The Confessions

by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  Alarmed by his impetuosity, I hurriedly wrote to try and make him change his mind. I put all the strength of which I was capable into my exhortations, and they were successful. He returned to his filial duties, and withdrew the resignation he had put into his colonel’s hands; which that officer had been prudent enough to make no use of, in order to give him time to think the matter over. Cured from this folly, Saint-Brisson committed another a little less outrageous but hardly more to my liking. He became an author, publishing two or three pamphlets in succession, which showed some talent. But I shall never have to reproach myself for having given him such praise as would encourage him to pursue that career.

  Some time afterwards he came to see me, and we made a joint pilgrimage to the island of Saint-Pierre. I found him diffrent on this trip from the man he had seemed at Montmorency. There was something affected about him, which did not upset me much at the time, but which I have often remembered since. He visited me once more at the Hôtel de Saint-Simon, as I was passing through Paris on my way to England. There I learnt something he had never told me: that he frequented high society and quite often saw Mme de Luxembourg. He gave me no sign of life when I was at Trye, and sent me no message by his relative, Mlle Séguier, who was my neighbour, and who has never seemed very favourably disposed towards me. In short M. de Saint-Brisson’s passionate attachment ended suddenly, like my intimacy with M. de Feins. But whereas de Feins owed me nothing, Saint-Brisson was in my debt – unless the stupidities I had saved him from committing were only a pretence on his part, which really they may very well have been.

  I had just as many, and even more visits from Geneva as well. The Delucs, father and son, chose me one after the other for their sick-nurse. The father fell ill on the way, the son was ill when he left Geneva, and they both came to recuperate with me. Pastors, relatives, religious humbugs, and persons of every description came from Geneva and from Switzerland, not, like those from France, to admire and chaff me, but for the purpose of scolding and catechizing me. The only one who pleased me was Moultou, who came for a visit of three or four days, and whom I should have liked to keep longer. The most constant of them all and the most persistent, who finally overcame me by his importunities, was a M. d’lvernois, a Genevese merchant and a French refugee, who was related to the public prosecutor of Neuchâtcl. This M. d’lvernois of Geneva came to Motiers twice a year for the sole purpose of seeing me, and stayed at my house from morning to night for several days on end, joining me in my walks and bringing me hundreds of little presents. Thus he wormed his way into my confidence, against my will, and interfered in all my business despite the fact that we had no ideas, tastes, feelings, or interests in common. I doubt whether he had read a single book of any kind from beginning to end in all his life, or even knew what mine were about. When I began to collect plants, he came with me on my botanizing excursions, without any taste for the pursuit, or anything to say to me; nor had I anything to say to him. He was even so bold as to spend three whole days alone with me in an inn at Goumoins, from which I had hoped to drive him by dint of boring him and letting him see how much he bored me. But for all that, I was never able to break down his incredible persistence, or to discover the reason for it.

  Among all these acquaintances, which I only made and kept up under compulsion, I must not pass over the only one that was pleasing to me, and about which I felt real emotion. I am thinking of a young Hungarian who came to live at Neuchâtel and moved to Motiers some months after I settled there myself. He was known locally as the Baron de Sauttern, the name under which he had been introduced from Zürich. He was tall and well-built, his features were pleasant, and he was gentle and sociable in conversation. He told everybody, and gave me to understand myself, that he had come to Neuchâtel solely on my account, in order to learn virtue in his youth through intercourse with me. His expression, his air, his manners seemed to me in keeping with his words; and I should have considered myself lacking in a most important duty if I had turned a young man away in whom I saw nothing but pleasant qualities, and who had so praiseworthy a motive for seeking me out. I can never give my affection by halves, and soon he had my entire friendship, my entire confidence. We became inseparable. He accompanied me on all my walking expeditions, and grew to enjoy them. I took him to my Lord Marshal, who was extremely kind to him. As he could not yet express himself in French, he spoke and wrote to me only in Latin; I replied in French. But this mixture of the two languages did not make our conversations any less fluent or less lively in any way. He told me about his family, his affairs and his adventures, and about the Court of Vienna, with the domestic details of which he seemed well acquainted. In short, for nearly two years, during which we were on terms of the greatest intimacy, I invariably found him to be a gentleman of character, great personal cleanliness, and extreme propriety in his language; in fact he had all the marks of a man of breeding, which made me esteem him too highly not to love him.

  When my intimacy with him was at its greatest, d’lvernois wrote to me from Geneva to warn me against a young Hungarian who had come to settle near me, for he had been assured that he was a spy sent by the French ministry to observe me. This warning was calculated to afford me particular uneasiness because everybody in my own district was advising me to keep on my guard; for I was being watched, and they were hoping to lure me on to French soil and there do me some injury.

  In order to shut my stupid advisers’ mouths once and for all, I proposed to Sauttern, without a word of warning, that we should take a walk to Pontarlier. He agreed, and when we got there I gave him d’lvernois’ letter to read. Then, embracing him warmly, I said: ‘Sauttern needs no proof of my confidence, but the public requires proof that I know it is not misplaced.’ That embrace was very sweet; it was one of those spiritual pleasures that persecutors can never know, and of which they can never rob the oppressed.

  I shall never believe that Sauttern was a spy, or that he betrayed me; but he did deceive me. When I opened my heart to him unreservedly he was so bold as to keep his own constantly shut and to delude me with lies. He invented some story which convinced me that his presence was necessary in his own country. I entreated him to set out without delay. He set out, and when I supposed him already in Hungary I learnt that he was at Strasbourg. It was not the first time he had been there. He had upset a marriage in the town, and the husband had written to me, knowing that he was in the habit of visiting me. I had done all I could to recall the young woman to virtue and Sauttern to his duty. When I thought they had completely broken it off they had come together again, and the husband himself had been so obliging as to take the young man back into the house. After that there was nothing more for me to say. I discovered that the so-called baron had imposed on me with a heap of lies. His name was not Sauttern but Sauttersheim. As for the title of baron, which he was given in Switzerland, I could not blame him for that, since he had never assumed it himself. But I have no doubt that he was really a gentleman by birth, and my Lord Marshal, who was à judge of men and had been in Hungary, always looked on him and treated him as such.

  Immediately after his departure the maid at the inn at Motiers, where he dined, declared that she was pregnant by him. She was such a dirty slut, and Sauttern, who was generally esteemed and respected as a decent and well-behaved young man, so particularly prided himself on his cleanliness, that everyone was shocked by her effrontery. The most attractive women in the district, who had vainly lavished their charms upon him, were furious, and I was beside myself with indignation. I made every effort to get the impudent woman arrested, offering to pay all expenses and go bail for Sauttersheim. I wrote to him strong in the conviction, not only that her pregnancy was not of his doing, but that it was a pretence, and that the whole business was nothing but a trick on the part of his enemies and mine. I asked him to return to the district to confound the creature and whoever was prompting her. I was surprised at the weakness of his reply. He wrote to the pastor whose parishioner the slut was, and tried to h
ush the affair up. In view of which I ceased to interest myself in the matter, being greatly surprised that so debauched a man could have had sufficient control of himself to make me believe in his decency throughout our very close intimacy.

  From Strasbourg Sauttersheim went to Paris to seek his fortune, but only found poverty. He wrote to me to confess his sins. My bowels were moved by the memory of our old friendship, and I sent him some money. In the next year, when I passed through Paris, I saw him in much the same state. But he was then a great friend of M. Laliaud, although I could not find out how he had made his acquaintance, and whether it was an old or a new one. Two years afterwards Sauttersheim returned to Strasbourg; from there he wrote to me, and there he died. That is the brief story of our relationship, and all that I know about’his adventures. But whilst I deplore the fate of that unhappy young man, I shall never cease to believe that he was a gentleman by birth, and that his disreputable behaviour was only the effect of the situations into which he fell.

  Such were the acquisitions in the way of relationships and acquaintances that I made at Motiers. How many of these should I have needed to compensate me for the cruel losses I sustained during that same time!

  The first of them was M. de Luxembourg, who after suffering long torment from the doctors at last fell a victim to them. For they treated his gout, which they refused to recognize, as a disease which they could cure. If we can trust the report written for me by La Roche, Madame’s confidential servant, this was a cruel and memorable example of the miseries for which we must pity the great.

  The loss of this good gentleman affected me the more because he was the only true friend I had in France; and the sweetness of his character was such that it made me altogether forget his rank and grow fond of him, as of an equal. Our relationship did not end with my retirement; he continued to write to me as before. I seemed to notice, however, that my absence or my misfortune had cooled his affection. It is very difficult for a courtier to preserve an unwavering attachment for someone whom he knows to be in disgrace with the authorities. I concluded besides that the great influence Mme de Luxembourg possessed over him had worked against me, and that she had profited by my absence to injure me in his eyes. She, in spite of some demonstrations of simulated friendship, which became steadily less frequent, took smaller pains every day to hide the change in her feelings towards me. She wrote to me four or five times, at intervals, while I was in Switzerland, and after that ceased writing; and it required all my prejudice in her favour, all my confidence, all the blindness in which I still persisted, for me not to see in her behaviour something more than a mere coolness towards me.

  Guy the bookseller, who was Duchesne’s partner, and since my time had been a constant visitor at the Hôtel de Luxembourg, wrote to me that I was remembered in the Marshal’s will. I did not doubt his word, for there was nothing strange or incredible in that. But it made me deliberate what my attitude should be to the legacy. All things considered, I decided to accept it, whatever it might be, and so pay respect to an honourable man who, in a rank almost impervious to friendship, had shown a true friendship to me. I have been relieved from this duty, having heard no more of this legacy, whether the tale was true or false; and indeed it would have pained me to violate one of my great moral principles, never to profit in any way by the death of anyone dear to me. During our friend Mussard’s last illness, Lenieps proposed that I should take advantage of his evident gratitude for our care, and suggest that he should make some settlements in our favour: ‘Ah, my dear Lenieps,’ I answered, ‘let us not pollute the sad but sacred duties we are performing for our dying friend by any thought of our own interest. I hope never to be mentioned in anyone’s will, and certainly not in any friend’s.’ It was at about the same time that my Lord Marshal spoke to me of his will, and of the provision he intended to make for me in it. My answer to him I have recorded in the First Part of these Confessions*

  My second loss, a still more painful and more irreparable one, was that of the best of women and of mothers who, already burdened with years and overburdened with infirmities and miseries, left this vale of tears to pass to the abode of the blessed, where the pleasing memories of the good we have done here below is its own everlasting reward. Go, gentle and kindly soul, to join Fénélon, Bernex, Catinat, and all those like them who, in a humbler walk of life, have opened their hearts to true charity. Go, taste the fruit of your own good deeds, and prepare for your pupil the place that he hopes one day to occupy by your side! You are indeed fortunate amidst your misfortunes that by putting an end to them Heaven has spared you the cruel spectacle of his! Afraid of saddening her heart by the tale of my first disaster, I had not written to her since arriving in Switzerland. But I wrote to M. de Conzié for news of her, and it was he who informed me that she had ceased to suffer also. But if I did not think that I should see her again in another life, my feeble imagination would refuse to believe in the perfect happiness I hope there to enjoy.

  My third and last loss – for since then I have had no friends left to lose – was that of my Lord Marshal. He did not the but, growing tired of serving an ungrateful people, he left Neuchâtel, and I have never seen him since. He is alive and will, I hope, survive me. He is alive and, thanks to him, all my ties upon earth are not broken. There still remains one man who is worthy of my friendship. For the true value of friendship lies rather in one’s own feelings than in those which one inspires in another. But I have lost the delights that accrued to me from his friendship, and now I can only reckon him among those whom I still love, but with whom I am no longer in touch. He went to England to receive the King’s pardon, and to redeem his estates, which had long ago been confiscated. We did not separate without planning a future meeting, to which he seemed to look forward with as much pleasure as I. He intended to settle in his mansion of Keith Hall, near Aberdeen, and I was to pay him a visit there. But this prospect was too attractive for me to hope that it would ever be realized. He did not remain in Scotland. Affectionate entreaties from the King of Prussia brought him back to Berlin, and it will soon be seen how I was prevented from joining him there.

  Before his departure, foreseeing the storm that was beginning to rise against me, he sent me of his own accord free letters of naturalization, which seemed a most certain safeguard against the possibility of my being expelled from the country. The Corporation of Couvet in the Val-de-Travers imitated the Governor’s example and granted me a patent of citizenship, which was also free. So, now that I was a full citizen in every respect, I was safe from legal expulsion even at the hands of the Prince. But it has never been by legitimate means that enemies have persecuted that man who of all men has most respected the law.

  I do not think that I should reckon the loss of Abbé de Mably among those that I sustained at that time. Having lived at his brother’s, I had had some connexion with him, but never a very intimate one; and I have reason to think that his feelings for me had changed their nature since I had acquired more fame than he. But it was on the publication of the Letters written from the Mountain that I detected the first sign of his ill-will towards me. There was a letter to Mme Saladin circulating in Geneva, which was attributed to him, and in which my work was referred to as the seditious clamourings of a violent demagogue. The respect I felt for the Abbé and the high opinion I had of his learning forbade me to believe for a moment that this extravagant letter was by him. I acted in the matter as my frank nature dictated. I sent him a copy of the document, informing him that it was attributed to him. He did not make any reply. His silence astonished me. But judge of my surprise when Mme de Chenonceaux sent me news that he had really written the letter, and that mine had greatly embarrassed him. For, after all, even if he had been in the right, how could he have excused a bold and public gesture made in sheer lightness of heart, without obligation or necessity, for the sole purpose of crushing a man already deep in misfortune, a man to whom he had always shown goodwill and who had never proved unworthy of it? Some time afterwar
ds appeared the Dialogues of Phocion, which I found to be a barefaced and shameless compilation from my own writings. I felt as I read the book that its author had made up his mind about me, and henceforth I had no bitterer enemy. I think that he could not forgive me The Social Contract, which was so far above his own powers, or the Perpetual Peace, and that he had only suggested that I should make a selection from the Abbé de Saint-Pierre because he had thought that I should not be successful with it.

  The further I go in my story, the less order and sequence I can put into it. The disturbances of my later life have not left events time to fall into shape in my head. They have been too numerous, too confused, too unpleasant to be capable of straightforward narration. The only strong impression they have left me is that of the horrible mystery enveloping their cause, and of the deplorable state to which they have reduced me. Now my story can only proceed at haphazard, according as the ideas come back into my mind. I remember that during the time of which I am speaking, being immersed in my Confessions, I talked most rashly to everybody, never even imagining that anyone could have the interest or desire, and still less the power, to put any obstacle in the way of this enterprise. And even if I had thought otherwise, it is unlikely that I should have been more circumspect, since by nature I am absolutely incapable of concealing anything that I feel or think. News that I was so engaged was, so far as I can judge, the real cause of the storm which was raised for the purpose of expelling me from Switzerland and delivering me into the hands of those who would prevent my completing my task.