ROUSSEAU, John Baptist

ROUSSEAU, John Baptist, a celebrated French poet, was born at Paris, in April 1671. His father, who was a shoemaker in good circumstances, made him study in the best colleges of Paris, where he distinguished himself by his abilities. He at length applied himself entirely to poetry, and soon made himself known by several short pieces, that were filled with lively and agreeable images, which made him sought for by persons of the first rank, and men of the brightest genius. He was admitted in quality of élève, or pupil, into the academy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres, in 1701, and almost all the rest of his life attached himself to some great men. He attended Marshal Tallard into England, in quality of secretary, and here contracted a friendship with St Evremond. At his return to Paris, he was admitted into the polite company, lived among the courtiers, and seemed perfectly satisfied with his situation; when, in 1708, he was prosecuted for being the author of some couplets, in which the characters of several persons of wit and merit were blackened by the most atrocious calumnies. This prosecution made much noise; and Rousseau was banished in 1712 out of the kingdom, to which he was never more to return, by a decree of the parliament of Paris. However, he always steadily denied, and even on his death-bed, his being the author of these couplets. From the date of this sentence he lived in foreign countries, where he found illustrious protectors. The count de Lue, ambassador of France, in Switzerland, took him into his family, and studied to render his life agreeable. He took him with him to the treaty of Baden in 1714, where he was one of the plenipotentiaries, and presented him to Prince Eugene, who entertaining a particular esteem for him, took him to Vienna, and introduced him to the emperor's court. Rousseau lived about three years with Prince Eugene; but having lost his favour by satirising one of his mistresses, he retired to Brussels, where he afterwards usually resided, and where

Rouffeau. he met with much attention and much generosity, as we shall soon mention.—It was there that his disputes with Voltaire commenced, with whom he had become acquainted at the college of Louis the Great, who then much admired his turn for poetry. At that time Voltaire assiduously cultivated the acquaintance of Rouffeau, and made him a present of all his works; and Rouffeau, flattered by his respect, announced him as a man who would one day be a glory to the age. The author of the Henriade continued to consult him about his productions, and to lavish on him the highest encomiums, while their friendship daily increased. When they again met at Brussels, however, they harboured the blackest malice against one another. The cause of this enmity, as Rouffeau and his friends tell the story, was a lecture which he had composed from his Epistle to Julia, now Urania. This piece frightened Voltaire, as it plainly discovered his rage against him. The young man, vexed at these calumnies, understood the whole as thrown out against him. This is what Rouffeau asserts. But his adversaries, and the friends of the poet whom he erred down, suspected him, perhaps rather rashly, of having employed sarcasms, because he thought that his own reputation was in danger of being eclipsed by that of his rival. What is very singular, these two celebrated characters endeavoured each of them to prepossess the public with a bad opinion of the other, which they themselves never entertained in reality, and to smother in their breast that esteem for each other which, in defiance of all their exertions, still held its place. Rouffeau, from the period of this dispute, always represented Voltaire as a buffoon, as a writer possessing neither taste nor judgment, who owed all his success to a particular mode which he pursued. As a poet he considered him as inferior to Lucan, and little superior to Prædon. Voltaire treated him still worse. Rouffeau, according to him, was nothing better than a plagiarist, who could make shift to rhyme, but could not make any reflections; that he had nothing but the talent of arranging words, and that he had even lost that in foreign countries. He thus addresses him, in a piece little known.

Aussitôt le Dieu qui m'inspire
T'arracha le luth et la lyre
Qu'avoient déshonorés tes mains;
Tu n'es plus qu'un reptile immonde,
Rebut du Parnasse et du monde
Enfouli dans tes venins.

In consequence of the little esteem in which Rouffeau was held at Brussels, he could never forget Paris. The grand-prior of Vendôme, and the baron de Breteuil, solicited the regent duke of Orleans to allow him to return; which favour was obtained. But our poet, before he would make use of the lettres de rapel issued in his favour, demanded a review of his process, which he wished to be repealed, not as a matter of favour, but by a solemn judgment of court; but his petition was refused. He then came over, in 1721, to England, where he printed A Collection of his Works, in 2 vols 12mo, at London. This edition, published in 1723, brought him near 10,000 crowns, the whole of which he placed in the hands of the Ostend company. The affairs of this company, however, soon getting into confusion, all those who had any money in their hands lost the whole

of it, by which unfortunate event Rouffeau, when arrived at that age when he stood most in need of the comforts of fortune, had nothing to depend upon but the generosity of some friends. Boutet, public notary in Paris, was peculiarly generous and attentive to him. He found a still greater asylum in the duke d'Aremberg, whose table was open to him at all times; who being obliged in 1733 to go into the army in Germany, settled on him a pension of 1500 livres. But unfortunately he soon lost his good opinion, having been imprudent enough to publish in a journal (of which Voltaire accused him), that the duke d'Aremberg was the author of those verses for which he himself had been banished France. He was therefore dismissed from his table, and his pride would not allow him to accept of the pension after this rupture. Brussels now became insupportable to him; and the count de Lue, and M. de Senozan, receiver-general of the church revenue, being informed of his disappointments, invited him to come privately to Paris, in the hopes of procuring a diminution of the period of his banishment. Some time previous to this Rouffeau had published two new letters; one to P. Brumoy, on tragedy; the other to Rollin, on history. It is said, he expected from his letter to Brumoy to get the favour of all the Jesuits; and from the one to Rollin, the patronage of the Jesuits. He had likewise written an Ode, in praise of Cardinal de Fleury, on Peace, which met with a favourable reception, although it was not equal to some of his former pieces. He imagined his return to Paris would be found no difficult matter. He attempted it, and found he could not obtain a pass for a single year. Some say, that Rouffeau had irritated some persons in power, by an allegory, called The Judgment of Pluto; in which piece he describes one of the principal judges, whose skin Pluto had caused to be taken off and stretched out on the seat in the bench. This satire, joined to the secret machinations of enemies, rendered all the attempts of his friends to procure his return abortive. After having staid three months at Paris, he returned to Brussels in February 1740, at which place he died March 17, 1741, strongly impressed with religious sentiments. Immediately before he received the viaticum, he protested he was not the author of those horrid verses which had so much embittered his life; and this declaration, in the opinion of the virtuous part of mankind, will be considered as a sufficient proof of his innocence. Some have said that Rouffeau was profane, troublesome, capricious, forward, vindictive, envious, a flatterer, and a satirist. Others again represent him as a man full of candour and openness, a faithful and grateful friend, and as a Christian affected with a sense of religion.—Amidst such widely varied accounts it is difficult to form an opinion of his character. Such of our readers as wish to know more of this great poet may consult the Dictionary of M. Chaupie, written with as much precision as impartiality, who endeavours to give a just idea of his character. From what he says, it does not appear that Rouffeau can be cleared from the accusation brought against him of having attacked his benefactors. We believe he may be much more easily freed from the imputation brought against him by some of having disowned his father: for what occasion had Rouffeau to conceal the obscurity of his birth? It exalted his own merit.

Rouffau. M. Seguy, in concert with M. the prince of la Tour Tassis, has given a very beautiful edition of his works, agreeable to the poet's last corrections. It was published in 1743, at Paris, in three vols. 4to, and in 4 vols. 12mo, containing nothing but what was acknowledged by the author as his own. It contains, 1. Four Books of Odes, of which the first are sacred odes, taken from the Psalms. "Rouffau (says Ferron) unites in himself Pindar, Horace, Anacreon, and Malherbe. What fire, what genius, what flights of imagination, what rapidity of description, what variety of affecting strokes, what a crowd of brilliant comparisons, what richness of rhymes, what happy versification; but especially what inimitable expression! His verses are finished in the highest style of perfection that French verse is capable of assuming." The lyric compositions of Rouffau are, in general, above mediocrity. All his odes are not, however, of equal merit. The most beautiful are those which he has addressed to count de Luc, to Malherbe, to Prince Eugene, to Vendome, to the Christian princes; his Odes on the death of the prince de Conti, on the battle of Peterwaradin; and the Ode to Fortune, although there are certainly some few weak stanzas to be met with in it. There is considerable neatness in the composition of the Ode to a Widow, in his stanzas to the Abbé de Chaulieu, in his addresses to Rossignol, in his Odes to Count de Bonneval, to M. Duché, and to Count de Sinzendorf; and it is to be lamented that he wrote so few pieces of this kind, from which his genius seemed to lead him with difficulty. 2. Two Books of Epistles, in verse. Although these do not want their beauties, yet there prevails too much of a misanthropic spirit in them, which takes away greatly from their excellence. He makes too frequent mention of his enemies and his misfortunes; he displays those principles which are supported less on the basis of truth than on those various passions which ruled his mind at the time. He puts forth his anger in paradoxes. If he be reckoned equal to Horace in his odes, he is far inferior in his epistles. There is much more philosophy in the Roman poet than in him. 3. Cantatas. He is the father of this species of poetry, in which he stands unrivalled. His pieces of this sort breathe that poetical expression, that picturesque style, those happy turns, and those easy graces, which constitute the true character of this kind of writing. He is as lively and impetuous as he is mild and affecting, adapting himself to the passions of those persons whom he makes to speak. "I confess (says M. de la Harpe) that I find the cantatas of Rouffau more purely lyric than his odes, although he rises to greater heights in these. I see nothing in his cantatas but bold and agreeable images. He always addresses himself to the imagination, and he never becomes either too verbose or too prolix. On the contrary, in some of the best of his odes, we find some languishing stanzas, ideas too long delayed, and verses of inexcusable meanness. 4. Allegories, the most of which are happy, but some of them appear forced. 5. Epigrams, after the manner of Martial and Marot. He has taken care to leave out of this edition those pieces which licentiousness and debauchery inspired. They bear, indeed, as well as his other pieces, the marks of genius; but such productions are calculated only to dishonour their authors, and corrupt the heart of those who read them. 5. A Book of Poems on Various Subjects,

which sometimes want both ease and delicacy. The Rouffau. most distinguished are two eclogues, imitated from Virgil. 6. Four comedies in verse; the Flatterer, whose character is well supported; the Imaginary Forefathers, a piece which had much less success, although it affords sufficiently good sentiment; the Capricious Man, and the Dupe of Herself, pieces of very inconsiderable merit. 7. Three comedies in prose; the Coffee-house, the Magic Girdle, and the Madragore, which are little better than his other theatrical pieces. The theatre was by no means his forte; he had a genius more suited for satire than comedy, more akin to Boileau's than Molière's. 8. A Collection of Letters, in prose. In this edition he has selected the most interesting.—There is a larger collection in 5 volumes. This last has done at the same time both injury and honour to his memory. Rouffau in it speaks both in favour of and against the very same persons. He appears too hasty in tearing to pieces the characters of those who displease him. We behold in them a man of a steady character and an elevated mind, who wishes to return to his native country only that he might be enabled completely to justify his reputation. We see him again corresponding with persons of great merit and uncommon integrity, with the Abbé d'Olivet, Racine the son, the poets La Fosse and Duché, the celebrated Rollin, M. le Franc de Pompignan, &c. &c. We meet also with some anecdotes and exact judgments of several writers. A bookseller in Holland has published his port-folio, which does him no honour. There are, indeed, some pieces in this wretched collection which did come from the pen of Rouffau; but he is less to be blamed for them than they are who have drawn these works from that oblivion to which our great poet had consigned them. A pretty good edition of his Selected Pieces appeared at Paris in 1741, in a small 12mo volume. His portrait, engraved by the celebrated Aved, his old friend, made its appearance in 1778, with the following motto from Martial:

Certior in nostro carmine vultus erit.