ROUSSEAU. 151 



nexion with her. He desired, indeed, that the book 

 should not be published before 1800, and it was given 

 to the world by a breach of trust in 1788. But the 

 lady's family were still alive, had it been withheld the 

 full period prescribed, and her memory was something, 

 or should have been something, in the estimation of a 

 pure sentimentalist, of one who was preparing his own 

 history for the very purpose of gratifying a perverted, 

 unnatural love of posthumous distinction by publishing 

 his weakness and his shame to the scorn of future ages. 

 He could hardly conceive that any other person than 

 himself had a similar propensity for self-slander. But 

 even he himself would not easily have borne to be 

 slandered by any pen but his own. 



Madame de Warens endeavoured to procure for him 

 orders in the church, and sent him with a pension 

 given by the Bishop of Annecy to the seminary, where 

 after some months it was found impossible to make 

 him learn Latin enough for a priest. She then made 

 a M. le Maitre, the director of the cathedral music, 

 take him as a pupil and helper. He passed near a year 

 with him, and was treated with the utmost kindness. 

 A profligate, unprincipled young man from Provence, 

 called Venture de Villeneuve, came to Annecy, and 

 from his cleverness, his skill in music, and his excessive 

 impudence, made some sensation in the society of that 

 place. He soon captivated Rousseau for that reason, 

 and to save him from so ruinous an association, as well 

 as to assist Le Maitre, who had quarrelled with the 

 chapter, he was desired to accompany him to Lyons. 

 Thither he went, and was still most kindly treated by 

 Le Maitre, whose only fault seems to have been his 



