Book: The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete

J >> Jean Jacques Rousseau >> The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete




I have somewhere said, that nothing should be granted to the senses, when
we wished to refuse them anything. To prove how false this maxim was
relative to Madam d' Houdetot, and how far she was right to depend upon
her own strength of mind, it would be necessary to enter into the detail
of our long and frequent conversations, and follow them, in all their
liveliness during the four months we passed together in an intimacy
almost without example between two friends of different sexes who contain
themselves within the bounds which we never exceeded. Ah! if I had lived
so long without feeling the power of real love, my heart and senses
abundantly paid the arrears. What, therefore, are the transports we feel
with the object of our affections by whom we are beloved, since the
passions of which my idol did not partake inspired such as I felt?

But I am wrong in saying Madam Houdetot did not partake of the passion of
love; that which I felt was in some measure confined to myself; yet love
was equal on both sides, but not reciprocal. We were both intoxicated
with the passion, she for her lover, and I for herself; our sighs and
delicious tears were mingled together. Tender confidants of the secrets
of each other, there was so great a similarity in our sentiments that it
was impossible they should not find some common point of union. In the
midst of this delicious intoxication, she never forgot herself for a
moment, and I solemnly protest that, if ever, led away by my senses,
I have attempted to render her unfaithful, I was never really desirous
of succeeding. The vehemence itself of my passion restrained it within
bounds. The duty of self-denial had elevated my mind. The lustre of
every virture adorned in my eyes the idol of my heart; to have soiled
their divine image would have been to destroy it. I might have committed
the crime; it has been a hundred times committed in my heart; but to
dishonor my Sophia! Ah! was this ever possible? No! I have told her a
hundred times it was not. Had I had it in my power to satisfy my
desires, had she consented to commit herself to my discretion, I should,
except in a few moments of delirium, have refused to be happy at the
price of her honor. I loved her too well to wish to possess her.

The distance from the Hermitage to Raubonne is almost a league; in my
frequent excursions to it I have sometimes slept there. One evening
after having supped tete-a-tete we went to walk in the garden by a fine
moonlight. At the bottom of the garden a considerable copse, through
which we passed on our way to a pretty grove ornamented with a cascade,
of which I had given her the idea, and she had procured it to be executed
accordingly.

Eternal remembrance of innocence and enjoyment! It was in this grove
that, seated by her side upon a seat of turf under an acacia in full
bloom, I found for the emotions of my heart a language worthy of them.
It was the first and only time of my life; but I was sublime: if
everything amiable and seducing with which the most tender and ardent
love can inspire the heart of man can be so called. What intoxicating
tears did I shed upon her knees! how many did I make her to shed
involuntarily! At length in an involuntary transport she exclaimed:
"No, never was a man so amiable, nor ever was there one who loved like
you! But your friend Saint Lambert hears us, and my heart is incapable
of loving twice." I exhausted myself with sighs; I embraced her--what an
embrace! But this was all. She had lived alone for the last six months,
that is absent from her husband and lover; I had seen her almost every
day during three months, and love seldom failed to make a third. We had
supped tete-a-tete, we were alone, in the grove by moonlight, and after
two hours of the most lively and tender conversation, she left this grove
at midnight, and the arms of her lover, as morally and physically pure as
she had entered it. Reader, weigh all these circumstances; I will add
nothing more.

Do not, however, imagine that in this situation my passions left me as
undisturbed as I was with Theresa and mamma. I have already observed
I was this time inspired not only with love, but with love and all its
energy and fury. I will not describe either the agitations, tremblings,
palpitations, convulsionary emotions, nor faintings of the heart,
I continually experienced; these may be judged of by the effect her image
alone made upon me. I have observed the distance from the Hermitage to
Eaubonne was considerable; I went by the hills of Andilly, which are
delightful; I mused, as I walked, on her whom I was going to see, the
charming reception she would give me, and upon the kiss which awaited me
at my arrival. This single kiss, this pernicious embrace, even before
I received it, inflamed my blood to such a degree as to affect my head,
my eyes were dazzled, my knees trembled, and were unable to support me;
I was obliged to stop and sit down; my whole frame was in inconceivable
disorder, and I was upon the point of fainting. Knowing the danger,
I endeavored at setting out to divert my attention from the object,
and think of something else. I had not proceeded twenty steps before the
same recollection, and all that was the consequence of it, assailed me in
such a manner that it was impossible to avoid them, and in spite of all
my efforts I do not believe I ever made this little excursion alone with
impunity. I arrived at Eaubonne, weak, exhausted, and scarcely able to
support myself. The moment I saw her everything was repaired; all I felt
in her presence was the importunity of an inexhaustible and useless
ardor. Upon the road to Raubonne there was a pleasant terrace called
Mont Olympe, at which we sometimes met. I arrived first, it was proper I
should wait for her; but how dear this waiting cost me! To divert my
attention, I endeavored to write with my pencil billets, which I could
have written with the purest drops of my blood; I never could finish one
which was eligible. When she found a note in the niche upon which we had
agreed, all she learned from the contents was the deplorable state in
which I was when I wrote it. This state and its continuation, during
three months of irritation and self-denial, so exhausted me, that I was
several years before I recovered from it, and at the end of these it left
me an ailment which I shall carry with me, or which will carry me to the
grave. Such was the sole enjoyment of a man of the most combustible
constitution, but who was, at the same time, perhaps, one of the most
timid mortals nature ever produced. Such were the last happy days I can
reckon upon earth; at the end of these began the long train of evils, in
which there will be found but little interruption.

It has been seen that, during the whole course of my life, my heart, as
transparent as crystal, has never been capable of concealing for the
space of a moment any sentiment in the least lively which had taken
refuge in it. It will therefore be judged whether or not it was possible
for me long to conceal my affection for Madam d'Houdetot. Our intimacy
struck the eyes of everybody, we did not make of it either a secret or a
mystery. It was not of a nature to require any such precaution, and as
Madam d'Houdetot had for me the most tender friendship with which she did
not reproach herself, and I for her an esteem with the justice of which
nobody was better acquainted than myself; she frank, absent, heedless; I
true, awkward, haughty, impatient and choleric; We exposed ourselves more
in deceitful security than we should have done had we been culpable. We
both went to the Chevrette; we sometimes met there by appointment. We
lived there according to our accustomed manner; walking together every
day talking of our amours, our duties, our friend, and our innocent
projects; all this in the park opposite the apartment of Madam d'Epinay,
under her windows, whence incessantly examining us, and thinking herself
braved, she by her eyes filled her heart with rage and indignation.

Women have the art of concealing their anger, especially when it is
great. Madam d'Epinay, violent but deliberate, possessed this art to an
eminent degree. She feigned not to see or suspect anything, and at the
same time that she doubled towards me her cares, attention, and
allurements, she affected to load her sister-in-law with incivilities
and marks of disdain, which she seemingly wished to communicate to me.
It will easily be imagined she did not succeed; but I was on the rack.
Torn by opposite passions, at the same time that I was sensible of her
caresses, I could scarcely contain my anger when I saw her wanting in
good manners to Madam d'Houdetot. The angelic sweetness of this lady
made her endure everything without complaint, or even without being
offended.

She was, in fact, so absent, and always so little attentive to these
things, that half the time she did not perceive them.

I was so taken up with my passion, that, seeing nothing but Sophia
(one of the names of Madam d'Houdetot),I did not perceive that I was
become the laughing-stock of the whole house, and all those who came to
it. The Baron d'Holbach, who never, as I heard of, had been at the
Chevrette, was one of the latter. Had I at that time been as mistrustful
as I am since become, I should strongly have suspected Madam d'Epinay to
have contrived this journey to give the baron the amusing spectacle of an
amorous citizen. But I was then so stupid that I saw not that even which
was glaring to everybody. My stupidity did not, however, prevent me from
finding in the baron a more jovial and satisfied appearance than
ordinary. Instead of looking upon me with his usual moroseness, he said
to me a hundred jocose things without my knowing what he meant. Surprise
was painted in my countenance, but I answered not a word: Madam d'Epinay
shook her sides with laughing; I knew not what possessed them.
As nothing yet passed the bounds of pleasantry, the best thing I could
had done, had I been in the secret, would have been to have humored the
joke. It is true I perceived amid the rallying gayety of the baron,
that his eyes sparkled with a malicious joy, which could have given me
pain had I then remarked it to the degree it has since occurred to my
recollection.

One day when I went to see Madam d'Houdetot, at Eaubonne, after her
return from one of her journeys to Paris, I found her melancholy, and
observed that she had been weeping. I was obliged to put a restraint on
myself, because Madam de Blainville, sister to her husband, was present;
but the moment I found an opportunity, I expressed to her my uneasiness.
"Ah," said she, with a sigh, "I am much afraid your follies will cost me
the repose of the rest of my days. St. Lambert has been informed of what
has passed, and ill informed of it. He does me justice, but he is vexed;
and what is still worse, he conceals from me a part of his vexation.
Fortunately I have not concealed from him anything relative to our
connection which was formed under his auspices. My letters, like my
heart, were full of yourself; I made him acquainted with everything,
except your extravagant passion, of which I hoped to cure you; and which
he imputes to me as a crime. Somebody has done us ill offices. I have
been injured, but what does this signify? Either let us entirely break
with each other, or do you be what you ought to be. I will not in future
have anything to conceal from my lover."

This was the first moment in which I was sensible of the shame of feeling
myself humbled by the sentiment of my fault, in presence of a young woman
of whose just reproaches I approved, and to whom I ought to have been a
mentor. The indignation I felt against myself would, perhaps, have been
sufficient to overcome my weakness, had not the tender passion inspired
me by the victim of it, again softened my heart. Alas! was this a moment
to harden it when it was overflowed by the tears which penetrated it in
every part? This tenderness was soon changed into rage against the vile
informers, who had seen nothing but the evil of a criminal but
involuntary sentiment, without believing or even imagining the sincere
uprightness of heart by which it was counteracted. We did not remain
long in doubt about the hand by which the blow was directed.

We both knew that Madam d'Epinay corresponded with St. Lambert. This was
not the first storm she had raised up against Madam d'Houdetot, from whom
she had made a thousand efforts to detach her lover, the success of some
of which made the consequences to be dreaded. Besides, Grimm, who, I
think, had accompanied M. de Castries to the army, was in Westphalia, as
well as Saint Lambert; they sometimes visited. Grimm had made some
attempts on Madam d'Houdetot, which had not succeeded, and being
extremely piqued, suddenly discontinued his visits to her. Let it be
judged with what calmness, modest as he is known to be, he supposed she
preferred to him a man older than himself, and of whom, since he had
frequented the great, he had never spoken but as a person whom he
patronized.

My suspicions of Madam d'Epinay were changed into a certainty the moment
I heard what had passed in my own house. When I was at the Chevrette,
Theresa frequently came there, either to bring me letters or to pay me
that attention which my ill state of health rendered necessary. Madam
d'Epinay had asked her if Madam d'Houdetot and I did not write to each
other. Upon her answering in the affirmative, Madam d'Epinay pressed her
to give her the letters of Madam d'Houdetot, assuring her that she would
reseal them in such a manner as it should never be known. Theresa,
without showing how much she was shocked at the proposition, and without
even putting me upon my guard, did nothing more than seal the letters she
brought me more carefully; a lucky precaution, for Madam d'Epinay had her
watched when she arrived, and, waiting for her in the passage, several
times carried her audaciousness as far as to examine her tucker. She did
more even than this: having one day invited herself with M. de Margency
to dinner at the Hermitage, for the first time since I resided there,
she seized the moment I was walking with Margency to go into my closet
with the mother and daughter, and to press them to show her the letters
of Madam d'Houdetot. Had the mother known where the letters were, they
would have been given to her; fortunately, the daughter was the only
person who was in the secret, and denied my having preserved any one of
them. A virtuous, faithful and generous falsehood; whilst truth would
have been a perfidy. Madam d' Epinay, perceiving Theresa was not to be
seduced, endeavored to irritate her by jealousy, reproaching her with her
easy temper and blindness. "How is it possible," said she to her, "you
cannot perceive there is a criminal intercourse between them? If besides
what strikes your eyes you stand in need of other proofs, lend your
assistance to obtain that which may furnish them; you say he tears the
letters from Madam d'Houdetot as soon as he has read them. Well,
carefully gather up the pieces and give them to me; I will take upon
myself to put them together."

Such were the lessons my friend gave to the partner of my bed.

Theresa had the discretion to conceal from me, for a considerable time,
all these attempts; but perceiving how much I was perplexed, she thought
herself obliged to inform me of everything, to the end that knowing with
whom I had to do, I might take my measures accordingly. My rage and
indignation are not to be described. Instead of dissembling with Madam
d'Epinay, according to her own example, and making use of counterplots,
I abandoned myself without reserve to the natural impetuosity of my
temper; and with my accustomed inconsiderateness came to an open rupture.
My imprudence will be judged of by the following letters, which
sufficiently show the manner of proceeding of both parties on this
occasion:

NOTE FROM MADAM D'EPINAY.
"Why, my dear friend, do I not see you? You make me uneasy. You have so
often promised me to do nothing but go and come between this place and
the Hermitage! In this I have left you at liberty; and you have suffered
a week to pass without coming. Had not I been told you were well I
should have imagined the contrary. I expected you either the day before
yesterday, or yesterday, but found myself disappointed. My God, what is
the matter with you? You have no business, nor can you have any
uneasiness; for had this been the case, I flatter myself you would have
come and communicated it to me. You are, therefore, ill! Relieve me,
I beseech you, speedily from my fears. Adieu, my dear friend: let this
adieu produce me a good-morning from you."

ANSWER.
"I cannot yet say anything to you. I wait to be better informed, and
this I shall be sooner or later. In the meantime be persuaded that
innocence will find a defender sufficiently powerful to cause some
repentance in the slanderers, be they who they may."

SECOND NOTE FROM THE SAME.
"Do you know that your letter frightens me? What does it mean? I have
read it twenty times. In truth I do not understand what it means. All I
can perceive is, that you are uneasy and tormented, and that you wait
until you are no longer so before you speak to me upon the subject.
Is this, my dear friend, what we agreed upon? What then is become of
that friendship and confidence, and by what means have I lost them?
Is it with me or for me that you are angry? However this may be, come to
me this evening I conjure you; remember you promised me no longer than a
week ago to let nothing remain upon your mind, but immediately to
communicate to me whatever might make it uneasy. My dear friend, I live
in that confidence--There--I have just read your letter again; I do not
understand the contents better, but they make me tremble. You seem to be
cruelly agitated. I could wish to calm your mind, but as I am ignorant
of the cause whence your uneasiness arises, I know not what to say,
except that I am as wretched as yourself, and shall remain so until we
meet. If you are not here this evening at six o'clock, I set off to
morrow for the Hermitage, let the weather be how it will, and in whatever
state of health I may be; for I can no longer support the inquietude I
now feel. Good day, my dear friend, at all risks I take the liberty to
tell you, without knowing whether or not you are in need of such advice,
to endeavor to stop the progress uneasiness makes in solitude. A fly be
comes a monster. I have frequently experienced it."

ANSWER.
"I can neither come to see you nor receive your visit so long as my
present inquietude continues. The confidence of which you speak no
longer exists, and it will be easy for you to recover it. I see nothing
more in your present anxiety than the desire of drawing from the
confessions of others some advantage agreeable to your views; and my
heart, so ready to pour its overflowings into another which opens itself
to receive them, is shut against trick and cunning. I distinguish your
ordinary address in the difficulty you find in understanding my note.
Do you think me dupe enough to believe you have not comprehended what it
meant? No: but I shall know how to overcome your subtleties by my
frankness. I will explain myself more clearly, that you may understand
me still less.

"Two lovers closely united and worthy of each other's love are dear to
me; I expect you will not know who I mean unless I name them. I presume
attempts have been made to disunite them, and that I have been made use
of to inspire one of the two with jealousy. The choice was not
judicious, but it appeared convenient to the purposes of malice, and of
this malice it is you whom I suspect to be guilty. I hope this becomes
more clear.

"Thus the woman whom I most esteem would, with my knowledge, have been
loaded with the infamy of dividing her heart and person between two
lovers, and I with that of being one of these wretches. If I knew that,
for a single moment in your life, you ever had thought this, either of
her or myself, I should hate you until my last hour. But it is with
having said, and not with having thought it, that I charge you. In this
case, I cannot comprehend which of the three you wished to injure; but,
if you love peace of mind, tremble lest you should have succeeded.
I have not concealed either from you or her all the ill I think of
certain connections, but I wish these to end by a means as virtuous as
their cause, and that an illegitimate love may be changed into an eternal
friendship. Should I, who never do ill to any person, be the innocent
means of doing it to my friends? No, I should never forgive you; I
should become your irreconcilable enemy. Your secrets are all I should
respect; for I will never be a man without honor.

"I do not apprehend my present perplexity will continue a long time. I
shall soon know whether or not I am deceived; I shall then perhaps have
great injuries to repair, which I will do with as much cheerfulness as
that with which the most agreeable act of my life has been accompanied.
But do you know in what manner I will make amends for my faults during
the short space of time I have to remain near to you? By doing what
nobody but myself would do; by telling you freely what the world thinks
of you, and the breaches you have to repair in your reputation.
Notwithstanding all the pretended friends by whom you are surrounded, the
moment you see me depart you may bid adieu to truth, you will no longer
find any person who will tell it to you."


THIRD LETTER FROM THE SAME.

"I did not understand your letter of this morning; this I told you
because it was the case. I understand that of this evening; do not
imagine I shall ever return an answer to it; I am too anxious to forget
what it contains; and although you excite my pity, I am not proof against
the bitterness with which it has filled my mind. I! descend to trick
and cunning with you! I! accused of the blackest of all infamies!
Adieu, I regret your having the adieu. I know not what I say adieu:
I shall be very anxious to forgive you. You will come when you please;
you will be better received than your suspicions deserve. All I have to
desire of you is not to trouble yourself about my reputation. The
opinion of the world concerning me is of but little importance in my
esteem. My conduct is good, and this is sufficient for me. Besides, I
am ignorant of what has happened to the two persons who are dear to me as
they are to you."


This last letter extricated me from a terrible embarrassment, and threw
me into another of almost the same magnitude. Although these letters and
answers were sent and returned the same day with an extreme rapidity, the
interval had been sufficient to place another between my rage and
transport, and to give me time to reflect on the enormity of my
imprudence. Madam d'Houdetot had not recommended to me anything so much
as to remain quiet, to leave her the care of extricating herself, and to
avoid, especially at that moment, all noise and rupture; and I, by the
most open and atrocious insults, took the properest means of carrying
rage to its greatest height in the heart of a woman who was already but
too well disposed to it. I now could naturally expect nothing from her
but an answer so haughty, disdainful, and expressive of contempt, that I
could not, without the utmost meanness, do otherwise than immediately
quit her house. Happily she, more adroit than I was furious, avoided,
by the manner of her answer, reducing me to that extremity. But it was
necessary either to quit or immediately go and see her; the alternative
was inevitable; I resolved on the latter, though I foresaw how much I
must be embarrassed in the explanation. For how was I to get through it
without exposing either Madam d'Houdetot or Theresa? and woe to her whom
I should have named! There was nothing that the vengeance of an
implacable and an intriguing woman did not make me fear for the person
who should be the object of it. It was to prevent this misfortune that
in my letter I had spoken of nothing but suspicions, that I might not be
under the necessity of producing my proofs. This, it is true, rendered
my transports less excusable; no simple suspicions being sufficient to
authorize me to treat a woman, and especially a friend, in the manner I
had treated Madam d'Epinay. But here begins the noble task I worthily
fulfilled of expiating my faults and secret weaknesses by charging myself
with such of the former as I was incapable of committing, and which I
never did commit.

I had not to bear the attack I had expected, and fear was the greatest
evil I received from it. At my approach, Madam d' Epinay threw her arms
about my neck, bursting into tears. This unexpected reception, and by an
old friend, extremely affected me; I also shed many tears. I said to her
a few words which had not much meaning; she uttered others with still
less, and everything ended here. Supper was served; we sat down to
table, where, in expectation of the explanation I imagined to be deferred
until supper was over, I made a very poor figure; for I am so overpowered
by the most trifling inquietude of mind that I cannot conceal it from
persons the least clear-sighted. My embarrassed appearance must have
given her courage, yet she did not risk anything upon that foundation.
There was no more explanation after than before supper: none took place
on the next day, and our little tete-a-tete conversations consisted of
indifferent things, or some complimentary words on my part, by which,
while I informed her I could not say more relative to my suspicions,
I asserted, with the greatest truth, that, if they were ill-founded,
my whole life should be employed in repairing the injustice. She did not
show the least curiosity to know precisely what they were, nor for what
reason I had formed them, and all our peacemaking consisted, on her part
as well as on mine, in the embrace at our first meeting. Since Madam
d'Epinay was the only person offended, at least in form, I thought it was
not for me to strive to bring about an eclaircissement for which she
herself did not seem anxious, and I returned as I had come; continuing,
besides, to live with her upon the same footing as before, I soon almost
entirely forgot the quarrel, and foolishly believed she had done the
same, because she seemed not to remember what had passed.

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