When “Emile” appeared it shocked the theologians. The City ordered it to be burned by the official hangman. The Church said to him:—“You extol the excellence of the Gospel yet you destroy its dogmas. You paint the beauty of the virtues yet you snuff them out in the souls of your readers.” He was even condemned by Parliament to be imprisoned. The pious Jacob Vernet, Pastor Mouton and Pastor Vernes wrote him letters expressing their admiration of his talents but criticizing some of his views. After he published his “Lettres de la Montagne,” which caused a terrible hubbub, Vernes, Chapuis and Claparède publicly attacked him.
Voltaire wrote:—“Grand and edifying spectacle presented by the venerable Company of Pastors at Geneva! While the Government is burning Rousseau’s books, the clergy approves of them and finds itself very happy to be reduced to a natural religion which proves nothing and asks little.”
And those that stoned the prophets raise monuments to them. Calvin, whom Rousseau called “esprit dur et farouche,” has no monument, unless a street named after him may be considered as one; but Rousseau has a whole island with a big bronze statue on it and a street besides.
This is the substance of our breakfast-table conversation. When we had finished our coffee and rolls we started out for a long walk. Ruth, like a woman, wanted to look at the shops; Will and I would go hunting for Rousseau and Calvin.
For a long time a house in Geneva bore the inscription:—
ICI EST NE
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU
LE 28 JUIN
1712.
But that was a mistake. It is now known that he was born in his father’s house, Number 2, Grand’ Rue, and there he lived till 1719. Then he went to live at 73, Rue de Constance. His father, Isaac Rousseau, though of a family which had emigrated from Paris, where they had been booksellers, and had for two hundred years enjoyed a highly respectable position in the bourgeoisie of Geneva, was regarded as rather frivolous. Probably that was because he varied his trade of watch-making by giving dancing-lessons. Dancing in the city of Calvin, in spite of the illustrious example of King David before the Ark of the Tabernacle, was regarded with little favour. He engaged in a quarrel with the retired Captain Goutier and they fought a duel contrary to the law. Goutier was wounded. On investigation Isaac was found guilty and condemned to beg pardon on his two knees. He chose to expatriate himself, and Jean Jacques went to live with his Uncle Bernard at 19, Grand’ Rue, and at Bossey with Pastor Lambercie. His education was not wholly neglected. He himself says:—
“At the age of seven I used to read books of history with my father. Plutarch became my favourite study. Agesilaus, Brutus, Aristotle were my heroes; from the discussions which these readings caused between my father and me, grew that free and republican spirit, that proud indomitable character, impatient of any yoke or servitude, which has so tormented me all the days of my life. Born a citizen of a republic, son of a father whose patriotism was his strongest passion, I took fire by his example; constantly occupied with Athens and Rome, I became the very person whose life I was reading; the story of the acts of constancy and bravery which struck me, made my eyes sparkle, my voice grow strong.”
Whatever his training really was, for he is not always a reliable chronicler of his own actions, he contrasts what he considered the ideal up-bringing of children as conducted in Switzerland with that of the French children. His words were destined to bear fruit:—