mamma or myself; I cannot be more favorable to Theresa, and whatever
pleasure I may have in doing honor to a person who is dear to me, I will
not disguise the truth, although it may discover in her an error, if an
involuntary change of the affections of the heart be one. I had long
perceived hers to grow cooler towards me, and that she was no longer for
me what she had been in our younger days. Of this I was the more
sensible, as for her I was what I had always been. I fell into the same
inconvenience as that of which I had felt the effect with mamma, and this
effect was the same now I was with Theresa. Let us not seek for
perfection, which nature never produces; it would be the same thing with
any other woman. The manner in which I had disposed of my children,
however reasonable it had appeared to me, had not always left my heart at
ease. While writing my 'Treatise on Education', I felt I had neglected
duties with which it was not possible to dispense. Remorse at length
became so strong that it almost forced from me a public confession of my
fault at the beginning of my 'Emilius', and the passage is so clear, that
it is astonishing any person should, after reading it, have had the
courage to reproach me with my error. My situation was however still the
same, or something worse, by the animosity of my enemies, who sought to
find me in a fault. I feared a relapse, and unwilling to run the risk,
I preferred abstinence to exposing Theresa to a similar mortification.
I had besides remarked that a connection with women was prejudicial to my
health; this double reason made me form resolutions to which I had but
sometimes badly kept, but for the last three or four years I had more
constantly adhered to them. It was in this interval I had remarked
Theresa's coolness; she had the same attachment to me from duty, but not
the least from love. Our intercourse naturally became less agreeable,
and I imagined that, certain of the continuation of my cares wherever she
might be, she would choose to stay at Paris rather than to wander with
me. Yet she had given such signs of grief at our parting, had required