Jean Jacques Rousseau

Another thing worthy of notice is that, after her first weakness, she rarely bestowed her favours except upon the unfortunate; persons of distinction spent their labour upon her in vain; but, if she once began to feel sympathy for a man, he must have been little deserving of love if she did not end by loving him. If she sometimes chose those who were unworthy of her, the blame rested, not on any low inclinations, which were far removed from her noble heart, but nly on her too generous, too kindly, too compassionate, and too feeling disposition, which she did not always control with sufficient judgement

However, this intoxication, to whatever point it was carried, did not go so far as to make me forget my age and my position, flatter me with the idea that I could still inspire love, or make me attempt to communicate this devouring, but barren fire, by which, from childhood, I felt my heart in vain consumed. I did not hope, I did not even desire it; I knew that the time for love was over; I was too keenly conscious of the ridicule heaped upon elderly beaux, to expose myself to it, and I was not the man to become presumptuous and self-confident in my declining years, after having so rarely displayed such qualities during my best days. Besides, as a friend of peace, I should have dreaded domestic storms, and I loved Thérèse too sincerely, to expose her to the annoyance of seeing me entertain livelier feelings for others than those with which she herself inspired me. What did I do on this occasion? The reader must have already guessed, if he has hitherto followed me with the least attention. The impossibility of grasping realities threw me into the land of chimeras, and, seeing nothing in existence which was worthy of my enthusiasm, I sought nourishment for it in an ideal world, which my fertile imagination soon peopled with beings after my own heart. This resource was never so welcome to me or so fruitful. In my continual ecstasies, I intoxicated myself with full draughts of the most delightful sensations that have ever entered the heart of man. I entirely forgot the human race, and created for myself societies of perfect beings, heavenly alike in their beauties and virtues; trusty, tender, and loyal friends such as I never found in this world below. I found such pleasure in soaring into the empyrean, in the midst of the charming objects by which I was surrounded, that I passed the hours and days in it without taking count of them, and, forgetting everything else, no sooner had I hastily eaten a morsel of food, than I burned to escape, in order to run to my groves again.

This recollection, rendered still more charming by the breath of innocence which pervaded it, brought back others of the same kind. Presently, I saw gathered round me all the objects which had touched my heart with emotion during my youth – Mademoiselle Galley, Mademoiselle de Graffenried, Mademoiselle de Breil, Madame Basile, Madame de Larnage, my young pupils, even the piquant Zulietta, whom my heart can never forget. I saw myself surrounded by a seraglio of houris and by my old acquaintances, the liveliest desire for whom was no new sensation for me. My blood became heated and inflamed, my head swam, in spite of my hairs already growing grey: and the serious citizen of Geneva, the austere Jean-Jacques, close upon his forty-fifth year, suddenly became again the love-sick shepherd. The intoxication which seized me, although so sudden and extravagant, was, notwithstanding, so strong and lasting, that nothing less than the unforeseen and terrible crisis of the unhappiness into which it plunged me would have been able to cure me of it.

Consider my ardent and lascivious temperament, my heated blood, my heart intoxicated with love, my vigorous health, my age. Remember that, in this condition, thirsting after women, I had never yet touched one; that imagination, need, vanity, and curiosity, all combined to devour me with the burning desire of being a man and showing myself one. Add to this, above all – for it must never be forgotten – that my tender and lively attachment to her, far from diminishing, had only become warmer every day, that I was never happy except with her; that I never left her except to think of her; that my heart was full, not only of her goodness and amiability, but of her sex, her form, her person; in a word, of her, under every aspect in which she could be dear to me.

It is quite true that I wrote this romance in a state of most feverish ecstasy, but they were wrong in thinking that it had needed real objects to produce this condition; they were far from understanding to what an extent I am capable of being inflamed by beings of the imagination.

she attached to the agreement the most solemn formalities, and gave me eight days to think over them, which, like a hypocrite, I assured her I did not require; for, to crown the singularity of the whole affair, I was really glad of the respite, so greatly had the novelty of these ideas struck me, and so disordered did I feel the state of my own to be, that I wanted time to set them in order. It will be imagined that those eight days seemed eight centuries to me; on the contrary, I could have wished that they had really lasted as long. I do not know how to describe my condition; it was a kind of fright mingled with impatience, during which I was so afraid of what I longed for, that I sometimes seriously endeavoured to think of some decent way of avoiding the promised happiness.

The reader, already disgusted, is doubtless of opinion that, being already possessed by another man, she degraded herself in my eyes by distributing her favours, and that a feeling of disesteem cooled those with which she had inspired me. He is mistaken. This distribution was certainly very painful to me, as much in consequence of a very natural feeling of delicacy as because I really considered it unworthy of her and myself; but it never altered my feelings towards her, and I can swear that I never loved her more tenderly than when I had so little desire to possess her.

The remainder of the day, I buried myself in the forest, where I sought and found the picture of those primitive times, of which I boldly sketched the history. I demolished the pitiful lies of mankind; I dared to expose their nature in all its nakedness, to follow the progress of time and of the things which have disfigured this nature; and, comparing the man, as man has made him, with the natural man, I showed him, in his pretended perfection, the true source of his misery.

Those who deny the sympathy of souls may explain, if they can, how, from the first interview, from the first word, from the first look, Madame de Warens inspired me, not only with the liveliest feelings of attachment, but with a perfect confidence which has never belied itself. Granted that my sentiments for her were really love, which will at least appear doubtful to those who follow the history of our relations, how came it that this passion was from the outset accompanied by the feelings which it least inspires – peace of heart, calm, cheerfulness, confidence, trust? How was it that, when for the first time I approached an amiable, refined, and dazzlingly beautiful woman, a lady of higher position than my own, the like of whom I had never addressed, upon whom my destiny in a manner depended, according as she interested herself more or less on my behalf – how came it, I repeat, that, in spite of all this, I immediately felt as free and completely at my ease as if I had been perfectly certain of pleasing her? How was it that I did not for a single moment experience a feeling of embarrassment, timidity, or awkwardness? Naturally bashful and easily put out of countenance, knowing nothing of the world, how was it that from the first day, from the first moment, I was able to assume with her the easy manners, the tender language, the familiar tone which prevailed between us ten years later, when our close intimacy had made it natural?

Although Turin was further than Geneva, I judged that, being the capital, it was more closely connected with Annecy than a town of different faith and in a foreign land; and, besides, as I was setting out in obedience to Madame de Warens, I considered myself as remaining under her guidance, and that was more than living in her neighbourhood.

No sooner had I shown myself to Madame de Warens, than her manner reassured me. I trembled at the first sound of her voice. I threw myself at her feet, and, in transports of liveliest joy, I fastened my lips upon her hand. I do not know whether she had heard any news of me, but her face showed little surprise and no displeasure. ‘Poor little one,’ she said, in a caressing voice, ‘here you are again then?

When the essay was finished, I showed it to Diderot, who was pleased with it, and suggested a few corrections. This production, however, although full of warmth and vigour, is altogether destitute of logic and arrangement. Of all the works that have proceeded from my pen, it is the weakest in argument and the poorest in harmony and proportion; but, however great a man’s natural talents may be, the art of writing cannot be learnt all at once.