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Jean-Jacques Rousseau 1712-1778
J.J.
Rousseau was a thinker. He
was also an excellent chess player, a Frenchman and a philosopher.
Rousseau was born in Geneva, which, at the time of his birth, was an independent city, protected by
France. Geneva became officially Swiss in the year 1814.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau was for expressing emotion
and against suppressing them just for the sake of being polite.
He also recommended that we all should get in touch with our conscience a little bit
more.
(define Conscience = Inner sense of right and wrong)
Pronounce
CONSCIENCE
Rousseau felt emotions much
stronger than the average bear. So it was no surprise that he hated
social injustice with a vengeance.
JJ's Book The Social Contract.
One of of Jean-Jacques' all-time
favorites was
Plutarch.
He also liked the works of
Voltaire,
who lived 1694 - 1778. The two, Rousseau and Voltaire, got along
well at first but later
ended up despising each other.
J.J. Rousseau was one of the first ones who thought
that childhood memories could form your personality. He was also the
inventor of modern autobiography with his work Confessions.
Rousseau adopted a systematic study to improve
mind and heart (
Ben Franklin
comes to mind with his self-improvement system).
Rousseau says,
"I have undertaken a
system of study that I have divided under two principal headings:
the first, everything that serves to enlighten the mind and fill it
with useful and agreeable knowledge; the second, methods for
training the heart in wisdom and virtue."
He ordered stacks of books
and started developing his own self-help program.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
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