to country, to seek an asylum, with as much venom as if he had been a mad dog; thanks to the vile spirit of bigotry, which has not received its death wound. Women of the first fashion in France are now ashamed of not nursing their own children; and stays are universally proscribed from the bodies of the poor infants, which were for so many ages torture to them, as they are still in Spain. The country residence may not have effects equally obvious; but they will be no less sure in the end, and in all respects beneficial to every cla.s.s in the state." Arthur Young's _Travels_, i.

72.

[60] _Causeries_, xi. 195.

[61] _Nouv. Hel._, V. iii. "You remember Rousseau's description of an English morning: such are the mornings I spend with these good people."--Cowper to Joseph Hill, Oct. 25, 1765. _Works_, iii. 269. In a letter to William Unwin (Sept. 21, 1779), speaking of his being engaged in mending windows, he says, "Rousseau would have been charmed to have seen me so occupied, and would have exclaimed with rapture that he had found the Emilius who, he supposed, had subsisted only in his own idea." For a description ill.u.s.trative of the likeness between Rousseau and Cowper in their feeling for nature, see letter to Newton (Sept. 18, 1784, v. 78), and compare it with the description of Les Charmettes, making proper allowance for the colour of prose.

[62] IV. x. 260.

[63] V. ii. 37.

[64] V. ii. 47-52.

[65] Rousseau considered that the Fourth and Sixth parts of the New Helosa were masterpieces of diction. _Conf._ ix. 334.

[66] VI. viii.. 298. _Conf._, xi. 106.

[67] The La Bedoyere case, which began in 1745. See Barbier, iv. 54, 59, etc.

[68] III. xviii. 84.

[69] III. xx. 116. In the letter to Christopher de Beaumont (p. 102), he fires a double shot against the philosophers on the one hand, and the church on the other; exalting continence and purity, of which the philosophers in their reaction against asceticism thought lightly, and exalting marriage over the celibate state, which the churchmen a.s.sociated with mysterious sanct.i.ty.

[70] I. lxii.

[71] V. ii.

[72] V. vii. 141.

[73] V. ii. 31-33.

[74] For the Robecq family, see Saint Simon, xviii. 58.

[75] Morellet's _Mem._, i. 89-93. Rousseau, _Conf._, x. 85, etc. This _Vision_ is also in the style of Grimm's _Pet.i.t Prophete_, like the piece referred to in a previous note, vol. ii. p. 31.

[76] Madame de Vandeul's _Mem. sur Diderot_, p. 27. Rousseau, _Conf._, vii. 130.

[77] _Nouv. Hel._, V. xiii. 194. _Conf._, x. 43.

[78] The reader will find a fuller mention of the French book trade in my _Diderot_, ch. vi.

[79] _Conf._, xi. 127.

[80] See a letter from Rousseau to Malesherbes, Nov. 5, 1760. _Corr._, ii. 157.

[81] _Corr._, ii. 157.

[82] C.G. de Lamoignon de Malesherbes (p. 1721--guillotined, 1794), son of the chancellor, and one of the best instructed and most enlightened men of the century--a Turgot of the second rank--was Directeur de la Librairie from 1750-1763. The process was this: a book was submitted to him; he named a censor for it; on the censor's report the director gave or refused permission to print, or required alterations. Even after these formalities were complied with, the book was liable to a decree of the royal council, a decree of the parliament, or else a _lettre-de-cachet_ might send the author to the Bastile. See Barbier, vii. 126.

After Lord Shelburne saw Malesherbes, he said, "I have seen for the first time in my life what I never thought could exist--a man whose soul is absolutely free from hope or fear, and yet who is full of life and ardour." Mdlle. Lespina.s.se's _Lettres_, 90.

[83] See note, p. 132.

[84] _Conf._, xi. 134.

[85] _Conf._, xi. 139.

[86] _Ib._, xi. 139. _Corr._, ii. 270, etc. Dec. 12, 1761, etc.

[87] _Conf._, xi. 150.

[88] Fourth Letter to Malesherbes, p. 377.