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BookVm1 I was obliged to make a pause at the end of the preceding Book. With this one begins the long chain of my misfortunes in itsfirstorigin. Having lived in two of the most brilliant houses of Paris, I had not failed to make some acquaintances in spite of my lack of aplomb. Among others, at Mme Dupin's I had made that of the young crown prince of Saxe-Gotha and of his Tutor the Baron de Thun.2 At M. de la Popliniere's I had made that of M. Segui, a friend of the Baron de Thun, and known in the literary world through hisfineedition of Rousseau.3 The Baron invited M. Seguy and me to go to pass a day or two at Fontenay-sous-Bois,4 where the Prince had a house. We went there. While passing in front of Vincennes, at the sight of the Keep I felt a rending of the heart the effect of which the Baron noticed on my face. At supper the Prince spoke about Diderot's detention. In order to make me speak the Baron accused the prisoner of imprudence: some of which I put into the impetuous manner I defended him. They pardoned that excess of zeal in someone inspired by an unfortunate friend and changed the subject. Two Germans attached to the Prince were there. One called M. Klupffell,5 a very witty man, was his Chaplain, and later on became his Tutor after having supplanted the Baron. The other was a young man called M. Grimm, who served him as a reader while waiting to find some position, and whose very sparing outfit announced his pressing need to find one.6 From that very night Klupffell and I began a connection that soon became friendship. The connection with the Said Grimm did not exactly proceed so fast. He hardly put himself forward, being very far from that supercilious tone that prosperity gave him afterward. The next day at dinner we spoke about music; he spoke well about it. I was carried away with joy when I learned that he accompanied on the Clavichord. After dinner some7 music was brought in. We made music all day at the Prince's Clavichord, and thus began that friendship which at first was so sweet for me, finally so fatal, and about which I will have so much to say from now on. Upon returning to Paris I learned the agreeable news that Diderot had left the Keep, and he had been given the Chateau and park of Vincennes as prison on his parole with permission to see his friends.8 How hard it was for me not to be able to run there that very instant! But being held 293 294 Confessions back for two or three days at Mme Dupin's by essential concerns, after three or four centuries of impatience I flew into my friend's arms. Inexpressible moment! He was not alone. D'Alembert9 and the Treasurer of the Ste. Chapelle were with him. Upon entering I saw only him, I only made a leap, a shout, I pressed my face onto his, I clasped him closely without speaking to him except with my tears and my sobs; I choked with tenderness and joy. His first movement after leaving my arms10 was to turn toward the Ecclesiastic and say to him, "You see, Sir, how my friends love me." Having abandoned myself entirely to my emotion, I did not reflect on that way of drawing an advantage from it at the time. But when I have thought about it sometimes since then, I have always judged that in Diderot's place, that would not have been the first idea that would have come to me. I found him very much affected by his imprisonment. The Keep had made a terrible impression on him and, although he was extremely pleasantly situated at the Chateau and master of his walks in a park that is not even closed in by walls, he needed the society of his friends so as not to surrender to his dark mood. Since I was certainly the one who commiserated the most with his pain, I believed I was also the one whose sight would be most consoling to him, and, in spite of very demanding occupations , at least every second day, I went either alone or with his wife to pass the afternoon with him. That year 1749 the Summer was excessively...

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