Rousseau’s Confessions

Steve Wood TCCC

The First Romantic

One of the constants of literary study is that not every writer fits neatly into the categories established by literary periods.

Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) is one of those writers who defied the times in which they lived.

His Most Famous Works

Discourse on the Origin of Inequality Among Mankind (1755; trans. 1761): Here he argued that the natural man, untainted by civilization, is a noble and superior creature.

The Social Contract (1762; trans. 1797): In this work he defended democracy and the will of the people as being a superior form of government.

Émile (1762; trans. 1763): This novel stressed the important of creative expression in formative education, instead of the repressive, rigid educational model that was popular in the day.

His Accomplishments

“Rousseau profoundly influenced romanticism in literature and philosophy in the early 19th century. He also affected the development of the psychological literature, psychoanalytic theory, and philosophy of existentialism of the 20th century, particularly in his insistence on free will, his rejection of the doctrine of original sin, and his defense of learning through experience rather than analysis.”

"Rousseau, Jean Jacques," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 2000.

The Model for

Confessions

As was the case with other Neoclassical writers, Rousseau looked to a classical source for his inspiration. In this case, his classical model was Augustine’s

Confessions

.

The

Confessions

of St. Augustine

Augustine of Hippo (354-430) was one of the most important philosophers and theologians of the Middle Ages.

His

Confessions

were written in 397 and are what might be termed a spiritual and intellectual autobiography.

“Take Up and Read”

Augustine details his early life (354-387) for a specific didactic purpose: to show the path that brought him to his current spiritual views.

One Man’s Life as Moral Lesson

“Great art Thou, O Lord, and greatly to be praised; great is Thy power, and Thy wisdom infinite. And Thee would man praise; man, but a particle of Thy creation; man, that bears about him his mortality, the witness of his sin, the witness that Thou resistest the proud: yet would man praise Thee; he, but a particle of Thy creation .” - The beginning of Augustine’s

Confessions (translated by E.B. Pusey)

One Man’s Life as One Man’s Life

For Rousseau, however, the virtue in telling his life story was simply in the telling.

His interest was not in how others might apply the lessons of his life (if indeed there were actually any lessons), but rather in the unique nature of his own life story.

The Beginning of Rousseau’s

Confessions

“I have begun on a work which is without precedent, whose accomplishment will have no imitator. I propose to set before my fellow-mortals a man in all the truth of nature; and this man shall be myself. I have studied mankind and know my heart; I am not made like any one I have been acquainted with, perhaps like no one in existence; if not better, I at least claim originality, and whether Nature has acted rightly or wrongly in destroying the mold in which she cast me, can only be decided after I have been read.”

The Beginning of Rousseau’s

Confessions

“I will present myself, whenever the last trumpet shall sound, before the Sovereign Judge with this book in my hand, and loudly proclaim, "Thus have I acted; these were my thoughts; such was I. With equal freedom and veracity have I related what was laudable or wicked, I have concealed no crimes, added no virtues; and if I have sometimes introduced superfluous ornament, it was merely to occupy a void occasioned by defect of memory: I may have supposed that certain, which I only knew to be probable, but have never asserted as truth, a conscious falsehood.”

The Beginning of Rousseau’s

Confessions

“Such as I was, I have declared myself; sometimes vile and despicable, at others, virtuous, generous, and sublime; even as Thou hast read my inmost soul: Power Eternal! assemble round Thy throne an innumerable throng of my fellow-mortals, let them listen to my confessions, let them blush at my depravity, let them tremble at my sufferings; let each in his turn expose with equal sincerity the failings, the wanderings of his heart, and if he dare, aver, I was better than that man.“ Translated by W. Conyngham Mallory