Diotimos Library · Journals, Notebooks & Fragments Collection · Bilingual Edition
The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume I
Complete Notebooks · French with an independent English translation.
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Facing Pages · Branch 3052 of 3781
[On Voltaire.] · Entry 3052
French
p. 61033 septembre.
Mais au contraire rien n’est si simple et si peu merveilleux (je veux dire si peu merveilleux d’appareil). La vertu sublime n’est qu’une extrême bonté et le génie n’est qu’un extrême bon sens appliqué aux choses qui sont hors du monde dans la nature ou hors de l’usage dans l’industrie. En parler emphatiquement, c’est les connoître peu. Tout échaffaudage (sic) les masques et expose à les méconnoître.
The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume I: [On Voltaire.]
p. 6104September 3.
But on the contrary nothing is so simple and so little marvelous (I mean so little marvelous in its apparatus). Sublime virtue is only extreme goodness, and genius is only extreme good sense applied to things that are outside the world in nature or outside customary use in human ingenuity. To speak of them grandiloquently is to know them little. All scaffolding (sic) masks them and risks making them misunderstood.
Socrates
Reading The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume I · [On Voltaire.] · Entry 3052
Ask about a concept, passage, contradiction, or connection.
Socrates will begin with this book and its sources.About This Reading Edition
Joubert’s notebooks return to the work of thinking and writing, the demands of friendship, and questions of faith, beauty and conduct. This edition pairs the French with a new English translation, preserving the order of the chosen source and the unfinished character of its fragments. Dates and source references allow readers to follow a thought through time or return to its printed context.
Historical Text and Translation
The French text follows André Beaunier’s 1938 edition of Les Carnets de Joseph Joubert, published by Gallimard from Joubert’s autograph manuscripts. Volume I presents the entries on printed pages 32–475. French and English are aligned paragraph by paragraph, retaining the source order, printed dates and page references so readers can return to the facsimile.
About Diotimos Editions
Diotimos Editions prepared this new English translation directly from the French, preserving Joubert’s distinctions, recurring images, ambiguities and unfinished thoughts. Translator’s notes clarify wording, references and uncertain readings: Essential keeps notes that help explain a passage, while All includes technical detail. Annotations from the 1938 source edition remain distinct from the new translator’s notes.
Rights
The linked facsimile records identify the French source as public domain in the United States. The new English translation and editorial notes are © 2026 Diotimos, with source annotations and new editorial contributions credited separately. This edition pairs the complete French notebooks with an independent English translation, preserving the distinction between Joubert’s text and its accompanying notes.