著者

中村 博武

出版者

プール学院大学

雑誌

プール学院大学研究紀要 (ISSN:13426028)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.49, pp.41-52, 2009-12

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Jean - Jacques Rousseau's expression of old age found in les Reveries du Promeneur Solitaire can be understood as training that recurs in one's true self. He reduced amour proper as passions acquired by various human relationship to amour de soi , the soul filled only with the sentiment of existence.Late in Rousseau's life, he copied scores in the morning, went for a stroll in the afternoon, and collected plants and examined the plant structure and order. In this way, he put himself in harmony with the order of nature and did so in order to recover the harmony of his soul. This experience of fusing with nature brought the sense of his ego disappearing. It is a religious act of planning to separate the soul from the body, as "ecstasy" suggests it. For him, this sense of secession from the body was a sign of living in the next world because when the soul is liberated from the bonds of body, it is as though it rises into heaven. Therefore, Rousseau viewed nature as a religious textbook and contemplated nature to quiet the disorder of his soul because of unjust persecutions and to regain spiritual harmony.This idea of nature where person doesn't exist also recalls Rousseau's peaceful life with Madame de Warens. His contemplative life was deeply influenced by her and he seemed to identify her with calm nature, or looked at nature with her in his mind. That is to say, Rousseau's sentiment of existence was filled not only with the contemplation of nature but also with his memories of her.Even when he excluded the influence of the body from the soul, he realized that those memories still existed.According to Rousseau, Madame de Warens shaped him so that the two come to share their existence in common. His relationship with Madame was an essential part of his sentiment of existence. It was for this reason that he recorded this happy, intimate memories of Madame de Warens in the last chapter of les Reveries du Promeneur Solitaire.