In this case, he is telling everyone his sin, and he want to be forgive. The narrator is Catholic, so the narrator have religious belief, so he wrote his own personal life including every detail of though. First of all, people around 18th century are still embracing the enlightenment, which are not completely accepted.

I know the narrator’s purpose by reading the book because “confessions” is a autobiography of his life, and this is published after his death. The narrator’s purpose in writing these “confessions” is to serve as a regression to his own life, and to change the society or people’s view to his life. What is the narrator’s purpose in writing these “confessions”? How do you know? He writes: “and so I have spent my life coveting but never declaring myself to the women I loved most.” However, Rousseau saw this as an advantage in keeping his “heart pure and … behaviour honourable.”ġ. Rousseau admits that his childhood sexuality, or lack thereof, burdened him for the rest of his life. This is reminiscent of Sigmund Freud’s Oedipal Complex. After this, he viewed all beautiful women he met as the woman who punished him as a child. When he was punished by his guardian, a sexual desire in him was awakened. Rousseau writes of how loved he was by the “best people in the world.” He was very educated and sought to avoid letting down his guardian, after his father left. He speaks of his rearing as a child as one that exceeded those of royal princes. These works inspired Rousseau‘s “free, republican spirit.” The stories also left him with romantic notions about human life that were eventually done away with after reading works by philosophers and historians. Through this, Rousseau said he became aware of his feelings and emotions. Father and son would stay up late reading romance novels to each other. Despite reminding his father of his dead wife, they developed a relationship that benefitted both. In “Confessions,” Book Two, Rousseau speaks of his birth, the cause of his mother’s death, as one misfortune of many throughout his life. How does Rousseau describe his childhood? What significance can we draw from this description?

Rousseaus confessions