tion that as such it has exerted a highly important influence upon the development of democratic ideas. In politics Rousseau may well be regarded as the most important of the eighteenth century "radicals." On this question see the Introduction in this volume to the Discours sur l'Inégalité and the Contrat Social. With such criticism of details we are not for the present concerned. To understand his philosophy we must keep in mind, none the less, what, according to Rousseau's conception, was to be the function and end of this new State. His system as a whole is most easily open to attack because of the dualism which he sets up between the life of intellect and the life of feeling. Doubtless there is no such fundamental dichotomy in the human personality, and even if we grant that sentiment and reason may not always be in entire accord, the effects of this opposition are perhaps less baleful than he imagined and there may be other ways of bringing about a new modus vivendi. In the present discussion we desire, however, merely to point out the extraordinary importance to eighteenth and nineteenth century currents of thought of a philosophy so new, so striking, and so attractive.

We may conclude, then, that taken in isolation, it is possible to find parallels in earlier literature to many if not all of the ideas expressed by Rousseau. So far we may accept the conclusions of recent investigators. The belief in the goodness of man and of nature, the glorification of the simple life, the exalting of sentiment, the preaching of natural religion, all these have been abundantly shown to have existed before his

day.22 So too, many of the conclusions drawn from such premises, many of his recommendations with regard to the rearing and training of children, or with the assembling and governing of men in states were known to his predecessors. Even the conception that the State is based on a contract and that it should be governed by the volonté générale was not exclusively his discovery.23. But it is not upon such details that his reputation must rest. His importance in the history of philosophy and of literature depends upon the general system which he presents and upon the peculiarly feverish earnestness with which he presents it.

The point may be readily illustrated by a brief comparison.

Perhaps from none of his predecessors did Rousseau borrow more extensively than from Montaigne. Yet their points of departure, their attitude and aims, were as diverse as they well could be. Montaigne was by habit a student and by temperament he had in him something of the fatalist. He observes the life about him, and his reflections are often not unlike Rousseau's

22 On Rousseau's sources cf. Lanson. Manuel Bibliographique, Origines et Sources des Euvres de Rousseau, Vol. III, pp. 802803, and more especially, Delaruelle, Les sources principales de J.-J. Rousseau dans le premier discours. Revue d'histoire littéraire de la France. 1912. Vol. XIX, pp. 245-271; also ibid., p. 640; also Vol. XX, p. 424: Krueger. Fremde Gedanken in Rousseau's ersten Discours. 1891; Morel, Recherches sur les sources du Discours sur l'Inégalité. Annales J.-J. Rousseau. 1909. Vol. V, pp. 119-198; Villey, L'Influence de Montaigne sur les Idées pédagogiques de Locke et de Rousseau. 1911.

23 Cf. Atger. Essai sur l'histoire des doctrines du contrat social.

1906.

conclusions. But he accepts the fact, even while he may regret that through such a world we must hunt our way. Far differently stands the case with Rousseau. He is neither fatalistic in temper, nor by training a student of human psychology. He is an advocate and a reformer. Essentially utopian, on the basis of what he believed to be a newer and better conception of the world he would demolish and reconstruct. attitude was that of one who would

"shatter the old world to bits, and then

Remould it nearer to the heart's desire."

His

It is for this reason that he accepts very little and is forever in protest. The student who is about to consider Rousseau's various works will therefore do well to begin by regarding him as a man of letters of genius, who, in point of importance if not of time, was the first pleader for some of the most significant changes effected by the eighteenth century. To assist in this study the works are here arranged in chronological order with an introduction to each, dealing with the circumstances under which it was written, and its general bearing.

The Manuel Bibliographique of Lanson is so easily accessible and can be so readily supplemented by the critical yearly bibliographies of the Annales J. J. Rousseau that it has seemed unnecessary to add any extended list of reference works here. In the Notes the more important recent contributions bearing on the immediate matter in hand have been indicated. The references to Rousseau's works in the footnotes are made to the Hachette edition of the Euvres.

In addition to the text of Rousseau himself the Programme of the Académie de Dijon, as Rousseau read it in the Mercure de France on that eventful day of 1749 is printed at the head of the Discourse.* I have here followed the copy made by that veteran Rousseauiste, M. Ritter, for the Zeitschrift für französische Sprache und Literatur.26 Although the Programme is of course not Rousseau's, it seemed to the editor that it might help the student to understand the situation, if he had this interesting and famous announcement before him.

* As Rousseau tells us at the close of his Préface (cf. p. 22 infra) he made a few additions to his manuscript after submitting it to the Academy and before its publication (1750). One of these is in all probability the passage on page 51, containing Rousseau's reference to the Pensées philsophiques (XXV) of Diderot, a volume which had been condemned by the Parlement shortly after it appeared in 1746. The Academy of Dijon could not formally have recognized an essay that cited with approval a volume which had been officially suppressed.

26 Vol. XI, pp. 26-27.

PROGRAMME DE L'ACADEMIE DES SCIENCES ET BELLES LETTRES DE DIJON POUR LE PRIX DE MORALE DE 1750

L'Académie, fondée par M. Hector Bernard Poussier, Doyen du Parlement de Bourgogne, annonce à tous les Sçavans que le Prix de Morale pour l'année 1750-consistant en une Médaille d'or, de la valeur de trente pistoles,-sera adjugé à celui qui aura le mieux résolu le Problême suivant:

Si le rétablissement des Sciences et des Arts a contribué à épurer les mœurs.

Il sera libre à tous ceux qui voudront concourir d'écrire en François ou en Latin, observant que leurs Ouvrages soient lisibles, et que la lecture de chaque Mémoire remplisse et n'excède point une demie heure.

Les Mémoires francs de port (sans quoi ils ne seront pas retirés) seront addressés à M. Petit, secretaire de l'Académie, rue due vieux Marché à Dijon-qui n'en recevra aucun après le premier Avril.

Comme on ne sçauroit prendre trop de précautions, tant pour rendre aux Sçavans la justice qu'ils méritent, que pour écarter autant qu'il est possible les brigues, et cet esprit de partialité qui n'entrainent que trop souvent les suffrages vers les objets connus, ou qui les en détournent par d'autres motifs également irréguliers, l'Académie déclare que tous ceux qui ayant travaillé sur le sujet donné seront convaincus de s'être fait connaitre directement ou indirectement pour Auteurs des Mémoires, avant qu'elle ait décidé sur la distribution du Prix, seront exclus du concours.-Pour obvier à cet inconvénient, chaque Auteur sera tenu de mettre au bas de son Mémoire une Sentence ou Devise, et d'y joindre une feuille de papier cachetée, sous le dos de laquelle sera la même sentence, et sur le cachet son nom, ses qualités et sa demeure, pour y avoir recours à la distribution du Prix. Les dites Feuilles, ainsi cachetées de façon qu'on ne puisse y rien lire à travers, ne seront point ouvertes avant ce temps là, et le secretaire en tiendra un Régistre exact.-Ceux qui exige