ntionalities have no share. He
values most those things that are most useful to him; and never
deviating from this standard, is not influenced by general opinion.

Emile is industrious, temperate, patient, steadfast, and full of
courage. His imagination, never aroused, does not exaggerate dangers.
He feels few discomforts, and can bear pain with fortitude, because he
has never learned to contend with fate. He does not yet know exactly
what death is, but, accustomed to yield to the law of necessity, he
will die when he must, without a groan or a struggle. Nature can do no
more at that moment abhorred by all. To live free and to have little
to do with human affairs is the best way of learning how to die.

In a word, Emile has every virtue which affects himself. To have the
social virtues as well, he only needs to know the relations which make
them necessary; and this knowledge his mind is ready to receive. He
considers himself independently of others, and is satisfied when others
do not think of him at all. He exacts nothing from others, and never
thinks of owing anything to them. He is alone in human society, and
depends solely upon himself. He has the best right of all to be
independent, for he is all that any one can be at his age. He has no
errors but such as a human being must have; no vices but those from
which no one can warrant himself exempt. He has a sound constitution,
active limbs, a fair and unprejudiced mind, a heart free and without
passions. Self-love, the first and most natural of all, has scarcely
manifested itself at all. Without disturbing any one's peace of mind
he has led a happy, contented life, as free as nature will allow. Do
you think a youth who has thus attained his fifteenth year has lost the
years that have gone before?

[1] This might be carried too far, and is to be admitted with some
reservations. Ignorance is never alone; its companions are always
error and presumption. No one is so certain that he knows, as he who
knows nothing; and prejudice of all kinds is the form in which our
ignorance is clothed.

[2] The armillary sphere is a group of pasteboard or copper circles, to
illustrate the orbits of the planets, and their position in relation to
the earth, which is represented by a small wooden ball.

[3] The imaginary circles traced on the celestial sphere, and figured
in the armillary sphere by metallic circles, are called _culures_.

[4] Rousseau here informs