고독한 산보자의 명상

루소는 그의 일생에서 가장 행복한 때가 그가 망명지로 향하기 전 머물렀던 호수의 섬에서 보낸 두 달간이었다고, 그의 “고독한 산보자의 명상”에서 상술하였다. 

 

나에게도 그런 두 달의 시간이 있었다.  여기에서.==>^^*꾸벅

 

 

 

 

루소의 책 일부분을 카피해 왔다.==>

 

"지금까지 내가 살던 모든 곳들에서(거기엔 멋진 곳도 있었지만) 비엔느 호수 한 가운데 있는 생 피에르 섬같이 진실로 나를 행복하게 해준 곳, 깊은 애석의 정을 마음에 남겨 준 곳은 다른 데는 없었다. 그 작은 섬은 누샤텔에서는 "못뜨" 섬이라 불리는데, 스위스에서 조차 사람들에게 거의 알려져 있지 않다. 비엔느 호반은 쥬네브 호반에 비하면 더 야생적이고 로만적이다. 바위와 숲이 물가에 바짝 가까이 있기 때문이다. 그런데도 경치는 밝고 아름답다. 농경지나 포도밭이 적고 취락이나 인가가 드물어도 거기에는 자연 그대로의 초원•목장•나무그늘의 휴식처가 많고 기복과 濃淡이 풍부하다. 거기엔 고독한 명상자, 마음껏 자연의 매력에 취하고, 정적 가운데서 마음을 가라 앉히고, 그 정적을 깨는 건 단지 독수리의 울음, 이따금 들리는 알 수 없는 새들의 지저귐, 그리고 산에서 떨어지는 분류의 폭음 - 이런 경지를 사랑하는 이에게는 흥미있는 곳이다.

 

이 아름다운 호수는 원형같은 형태인데, 그 속에 두 개의 작은 섬을 에워싸고 있다. 모띠에로부터 돌팔매에 쫓겨 내가 숨어든 곳이 바로 이 섬이다. 나에게는 이 곳이 참으로 멋지다고 생각됐고, 내 기질에 딱 들어 맞는 생활을 할 수가 있어서 거기서 일생을 지낼 작정이던 나는 영국에 나를 데려가려는 계획 - 그 첫 징조를 나는 이미 감지하고 있었다 - 의 방해가 될 행동을 사람들이 허락하지 않으리라는 것만이 걱정이었다. 나는 이 섬에서 사는 것이 채 두 달도 허락되지 않았지만, 가령 거기서 두 해, 두 세기, 아니 영원을 살았던들, 한 순간도 싫지 않았을 것이다. 거기서 나와 아내는 稅吏와 그의 아내, 고용인들 밖엔 얘기할 상대도 없었다. 나는 그 두 달을 생애에서 가장 행복한 때라고 여길 뿐 아니라, 일생동안 만족한 기분으로 살 수 있었을 거라고 여길 만큼 행복한 때였다.

 

그 행복이란 도시 어떤 것이었는가? 또 어떻게 그 행복을 즐겼는가? 나는 거기서 가진 생활을 그려볼 테니까, 오늘의 모든 사람들이 될 수 있으면 알아주길 바란다. 존귀한 "무위"야 말로, 그 쾌적함을 맘껏 맛보았으면 하고 바랐던 즐거움의 제일의, 주된 것인데, 실제로 거기에 머문 동안에 누린 것은 모두 한가에 몸을 맡긴 사람에게 필요한 감미로운 일이었다.

급히 혼자 입은 옷 단벌로 옮겨간 나는 뒤에 가정부(테레즈)를 불러 들이고 책 가지와 짐을 붙여 왔지만, 일체 손을 대지 않는 게 기쁘고, 상자 떼기와 짐 보따리를 그냥 놔두고, 여생을 살려는 곳에서, 내일 아침이면 떠나갈 여인숙인양 살고 있었다. 특히 가장 기쁘게 여긴 것은 책들을 언제까지 상자에 싼 채로 놔두고 더구나 펜이나 잉크를 가까이 놓지 않은 것이다. 그런그런 시시한 서류나 변변치 않은 책 대신, 꽃과 건초를 방안 가득히 펴놓았다. 왜냐하면 그 무렵 식물학에 열중하게 된 덕분에 식물학에 취미를 갖게 되어 그것이 나의 정열이 되었다.

 

나는 "피에르 섬 식물지"를 써서 이 섬의 모든 식물들을 그 책에 여생을 받혀 상세하게 기술할 작정이었다. 어떤 독일인은 레몬 껍질에 관한 책을 썼다는데, 나는 목장의 목초 하나하나, 숲의 이끼 하나하나, 바위를 덮은 석화 하나하나에 대해 한 권의 책을 썼을지 모른다. 이 멋진 계획을 실행하려고 아침마다 함께 조반을 들고는 손에 확대경을 들고 책『자연의 체계』를 끼고 섬 한 군데로 탐방에 나서곤 했다. 그 때까지는 생각도 못한 식물의 通有性을 분간, 흔한 種에서 그것을 검증하는 일이 나를 경이롭게 하고 더욱 진기한 종을 만날 기대를 안겨 주었다. 저녁을 들고 나서 갠 밤이면 우리는 함께 고지에 올라 어슬렁어슬렁 산책하고 거기서 호수 위 대기와 시원한 공기를 호흡한다. 원두막에서 몸을 쉬며 흥겹게 웃고, 얘기하며, 옛 노래의 일절을 부른다. 그리고 끝으로 오늘 하루에 만족하고, 내일도 그러하기를 기원하며 잠자리에 든다.

 

긴 생애의 변전 속에서 나는 이를 데 없이 감미로운 향락과 강렬한 환희의 시기의 추억이 뜻밖에도 가장 나를 매혹하고 강하게 마음을 끄는 것이 아님을 알았다. 나의 마음이 애석해 하는 행복이란 금새 사라질 순간이 아니라, 하나의 단순하고 변하지 않는 상태이고 거기에 격렬한 것은 아무 것도 없더라도, 하나의 소박하고 변하지 않는 상태이며, 그 지속이 매력을 증대하고 이윽고 거기에서 지복의 행복을 찾아낼 무엇인가이다. 이 세상 만사는 끊임없는 유동 속에 있다. 그러나 혼이 강한 지반을 찾아내 거기에 안주하고 거기에 자기의 전 존재를 집중하여 과거를 불러낼 필요도 없고 미래를 걱정할 필요도 없는 상태, 시간이 혼에게 아무 의의도 없는 것 같은 상대, 언제까지나 현재가 이어지고, 그러면서 그 지속을 느끼게 하지 않는, 계기의 자취도 없이, 결핍과 향유의, 쾌락과 고통의, 원망과 공포의 어떤 느낌도 없이 오로지 우리가 현존한다는 감정만이 있고 이 감정만으로 혼의 전체를 채울 수 있는 그런 상태가 있다면, 이런 상태가 계속되는 한, 거기 사람은 행복한 사람이라고 부를 수 있겠다. 그런 상태야말로 내가 생 피에르 섬에서 고독한 몽상에 잠기며 가다가다 경험한 상태이다.

 

그런 경지에 있는 사람은 도시 무엇을 즐기는가? 그것은 자기 외부에 있는 무엇이 아니라, 자기자신과 자기의 존재 이외의 아무 것도 아니다. 다른 모든 정념을 내버린 존재감은 그 자체가 만족과 평온의 귀중한 감정이고, 이 감정만으로도 넉넉히 이 존재는 사랑스럽고 기분 좋은 것이 된다. 지금과 같은 세상에서는 그런 기분 좋은 도취감을 동경하여 끊임없이 마음에 일어나는 욕구가 의무로 명하는 활동적 생활에 대한 흥미를 잃는 것은 좋은 일이 아닐 것이다. 그러나 인간사회에서 떨어져 이 세상에서 남을 위하여 또 자신을 위하여도 유익한 일을 아무 것도 할 수 없는 불행한 사람은 이 상태 속에서, 모든 인간적인 행복을 보상할 일을 운명도 사람들도 빼앗을 수 없는 보상을 찾아낼 것이다.

 

절대의 침묵은 비애를 가져온다. 그래서 기분 좋은 상상의 구원이 필요하게 되고, 상상력이 풍부한 사람에게는 이런 구원이 극히 자연스럽게 찾아온다. 그러나 자연의 손으로 세계의 다른 부분으로부터 격리된 풍요한 고독에서 그런 것을 더욱 완전히, 더욱 기분 좋게 겪었 다고 말하지 않으면 안 된다. 오랜 동안의 유쾌한 몽상에서 깨어나 푸른 풀•꽃•새들에 에워싸인 자기를 보고, 맑고 깨끗한 드넓은 호수로 하여 환상같은 기슭에 멀리 눈을 보내며 나는 그렇게 사랑스런 모든 것을 자기의 창작에 동화시키는 것이다. 때때로 나는 실제로 그 섬에 있었을 때 그 광경을 더욱 가까이 상쾌하게 느끼기도 한다.

 

Fifth walk

"Everything is in constant flux on this earth. Nothing keeps the same unchanging shape, and our affections, being attached to things outside us, necessarily change and pass away as they do. Always out ahead of us or lagging behind, they recall a past which is gone or anticipate a future which may never come into being; there is nothing solid there for the heart to attach itself to. Thus our earthly joys are almost without exception the creatures of a moment; I doubt whether any of us knows the meaning of lasting happiness. Even in our keenest pleasures there is scarcely a single moment of which the heart could truthfully say: 'Would that this moment could last for ever!' And how can we give the name of happiness to a fleeting state which leaves our hearts still empty and anxious, either regretting something that is past or desiring something that is yet to come?

 

But if there is a state where the soul can find a resting-place secure enough to establish itself and concentrate its entire being there, with no need to remember the past or reach into the future, where time is nothing to it, where the present runs on indefinitely but this duration goes unnoticed, with no sign of the passing of time, and no other feeling of deprivation or enjoyment, pleasure or pain, desire or fear than the simple feeling of existence, a feeling that fills our soul entirely, as long as this state lasts, we can call ourselves happy, not with a poor, incomplete and relative happiness such as we find in the pleasures of life, but with a sufficient, complete and perfect happiness which leaves no emptiness to be filled in the soul....

 

What is the source of our happiness in such a state? Nothing external to us, nothing apart from ourselves and our own existence; as long as this state lasts we are self-sufficient like God. The feeling of existence unmixed with any other emotion is in itself a precious feeling of peace and contentment which would be enough to make this mode of being loved and cherished by anyone who could guard against all the earthly and sensual influences that are constantly distracting us from it in this life and troubling the joy it could give us. But most men being continually stirred by passion know little of this condition, and having only enjoyed it fleetingly and incompletely they retain no more than a dim and confused notion of it and are unaware of its true charm. Nor would it be desirable in our present state of affairs that the avid desire for these sweet ecstasies should give people a distaste for the active life which their constantly recurring needs impose upon them. But an unfortunate man who has been excluded from human society, and can do nothing more in this world to serve or benefit himself or others, may be allowed to seek in this state a compensation for human joys, a compensation which neither fortune nor mankind can take away from him."

 

 

Rousseau
Reveries of the Solitary Walker

 

This book illustrates the author's paranoia. The book's summary: "The struggle between Rousseau's yearning for solitude and his need for society is the central theme of the Reveries." The Reveries describe "the great French writer's sense of isolation and alienation from a world which he felt had rejected his work."
These quotations are, of course, out of context, but I think they still have an impact...

 

First walk

"A recent event as sad as it was unexpected has finally extinguished this feeble ray of hope and shown me that my earthly destiny is irrevocably fixed for all time. Since then, I have resigned myself utterly and recovered my peace of mind."

"...realizing eventually that all my efforts were in vain and my self-torment of no avail, I took the only course left to me, that of submitting to my fate and ceasing to fight against the inevitable. This resignation has made up for all my trials by the peace of mind it brings me, a peace of mind incompatible with the unceasing exertions of a struggle as painful as it was unavailing."

"They were so eager to fill up my cup of misery that neither the power of men nor the stratagems of hell can add one drop to it. Even physical suffering would take my mind off my misfortunes rather than adding to them. Perhaps the cries of pain would save me the groans of unhappiness, and the laceration of my body would prevent that of my heart."

"Actual misfortunes have little effect on me; it is easy for me to accept those which I suffer in reality, but not those which I fear. My fevered imagination builds them up, works on them, magnifies them, and inspects them from every angle. They are far more of a torment to me imminent than present; the threat is far more worse than the blow. As soon as they happen, they lose all the terrors lent to them by imagination and appear in their true size. I find them far less formidable than I had feared, and even in the midst of my suffering I feel a sort of relief. In this state, freed from all further fear and from the anxieties of hope, I shall learn from mere habit to accept ever more easily a situation which can grow no worse; and as my awareness of it is dulled by time they can find no further way of reviving it. So much good my persecutors have done me by recklessly pouring out all the shafts of their hatred. They have deprived themselves of any power over me and henceforward I can laugh at them."

"Everything external is henceforth foreign to me. I no longer have any neighbors, fellow-men, or brothers in this world. I live here as in some strange planet on to which I have fallen from the one I knew. All around me I can recognize nothing but objects which afflict and wound my heart, and I cannot look at anything that is close to me or round about me without discovering some subject for indignant scorn or painful emotion. Let me therefore detach my mind from these afflicting sights; they would only cause me pain, and to no end. Alone for the rest of my life, since it is only in myself that I find consolation, hope and peace of mind, my only remaining duty is towards myself and this is all I desire."

 

 

Second walk

"Today there is more recollection than creation in the products of my imagination, a tepid languor saps all my faculties, the vital spirit is gradually dying down within me, my soul no longer flies up without effort from its decaying prison of flesh, and were it not for the hope of a state to which I aspire because I feel that it is mine by right, I should now live only in the past. Thus if I am to contemplate myself before my decline, I must go back several years to the time when, losing all hope for this life and finding no food left on earth for my soul, I gradually learnt to feed it on its own substance and seek all its nourishment within myself."

"...I learnt from my own experience that the source of true happiness is within us, and that it is not in the power of men to make anyone truly miserable who is determined to be happy."

"The country was still green and pleasant, but it was deserted and many of the leaves had fallen; everything gave an impression of solitude and impending winter. This picture evoked mixed feelings of gentle sadness which were too closely akin to my age and my experience for me not to make the comparison. I saw myself at the close of an innocent and unhappy life, with a soul still full of intense feelings and a mind still adorned with a few flowers, even if they were already blighted by sadness and withered by care. Alone and neglected, I could feel the approach of the first frosts and my failing imagination no longer filled my solitude with beings formed after the desires of my heart. Sighing I said to myself: What have I done in this world? I was created to live, and I am dying without having lived."

"God is just; his will is that I should suffer, and he knows my innocence. That is what gives me confidence. My heart and my reason cry out that I shall not be disappointed. Let men and fate do their worst, we must learn to suffer in silence, everything will find its proper place in the end and sooner or later my turn will come."

 

 

Third walk

"Youth is the time to study wisdom, age the time to practise it. Experience is always instructive, I admit, but it is only useful in the time we have left to live. When death is already at the door, is it worth learning how we should have lived?"

"The sad truth that time and reason have revealed to me in making me aware of my misfortune, has convinced me that there is no remedy and that resignation is my only course. Thus all the experience of my old age is of no use to me in my present state, nor will it help me in the future."

"Since the days of my youth I had fixed on the age of forty as the end of my efforts to succeed, the final term of my various ambitions. I had the firm intention, when I reached this age, of making no further effort to climb out of whatever situation I was in and of spending the rest of my life living from day to day with no thought for the future. When the time came I carried out my plan without difficulty, and although my fortune at the time seemed to be on the point of changing permanently for the better, it was not only without regret but with real pleasure that I gave up these prospects. In shaking off all these lures and vain hopes, I abandoned myself entirely to the nonchalant tranquillity which has always been my dominant taste and most lasting inclination. I quitted the world and its vanities, I gave up all finery--no more sword, no more watch, no more white stockings, gilt trimmings and powder, but a simple wig and a good solid coat of broadcloth--and what is more than all the rest, I uprooted from my heart the greed and covetousness which gave value to all I was leaving behind. I gave up the position I was then occupying, a position for which I was quite unsuited, and set myself to copying music at so much a page, an occupation for which I had always had a distinct liking."

"All the sharpest torments lose their sting if one can confidently expect a glorious recompense, and the certainty of this recompense was the principal fruit of my earlier meditations."

 

 

Fifth walk

"Everything is in constant flux on this earth. Nothing keeps the same unchanging shape, and our affections, being attached to things outside us, necessarily change and pass away as they do. Always out ahead of us or lagging behind, they recall a past which is gone or anticipate a future which may never come into being; there is nothing solid there for the heart to attach itself to. Thus our earthly joys are almost without exception the creatures of a moment; I doubt whether any of us knows the meaning of lasting happiness. Even in our keenest pleasures there is scarcely a single moment of which the heart could truthfully say: 'Would that this moment could last for ever!' And how can we give the name of happiness to a fleeting state which leaves our hearts still empty and anxious, either regretting something that is past or desiring something that is yet to come? But if there is a state where the soul can find a resting-place secure enough to establish itself and concentrate its entire being there, with no need to remember the past or reach into the future, where time is nothing to it, where the present runs on indefinitely but this duration goes unnoticed, with no sign of the passing of time, and no other feeling of deprivation or enjoyment, pleasure or pain, desire or fear than the simple feeling of existence, a feeling that fills our soul entirely, as long as this state lasts, we can call ourselves happy, not with a poor, incomplete and relative happiness such as we find in the pleasures of life, but with a sufficient, complete and perfect happiness which leaves no emptiness to be filled in the soul....What is the source of our happiness in such a state? Nothing external to us, nothing apart from ourselves and our own existence; as long as this state lasts we are self-sufficient like God. The feeling of existence unmixed with any other emotion is in itself a precious feeling of peace and contentment which would be enough to make this mode of being loved and cherished by anyone who could guard against all the earthly and sensual influences that are constantly distracting us from it in this life and troubling the joy it could give us. But most men being continually stirred by passion know little of this condition, and having only enjoyed it fleetingly and incompletely they retain no more than a dim and confused notion of it and are unaware of its true charm. Nor would it be desirable in our present state of affairs that the avid desire for these sweet ecstasies should give people a distaste for the active life which their constantly recurring needs impose upon them. But an unfortunate man who has been excluded from human society, and can do nothing more in this world to serve or benefit himself or others, may be allowed to seek in this state a compensation for human joys, a compensation which neither fortune nor mankind can take away from him."

 

 

Sixth walk

"There are types of adversity which elevate and strengthen the soul, but there are others which depress and crush it; such is the one of which I am a victim. If there had been the slightest leaven of evil in my soul, this adversity would have fermented it to excess and driven me into a frenzy, but it only succeeded in reducing me to inactivity. Unable to do good to myself or anyone else, I abstain from acting; and this state, which is only blameless because I cannot avoid it, makes me find a sort of satisfaction in abandoning myself completely and without reproach to my natural inclination. No doubt I go too far, since I avoid opportunities for action even when I think nothing but good can come from them. But knowing that I am not allowed to see things as they are, I refrain from judging by the appearances my enemies give to things, and however alluring the motives for action may seem, it is enough that they have been left within my grasp for me to be sure they are deceptive."

"I have never believed that man's freedom consists in doing what he wants, but rather in never doing what he does not want to do, and this is the freedom I have always sought after and often achieved, the freedom by virtue of which I have most scandalized my contemporaries."

 

 

Eighth walk

"In all the ills that befall us, we are more concerned by the intention than the result. A tile that falls off a roof may injure us more seriously, but it will not wound us so deeply as a stone thrown deliberately by a malevolent hand. The blow may miss, but the intention always strikes home."

"Since by the light of reason I could see nothing but absurdities in the explanations I tried to give for everything that happened to me, I realized that, as all its causes and operations were unknown and incomprehensible to me, I should ignore them completely, that I should regard all the details of my fate as the workings of mere necessity, in which I should not seek to find any intention, purpose, or moral cause, that I must submit to it without argument or resistance since these were useless, that since all that was left to me on earth was to regard myself as a purely passive being, I should not waste the strength I needed to endure my fate in trying to fight against it. This was what I told myself. My reason and my heart assented, yet I could feel that my heart was not entirely satisfied. Whence came this dissatisfaction? I searched and found the answer: it came from my self-love, which, having waxed indignant against mankind, still rebelled against reason."

 

 

Ninth walk

"Happiness is a lasting state which does not seem to be made for man in this world. Everything here on earth is in a continual flux which allows nothing to assume any constant form. All things change round about us, we ourselves change, and no one can be sure of loving tomorrow what he loves today. All our plans of happiness in this life are therefore empty dreams. Let us make the most of peace of mind when it comes to us, taking care to do nothing to drive it away, but not making plans to hold it fast, since such plans are sheer folly. I have seen few if any happy people, but I have seen many who were contented, and of all the sights that have come my way this is the one that has left me most contented myself."

"...if my pleasures are brief and few in number, it is also true that when they come they give me an intenser enjoyment than if I were more used to them. I ruminate on them so to speak, turning them over frequently in my memory, and few as they are, if they were pure and unmixed, they would perhaps make me happier than in my days of prosperity. In extreme poverty a little is enough to make one rich; a beggar is gladder to find one gold coin than a rich man to find a purse full of money. People would laugh if they could see how my soul is affected by the slightest pleasures..."

"It is only when I am alone that I am my own master, at all other times I am the plaything of all who surround me."