This little domestic arrangement continued for several days before it came into my head to rob the robber, and tithe M. Verrat for the proceeds of the asparagus.... I thus learned that to steal was, after all, not so very terrible a thing as I had conceived; and ere long I turned this discovery to so good an account, that nothing I had an inclination for could safely be left within my reach....
And now, before giving myself over to the fatality of my destiny, let me, for a moment, contemplate what would naturally have been my lot had I fallen into the hands of a better master. Nothing was more agreeable to my tastes, nor better calculated to render me happy, than the calm and obscure condition of a good artisan, more especially in certain lines, such as that of an engraver at Geneva.... In my native country, in the bosom of my religion, of my family, and my friends, I should have led a life gentle and uncheckered as became my character, in the uniformity of a pleasing occupation and among connections dear to my heart. I should have been a good Christian, a good citizen, a good father, a good friend, a good artisan, and a good man in every respect. I should have loved my station; it may be I should have been an honor to it: and after having passed an obscure and simple, though even and happy, life, I should peacefully have departed in the bosom of my kindred. Soon, it may be, forgotten, I should at least have been regretted as long as the remembrance of me survived.
Instead of this... what a picture am I about to draw!
Thus ends the first book of the "Confessions."
The picture Rousseau is "about to draw" has in it a certain Madame de Warens for a principal figure. (Apprentice Jean Jacques has left his master, and entered on a vagabond life.) This lady is a character very difficult for us Protestant Americans in our contrasted society to conceive as real or as possible. She kept a house of, what shall we call it? detention, for souls doubtfully in the way of being reclaimed from Protestant error into the bosom of the Roman-Catholic Church. She was herself a Roman-Catholic convert from Protestantism. She had forsaken a husband, not loved, and was living on a bounty from King Victor Amadeus of Sardinia. For Annecy, the home of Madame de Warens, our young Jean Jacques, sent thither by a Roman-Catholic curate, sets out on foot. The distance was but one day's walk; which one day's walk, however, the humor of the wanderer stretched into a saunter of three days. The man of fifty-four, become the biographer of his own youth, finds no loathness of self-respect to prevent his detailing the absurd adventures with which he diverted himself on the way. For example:—
Not a country-seat could I see, either to the right or left, without going after the adventure which I was certain awaited me. I could not muster courage to enter the mansion, nor even to knock, for I was excessively timid; but I sang beneath the most inviting window, very much astonished to find, after wasting my breath, that neither lady nor miss made her appearance, attracted by the beauty of my voice, or the spice of my songs,—seeing that I knew some capital ones that my comrades had taught me, and which I sang in the most admirable manner.
Rousseau describes the emotions he experienced in his first meeting with Madame de Warens:—
I had pictured to myself a grim old devotee—M. de Pontverre's "worthy lady" could, in my opinion, be none other. But lo, a countenance beaming with charms, beautiful, mild blue eyes, a complexion of dazzling fairness, the outline of an enchanting neck! Nothing escaped the rapid glance of the young proselyte; for that instant I was hers, sure that a religion preached by such missionaries could not fail to lead to paradise!
This abnormally susceptible youth had remarkable experiences, all within his own soul, during his sojourn, of a few days only, on the present occasion, under Madame de Warens's hospitable roof. These experiences, the autobiographer, old enough to call himself "old dotard," has, nevertheless, not grown wise enough to be ashamed to be very detailed and psychological in recounting. It was a case of precocious love at first sight. One could afford to laugh at it as ridiculous, but that it had a sequel full of sin and of sorrow. Jean Jacques was now forwarded to Turin, to become inmate of a sort of charity school for the instruction of catechumens. The very day after he started on foot, his father, with a friend of his, reached Annecy on horseback, in pursuit of the truant boy. They might easily have overtaken him, but they let him go his way. Rousseau explains the case on behalf of his father as follows:—
My father was not only an honorable man, but a person of the most reliable probity, and endowed with one of those powerful minds that perform deeds of loftiest heroism. I may add, he was a good father, especially to me. Tenderly did he love me, but he loved his pleasures also; and, since our living apart, other ties had, in a measure, weakened his paternal affection. He had married again, at Nyon; and though his wife was no longer of an age to present me with brothers, yet she had connections; another family-circle was thus formed, other objects engrossed his attention, and the new domestic relations no longer so frequently brought back the remembrance of me. My father was growing old, and had nothing on which to rely for the support of his declining years. My brother and I had something coming to us from my mother's fortune; the interest of this my father was to receive during our absence. This consideration did not present itself to him directly, nor did it stand in the way of his doing his duty; it had, however, a silent, and to himself imperceptible, influence, and at times slackened his zeal, which, unacted upon by this, would have been carried much farther. This, I think, was the reason, that, having traced me as far as Annecy, he did not follow me to Chamberi, where he was morally certain of overtaking me. This will also explain why, in visiting him many times after my flight, I received from him on every occasion a father's kindness, though unaccompanied by any very pressing efforts to retain me.