“No great Man.... Found always at the top, less by power in swimming than by lightness in floating.”
XVII
ROUSSEAU: 1712-1778; St. Pierre: 1737-1814.
There are two Rousseaus in French literature. At least there was a first, until the second effaced him, and became the only.
We speak, of course, in comparison, and hyperbolically. J. B. Rousseau is still named as a lyric poet of the time of Louis XIV. But when Rousseau, without initials, is spoken of, it is always Jean Jacques Rousseau that is meant.
Jean Jacques Rousseau is perhaps the most squalid, as it certainly is one of the most splendid, among French literary names. The squalor belongs chiefly to the man, but the splendor is wholly the writer’s. There is hardly another example in the world’s literature of a union so striking of these opposites.
Rousseau’s life he has himself told, in the best, the worst, and the most imperishable of his books, the “Confessions.” This book is one to which the adjective charming attaches, in a peculiarly literal sense of the word. The spell, however, is repellent as well as attractive. But the attraction of the style asserts and pronounces itself only the more, in triumph over the much there is in the matter to disgust and revolt. It is quite the most offensive, and it is well-nigh the most fascinating, book that we know.
The “Confessions” begin as follows: