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← ExitThe Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume II

Reading language

YEAR 1809

July 15.

“An emblazoned face,”—and as if quartered with armorial bearings. It was said of Alfieri. The expression is good. His haughty air...

July 16.

“One must die in order,” as Chateaubriand said. And i[…] is almost as horrible to die amid public disorder as amid one’s own.

July 20.

All their passions are coarse, their hatreds, their friendships, their admirations, their disgusts. Their enthusiasm is animal.

August 1.

Self-evidence dispels reasonings.

August 2.

The university needs as its heads men who are attached to the world.

August […].

In everything that is action, habit makes up for attention and […]ent its place. (See movements...)

That one must have left the earth at times. If the soul has not risen, […]ar contemplation (intellect), through prayer (the entire soul) and […]ar privation or sacrifice (the will)...

[…]undi, August 21.

Φύσις. — As if truth were at the bottom of a well. It is […]lutôt in the clouds.

Gambols. Sometimes grave, but always light. “Gambols […]e monkey on the rope,” as he says himself: such is Voltaire’s gait.

August […]4.

Voltaire. A moral, literary, intellectual monkey. But he performed his […]ambades well. He even counterfeited gravity; but for only a short time. All […]es roles end in some leap, a true monkey trick.

August […]7.

Everything that becomes a duty must become dear.

September […]ᵉʳ.

Distinction between soul and body, foundation of all good philosophy. Every method that serves or tends to obscure this notion […]oit therefore be severely banished.

T86.Emblazoned and quartered retain the heraldic vocabulary, including the division of a shield into quarters in écartelé. The face is not converted into an actual coat of arms. Expression renders mot for the quoted phrase; the final haughty air remains unfinished, and the original speaker remains unidentified.

T268.The closing nominal fragment and ellipsis remain. The end of dit is partly clipped at the right edge and qualified from surviving letters.

T87.Order recurs within disorder in the opposed private and public conditions. One’s own resumes disorder, not one’s own death. The French i[…] remains a damaged pronoun residue; possible il is not restored. The attribution remains to Chateaubriand without an invented occasion or textual source.

T88.The source prints amirations with no d. English reads the intended sense as admirations while explicitly recording that intervention; the French anomaly is unchanged. The unnamed person takes singular their without an invented identity. Coarse and animal retain the separate evaluations, and the four plural examples remain.

T89.Self-evidence follows the historical sense of évidence as truth immediately apparent to the mind, consistent with the earlier passage on faith. Dispels preserves dissipe; plural reasonings retains the multiplicity of raisonnemens instead of making the sentence a blanket rejection of reason itself.

T271.The er in the August 1 date is raised.

T90.Heads preserves the governing role in chefs. Attached to the world retains the breadth of tiennent au monde, which can concern connection or attachment rather than merely holding worldly opinions. The university is not assigned an institution or a modern administrative title. The following page begins a separate entry.

T91.Makes up for renders supplée à. The French verb residue […]ent remains in English; tient, takes or holds, is a possible completion. Its place resumes attention. The parenthetical See movements is retained as a direction without inventing a linked target.

T273.The August day is wholly lost. At the left continuation edge only ent survives of the verb; tient is a possible completion but not certified. The parenthetical direction remains within this paragraph.

T92.The opening That and completed act in have left remain. The conditional is unfinished. The two […]ar residues remain French, with par, through, a likely completion not supplied in the text. Contemplation, prayer, and privation or sacrifice remain paired with their respective faculties in Joubert’s parentheses.

T274.The opening Qu’il and unfinished Si sequence remain. Both left-edge occurrences before ar lose their initial letter; par is a likely completion, not inserted as recovered print.

T93.The Greek Φύσις means nature; its accent remains qualified in the source record. The damaged […]lutôt remains French: plutôt, rather, is a possible completion. No ancient author is supplied for the well image, and the clouds are not paraphrased as obscurity or elevation.

T94.Gambols recurs, with grave and light retaining the opposing weights and tones. The French […]e remains in the quotation; probable de would give of a monkey, but is not certified. Gait preserves the movement in allure as a description of literary manner. The attribution to Voltaire himself is retained without assigning a particular letter or poem.

T276.The opening before e in the quotation is lost; de is likely but not certified. The later de before Voltaire has a partial surviving ascender and is qualified. Lui-même retains its hyphen.

T95.The nominal threefold designation remains. The French residues […]ambades and […]es are left visible: gambades, gambols, and ses, his, are possible completions, but the second lost initial is not established by the surviving ending. Counterfeited gravity retains the acting image; the shift from past description to roles that end in a leap remains.

T277.Only final 4 survives in the damaged August day. Left-edge openings before ambades and es are lost; gambades and ses are contextual possibilities, while the second missing initial is not established by the surviving ending alone.

T96.Becomes and become repeat the same change, while duty and dear remain distinct. Must retains the obligation in doit.

T97.The opening remains nominal. Serves and tends remain alternatives before obscuring the notion. The French […]oit remains a verb residue; doit, must, is a possible completion. Severely banished keeps the strength of the injunction without naming an institution that would enforce it.

T279.Only raised er remains in the September date; no numeral is supplied. The line-broken philosophie is qualified from surviving philo and the partly damaged sophie. Before oit the initial letter is wholly lost; doit is possible but not certified.