Returning to Paris, he resolved once more to adopt a literary career. He wrote articles on musical subjects for the Encyclopédie, and made sketches of operas, ballets, and divertissements, until one day, going to see his friend Diderot, imprisoned at the time in the castle of Vincennes, he happened to read as he walked along, in the Mercure de France, an advertisement offering a prize to the author of the best essay on this subject: “Has the progress of science and art tended to corrupt or to purify manners?” According to Diderot and his friends, it was he, the imprisoned philosopher critic, tale writer, and dramatist, who suggested to Rousseau that, instead of taking the commonplace[{284}] view of the matter, he would do well to maintain, as paradoxically as he pleased, that the development of art and science had exercised not a healthy but a baneful effect. Rousseau, however, maintained that the idea of treating the subject from the negative point of view originated with himself alone. “If ever anything,” he wrote long afterwards, “resembled a sudden inspiration, it was the movement that at once took place in my mind on reading the advertisement. Suddenly my intelligence was dazzled by a thousand lights. Crowds of ideas assailed me with a force and a confusion which caused me inexpressible trouble; my head was seized with a giddiness resembling intoxication.” Whoever suggested to Rousseau the idea of his essay, it was to him that the Academy of Dijon adjudged the prize. His paradoxes wounded many a writer, many a poet, many a would-be philosopher. But meanwhile all the literary and scientific society of Paris had been thrown by Rousseau’s arguments into a state of commotion.
JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU.
Rousseau, however, instead of profiting by the striking success he had achieved, resolved in the first place to put in practice the principles of simplicity and even asceticism which he had expounded in his treatise. At the time of the essay’s being published he occupied the lucrative post of cashier to M. de Franceuil, one of the Farmers General. But he now refused to have anything to do with finance, preferring to gain his bread by copying music. This resolution did but increase his reputation and cause his writings to be in greater demand than ever. Soon afterwards, in 1762, his opera, The Village Seer (Le devin du village), was represented at Fontainebleau with immense success. The king wished the author of the graceful pastoral to be presented to him, and a pension awaited him. But he turned his back on the seductions of fortune and resumed his copying. There were not wanting detractors, who saw in this fine spirit of independence simply the pride of Antisthenes visible through the holes in his coat.
In 1753 Rousseau published his “Letters on French Music” and his “Discourse on the Origin of Inequality.” Then he journeyed to Geneva, where he returned to Protestantism in order to recover the title of citizen, which in due time he lost once more, after the publication of “Emile.” Tired of the world, he now accepted an asylum which was offered to him by his friend, Madame d’Epinay, in the valley of Montmorency, where he wrote nearly the whole of his famous “Nouvelle Héloïse.” The work would doubtless have benefited by the omission of many a rhetorical phrase; but the passion for nature, the exalted delirium of the heart and the senses, the storms, the tears which it contained, were things so new that the whole generation allowed itself to be carried away with the transports of Rousseau. He had found inspiration for the book, it was said, in his unfortunate love for Madame d’Houdelot—a love which almost degenerated into a mental derangement and which commenced his series of misfortunes. Madame d’Epinay, who was then in relationship with Grimm, saw with no kindly eye the affection of Jean Jacques for another than she. Rousseau soon found his position so disagreeable that, breaking with Madame d’Epinay, he abruptly[{285}] quitted her house although it was the depth of winter. Hospitality was offered to him at Montlouis, near Montmorency, and there he wrote his “Letter to d’Alembert on Stage Plays,” a pamphlet which caused a considerable stir. Voltaire was then the king of the theatre; and to attack one was to attack the other. Voltaire was enraged, and could not keep within bounds. He insulted his adversary, who, however, did not reply in the same tone. This quarrel, which ended to the advantage of Rousseau, had the effect of diverting his mind for a moment; but very soon he became once more a prey to that morbid melancholy and suspicion which were to accompany him to his grave, and which rendered the remainder of his life painful to contemplate. He died in 1788 at Ermenonville, whither he had been invited on a country visit by M. de Girardin, at a time when old age, infirmities, and misery had already driven him to distraction.
MADAME D’EPINAY.
The eccentricities and weakness of his character, however, vanish in presence of his literary fame. Although his remains are not at Ermenonville, the place is often visited by strangers interested in Rousseau’s last days. M. Thiébaut de Berneaud, in his “Voyage à Ermenonville,” 1826, declares that when, eleven years earlier, in 1815, “the chief of one of the hostile armies arrived at Plessis-Belleville” and, examining his topographical map, found himself close to Ermenonville, he asked whether this was not the place where Jean Jacques Rousseau had breathed his last, and receiving an affirmative reply, declared that as long as there were Prussians in France Ermenonville should be exempt from war contributions. The unnamed warrior marched, says M. Thiébaut de Berneaud, towards the last abode of the sentimental philosopher, and, uncovering himself as he drew near, ordered his troops to treat Ermenonville, its inhabitants, and all that belonged to it, with respect—a command which was religiously observed.