Rousseau, Jean Jacques. Autograph Letter Signed ("Rousseau"), in French, 1 page, (7 ? x 6 ? in.; 200 x 162 mm.), "Wooton," 10...

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Rousseau, Jean Jacques. Autograph Letter Signed ("Rousseau"), in French, 1 page, (7 ? x 6 ? in.; 200 x 162 mm.), "Wooton," 10 May 1766 to an unidentified female correspondent; with red wax seal, browned, skillfully repaired. A stormy life has made me sigh for repose. Rousseau writes in full; translated from French: Far from forgetting you, Madame, one of my pleasures in this retreat is to recall the happy times of my life; they have been rare and short-lived, but the memory of them increases them and it is the past which makes the present bearable for me, and I have too great a need of you to forget you. However, I will not write to you, Madame; a stormy life has made me sigh for repose and I feel that I can have none of that except by giving up all correspondence outside the place I am inhabiting. So I am taking up my position, too late no doubt, but soon enough to enjoy those days of peace which may be left to me. Farewell, Madame; the friendship you have honored me with will always be with me and dear to me; may I pray also that you remember it sometimes. Written at the height of his infamous quarrel with David Hume, Rousseau's letter seems to convey a desperate desire to escape the public attention that had dogged him from Paris to London to the remote town in the Derbyshire Peaks where he made his retreat. Yet at the same time, its bold sense of resolution does not ring true. Lodging at the home of Richard Davenport, a sympathetic gentlemen whom he had met while posing at the painter Ramsay's, Rousseau in fact continued to write letters throughout the summer, complaining of the treatment he received at the hands of Hume, who had escorted him from France, helped him look for a place to live in England, and made efforts to secure him a pension. His paranoia was aroused in April upon the publication of a spurious and sarcastic letter from Frederick II to Rousseau, in which the philosopher was attacked for his eccentricities, his lack of common sense, and his abiding sense of persecution. Rousseau held Hume responsible for this epistle, and - despite the pleas of his friends - prepared his own letter in answer to the "hold" which he felt Hume now had over him (while travelling, he had heard Hume exclaim in his sleep, "I hold Jean Jacques Rousseau!"). This eighteen-page diatribe of 10 July 1766 became a 'cause celebre' on both sides of the Channel and prompted Hume's own "Concise Account." The friendship between the two men, if it had ever truly existed, had now come to an end.