  The years following the publication of the Second Discourse in 1755 were the most productive and important of Rousseau’s career. He withdrew from Paris and, under the patronage of, first Mme d’Epinay and then the Duke and Duchess of Luxembourg, worked on a novel, Julie, ou La Nouvelle Héloïse, and then on Emile and The Social Contract. Julie appeared in 1761 and was an immediate success. The novel is centred on a love triangle between Julie, her tutor Saint Preux and her husband Wolmar. The work is cast in epistolary form, and is an important supplementary source for the interpretation of Rousseau’s social philosophy, containing, as it does, such elements as a vision of rural community and the presence of a manipulative genius who achieves the appearance of natural harmony through cunning artifice and who thus anticipates both the tutor in Emile and the legislator of The Social Contract. Both works appeared in 1762, marking the high point of Rousseau’s intellectual achievement. 