Les Charmettes and Rousseau
LES CHARMETTES AND ROUSSEAU.(1)
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THERE is a religion in literature as well as in love,—both
of a very Pagan description. They abound in superstitions.
We gaze upon the portrait of a favourite mistress or a favou-
rite author, worshipping the memory of her kisses and his
pages, till it becomes downright idolatry. With what ardent
devotion we perform many a pilgrimage to our Lady—not of
Loretto!(2) and what a thrill in our bosoms, and how thankful
are our hearts, when we approach, as towards some sainted
shrine, the dwelling of “one who was great through mortal
days, and died of fame unshorn!”(3) Are we not in a blessed
state when we find ourselves in his own garden, his own
bed-room, his own parlour? Then if, according to a good
custom, everything or something remains the same as when
he lived there, they are precious relics working miracles in
our imagination. That antique chair in Shakespear’s house!(4)
A man cannot sit in it five minutes without fancying his
modern dress is rapidly metamorphosing itself into ruff,
jerkin, doublet, and hose; and in this visionary attire, how
easy to persuade oneself that Shakespear “has just stepped
out, and will be back again immediately!”(5) As for his tomb,
telling me in very plain prose that he is certainly dead and
buried, I look upon it as an insolent piece of matter-of-fact.
A poet can have no grave, except in the eyes of those he
personally loved; and if they must rear him a monument, let
it be an evergreen bower,—it will last their time, and is a
more graceful and a more appropriate memorial than their
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and want to know which he liked best. One of his houses
is in the hands of a man worthy to be its owner;—I
wonder why I did no more than peep in at a window. A
visit to Burns’ cottage(8) should not be missed. Go and be
surrounded by the scenes of his youth, his joy, his hope,
when his days were glorious as his imagination. And that
part of Ayrshire(9) is so beautiful! Go, I say, and be like one
of his own poems, “with pleasance of the breathing fields
yfed.”(10) The worst is, the cottage is not in its original simple
state, being altered and enlarged for the accommodation of
visitors. Still there is a charm about it; for it was there,
as Keats(11) expresses it in one of his unpublished sonnets,
written under the very roof,—
“Where thou didst dream alone on budded bays,
Happy, and thoughtless of thy day of doom!”(12)
his wretchedness, his despair. I do not exactly understand
such a taste; it seems very Presbyterian.(14) Owing to this
want of taste for the miserable, I never went into Collins’
How melancholy it looks! There seems contagion in its very
walls and window sashes. Often have I stood before it, and
before Flaxman’s monument to his memory,(17) with as little desire
to pass the threshold, as to enter his grave. The statu quo po-
sition of all sorts of furniture in Garrick’s house at Hampton
Court(18) is too much for Garrick; besides, it is in obedience
to his last Will and Testament. Dr. Johnson’s(19) bed-room in
Thrale’s villa at Streatham(20) was worth seeing, till an auction
spoiled it. The bow window looked into the garden; the paper
and curtains, at his own request, were of a gay pattern, for
the Doctor could not bear any addition to his own gloom;
and there were the two desks, fixtures on each side of the
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window, on which he wrote his “Lives of the Poets.”(21) As
extremes are sure to meet, it is quite a natural transition
from the “great Moralist,”(22) who left the world’s morals as he
found them, to the Visionary, as he is called, who really “did
humbly wrote “The False Alarm,”(25) and “Taxation no Ty-
rather to earn a hard livelihood as a copier of music, than
receive a favour either from a Louis or a George.(28) Come
with me, reader, to Les Charmettes.(29)
There are many other houses where Rousseau lived, which
his admirers may visit as they please, but give me this, and
this alone, for here only was he happy. Among these grand
mountains, in this beautiful valley, he passed that period of
his life, when, generally speaking, the character is stamped
for ever. This was his school. As for the extraordinary
finish to his education, which Madame de Warens(30) was pleased
to bestow, that is neither your affair nor mine; nor do I per-
ceive the place is a jot the worse for it. But it was wrong!
Grant it was so; yet are we to consider those six previous
years he lived under her roof as nothing? “Then is Bohemia
nothing!”(31) Let the praise that is justly her due be freely
allowed, especially as, in her after life, neither sex can offer
an apology for her conduct. Her previous history says much
in her favour. She was young, handsome, and accomplished,
beloved by a host of friends, and enjoying an ample fortune,
which she used nobly. Yet friends, fortune, and country,
she relinquished for conscience’ sake, and retired to Savoy(32)
on a precarious stipend from the King of Sardinia.(33) It was
then that Rousseau, at the age of sixteen, destitute of every
thing, came recommended to her protection. She received
him into her house, clothed him, supplied him with all the
means in her power to obtain masters for the cultivation of his
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mind, constantly interested herself in his behalf, and this,
for six years, before those familiarities commenced which
have given so much offence. He calls her “the best of
women.”(34) Truly she was so to him; and though we may
smile at those passages in his Confessions, where he endea-
vours to persuade us she was never in the wrong, still we
must confess they do honour to his heart.
About a mile from Chambery, up the side of the hill to
the south of the town, and through a shady and winding
lane, you arrive at Les Charmettes. The lane is delightful;
with something like an English hedge on one side, and a
small tumbling brook on the other; and you walk under the
boughs of the walnut, the chesnut, the vine, the fig, and the
acacia. A little, ragged, bright-eyed boy stared up full in
my face, and cried out, “Ah, Monsieur, I know where you
are going!—to Jean Jaques?” Then jumping before me to
lead the way, suddenly he turned round and again accosted
me with—“Was not that Jean Jaques a very famous man?”
This was the only tribute I heard paid to the fame of the
philosopher in Savoy. It was spoken by a poor and reckless
urchin; others were too prudent to hint their opinions be-
fore a stranger. Possibly they were aware that Britain had
had not that ancient appearance I expected. It is at present
uninhabited. There is an inscription on a stone placed in
the wall, containing some very neat verses, saying just
enough on both sides of the question.*
* This inscription, or rather three-fourths of it, is on his house in the Ile
de St. Pierre.(38) It is the complimentary part which is omitted; and, in lieu
of it, we have a paltry common-place exclamation. The lines have been
attributed to Madame de Franqueville.(39) In the garden of the Hermitage at
complaining mood, and not good of their kind.
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Réduit, par Jean Jaques(42) habité,
Tu me rapelles son génie,
Sa solitude, sa fierté,
Et ses malheurs, et sa folie:
A(43) la gloire, à la vérité,
Il osa consacrer sa vie,
Et fut toujours persécuté
Ou par lui-même, ou par l’envie.(44)
Why is not the seditious stone torn from its home, and sent
to some House of Correction? No; there it stands by con-
sent of the legitimate authorities; and our loving subjects
con it by heart, and then run to catch a peep at the backs of
his works through that glass case in the library at Cham-
bery, where they are so fearfully placed under lock and key:
what an edifying contradiction for these our loving subjects!
However, I hate politics when something better is at hand,
and, thanks to the old woman with the key of the door, I
can now enter the house. In the dining-room are the por-
traits of Rousseau and Madame de Warens, with their ages
ludicrously reversed; she in the first bloom of youth, and
he, an old man in a wig, with a face intended to express a
staid maturity of thought. As you go up stairs, you see the
little chapel with its altar, for which the poor Baroness paid
so dearly. Both above and below some remnants of its
former furniture are shewn, among which is a truckle-bed,
said to have belonged to Jean Jaques. So it was here he
passed his happiest days! Here he would lay his music
aside to pursue his favourite study of botany upon the hills;
or close his books, and ramble abroad to gaze upon the face
of nature, in her loveliest and grandest aspect. Often have
his young feet speeded across the lane to the green on the
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other side,—there, in the orchard—to look upon the Alps.
I would have given a Louis(46) for permission to read, on that
very spot, ten pages of any one of his volumes. But my
money could not buy that pleasure. Alas! it is too true,—
any ten of his pages are worth more than any Louis.
It is certain that had not Rousseau given us his Confes-
sions, his fame would have been greater, as his character
would have been more respected. If we knew no more of
him than of one of his contemporaries, how readily the apo-
logy of “we are however unacquainted with all the particu-
lars,” would run at the heels of every imputed fault; and
where there was a doubt, the most malignant biographer
must have hesitated. In revealing the whole truth, he
trusted to the sympathy of mankind, forgetting or not be-
lieving two truths respecting other men: 1st. That few
would sympathise with those delinquencies, which they,
either from circumstances or education, are never tempted
to commit: and 2d. That others who had committed them,
would be very apt to pretend they had not, and owe him a
grudge for touching their consciences. He has destroyed
the charm that hovers over genius by this stripping of his
humanity; at least, to me: for he has, doubtless, admirers
who think otherwise. We see him among the common
crowd of mortals, sometimes better and sometimes worse,
but always in the crowd. Were the secret workings of the
hearts of all great men disclosed, the lesson might be use-
ful; but our veneration would be decreased in proportion as
we saw their nature descend to our level. We would wil-
lingly believe that astonishing minds cannot be connected
with vulgar weaknesses. The Confessions ought to make
us more fearful of ourselves, and more charitable to others.
When they have a contrary effect, the reader alone is to
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blame. Once allow them to be the true picture of a human
being (which is rarely called in question) and it is folly or
hypocrisy that exclaims—“I am contaminated!” On the
other hand, there are many who contend he wrote with too
great a severity against himself, and insist on twisting every
thing into some crooked virtue. This, again, does injury,
since it provokes the opposite party to dwell upon his vices,
without a word of his remorse, and without balancing the
good against the evil. Friends and enemies have had their
best and worst of him. Unfortunately, either side may be
taken without fear of being accused of wilful misrepresenta-
tion. Perhaps there never was an author whom it was so
difficult to love or to hate by halves. My visit to Les Char-
mettes warmed my heart to his memory, and I would fain,
if possible, steer clear between the two extremes; and the
late work of M. de Musset, with its store of facts and
anecdotes, comes aptly to my assistance.(47)
Rousseau describes himself, when a child, “timid and
yielding in his general conduct, but fiery, proud, uncon-
querable in his passions;” and, when advanced in life, he
said, “I am constitutionally bold and of a timid character.”(48)
His life is a running comment upon these two texts; with
this exception, that sometimes he “could screw his cou-
rage to the sticking-place”(49) even to magnanimity. That
timid and yielding disposition, together with his passions,
were constantly leading him into errors, and, in his strug-
gles to extricate himself, he would often plunge in the
deeper. Nature intended him for a hero, but the world
made him a coward. Thus, while he insisted that every man
ought to earn his own livelihood, he was persuaded to ac-
cept a pension from the English Government. It is true he
soon perceived his mistake. “What now?” said he, “Am I
hushed to silence, or am I to be a flatterer?” Instantly he
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threw aside the royal pension, and sat in a corner to eat his
crust. At any rate he had the courage to recede. The
arrears ran on, but no consideration could ever induce him
to touch a penny of them. In the same way, while he
contended that friends should be on the same footing, he
rejected presents because he was too poor to make a return;
yet received favours amounting in value to more than any
direct present offered him. The fact is, they came accom-
panied with such kind expressions, and such benevolent
countenances, that he had not the heart to refuse. But
what was the consequence? No sooner was he left to his
own reflections, than he perceived they were, no matter
whether intentional or not, nothing less than cajoling him
out of his former professions; and therefore these mistaken
acts of friendship generally ended in a quarrel. Call it
pride, or what you will, still it was acting up to his prin-
ciples. It does not deserve the name of inconsistency; it
is consistency at war with odds, and eventually obtaining
the victory. That he was eccentric is undoubted, not only
in his opinions but in his dress, which was thought the
greater offence of the two, when a gold-laced coat was the
acme of gentlemanly existence; though surely eccentricity
is not a-kin to the deadly sins. Like all enthusiasts, when
he attempted to put his theories into practice, he became
ridiculous; and unlike most enthusiasts, there is a practical
good to be found in all his theories. Had he never at-
tempted to set an example, his doctrine might have been
more followed. What had an Armenian cloak, and many
other extravagances, to do with the preceptor of Emilius?(50)
Unhappily at that time, in his latter days, his whole con-
duct betokened a derangement of intellect. Towards the
conclusion of his Confessions, I think, there is evidence of
this infirmity. If that is doubtful, read his last work.—
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“The Walks of a Solitary Man,”(51)—which more properly
ought to be translated “The Wanderings.” Persecution
had done little, for he was a stout sufferer; but the being
betrayed by men on whom he relied as friends, was a
shock from which he never recovered; acting, as it pro-
bably did, on some malformation or disorganisation of
the brain, since it appears, by his own account, he was
always subject to a mysterious affection of the head. From
that time he suspected every one except Theresa,(52) who was
the only one to be suspected, till the discovery of her trea-
chery drove him to desperation. In this manner was his old
age haunted and tormented, even to death.
His worst actions, and the only bad ones of any magni-
tude, were the theft of the ribbon, followed by the accusation
against his innocent fellow-servant, and the sending his
children to the Foundling Hospital.(53) For the first, some
apology may be framed: there was certainly no premedi-
tated cruelty against the girl, since it arose from his sud-
denly acting from the impulse of a timid disposition—a fault
he was often guilty of in instances of less moment; nor has
he nor any one sufficiently dwelt upon his extreme youth
when it was committed. Nothing, however, can be said to
palliate the crime of deserting his offspring. The excuses
which passed through his mind at the time were precisely
the same as are made use of by all unnatural fathers when
they abandon their natural children. But there is this dif-
ference between him and many others: he bitterly wept
over his error; his anguish of heart was never at rest; and if
ever penitence could make mankind forgive, he ought to be
forgiven. Let the crime be execrated as you will. It is an
honest curse; but let it not touch Rousseau. Our Found-
ling Hospital, it is said, is stocked with the children of the
rich. How many thousands are sent to the parish! In
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some parishes, I have heard the frightful calculation is, that
only one in eleven survives its infancy. There is no coun-
try in the world so infamous for this crime as England. Yes;
let us curse it, and shut our hands and hearts against those
who have been guilty of it, and who can dare to mention it,
or hear it mentioned, without remorse. Rousseau was not
one of those.
Now for a pleasanter task. We will talk of his virtues,—
“close at the heels of his vices.”(54) As a literary man he had
no envy. While attacked and abused on all sides, he never
forgot his own honour and dignity. Voltaire,(55) his great rival,
in his histories, his romances, and his poems, was ever
aiming a blow at the Citizen of Geneva, either turning his
opinions or his person into ridicule. Rousseau always
spoke of his talents with respect, and would not be tempted
to retaliate. On the contrary, when a subscription was on
foot for a statue to Voltaire during his life, Rousseau cheer-
fully added his name; which unluckily threw “Philoso-
phy’s Harlequin”(56) into violent antics and contortions; and
there was no peace in Paris till the offensive name was
erased from the list. In private life, he was never heard to
speak ill of another behind his back. Deception of any
kind was his utter abhorrence. When Madame D’Epinay(57)
was in her angriest mood at him, she could not forbear
paying the compliment of saying—“If he gives you his
word, I believe he may be relied on.”(58) It is strange, if his
writings were insincere, that nothing like insincerity could
be discovered in his conversation. When he believed him-
self treated with duplicity, his indignation was indeed wild
and inexorable; nothing offended him so much. In his ge-
neral manners he was indulgent, gentle, and unassuming.
No one quitted his company with a painful sense of infe-
riority. His smile is represented as having been expressive
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of great sweetness. While he toiled hard to earn a subsist-
ence, observing the strictest economy down to the minutest
articles, dividing his daily modicum of small wine into equal
portions for dinner and supper, and compelled to forego the
pleasure of a friend at his table because it was too scantily
supplied, this man—this calumniated Rousseau—was sup-
porting an aged aunt in Switzerland. Year after year, for a
long series of years, the remittances never failed. A gentle-
man, travelling in her neighbourhood, heard of the circum-
stance and called upon her. “What, Sir,”—these were her
words,—“and have you seen my Nephew? Is it indeed true
that he has no religion? Our Clergymen tell me he is an
impious man. But how can that be? It is through his kind-
ness that I am now alive. Poor old woman as I am, above
eighty years old, without him I should die, alone and not a
soul near me, in a garret, of cold and hunger.” When this
was repeated to Rousseau,—“It is a debt,” said he; “she
took charge of me when an orphan.” Thanks, M. de Musset,
for this anecdote! You have planted an imperishable flower
in his laurel. It is a glorious burst of sunshine after all the
thunder we have heard against his name.
I sat down to write of Rousseau in his character as a man,
not as an author. Yet as some of his opinions, the moral
more than the religious, so startling to the prejudices of the
world, have brought much odium upon his memory, I am
willing to step forward in their defence. Nor can I, as a
man myself, omit saying something of his greatest work, to
which we are all so much indebted.
Had he not deserted his children, in all probability we
should never have seen his “Emile.” It appears as if, not
able to endure the pain of brooding over his fault, he had
appealed to his imagination for relief; and there, once more
a father, he cherished and tutored these his “dream-children”
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so differently from others, that, shocked at the dissimilarity,
he addressed his system to parents, calling upon them to
act as nature not as fashion bade them. At the commence-
ment of Emilius is a passage in allusion to his own case,
which is extremely pathetic. After exhorting fathers to
their duty, he says—“Neither poverty, nor labour, nor res-
pect for the world, can excuse us from maintaining our
children, and bringing them up ourselves. You may believe
me, reader, that what I say is true. Should a person of real
sensibility neglect this duty, I may venture to predict he will
long bewail his mistake, and nothing can ever console him.”(59) He
has been laughed at for inculcating a duty where he himself
was the greatest delinquent. How blind! Can any of these
laughers imagine a more heroic action than a man proclaim-
ing his crime, not idly, but to warn his fellow-creatures
against so miserable an error? Let this production, together
with his sorrows, be received as an expiation. Its utility is
practically acknowledged by all parties, however the “Con-
fessions of the Curate of Savoy,”(60) and some other parts, may
be hated by those who insist on being of a contrary creed.
As soon as it appeared, a host of theologians started up, de-
nouncing vengeance against its author, hunting him from
place to place; and at Geneva, his own Geneva, it was burnt
by the common hangman.(61) In this persecution the women
added no small share of irritation; for they would read the
volumes, extolled Rousseau, took their infants to their
bosoms, stripped off the horrid swathing clothes, treated
them like reasoning beings till they became reason-
able, and taught them love instead of fear. After a foolish
struggle the women triumphed, as they always do, over the
dogmatisms of men,—not to mention priests, who are the
first to yield to such an opposition. What individuals under
thirty or forty can say they may not be beholden to Rous-
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seau? Those who have straight backs, straight limbs, un-
pinched heads, health, and sound minds, ought in gratitude,
next to God and the care of their parents, to thank Jean
Jacques. Here in Italy (as far as I have seen, where the
light heath yet shows) swathes and a score of barbarous
customs are still in use; and the consequence is, there are
many dwarfs and a wretched crowd of deformed and help-
less creatures. On the contrary, in France and in England
these instances are rare. That Rousseau in his education of
Emilius puts forth many untenable paradoxes is certain; the
wonder is there are no more. At the time he wrote, Nature
was quite a theory, and a very puzzling one. How difficult it
must have been to give a tolerable guess at what kind of an
animal a little boy might turn out, when released from his cum-
brous and ridiculous dress, and in the hands of a sensible tutor.
Imagine him with bag-wig and sword, embroidered coat and
waistcoat, knee-breeches and a cocked-hat; and pursued all
day long by a coaxing and cursing nurse, with a rattle in
one hand and a rod in the other. Look at Hogarth’s(62) prints,
or, if you suspect his full-dressed puppets of caricature,
look at the family pictures of the last century. Yet it was
out of one of these monstrous abortions of folly and finery
that he produced that beautiful picture of Emilius at the
end of the second book. No one was more aware of the
imperfections in his system than himself. He was content
to be right in the main. When a gentleman told him he
was bringing up his son like another Emilius, the answer he
received was—“Then, Sir, you do wrong.” One of the
most distinguishing features between Voltaire and Rousseau
is, that the former was a destroyer and nothing else; while
the latter, though he pulled down also, was still careful to
build up. We may regard this work as a goodly and
graceful piece of architecture, though some of the minor
Z
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parts are a little out of proportion. To run this old meta-
phor out of breath, I would say it is silly to condemn the
whole fabric because a window may have a false position,
and a chimney-pot a false conclusion; or that the cornice
does not run in a true syllogism; or that the pilasters may
cry out with King Lear, “Ha! here’s three of us are sophis-
ticated!”(63) The man who can point out these defects can
amend them. Let him do so, and be thankful.
The heaviest charge against Rousseau’s writings is, that
they contain such descriptions as none but the most gross
mind could suggest. This word gross is often most irreve-
rently misapplied. A Bishop, who bids us fix our affections
solely on the world to come, will call all sublunary things
gross, except the emoluments of his See and his belly.
Grossness is too comprehensive, and must be reduced to its
simple signification,—pleasure without sentiment. Rous-
seau is never guilty of inculcating that in any of his works.
He inveighs with more than pulpit eloquence against it. I
grant he was voluptuous, in the best sense, which means no
more than a desire to be loved by all that is good and beau-
tiful. And this desire was so sublimated in his breast, that
every woman became a cruel disappointment to him. From
youth to age he went sighing through the world, outdoing
the jest of Diogenes and his lanthorn,(64) seeking some unat-
tainable creature—a Julia, a Clara, or a Sophia(65)—and meet-
ing with none but D’Epinays and D’Houpetots.(66) Madame
D’Houpetot indeed was something; but then M. Saint-Lan-
could not be satisfied with thinking a woman was an angel,
—no, she must needs be an angel while he thought her a
woman. Like his own Pygmalion,(69) he was always forming
faultless Galateas,(70) while his imagination, like a deity, ani-
mated them to his wishes. Then his enjoyment was to
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describe their charms, with all the voluptuousness and
all the delicacy of a lover.* “The only actual difference
between the fabulous solitary and the real one was, un-
fortunately, that Pygmalion seems to have been willing
enough to be contented, had he found a mistress that
deserved him; whereas Rousseau, when he was really be-
loved, and even thought himself so, was sure to be made
the ruin of his own comfort, partly by a distrustful morbi-
dity of temperament, and partly perhaps by a fastidious
metaphysical subtlety, which turned his eye with a painful
sharpness upon the defects instead of humanities of his
fellow creatures, and made the individual answer for the
whole mass.”(71) We may laugh at such a man, or we may pity
him, but it is impossible to call him a libertine,(72) Surely he
has been confounded with his namesake Jean Baptiste Rous-
seau,(73) the writer of the best French lyrics, the most licentious
epigrams, and the most pious psalms. Had our Rousseau
been the most gallant of rovers, yet had Theresa been his
true and lawful wife, he would have passed for a moderate
sort of a man and the best of husbands. The world is a
spoiled child, will have its own way, and likes those who
dandle and cocker it better than its benefactors. But his
writings! His “Julie, ou la nouvelle Heloise!” what are we
to say to that?
Truly, our grave-heads tell us this same novel of the New
Eloisa is of so immoral a tendency, that it ought never to be
put into the hands of any one younger than themselves. “’Tis
not good;” quoth Dame Quickly,(74) “that children should
know any wickedness: old folks, you know, have discretion,
as they say, and know the world.”(75) On the other hand,
Anna Seward,(76) like a sensible maiden, recommends it should
* This passage ought to have been mine. “Plague take those who anti-
be read by all young men. The reason she gives is to this
effect, for l have forgotten the precise words: that, beyond any
other work, it proves that the most ardent love, far from
being diminished or chilled by the union of sentiment, is
the more glowing as well as the more exalted; and therefore
it may be the means of weaning the gay men of the town
from heartless pleasures. This is good; and I am glad a
woman, as times and opinions go, had the courage to write
it. Quarrel not with voluptuousness, for he who has none of
it will have something infinitely worse. But here I see a
whole bench of grave-heads shake fearfully at this doctrine,
thinking themselves in no degree the worse for having, in
their day, been guilty of a little heartlessness. There is
much vulgar talk against this novel, much cant, like a dis-
tillation from the last Ultra review; and it may be divided
(Quarterly) into short-sightedness, misrepresentation, impu-
dence, and hypocrisy. St. Preux is not, in the ordinary
sense of the word, the seducer of his pupil. Truth is, he
and Julia very unintentionally seduce one another. Rather
than blame them, you must blame Nature for having formed
two congenial souls that could not be happy apart. The
fault then must lie in the factitious modes of society, which
form what is mistermed “its well being,” and which forbade
the marriage of these two loving hearts; as if it were pre-
posterous for a man of no family to wed the daughter of a
Baron, however enormous his perriwig, or however extraor-
dinary his gold-headed cane. Rousseau was deeply im-
pressed with the cruelty exercised against those who “love
not wisely but too well.”(79) He would not let virtue die, as
we kill horses, because she had unluckily made a false step,
and broken her leg. He dared to assert,—which was much in
his time, and nearly as much in ours,—that what is always
stigmatized as impure, is sometimes pure, and that nothing
[Page 343]
[Page 343]
but depravity could be the ruin of any one. Julia’s affection
for St. Preux was perhaps as holy (with reverence be it
spoken) as any matrimony could make it; and it is scarcely
possible to read their history without imagining she was di-
vorced, not from a lover, but from a first husband. This
however cannot be said to furnish a bad example, for both
of them are unhappy enough, if that will make our virtuous
critics happy. She, amidst the cherishing fondness of a
crowd of friends, and beloved by her husband, still looks
tearfully back to the first hour of her love, and that without
a wish it should return; and he is for ever wretched. Be
it observed, and this I think very moral, that the man is
here more severely punished than the woman, which still
remains a novelty, though it ought to be otherwise. And I
must notice another point of morality: we are here taught
how a Christian and an Atheist may live in harmony and
peace together, aye, even as man and wife;—surely this is
doing the bitter world some service. Besides, in Clara and
Julia, we meet with a fine generous compliment to the women,
which doubtless they deserve, though it is not often paid
them,—that they can love the same man and love one ano-
ther at the same time. But the greatest charm in the work
is the constant endeavour of the author to discover “a soul
of goodness in things evil;”(80) as if taught this lesson by his
favourites the bees, that can extract honey from poisonous
flowers. A few more such books, and the race of misan-
thropes would be at end. Nor has he any faith in such
Fathom,(84) and the rest of those bugbears of iniquity, who are
every now and then called upon to perform a little gratui-
tous villany, for the sake of heightening the interest. The
only thing I dislike is, that St. Preux, towards the end, be-
comes a mere puppet; and that Julia arrives at too high a
[Page 344]
[Page 344]
pitch of female excellence. She is too wonderful, too up-
right, too buckramed, too theatrical. I get weary of her,
and fall in love with Clara. The hussey grows saucy about
her acquirements and household economy. I long to hear
she has committed another slip; or that one of her servants
has given her warning for speaking crossly before breakfast.
Why does not she tear her best gown, or tread her shoes
down at heel? Is it possible she never fails in metaphy-
sics and the best of rice puddings? Give me something,
some little circumstance to her discredit, that I may get rid
of her cloying perfections. Quick—hurry over the leaves,
and let us come in at the death. Julia’s death! Ah! there
we love her once more. We fear to rustle the page as we
read of all the minute circumstances attending the last
hours of one so young, so beautiful, so beloved. “See!”
says the story of Addison,(85) “in what peace a Christian can
die!”(86) And how? Even no more than our criminals on the
scaffold. But the Christian Julia not only has peace; she
has so pure a sense of gratitude to God, that she can be
cheerful to the last. “Death,” she says, “is of itself suffi-
ciently painful! Why must it be rendered hideous? The
care which others throw away in endeavouring to prolong
their lives, I will employ in enjoying mine to the last
moment. Shall I make a hospital of my apartment, a scene
of disgust and trouble, when my last care ought to be to
assemble in it all those who are most dear to me?”(87) So the
curtains are gracefully looped back; she orders fresh flowers
to be placed on the chimney-piece; her friends and chil-
dren dine and sup at her bed-side; while she, “just as in
full health, calm and resigned, talked with the same good-
sense and the same spirit; putting on, now and then, an air
Orthodox people,—I mean people of all sorts of ortho-
doxies (except mine) are fond of attributing bad exits to
the heterodox,—nay, even of throwing their death-beds at
the heads of one another. I wish they would be content
with copying the smooth decency of departures like this,
and let their animosities die as well.
[1] “Les Charmettes and Rousseau”, by Charles Armitage Brown (1787-1842). Edited by Gilberta Golinelli.
[2] Loreto, town in central Italy, on the Musone River near the Adriatic coast. This place is renowned for the Santa Casa (Holy House of the Virgin), an important pilgrimage site.
[3] John Keats, “Lines Written in the Highland’s after a Visit to Burns’s Country” (1818), l. 12.
[4] Reference to the courting chair belonging to William Shakespeare (1564-1616) and Anne Hathaway, according to an account by the English engraver Samuel Ireland.
[5] Unidentified quotation.
[6] John Milton (1608-74), English poet, pamphleteer, and historian. Milton’s Paradise Lost (1688) is often seen as one of the greatest epic poems in English Literature.
[7] Milton lived in several different places throughout his life, including London, Cambridge, Paris, Florence, Rome.
[8] Robert Burns (1759-96), British poet, remembered for his songs and lyrics in English and Scots and also for his amours and his overt rebellion against orthodox religion and morality. The reference is to his first home in Alloway.
[9] Ayrshire, historic county, southwestern Scotland. The county is named after Ayr, its historic county town.
[10] Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene (1590), Canto III, Stanza 38, l. 2.
[11] John Keats (1795-1821), one of the most representative poets of the English Romantic movement. In his works, Keats tried to merge a vivid imagery, the sensuous appeal and elements of Classicism.
[12] John Keats, “This Mortal Body of a Thousand Days” (1818), ll. 3-4.
[13] Robert Burns’s house in Dumfries, Scotland. Here, the author lived the last three years of his life until his death in 1796. Over the years it has attracted many famous visitors including the poets Wordsworth, Coleridge and Keats.
[14] Presbyterian, form of church government which originated during the seventeenth-century Protestant Reformation. Plain in style and historically referred to as the “meeting house”, it reflects its function of a place where people meet to worship.
[15] House of William Collins (1721-59), pre-Romantic English poet, in Chichester.
[16] Chichester Cathedral in the city of Chichester, Sussex, southern England.
[17] Monument to the memory of William Collins in Chichester Cathedral by sculptor and designer John Flaxman (1755-1826).
[18] David Garrick (1717-79), English actor, theatre manager and poet. The reference is to his country house in Hampton Court Road, Hampton.
[19] Samuel Johnson (1709-84), English critic, biographer, essayist, poet, and lexicographer. He is considered as one of the greatest figures of eighteenth-century life and letters and one of the first Shakespearean critics and editors.
[20] Thrale’s House, belonging to the British politician and entrepreneur Henry Thrale (1724/1730?-81), located south of Tooting Bec Road in Streatham Park. Made famous by the writings of Samuel Johnson, himself a frequent visitor.
[21] Samuel Johnson, The Lives of the Poets (1779), also known as Prefaces, Biographical and Critical, to the Works of the English Poets.
[22] Samuel Johnson’s literary reputation was largely built upon his work as a moralist. William Mudford, A Critical Enquiry Into the Moral Writings of Dr. Samuel Johnson (1802) further consolidated this reputation.
[23] William Shakespeare, Othello, V.ii.337. All references from Shakespeare are taken from the Arden Edition, third series.
[24] Samuel Johnson received a royal pension of 300 pounds a year in recognition of his literary achievements.
[25] The False Alarm (1770), political pamphlet by Samuel Johnson in which the author expresses his endorsement for the House of Commons’ resolution not to readmit John Wilkes, previous member of Parliament found guilty of libel. The pamphlet aimed at ridiculing those who believed this case would lead to a constitutional crisis.
[26] Taxation No Tyranny (1775), Samuel Johnson’s longest tract. The title reflects his stance against the American Continental Congress, which, in 1774, adopted resolutions opposing what they viewed as oppressive taxation by England, particularly given that the colonies lacked representation in Parliament. According to Johnson, the colonists were not denied representation but had rather decided to leave the country in which they had the right to vote. The author also observes that colonists are supposed to support their mother country.
[27] Reference to Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-78), Swiss-born philosopher, writer, and political theorist, who was born in Geneve. His treaties and other literary works served as source of inspiration both for those fighting for the French Revolution and for the Romantic generation. Among his most significant works: A Discourse on the Origins of Inequality (Discours sur l’origine et les fondements de l’inégalité parmi les hommes) (1755), The Social Contract (Du Contrat Social) (1762), Emile; or, On Education (Émile; ou, de l’éducation) (1762), and The Confessions (Les Confessions) (1782-89).
[28] Unlike Samuel Johnson, Rousseau never received a royal pension. Louis and George were the French and English sovereigns at the time: Louis XIV (1638-1715, reigned 1643-1715) and George III (1738-1820, reigned 1760–1820).
[29] Les Charmettes, country house near Chambéry, southeastern France, was Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Madame de Warens’s house.
[30] Louise-Éléanore de la Tour du Pil, baroness de Warens (1700-62), aristocrat who had a romantic liaison with Rousseau between 1728 and 1742.
[31] William Shakespeare, The Winter’s Tale, I.ii.292.
[32] Savoy, historical region in southeastern France.
[33] Victor Amadeus II (1666-1732), duke of Savoy (1675-1713). Thanks to his diplomatic skills, he managed to become the first king of Sardinia-Piedmont (1720-30) and king of Sicily (1713-20).
[34] Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Confessions (1782-89), bk. 7:374.
[35] John Castle, also known as Castles, agent provocateur and government spy, acquitted on a charge of treason in 1817.
[36] William J. Oliver (1774?-1827), police informer and agent provocateur after the Napoleonic Wars.
[37] George Edwards, supposed government spy and agent provocateur.
[38] Peninsula in Lake Biel, Bern, Switzerland.
[39] Madame de Franqueville, French noblewoman.
[40] Hermitage, house in Montmorency, Île-de-France. The years Rousseau spent here were his most productive ones from a literary point of view.
[41] The New Eloise (1761), novel by Rousseau.
[42] Misspelling of Jacques.
[43] Misspelling of À.
[44] Trans. “Place inhabited by Jean Jacques, | You remind me of his genius, | His loneliness, his pride, | And his misfortunes, and his madness: | To glory, to truth, | He dared to devote his life, | and was always persecuted | Or by himself, or by desire.”
[45] French for “To glory, to truth!”.
[46] Louis, gold coin circulating in France before the French Revolution (1789).
[47] Anecdotes inédites, pour faire suite aux Mémoires de Mme d’Épinai, précédées de l’examen de ces mémoires (1818) by Victor Donatien de Musset-Pathay. De Musset (1768-1832), French writer and bureaucrat.
[48] “timid and… timid character.”: Both quotations are from Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Confessions (1782-89).
[49] William Shakespeare, Macbeth, I.vii.61.
[50] One of the characters in Rousseau’s Emile, or on Education (1762).
[51] The Reveries of the Solitary Walker (1782) is the last and unfinished work by Rousseau. The book combines autobiographical anecdotes, descriptions of sights, and other insights regarding education and political philosophy.
[52] Thérèse Levasseur, partner and then wife of Rousseau.
[53] The five children of Rousseau and Thérèse were left to the Paris Foundling Hospital, an institution meant for the reception of abandoned or exposed children.
[54] William Shakespeare, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, III.i.314.
[55] Voltaire (1694-1778), French writer, famous for his writings against tyranny, bigotry and cruelty. His most important works include the fictitious Philosophical Letters (Lettres philosophiques) (1734) and the novel Candide (1759).
[56] According to Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, “Essai sur J. J. Rousseau”, Oeuvres completes de Jacques-Henri-Bernardin de Saint-Pierre (1818), bk. 12:95, Rousseau defined Voltaire as “Philosophy’s Harlequin”.
[57] Louise d’Épinay (1726-83), prominent figure in eighteenth-century French literary circles. Despite her extensive literary production, she is renowned for her connection to some important French intellectuals of her age, including Denis Diderot.
[58] Louise d’Épinay, Mémoires de Madame d’Epinay (1876), 2:491.
[59] Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile (1762), bk. I.
[60] Fourth chapter of Rousseau’s Emile.
[61] The fourth chapter of Emile was condemned by the Sorbonne. The book was therefore banned in Paris and Geneva and was burned in public in 1762.
[62] William Hogarth (1697-1764), one of the most prominent English artists of the eighteenth century, well-known for his satirical engravings and paintings.
[63] William Shakespeare, King Lear, III.iv.103-04.
[64] Diogenes Laërtius, Greek philosopher of the third century BCE. It was said that he wandered with a lantern in his hands, and whenever he was asked the reason why, he replied that he was searching for a man that could live a happy and authentic life but could not find him anywhere.
[65] Julia (Julie) and Clara (Claire) are two characters in Rousseau’s The New Eloise. Sophie is a character in Emile.
[66] Possible reference to Sophie d’Houdetot (1730-1813), noblewoman with whom Rousseau had a passionate and platonic relationship.
[67] Jean François de Saint-Lambert (1716-1803), French poet, philosopher and military officer that Sophie d’Houdetot chose over Rousseau.
[68] Saint-Preux, central character in Rousseau’s The New Eloise.
[69] In Greek mythology, Pygmalion was the sculptor who fell in love with a female statue he himself had shaped.
[70] Galatea, in some versions of the Pygmalion story, is the name of Pygmalion ivory statue.
[71] Leigh Hunt, The Indicator, No. XXXI (1820), 241-42.
[72] Mispunctuation: comma erroneously placed instead of full stop.
[73] Jean-Baptiste Rousseau (1671-1741), French dramatist and poet, gained great popularity within the Parisian society of his age.
[74] Mistress Quickly is a character who appears in four Shakespeare’s plays: I Henry IV, II Henry IV, Henry V and The Merry Wives of Windsor.
[75] William Shakespeare, The Merry Wives of Windsor, II.ii.120-23.
[76] Anna Seward (1742-1809), English poet, literary critic, and writer, had connections with many intellectuals of her age, including Samuel Johnson, Erasmus Darwin, George Romney, Helen Maria Williams, Hester Lynch Piozzi, Robert Southey and Walter Scott. Her poems “Elegy on Captain Cook” (1780) and “Monody on Major André” (1781) made her well-known both in Europe and America.
[77] Leigh Hunt, The Indicator, No. XXXII (1820), 249. Hunt is reporting the Latin saying “Pereant qui ante nos nostra dixerunt”, often attributed to the Roman grammarian Aelius Donatus (4th century CE).
[78] The Indicator, periodical launched by Leigh Hunt on 13 October 1819. It would be published every Wednesday morning in the Strand by Joseph Appleyard (who worked for The Examiner). Each issue contained 8 pages dealing with different topics and mainly occupied by Hunt’s writing. Keats, Shelley, and Lamb partly contributed to The Indicator, until Hunt gave it up on 21 March 1821, after the publication of the seventy-sixth issue.
[79] William Shakespeare, Othello, V.ii.342.
[80] William Shakespeare, King Henry V, IV.i.4.
[81] Robert Lovelace, character in Samuel Richardson’s novel Clarissa (1747-48).
[82] Mr. Blifil, character in Henry Fielding’s novel Tom Jones (1749).
[83] Squire Thornhill, character in Oliver Goldsmith’s novel The Vicar of Wakefield (1766).
[84] Count Fathom, character in Tobias Smollett’s novel The Adventures of Ferdinand, Count Fathom (1753).
[85] Joseph Addison (1672-1719), English essayist, poet, and dramatist, was one of the main contributors to the periodicals The Tatler and The Spectator along with Richard Steele. His writing skills granted him important roles in the Whig government.
[86] These are supposedly Addison’s dying words to his stepson, Lord Warwick. See Edward Young, Conjectures on Original Composition, (1759), 102.
[87] Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Julie; ou, la Nouvelle Héloïse, (1761), vol. 2.
[88] Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Julie; ou, la Nouvelle Héloïse, (1761), vol. 2.
[89] Leigh Hunt and Charles Brown wanted “Les Charmettes” to be published under the pseudonym “Carluccio”, but the signature in the final version was “Carlone”.
Ultimo aggiornamento
01.09.2025