126 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN.

It is not our intention to enter into the details ofRousseau ’s connection with this lady. To any one wholoves to make a study of human nature, the “Confes-sions ’’ are an invaluable book, and disclose the secret ofmany hearts to those who have courage to penetrate intothe recesses of their own. But, to be useful, they mustbe read as they are, with the author’s observations andminute anatomy of motive; and a mere abridgmentwould disgust without advantage. It is not to-day thatwe have learnt, that it is not true, that when a womanloses one virtue she loses all. The true distinctivevirtue of woman’s nature is her promptitude to self-sacrifice, and a capacity to bind up her existence in thehappiness and well-being of the objects of her attach-ment. Experience shows us, that as far as a womandoes this, and is neither worldly nor depraved, she pre-serves, in spite of error, the more lovely qualities of hernature. Personal fidelity is the purifier and preserverof the affections; and whoso fails in this, either man orwoman, degrades human nature — the glory of which isto ally the sensations of love to the emotions of the heartand the passions of the soul. If we examine the con-duct of madame de Warens by this rule, we find herwanting; and whether she he a real personage, and didand felt as Rousseau describes, or an imaginary being,we may pass judgment on her, and assert that the eventproves that depravity of conduct led her to fail in ful-filling the duties which the affections impose.

Rousseau , having somewhat recovered his health, re-turned to his projects for worldly advancement, and hisjourneys that carried him hither and thither in search ofit. On one occasion he visited Montpellier for the sakeof consulting a physician; he returned—his hopes ofrenovated health gone, his resolve to dedicate himself tohis benefactress strengthened. He returned, to find an-other in his place—his friend’s heart changed — theparadise he cherished desecrated. He did not the lessresolve to serve her. “ Reduced,” he writes, “ to forma fate for myself independent of her, and not being