we should rarely feel the need of being virtuous. But
inclinations that might be easily overcome, drag us on without
resistance; we yield to light temptations of which we despise the
hazard. Insensibly we fall into perilous situations, against which we
could easily have shielded ourselves, but from which we can afterwards
only make a way out by heroic efforts that stupefy us, and so we sink
into the abyss, crying aloud to God, Why hast thou made me so weak? But
in spite of ourselves, God gives answer to our conscience, 'I made thee
too weak to come out from the pit, because I made thee strong enough to
avoid falling into it.'"[28] So the hopeful convert did fall in, not as
happens to the pious soul "too hot for certainties in this our life,"
to find rest in liberty of private judgment and an open Bible, but
simply as a means of getting food, clothing, and shelter.[29] The boy
was clever enough to make some show of resistance, and he turned to good
use for this purpose the knowledge of Church history and the great
Reformation controversy which he had picked up at M. Lambercier's. He
was careful not to carry things too far, and exactly nine days after his
admission into the Hospice, he "abjured the errors of the sect."[30] Two
days after that he was publicly received into the kindly bosom of the
true Church with all solemnity, to the high edification of the devout of
Turin, who marked their interest in the regenerate soul by contributions
to the extent of twenty francs in small money.

With that sum and formal good wishes the fathers of the Hospice of the
Catechumens thrust him out of their doors into the broad world. The
youth who had begun the day with dreams of palaces, found himself at
night sleeping in a den where he paid a halfpenny for the privilege of
resting in the same room with the rude woman who kept the house, her
husband, her five or six children, and various other lodgers. This rough
awakening produced no consciousness of hardship in a nature which,
beneath all fantastic dreams, always remained true to its first sympathy
with the homely lives of the poor. The woman of the house swore like a
carter, and was always dishevelled and disorderly: this did not prevent
Rousseau from recognising her kindness of heart and her staunch
readiness to befriend. He passed his days in wandering about the streets
of Turin, seeing the wonders of a capital, and expecting some adventure
that should raise him to unknown heights.