to the Hermitage, without I will not only say my having received the
least censure, but without any steps having been taken to prevent the
publication of it in France, where it was sold as publicly as in Holland.
The New Eloisa afterwards appeared with the same facility, I dare add;
with the same applause: and, what seems incredible, the profession of
faith of this Eloisa at the point of death is exactly similar to that of
the Savoyard vicar. Every strong idea in the Social Contract had been
before published in the discourse on Inequality; and every bold opinion
in Emilius previously found in Eloisa. This unrestrained freedom did not
excite the least murmur against the first two works; therefore it was not
that which gave cause to it against the latter.

Another undertaking much of the same kind, but of which the project was
more recent, then engaged my attention: this was the extract of the works
of the Abbe de Saint Pierre, of which, having been led away by the thread
of my narrative, I have not hitherto been able to speak. The idea was
suggested to me, after my return from Geneva, by the Abbe Malby, not
immediately from himself, but by the interposition of Madam Dupin, who
had some interest in engaging me to adopt it. She was one of the three
or four-pretty women of Paris, of whom the Abbe de Saint Pierre had been
the spoiled child, and although she had not decidedly had the preference,
she had at least partaken of it with Madam d'Aiguillon. She preserved
for the memory of the good man a respect and an affection which did honor
to them both; and her self-love would have been flattered by seeing the
still-born works of her friend brought to life by her secretary. These
works contained excellent things, but so badly told that the reading of
them was almost insupportable; and it is astonishing the Abbe de Saint
Pierre, who looked upon his readers as schoolboys, should nevertheless
have spoken to them as men, by the little care he took to induce them to
give him a hearing. It was for this purpose that the work was proposed
to me as useful in itself, and very proper for a man laborious in
manoeuvre, but idle as an author, who finding the trouble of thinking
very fatiguing, preferred, in things which pleased him, throwing a light
upon and extending the ideas of others, to producing any himself.
Besides, not being confined to the functions of a translator, I was at
liberty sometimes to think for myself; and I had it i