ROUSSEAU Jean-Jacques (1712-1778)

Lot 197
Go to lot
Estimation :
8000 - 10000 EUR
Result with fees
Result : 11 050EUR
ROUSSEAU Jean-Jacques (1712-1778)
L.A.S. "JJRousseau", "Ce mardi 7" [May 1776], à la marquise de CRÉQUI; 2 pages in-4 (a few small pinholes in the upper corner). Letter of rupture with her friend and protector, the marquise de Créqui. [Renée-Caroline de Froullay, marquise de Créqui by her marriage (1714-1803), widow, had received Rousseau in 1744 in her salon, which was also frequented by d'Alembert and Marmontel. There followed a strong friendship, finally broken by Rousseau's shady character]. "Rousseau can assure Madame la Marquise de Crequi that as long as he believes that he will find in her the feelings he bears there and whose return is due to him, far from counting and regretting his steps to have the honor of seeing her, he will believe himself well compensated for a hundred useless errands for the success of just one. But in any other case he declares that he regards a single step as indignities lost and his visits received as fraud and theft, since mutual esteem is the sacred and indispensable condition without which, apart from the necessity of business, he is determined never to honour anyone voluntarily. I admit that I receive people in my home for whom I have no esteem, but I receive them by force, I do not hide my disdain from them, and since they are accommodating, they bear it to their own ends. For me, who does not want to deceive or betray anyone, when I do so much as go to someone's home it is to honour them and to be honoured. I show him my esteem by going there; he shows me his esteem by receiving me. If he has the misfortune of refusing it to me, and if he is upright, he will soon be disillusioned, or soon delivered from me. These are my feelings, and if they agree with those of the Marquise de Crequi, I shall be glad of them, and if they differ, I hope she will tell me how. If she prefers not to tell me, she will speak very clearly. I beg her to accept here my greetings and respect"... He contended that he wrote this letter on the receipt of the Marquise's note; "but not wanting to entrust it to the small post office I waited until I was in a condition to carry it myself". Attached is the autograph minute of the Marquise de CRÉQUI's reply (1 page and a quarter in-16). "I confess that I do not believe that my precautions not to fail to receive Mr. Rousseau were susceptible to interpretation, I will not take them any more since they matted notes so little in conformity with the feelings of damnation that I stole from him, I have always believed that one honours me a lot by coming dear to me, and that I honour infinitely by receiving it, and I have no more to rectify my ideas on this point than on any other". [Rousseau prepared a reply to this post, which was finally not sent to the Marquise. So here we have Rousseau's very last letter to the Marquis de Créqui]. [Rousseau prepared a reply to this note, which was finally not sent to the Marquise.]
My orders
Sale information
Sales conditions
Return to catalogue