enthusiasm that the world has ever
seen. For some weeks he reigned in the capital, visible and glorious,
the undisputed lord of the civilized universe. The climax came when he
appeared in a box at the Theatre Francais, to witness a performance of
the latest of his tragedies, and the whole house rose as one man to
greet him. His triumph seemed to be something more than the mere
personal triumph of a frail old mortal; it seemed to be the triumph of
all that was noblest in the aspirations of the human race. But the
fatigue and excitement of those weeks proved too much even for Voltaire
in the full flush of his eighty-fourth year. An overdose of opium
completed what Nature had begun; and the amazing being rested at last.

French literature during the latter half of the eighteenth century was
rich in striking personalities. It might have been expected that an age
which had produced both Diderot and Voltaire would hardly be able to
boast of yet another star of equal magnitude. But, in JEAN-JACQUES
ROUSSEAU, there appeared a man in some ways even more remarkable than
either of his great contemporaries. The peculiar distinction of Rousseau
was his originality. Neither Voltaire nor Diderot possessed this quality
in a supreme degree. Voltaire, indeed, can only claim to be original by
virtue of his overwhelming common sense, which enabled him to see
clearly what others could only see confusedly, to strike without fear
where others were only willing to wound; but the whole bulk of his
thought really rested on the same foundation as that which supported the
ordinary conceptions of the average man of the day. Diderot was a far
bolder, a far more speculative thinker; but yet, though he led the very
van of the age, he was always in it; his originality was never more than
a development--though it was often an extreme development--of the ideas
that lay around him. Rousseau's originality went infinitely further than
this. He neither represented his age, nor led it; he opposed it. His
outlook upon the world was truly revolutionary. In his eyes, the reforms
which his contemporaries were so busy introducing into society were
worse than useless--the mere patching of an edifice which would never be
fit to live in. He believed that it was necessary to start altogether
afresh. And what makes him so singularly interesting a figure is that,
in more than one sense, he was right. It _was_ necessary to start
afresh; and the new world which was to spr