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The confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau, transl
The confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau transl Author:Jean Jacques Rousseau Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: appointed watehmaker to llio Seraglio. During his absence, the beauty wit, and accomplishmentss of my mother attracted a number of nd. mlrers, among whom Mons. d... more »o la Closure, Resident of France, was the moat assiduous in his attentions. His passion must have been extremely violent, since after a period of thirty years I have seen him affected at the very mention of her name. My mother had a defence more powerful oven than her virtue; she tenderly loved my father, and conjured him to return; his inclination seconding this request, he gave up every prospect of emolument, and hastened to Geneva. I was the unfortunate fruit of this return, being born ten months after, in a very weakly and infirm state: my birth cost my mother her life, and was the first of my misfortunes. I am ignorant how my father supported her loss at that time, but I know ho was ever after inconsolable. In me he still thought he saw her he Bo tenderly lamented, but could never forget I had been the innocent cause of his misfortune, nor did he ever embrace me, but his sighs, the convulsive pressure of his arms, witnessed that a bitter regret mingled itself with his caresses, though, as may be supposed, they were not on this account less ardent. When he said to mo, " Jean Jacques, let us talk of your mother," my usual reply was, " Yes, father, but then you know, we shall ery," and immediately the tears started from his eyes. "Ah I'' exclaimed he, with agitation, " Give mo back my wife; at least console mo for her loss; fill up, dear boy, the void she has left in my soul. Could I lovo thee thus wert thon only my son?" s Tii. . were too brilliant for her situation, the minister, her father, having bestowed great pains on her education. She was taught drawing, sinsing, and to play on the theorbo; had learnins, an...« less