172 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN.

him. Envy, base as it is, does not stoop to envy thatwhich is immeasurably inferior. Rousseau had cer-tainly sufficient cause to be displeased with Diderot , thetone of his letters being arrogant and presumptuous ;but his real displeasure was caused by the belief that hehad betrayed him, when he confided to him his senti-ments for madame d’Houdetot: balked and trampledon all sides, he was stung to resent his disappointmentsomewhere, and he selected Diderot for his victim.This was very wrong and self-deceptive : he quotesgood authority for proving the propriety of declaring tothe world that he and Diderot were no longer friends,and there was no great harm in so doing; but when heappended the quotation from Ecclesiastes in a note, ac-cusing Diderot of a great social crime, the betraying thesecret of a friend, he erred grossly, and cannot bedefended.

Rousseau had passed his existence in romantic reve-ries. This abstraction of mind always engenders anindolence that concentrates the mind in self, and hatesto be intruded upon by outward circumstances. Prideand indolence conjoined, created the independence ofspirit for which he took praise to himself. Independ-ence is of two sorts. When we sacrifice our pleasuresand our tastes to preserve the dear privilege of not de-ferring our principles and feelings to others, we fosteran exalted virtue ; but the independence that finds dutyan unwelcome clog—that regards the just claims ofour fellow-creatures as injurious and intolerable, andthat casts off the affections as troublesome shackles'—isone of the greatest errors that the human heart can nou-rish ; and such was the independence to which Rous-seau aspired when he neglected the first duty of manby abandoning his children. He often dilates on simplepleasures—the charms of unsophisticated affections, andthe ecstasy to be derived from virtuous sympathy— he,who never felt the noblest and most devoted passion ofthe human soul — the love of a parent for his child!We cannot help thinking that even while Rousseau de-