Rousseau's Dog (37 page)

LATE AUGUST/SEPTEMBER
London newspapers carry note saying Rousseau has issued a challenge to his enemies to publish. Opinion in Paris now swings back to the desirability of Hume's publishing his account.

SEPTEMBER
9
Hume asks Adam Smith to inform d'Alembert that he has a free hand to edit Hume's account.

OCTOBER
Exposé succinct de la contestation qui s'est élevée entre M. Hume et M. Rousseau avec des pièces justificatives
published in Paris.

NOVEMBER
Publication of English edition of A
Concise and Genuine Account of the Dispute between Mr. Hume and Mr. Rousseau.

1767

JANUARY
Jean-François-Maximilian Cerjat in Ashbourne area.

MARCH
Rousseau discusses with Davenport plans to move to London. Davenport revives question of royal pension.

MARCH
12
Rousseau sells his library in preparation to depart.

MARCH
18
Conway informs Davenport that the king has granted Rousseau a pension of £100 p.a.

APRIL
27
Davenport arrives at Davenport Hall and is confined there by gout.

MAY
1
Rousseau leaves Wootton.

MAY
5
Rousseau, in Spalding, asks the lord chancellor for an official guide for the journey to Dover.

MAY
14
Rousseau leaves Spalding.

MAY
18
Rousseau, in Dover, writes to Conway seeking an agreement on safe passage and accepting his suspicions of Hume were unjust.

MAY
22
Rousseau, Le Vasseur, and Sultan arrive in Calais.

1768

APRIL
29
Rousseau marries Thérèse Le Vasseur.

1770

JUNE ONWARD
Rousseau returns to Paris, completes the
Confessions,
and reads them aloud to rapt audiences until forbidden by the authorities. (The
Confessions
are published posthumously in 1781.)

AUGUST
25, 1776
Death of Hume.

JULY
2, 1778
Death of Rousseau.

Alembert, Jean-Báptiste le Rond d': 1717–83.
The natural son of the salon hostess Mme de Tencin and an eminent soldier, Chevalier Destouches-Canon. Abandoned as a baby by his mother in a wooden box on the steps of the Paris church of Saint-Jean-le-Rond (the baptistery of Notre-Dame), after which he was named. His father, nonetheless, paid for his upkeep and education. A foremost mathematician—he developed partial differential equations—he became a leader among the
philosophes
and a major force in the French Enlightenment. Diderot invited him to be coeditor of the
Encyclopédie;
he wrote the article setting out its aims. Socially he was in demand as a jester and mimic. He is also known for his devotion to Julie de l'Espinasse, to whose aid he came when her aunt and patron, Mme du Deffand, turned her out.

Boufflers, Marie-Charlotte-Hippolyte de Campet de Saujon, Comtesse de Boufflers-Rouverel: 1725–1800.
Married when twenty-one years old to édouard, comte de Boufflers (d. 1764), she soon became the mistress of the Prince de Conti, remaining with him until his death in 1776. Making her home at the Temple, Conti's Paris residence, she was known as
l'Idole du Temple,
but her sensibility, cultivation, and
accomplishments also gave her the title
Minerve savante.
Her salon was among the most brilliant of the age. After writing to Hume in Britain in 1761, she entered a relationship with him of passionate friendship; she was the go-between who brought him together with Rousseau, whom she greatly admired and supported until the publication of the
Confessions
in 1770.

Choiseul, étienne-François, Comte de Stainville, Duc de: 1719–85.
After a brilliant career as soldier and diplomat, he became minister for foreign affairs from 1758 to 1761, then minister for the navy (1761–66), and for war (1761–70) while simultaneously taking responsibility for foreign affairs from 1766. He was seen as the most influential figure in French politics and, in effect, prime minister. He negotiated the Treaty of Paris to end the Seven Years' War and avoided total humiliation for France, then concentrated on rebuilding the French navy and reforming the army. A believer in limited monarchy, he was a protector of the
philosophes
and a supporter of the
Encyclopédie.
Rousseau, who regarded Choiseul as a great statesman, dined with him in 1761 at the Luxembourgs'. Choiseul facilitated Rousseau's return to Paris in late December 1765 and, concerned at his flouting the parlement's authority, prompted his departure for London on January 4, 1766. When Rousseau returned to France in 1767, Choiseul again ensured that he remained unscathed. When Choiseul called for war against England in 1770, court intrigues forced him into exile and he never regained power.

Conti, Louis-François de Bourbon, Prince de:
1717—76.
Distinguished soldier and Louis XV's private political adviser from 1747 until 1757. In that time he carried out secret diplomacy in Europe for the French king. He then retired to the Temple (his Paris residence as grand prior of the Order of Knights of Malta). He was well known as an atheist and supporter of the
philosophes.
After a quarrel with his principal mistress, Mme d'Arty, in 1751, Conti began his long relationship with Mme
de Boufflers; however, he was determined not to marry her. Patron of Rousseau after meeting him in 1760. Lost to Rousseau at chess.

Deffand, Marie de Vichy de Chamrond, Marquise du: 1697–1780.
Briefly but famously mistress of the infant Louis XV's regent, Philippe, duc d'Orléans. In later life, though increasingly blind, she held a salon in Paris at the Convent des Filles de Saint Joseph in rue Saint-Dominique, where she was noted for the quickness of her wit, her sprightliness, and the range of talent in attendance. On Monday nights, the cream of Enlightenment Paris came to dinner in her salon decorated in buttercup-yellow silk. Took in her illegitimate niece Julie de l'Espinasse, but ejected her when she proved more popular than her aunt, thus earning the eternal hatred of d'Alembert. Rousseau initially felt sympathy for her handicap, but turned against her because of, among other things, “her wild prepossessions,” “her incredible prejudices,” and “her invincible obstinacy.” She corresponded extensively with Voltaire and was smitten by Walpole, with whom she exchanged some 1,700 letters, bequeathing him her favorite black spaniel, Tonton, who was not house-trained.

Diderot, Denis: 1713—84.
Atheist, novelist, playwright, exponent of radical theories of the stage, innovative literary and art critic, first and principal editor of the
Encyclopédie,
working on it from the prospectus in 1750 to the final plates in 1772. Of relatively humble origin—the son of a master cutler—he was educated at a Jesuit college. The burly Diderot and Rousseau met in the Café Procop in Paris in 1741, beginning a friendship that endured for fifteen years.

épinay, Louise-Florence-Pétronille Tardieu d'Esclavelles d', Dame de la Live: 1726–83.
Wife of dissolute tax-farmer general, from whom she separated. Held a salon in rue Saint-Honoré attended by such
philosophes
as d'Alembert, d'Holbach, and Grimm, who became her lover.
An early supporter of Rousseau's, she lent him a property, the Hermitage, when he left Paris. There he wrote
Héloïse.
Sister-in-law of Sophie d'Houdetot's, whom Rousseau loved insanely. Mme d'épinay parted company with Rousseau in 1757 when he refused to accompany her to Geneva to consult Dr. Tronchin: he suspected a plot between her and Grimm to dishonor him.

Grimm, Friedrich Melchior, Freiherr von: 1723–1807.
An impecunious German baron who became a tutor in Paris to the Duc d'Orléans and entered the inner circle of the
philosophes.
He was notorious for having fallen into a cataleptic fit over an unrequited love. His great contribution to the spread of enlightened ideas was the fortnightly cultural newsletter from Paris known as the
Correspondance littéraire
that he edited from 1753 to 1792. Circulating uncensored among the courts, the sovereigns and nobility in Germany, Scandinavia, and Russia, the mix of news, gossip, comment, and notes on recent publications is now regarded as invaluable cultural history of the age. He fell out with Rousseau over what he saw as the latter's ingratitude to his lover Mme d'épinay, but prided himself on not attacking Rousseau in print. Ruined by the French Revolution, he survived only through a pension from Catherine the Great.

Helvétius, Claude-Adrien: 1715–71.
Philosophe whose ambition was to reform society through education. His book
De l'esprit
[
Of the Mind
], published in 1758 and containing an attack on religious-based morality, was banned and burned in France and Switzerland, and led to a temporary suspension of the
Encyclopédie
with which he was associated. So radical was this book that such
philosophe
friends as Diderot and Rousseau rushed to join the critics.

Holbach, Paul-Henri Thiry, Baron d': 1723–89.
Immensely wealthy German resident of Paris who provided equally lavish hospitality and financial backing for the
philosophes
and the
Encyclopédie.
He was a
participant in the French Enlightenment whose passion for atheism shook even the other
philosophes.
A specialist on applied science, he contributed over four hundred articles to the
Encyclopédie,
on subjects ranging from chemistry to the roots of religion. An admirer and close friend of Hume's, he warned Hume against Rousseau.

L'Espinasse, Julie de: 1732–76.
Illegitimate offspring of the Comtesse d'Albon and Mme du Deffand's eldest brother, Gaspard. Attracted by her quickness of mind, in 1754 Mme du Deffand took her to assist in her salon, but ejected her in 1764 when she proved too popular with the guests. D'Alembert felt passionately about her—though this passion was not reciprocated—and set her up in the rue Saint-Dominique; her salon then became a magnet for the younger generation of
philosophes.
She died brokenhearted for love of Comte Guibert and is immortalized in Diderot's
Le Rêve d'Alembert.

Le Vasseur, Marie-Thérèse: 1721–1801.
Rousseau's partner by whom he had five children between 1746 and 1752. A laundry and kitchen maid, she met Rousseau in 1745 at the Paris Hôtel Saint-Quentin, where he was staying: they lived together until his death in 1778. Rousseau described his relationship with her as one of “attachment” rather than love, terming her his aunt,
gouvernante
(housekeeper), and sister. Following Rousseau's death, she was seduced by a much younger man, the thirty-four-year-old valet to the Comte de Giradin, Henri Bally, whom she married in November 1779.

Louis XV, the “Well-Beloved”: 1710–74.
King of France 1715–74. Great-grandson of Louis XIV, inheriting the throne at the age of five under the regency of the worldly, dissolute, but liberal Philippe, duc d'Orléans. After Louis dispensed with chief ministers in 1744, his court became a place of factional scheming while the king occupied himself with a series of mistresses, of whom the most famous was Mme de Pompadour, and lost almost all France's overseas possessions to Britain. His
ineffectual rule led to the decline of royal authority and prestige, and so strengthened the forces of revolution.

Luxembourg, Charles-François-Frédéric de Montmorency-Luxembourg, Maréchal de France, Duc de: 1702–64.
Distinguished soldier and protector of Rousseau at his country seat of Montmorency. Provided the coach for Rousseau to escape after the Paris parlement issued a warrant for his arrest following the publication of
Émile.
Rousseau thought him “weak but trustworthy.” His wife,
Madeleine-Angélique (1707–87),
whom Rousseau found charming, was a great supporter of both Rousseau and Le Vasseur. From her salon, she arbitrated on correct style and behavior—even though earlier, when married to the Duc de Boufflers, she had been notorious for her dissipated habits.

Montigny, Jean-Charles-Philibert Trudaine de: 1733–77.
Philosophe. Friend of Hume's and translator of his
Natural History of Religion.
Scion of one of the most influential families in France, he was in charge of national finances for roads and transport.

Morellet, Abbé André: 1727–1819.
An enlightened economist, conversationalist, and writer. Although in holy orders, he became part of the group of atheist
philosophes
who met at d'Holbach's.

Suard, Jean-Báptiste-Antoine: 1734–1817.
Journalist and editor of the
Gazette de France
and
Gazette littéraire de France.
Translator of Hume's account of the falling-out with Rousseau.

Turgot, Anne-Robert-Jacques, Baron de l'Aulne: 1727–81.
Economist, reformer, and statesman. Contributor to the
Encyclopédie
and advocate for policies of internal free trade and laissez-faire, in part as a means of undermining privilege and feudal interests. Regional administrator for Limoges (1761), minister of marine (1774), and controller of
finances (1774–76) when his zeal for modernization of the state led to his downfall. His contemporary reputation was for sagacity, penetrating intelligence, and profundity. Voltaire said of him, “I have scarcely ever seen a man more lovable and better informed.” Translated Hume's discourse
Of the Balance of Trade.

Verdelin, Marie-Madeleine de Brémond d'Ars, Marquise de: 1728–1810.
Daughter of impoverished nobleman and close friend of Sophie d'Houdetot's, with whom Rousseau was infatuated. After an uneasy start in 1759, became a sympathetic friend to Rousseau and played a major role in his move to London. Later, they fell out. Rousseau accused her of being a gossip.

Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet): 1694—1778.
Playwright, philosopher, moralist, historian, wit, successful businessman, prolific correspondent, campaigner against superstition and intolerance; this last role is epitomized in his famous motto
écrasez l'infame
(crush the infamous thing). Twice imprisoned in the Bastille and spent time in exile in England. In 1764, he anonymously published
Le Sentiment des citoyens,
exposing hurtful secrets about Rousseau, whom he met only once, in a salon in 1751.

… and other
philosophes,
rich patrons, nobles, gentlemen of the court, confidential servants, men in black, outraged parlementarians, and archbishops.

Du Peyrou, Pierre-Alexandre:
1729–94.
Financier living in Neuchâtel, where he built a new quayside on the lake and gave many of Rousseau's manuscripts to the municipal library. Came from a rich French Huguenot family in Dutch Guyana. Became friendly with Rousseau
through their shared joy in rambling and natural history. Suffered from gout. In 1782, he published the first complete edition of Rousseau's works. In his many letters, Rousseau addressed him as “my dear host,” and he addressed Rousseau as “my dear citizen.”

Ivernois, François-Henri d':
1722–78.
Genevan merchant and French refugee who effectively forced his friendship on Rousseau (in spite of the exile's attempt to bore him away), becoming a determined visitor at Môtiers, a walking and botanizing companion, and a regular correspondent thereafter.

Ivernois, Jean-Antoine d':
Medical doctor and eminent naturalist who taught Rousseau botany on Isle Saint-Pierre. Cousin (removed) of François-Henri.