“. . . I believe I told you before that as a nation I do not admire the Irish, and as to the great world and its frivolous ceremonies I cannot away with them. They fatigue one; I thank Heaven that I was not so unfortunate as to be born a lady of quality. I am now reading Rousseau’s ‘Emile,’ and love his paradoxes. He chooses a common capacity to educate, and gives as a reason that a genius will educate itself. However he rambles into that chimerical world in which I have too often wandered, and draws the usual conclusion that all is vanity and vexation of spirit. He was a strange, inconsistent, unhappy, clever creature, yet he possessed an uncommon portion of sensibility and penetration. . . . Adieu, yours sincerely,
