Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-Pierre (1737-1841), who originally trained as military engineer, spent much of his life travelling Europe and published his first work, Voyage a l'Ile de France in 1773. études de la Nature, described in The Concise Oxford Dictionary of French Literature (1976) as 'a pioneer work in the literature of the picturesque' established his literary reputation in 1784; Paul et Virginie was included in the 1787 edition of the work. Saint-Pierre wrote a biography of his friend, Jean-Jacques Rousseau in 1820. The writer of Paul et Virginie had much in common with Ruskin, particularly in his profound love of nature and his antipathy for atheism. In Praeterita Ruskin acknowledges the importance of Saint-Pierre alongside Rousseau in the development of his own work: 'I having shamefully forgotten hitherto the immense influence of Paul and Virginia amidst my early readings' ( Works, 35.440).