Diotimos Reading Desk

Tap the page, move to the top or bottom edge, swipe down, or press Tab to reveal reading controls. Use the arrow keys or swipe sideways to turn pages.

← ExitThe Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume II

Reading language

YEAR 1811

The smile dwells on the lips alone, but laughter has its seat and its grace on the teeth.

October 25.

One must change evil into good, finish what is imperfect and straighten what is crooked.

October 29.

Table airs (the old ones). One cannot remember them without picturing the gathering and the chorus. They prompt a sort of dance of the hands, as good dance airs prompt the dancing of the feet. They enliven like wine; like it, they dispel all serious ideas and inspire, as long as they last, a certain cordiality.

Not all the airs sung at table are true table airs.

Ancients. Because everything young is more beautiful than what is finished. Or rather, Everything growing is more beautiful than what is ended.

October 30.

The colors of all parties.

The liveliness of their good taste can sometimes lead their good judgment astray. (Certain critics are meant.)

November 2.

Mother Bᵒⁿ. She had become incapable of joy.

Credulity forges more miracles for itself than imposture can invent.

November 4.

Not all who write make a work, nor all who speak a discourse.

God. His goodness subjects him to his love for our souls. Heaven was [then] less peopled with men, and he would descend to earth to [converse] with them there.

November […].

Nothing corrects an ill-formed mind. A sad and grievous truth that one [learns] late and after much wasted care!

November […].

They have accused and excused themselves, judging themselves worthy of pardon [and] blame at once.

T106.The restriction alone belongs to the lips; laughter retains both its seat and grace on the teeth. The image is not replaced by an anatomical account.

T107.The three infinitive actions remain distinct, with the final physical image intact. Imperfect retains both incompleteness and defect without a newly supplied object.

T108.The nominal opening and retrospective parenthesis remain. Gathering, chorus, hands and feet are separate images, followed by the wine comparison and its stated duration. Table airs retains the particular song setting, distinct from any air sung at table.

T239.The two main paragraphs remain. Chorus alone is italic. The first nominal formulation, repeated airs and paired dance images are retained. The second paragraph’s partial negative is not recast as a categorical denial. Several right-edge endings are abraded but remain supported by surviving letter shapes.

T109.The negative is partial: not all, rather than none. The second physical paragraph retains the distinction between occasion and kind.

T110.The nominal opening and dependent Because remain. Or rather keeps Joubert’s revision visible; young and growing, finished and ended remain different terms, without a new subject for Ancients.

T240.The opening nominal word and dependent Parce que formulation remain. Tout retains its capital after the comma; the corrective Ou plutôt and both comparisons are preserved.

T111.The plural colors and the all remain in a nominal fragment. No named parties or symbolic colors are supplied.

T241.The nominal formulation remains without a governing predicate or named parties.

T112.Both good adjectives, possible occasional effect and the astray image remain. The source’s own parenthesis identifies only certain critics, not named people.

T113.The brief designation and past change remain, with no diagnosis or supplied cause. Bᵒⁿ retains the raised on and is not expanded. Mother renders mère without assigning a religious role or identifying the person.

T114.The reflexive forging and comparative number remain. Can preserves the limit on imposture’s invention; the French comparative ne does not introduce a second negation.

T244.The comparison and reflexive construction remain; no negative reversal is inferred from the comparative ne.

T115.Both negatives are partial, and the second predicate remains shared. Work and discourse keep the distinction between an activity and its achieved form without adding a criterion.

T245.The two partial negatives and the comma in the second elliptical clause remain; no verb is supplied in French.

T116.The nominal opening and present subjection to love remain, followed by the past account. The final he is read contextually as God, not made an impersonal heaven; the French pronoun itself is not expanded. The separate heaven/earth and souls/men terms remain. The bracketed then and converse are contextual English readings of damaged […]lors and […]onverser, possibly alors and converser. Their missing initials are not recovered or supplied in the French; the English brackets mark these interventions.

T117.Nothing retains the force of the first assertion. The exclamatory relative fragment and belated learning remain, with wasted care rather than a newly identified remedy or experience. The bracketed learns reads damaged […]pprend contextually as apprend; it does not claim to recover the missing French initial.

T247.No day digit survives securely before novembre. The initial letter before pprend is lost; the two p letters survive. Apprend is a contextual possibility only. The exclamation and nominal formulation remain.

T118.The paired reflexive acts and the simultaneous pardon/blame judgment remain. No confession, tribunal or group is identified. The bracketed and reads damaged […]t contextually as et; the missing French initial remains unsupplied.