Diotimos Reading Desk

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← ExitThe Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume II

Reading language

YEAR 1814

January 1.

To have no “talents for evil”...

“Warned by these white hairs” (Bossuet). White hairs warn us.

January 2.

And from the water’s surface he raised his calm head. (Virgil.) That is the model one must depict in quarrels.

Their lack of literary criticism came from their lack of [mistrust]. Good faith prolonged this kind of ignorance and, if a [virtue] is worth more than a piece of knowledge, the human race of those [half]-barbarous times was better in this respect than the human race of [today].

January […].

— rubbed with that garlic —

We have too much of a habit and too great a facility for abstractions. That is [why] there is so little gold in our books and in our style. Our [mind] pays itself with words that have an agreed value but no [solidity] — a kind of paper money.

[…]imanche, January 9.

Of what is theatrical in life, in speeches, in actions, in thoughts.

And if we were only a spectacle for the gods, still our trust in them, our vows, our prayers, our hope would be fit to please them. They would love us for these pious illusions; and if these illusions were, moreover, to be disappointed, they would be no less the charm best suited to make our life happy.

This is beautiful because it is onstage, in a pose. Didactically, it would be worth nothing. It would doubtless be worth nothing on a page of politics or morals; but on a page of history it is beautiful. It is beautiful, too, because it paints, and not because it illuminates. It is beautiful because it makes man known, and not because it clarifies the question. Finally, it is not beautiful for its reasoning and reason, but it is beautiful for its truth.

Behind my weakness there is strength (the weakness is in the instrument). Behind your strength there is weakness (this weakness is in the heart, in the reason, in too little frank goodwill).

Of what, in life and in actions, is beautiful theatrically and dramatically without being beautiful morally, logically, physically. Or Of what is beautiful because it paints and not because it pleases in itself.

These books [whose] thoughts and restrained style [have] on the mind the good effect that a calm face has on our eyes and our moods.

T1.The negative infinitive, quotation and unfinished ellipsis remain. No speaker or source of the phrase is identified. The source quotation includes de; the English negative construction has no separate equivalent of that French partitive component.

T2.The quoted participial fragment and repeated white hairs/warn remain. Bossuet is the conventional English name; the precise attributed source is not yet located. The French retains the printed Bossuët with diaeresis; conventional English Bossuet does not certify a different source spelling.

T326.The quotation closes before the parenthetic attribution, with its period outside the parenthesis. Bossuët visibly has two raised components over e; the printed diaeresis is retained without name normalization. The participial quotation and subsequent present plural predicate remain distinct.

T3.The Latin receives a fresh translation, retaining calm as a modifier of head. Compare Aeneid I.127, in the episode where Neptune calms the sea. The directly read Latin witness begins the verse with prospiciens rather than Joubert’s Et; the English follows the excerpt printed here. The poem’s named subject is not inserted into the body. The source control covers I.124–156 only, not a complete-book or original-edition-image reading. The printed Et is roman: only from the water’s surface he raised his calm head. corresponds to the italic Latin. The circumflex readings on summâ and undâ remain qualified in the French collation.

T4.Both lacks, the conditional comparison and its limited in-this-respect conclusion remain. Their refers to unnamed people. A piece of knowledge renders indefinite un scavoir. The literal vaux remains in French; ordinary English is worth expresses the intended third-person relation without claiming a corrected French form. [Mistrust], [virtue], [half] and [today] interpret […]éfiance, […]ertu, […]emi and au[…]ourd’hui contextually. Défiance or méfiance would both support mistrust; neither missing initial is certified. Each complete English counterpart is bracketed more broadly than its French letter loss, with barbarous outside the half bracket.

T328.The clipped line openings retain éfiance, ertu, emi and ourd’hui after the au wrap; no complete missing d/v/d/j is certified from their residual strokes. Foy and scavoir are literal. Native vaux visibly ends in x, not t, despite the grammatical anomaly after une […]ertu; no correction to vaut is imposed. The imperfect venoit/valoit and past prolongea remain distinct.

T5.The detached participial phrase keeps its physical image and both dashes. No person, garlic variety or figurative explanation is supplied.

T329.Only a narrow stem and small junction survive in the day position; they do not certify a complete digit. Both dashes, lowercase participial opening and unhyphenated ail là remain.

T6.Both too judgments, gold, agreed value and the concluding monetary image remain. Pays itself preserves se paye within the extended metaphor rather than reducing it to contentment. [Why], [mind] and [solidity] interpret pourquoi, esprit and solidité from […]ourquoi, […]sprit and […]olidité. The whole English words are bracketed; no missing French letters are certified.

T330.The three damaged line openings retain ourquoi, sprit and olidité. The incomplete first-letter remnants do not certify p/e/s. Repeated trop, si peu, valeur convenue and the nominal paper-money comparison remain. Monnoye is literal and papier monnoye has no hyphen.

T7.The nominal Of opening and four repeated in relations remain, without an invented governing sentence or title. The numerical January day 9 is intact; only the initial weekday letter is lost. Its date record must distinguish partial weekday from an unknown numerical day.

T331.The weekday’s initial capital has only a surviving right curve; its complete left stem is not certified, so only imanche remains after the loss marker. The numerical day 9 is complete. The nominal-relative opening and four dans relations remain. The worn but identifiable initial a of actions is retained rather than supplying an extra word.

T8.The initial And, hypothetical gods, only restriction and four devotions remain. Were to be disappointed preserves the conditional frustration of the illusions; it neither asserts their truth nor declares them already disproved. No less and the final superlative remain.

T332.The restrictive first si clause, inversion seroient-elles and both subsequent conditional relations remain. No question mark is supplied after plaire. The left-edge beginnings of confiance, elles, the wrapped sions, seroient and vie are damaged but substantially identifiable by their surviving outlines; no additional word is inferred. The plural human appeals and singular final charme remain distinct.

T9.The repeated beautiful judgments, two conditional worth-nothing formulations and all three contrasts remain. Paints, illuminates and clarifies retain different verbs. Reasoning and reason are not collapsed into one term; the final truth is not substituted for logical correctness.

T10.The two reversed judgments and two explanatory parentheses remain. My and your are distinct; no addressee or instrument is identified. The heart, reason and insufficient frank goodwill retain separate locations. All four French weakness forms read faiblesse with ai; no English wording change is required.

T11.Both nominal Of formulations and their Or relation remain. The five adverbs keep their different standards of judgment; dramatically concerns dramatic representation rather than mere intensity.

T335.Both nominal-relative De formulations remain, including the capital D after Ou. The five adverbs, full negative contrast and source hyphen in soi-même remain. No finite main predicate is supplied.

T12.The source editor supplies dont and font, rendered [whose] and [have]. These books remains the head of an unfinished nominal formulation; the relative verb does not become an invented main verb. Restrained modifies style. Eyes and moods retain the physical and affective comparison. Both French brackets are printed editorial supplements, distinct from present reproduction losses; the singular modéré qualifies style alone.