[152] Musset-Pathay has collected the details connected with the award of the prize, ii. 365-367.

[153] Second Letter to M. de Malesherbes, p. 358.  Also Conf., viii. 135.

[154] Diderot’s account (Vie de Seneque, sect. 66, Oeuv., iii. 98; also ii. 285) is not inconsistent with Rousseau’s own, so that we may dismiss as apocryphal Marmontel’s version of the story (Mem. VIII.), to the effect that Rousseau was about to answer the question with a commonplace affirmative, until Diderot persuaded him that a paradox would attract more attention.  It has been said also that M. de Francueil, and various others, first urged the writer to take a negative line of argument.  To suppose this possible is to prove one’s incapacity for understanding what manner of man Rousseau was.

[155] Conf., ix. 232, 233.

[156] Rousseau Juge de Jean Jacques, Dialogues, i. 252.

[157] Dialogues, i. 275, 276.

[158] Conf., viii. 138.

[159] “It made a kind of revolution in Paris,” says Grimm. Corr.  Lit., i. 108.

[160] Rep. au Roi de Pologne, p. 111 and p. 113.

[161] Rep. a M. Bordes, 138.

[162] Ib. 137.

[163] “The first source of the evil is inequality; from inequality come riches ... from riches are born luxury and idleness; from luxury come the fine arts, and from idleness the sciences.” Rep. au Roi de Pologne, 120, 121.

[164] Rep. a M. Bordes, 147.  In the same spirit he once wrote the more wholesome maxim, “We should argue with the wise, and never with the public.” Corr., i. 191.

[165] Rep. au Roi de Pologne, 128, 129.

[166] Rep. a M. Bordes, 150-161.

[167] P. 174.

[168] Egger’s Hellenisme en France, 28ieme lecon, p. 265.

[169] Voltaire to J.J.R.  Aug. 30, 1755.

[170] Rep. au Roi de Pologne, 105.

[171] In 1753 the French Academy, by way no doubt of summoning a counter-blast to Rousseau, boldly offered as the subject of their essay the thesis that “The love of letters inspires the love of virtue,” and the prize was won fitly enough by a Jesuit professor of rhetoric.  See Delandine, i. 42.

[172] Preface to Narcisse, 251.

[173] Rep. a M. Bordes, 167.

[174] P. 187.

[175] See for instance a strange discussion about morale universelle and the like in Mem. de Mdme. d’Epinay, i. 217-226.

[176] Often described as Morelly the Younger, to distinguish him from his father, who wrote an essay on the human heart, and another on the human intelligence.

[177] Code de la Nature, ou le veritable esprit de ses loix, de tout tems neglige ou meconnu.

[178] P. 169.  Rousseau did not see it then, but he showed himself on the track.