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March 10.
And it is necessary (for the order of the world) that they know this and that they forget it.
From Plato: that governments must care for the souls of men.
That there is in the mind a perpetual circulation of imperceptible reasonings.
But the voice is not merely air, but air modeled by us, impregnated with our warmth and wrapped, as in a kind of skin, by the vapor of our inner atmosphere, some emanation of which accompanies it and gives it a certain configuration and certain properties suited to producing certain effects on minds.
There is a class of ideas so beautiful in themselves that, though almost all minds are capable of producing them, they put almost all minds that possess them on a level and show them in the first rank. The great writer and the mediocre writer manifest them with the same success. It is enough for them to be expressed clearly to please, to charm, to satisfy. Grandeur, energy, originality of expression add almost nothing to their effect and merit. It is enough to see or glimpse them. The reader is content. The beauty of their nude form is such that it makes the charm of drapery useless. Apply this observation to the thoughts of Nicole and Paschal; you will find it just.
Yet one must express these beautiful ideas with care if one wishes them to be quoted, and one must make what is worthy of being known worthy of being quoted. Art alone impresses men. They dare neither remain ignorant of nor neglect anything that can be praised as a masterpiece. Everything beautiful goes unrecognized unless it bears the imprint of an extraordinary talent.
Men are indeed more struck by art than by nature.
March 11.
Jurguta. These kings allied with the Romans all governed in the Roman manner. It is natural to imitate those one fears and wishes to flatter.
March 13.
Heaven will abolish the language in which these works are written.
March 16.
Sometimes reason does not reason and unreason reasons.
One must often erase on paper everything one has not often erased inside one’s head.
March 17.
Democracy among friends, equality among equals; royalty is military.
Folly is allowed to be wise, a novel to be moral. But piety would be mocked if it spoke of providence like Zadig; a believer, if he praised the Gospel like J.-J.; a young and beautiful woman, if she spoke like Clarissa.
March 18.
To foresee strongly is to see. What one foresees in this way makes itself present.