ssion was Travail

ROBERT BURNS
The Ploughman-poet

HORACE GREELEY
How the Farm-boy Became an Editor

CHARLES DICKENS
The Factory Boy

CHARLOTTE BRONTE
The Country Parson's Daughter

LOUISA MAY ALCOTT
The Journal of a Brave and Talented Girl

HENRY GEORGE
The Troubles of a Job Printer

JACOB RIIS
"The Making of an American"

WILLIAM H. RIDEING
Rejected Manuscripts

HELEN ADAMS KELLER
How She Learned to Speak

JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU

(1712-1778)

THE MAN TO WHOM EXPRESSION WAS TRAVAIL

From the "Confessions of Rousseau."

It is strange to hear that those critics who spoke of Rousseau's
"incomparable gift of expression," of his "easy, natural style," were
ludicrously incorrect in their allusions. From his "Confessions" we
learn that he had no gift of clear, fluent expression; that he was by
nature so incoherent that he could not creditably carry on an ordinary
conversation; and that the ideas which stirred Europe, although
spontaneously conceived, were brought forth and set before the world
only after their progenitor had suffered the real pangs of labor.

But after all it is the same old story over again. Great things are
rarely said or done easily.

Two things very opposite unite in me, and in a manner which I cannot
myself conceive. My disposition is extremely ardent, my passions
lively and impetuous, yet my ideas are produced slowly, with great
embarrassment and after much afterthought. It might be said my heart
and understanding do not belong to the same individual. A sentiment
takes possession of my soul with the rapidity of lightning, but instead
of illuminating, it dazzles and confounds me; I feel all, but see
nothing; I am warm but stupid; to think I must be cool. What is
astonishing, my conception is clear and penetrating, if not hurried: I
can make excellent impromptus at leisure, but on the instant could
never say or do anything worth notice. I could hold a tolerable
conversation by the post, as they say the Spaniards play at chess, and
when I read that anecdote of a duke of Savoy, who turned himself round,
while on a journey, to cry out "_a votre gorge, marchand de Paris_!" I
said, "Here is a trait of my character!"

This slowness of thought, joined to vivacity of feeling, I am not only
sensible of in conversation, but even alone. When I write, my ideas
are arranged with the utmost difficulty. They glance on my imagination
and ferment till they di