What did his contemporaries recognize as great in him, even those who reviled him as a charlatan and a poseur. He lived among the most intelligent and competent literary judges. Why did they think that he was so remarkable? His eloquence was universally recognized. Admirers and bitter enemies alike agreed that Rousseau was the most eloquent man of his age. His style is overwhelming. Rousseau, Diderot eventually said, was what one says of the poor draftsman among painters: a great colorist. Rousseau's literary powers were indeed phenomenal and to understand him fully one must give more than a passing thought to how he wrote. There is, however, another quality that his contemporaries did not recognize, partly because they shared it. That is the scope of Rousseau's intellectual competence. Even among his versatile contemporaries he was extraordinary: composer, musicologist, playwright, drama critic, novelist, botanist, pedagogue, political philospher, psychologist.