date (see also _Corr._,
ii. 207), but in the well-known letter to her in 1769 (_Ib._ vi. 79),
he speaks of the twenty-six years of their union. Their so-called
marriage took place in 1768, and writing in that year he speaks of the
five-and-twenty years of their attachment (_Ib._ v. 323), and in the
_Confessions_ (ix. 249) he fixes their marriage at the same date; also
in the letter to Saint-Germain (vi. 152). Musset-Pathay, though giving
1745 in one place (i. 45), and 1743 in another (ii. 198), has with
less than his usual care paid no attention to the discrepancy.

[122] _Conf._, vii. 97-100.

[123] _Conf._, vii. 101. A short specimen of her composition may be
interesting, at any rate to hieroglyphic students: "Mesiceuras ancor
mien re mies quan geu ceures o pres deu vous, e deu vous temoes tous
la goies e latandres deu mon querque vous cones ces que getou gour e
rus pour vous, e qui neu finiraes quotobocs ces mon quere qui vous
paleu ces paes mes le vre ... ge sui avestous lamities e la reu conec
caceu posible e la tacheman mon cher bonnamies votreau enble e bon
amiess theress le vasseur." Of which dark words this is the
interpretation:--"Mais il sera encore mieux remis quand je sera aupres
de vous, et de vous temoigner toute la joie et la tendresse de mon
coeur que vous connaissez que j'ai toujours eue pour vous, et qui ne
finira qu'au tombeau; c'est mon coeur qui vous parle, c'est pas mes
levres.... Je suis avec toute l'amitie et la reconnaissance possibles,
et l'attachement, mon cher bon ami, votre humble et bonne amie,
Therese Le Vasseur." (_Rousseau, ses Amis et ses Ennemis_, ii. 450.)
Certainly it was not learning and arts which hindered Theresa's
manners from being pure.

[124] _Oeuv. et Corr. Ined._, 365.

[125] _Conf._, vii. 102. See also _Corr._, v. 373 (Oct. 10, 1768). On
the other hand, _Conf._, ix. 249.

[126] M. St. Marc Girardin, in one of his admirable papers on
Rousseau, speaks of him as "a bourgeois unclassed by an alliance with
a tavern servant" (_Rev. des Deux Mondes_, Nov. 1852, p. 759); but
surely Rousseau had unclassed himself long before, in the houses of
Madame Vercellis, Count Gouvon, and even Madame de Warens, and by his
repudiation, from the time when he ran away from Geneva, of nearly
every bourgeois virtue and bourgeois prejudice.

[127] _Conf._, vii. 11. Also footnote.

[128] _Reveries_, ix. 309.

[129] _Conf._, viii. 142, 143.

[130] The other day I came for the first time