164 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC 3IEN.

Horace Walpole spoke of him with contempt, and whoonly saw through the eyes of the high society shefrequented, speaks slightingly of his reception by whatshe calls “ the populace of beaux esprits but shementions also that he will have nothing to do with thegreat ladies of her acquaintance, nor their friends, andcourtiers. Grimm (and we must remark that, thoughGrimm often speaks disparagingly of Rousseau , thereis nothing absolutely false in his accounts in his Cor-respondence) writes that his return was the subject ofconversation for many days. The people followed himin crowds in the street; he was invited out to dinnerevery day ; and it only rested with him to frequentParisian society most distinguished for talent and rank.

His object in returning to Paris appears to have been,in the first place, to give publicity to his “ Confessions.”Soon after his arrival he read them aloud before the countand countess d’Egmont, prince Pignatelli, the marquisede Mesmes, and the marquis de Juigne. We cannotjustify his thus dragging the private life of his existentfriends before the world: it is the fnost flagrant dis-honesty in civilised society, and ought to be put on apar with picking pockets. We excuse Rousseau in a slightdegree, since his act sprung from insanity. He believedthat his enemies coalesced to defame him ; that he couldexculpate himself only by these “ Confessions which,unless rendered public during life, would he falsifiedafter he was dead; and he endeavoured to keep the secretsof his friends; though he limited his complaisancein this to hinting how much he could tell, if he liked.Madame d’Epinay was justly annoyed, and evenalarmed, at the idea of being made the fable of the day.This lady had no excess of delicacy, since she left be-hind her memoirs that unveil the secrets of her life;but she could not endure that her name and actionsshould he made topics of public conversation during herlife. She applied to M. de Sartine, lieutenant of po-lice, to suppress any future readings; and apparentlyhe complied with the wish, as there is only trace ofone more, before seven auditors, which took place at