Diotimos Reading Desk

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← ExitThe Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume II

Reading language

YEAR 1814

A pedant of virtue (of politeness, of good taste), etc. That is to say, one who teaches [it], displays it and does not understand it. To be a pedant of a thing is to display it in one’s speech or conduct in such a way as to seem to teach it. Pedantry always has some bombast.

December […].

I. Neither the world, nor Scripture, nor the Church makes God known clearly and perfectly.

II. It is not the truth of what is the object of faith, but the [necessity] of believing, that ought to be demonstrated.

III. Faith is not in ideas, but in the submission of [the] mind.

IV. One can believe without ideas and on trust; and one experiences this every day, even in human affairs.

Truths of practice. If opinions lead one there, one goes by balloon.

God does not owe us truth, which is his portion; he owes us only persuasion, which suffices for us. Persuasion is worth more than conviction; conviction chains man, persuasion makes him act.

To enter into the spirit of one’s role (applied to religion). One can receive emotion from the mere supposition of the true and adjust one’s feelings to the hypothesis.

To act in accordance with the hypothesis. This is what the astronomer and the physician often do. This is what someone who wishes to be a Christian can also do. — “Moved by the mere supposition...” One can be so; one is even readily so. — “To enter into the spirit of one’s role” or into that of one’s manners, memories or the attitude one adopts. — One also enters into the spirit that the place and its purpose require and that others bring to it, or that one was accustomed to bring to it, and that one judges fitting there. — Spirit of the place, spirit of the moment, spirit of the assembly, spirit... finally, spirit of the circumstances, spirit of the role, spirit of the action one performs.

Wednesday, December 7.

To create light (within oneself). (See Bacon.) A fine occupation, a fine study, a fine talent! It is better still to make oneself clear-sighted than to see, or at least than to look.

Wisdom. Wisdom of heart, wisdom of temper, wisdom of imagination.

Houses that do not have the lamp. (The marvelous lamp.)

T56.The nominal opening, parenthetic alternatives, teaches/displays/does not understand sequence and repeated display/teach relation remain. The first [it] contextually reads the damaged object pronoun in […]’enseigne; later intact objects remain unbracketed. The damaged article in avoir […]’air has no separately rendered English word in seem; its missing initial is not recovered. Bombast gives emphase its rhetorical force without adding a personal target. The comma before etc. is English punctuation; the French has none there.

T186.The nominal opening, virtue/politeness/good-taste terms, parenthesis and etc. remain, followed by the two definitions and the concluding always qualification. Plain Etre, the spaced C’est à dire and both possessives remain literal. At the left margin before ’enseigne and ’air, the surviving vertical/upper pieces do not securely establish complete l forms in the original-size color/native views; the apostrophes and following words remain. The open bowl before ’est is degraded but sufficiently identifiable for a qualified c reading. Independent bounded comparison agrees with these qualified distinctions; no French initial is supplied solely from grammar.

T57.All three negative alternatives, makes known and both adverbs remain. The Roman numeral is an internal paragraph label, not a new entry.

T187.Four separately indented Roman I–IV paragraphs remain in one dated unit. The day has only disconnected/right-curved remnants; a complete numeral is not certified and no 6 is restored. The three Ni terms and their shared ne, the truth/necessity contrast, both not/but constructions, the modal faudroit and the sans idées/de confiance distinction remain. Foi keeps its plain i. The first c of clairement is abraded but has a qualified identifiable bowl in color. Only écessité, ’esprit and es are complete at the three later line openings; preceding n/l/l forms are not certified from the incomplete stems and merged show-through. Whole missing components stay marked; the apostrophe before esprit is retained. Independent bounded comparison agrees with this incomplete date and the three recorded margin limits, retaining all contour qualifications.

T58.The contrast concerns the truth of the object and the necessity of belief. [Necessity] is a whole-word contextual rendering of […]écessité, without recovering the initial n. The conditional obligation remains; English recasts the infinitive démontrer as a passive without changing what requires demonstration.

T59.The negative locative contrast and submission remain without converting the claim into intellectual agreement or a named religious rule. [The] contextually supplies the damaged article in de […]’esprit; mind renders intact esprit.

T60.Without ideas and on trust remain different prepositional relations; the English does not imply a lack of trust. Can, every day and even preserve their scopes. In tous […]es jours, tous is intact and the plural French article is damaged; every day has no independent English article to bracket. This does not certify a complete French les.

T61.The nominal opening, conditional relation and literal balloon image remain. There points back to practical truths without identifying a particular practice or transport history.

T188.The plural nominal opening and complete conditional balloon image remain. The initial e of en near the folded margin is degraded but identifiable in color; no extra word or source gap is inferred from adjoining pale show-through.

T62.The denied debt, only restriction, portion image and sufficiency remain. Persuasion and conviction each recur, with chains and makes act preserving their opposed consequences.

T189.The negative point and restrictive ne...que remain distinct. Both relative clauses, the repeated persuasion/conviction terms, comparative vaut mieux and the final two effects are preserved in source order. The folded openings doit, la and agir are read as qualified identifiable foreground letters in the clearer color image, not supplied from the sentence. Enchaîne carries a compressed raised mark consistent with the circumflex; its precise contour remains qualified.

T63.The infinitive, application parenthesis, possibility and mere supposition remain. The true retains nominal du vrai rather than conflating it with a separately named vérité. Emotion and feelings retain separate places in the statement, with no named theatrical role or experiment supplied.

T190.The infinitive opening and parenthetic applied-to-religion qualification remain; On peut governs both receive and adjust relations, with seule intact. The abraded r of recevoir and t at the ordinary sen-/timens line continuation remain qualified identifiable in the color original; no extra missing word or letter is inferred merely from the wrap.

T64.The initial infinitive, repeated This is what, often/can/also, two bounded quotations and suspended ellipsis remain. Spirit repeats throughout the final sequence. The clauses concerning what the place and its purpose require, what others bring, what one was accustomed to bring and what one judges fitting are contextually read as sharing spirit; the embedded qu’il a describes the purpose the place has, rendered its purpose. This is a defensible reading of the compressed attachments, not a uniquely certified parse. The source comma after lieu has no counterpart inside reordered English the place and its purpose. The dash before One also enters begins at the continuation margin; the sequence remains one paragraph. The second clause after One can moves from possibility to assertion.

T191.This entire long passage is one physical paragraph. The margin dash before On entre does not begin another indented paragraph. Four dashes, both quoted spans, the printed ellipsis inside the first quotation and later esprit... remain in their exact sequence. Plain Emu and eut remain literal, with no accent inferred from expected modern spelling or tense. The astronomy/medicine pair, peut/aussi/même degrees, two alternatives and repeated esprit catalogue are preserved. The comma after lieu and the relative syntax of destination/qu’il a/que les autres y apportent remain without syntactic repair. The color view retains qualified identifiable foreground starts in nome, chrétien, l’est, celui, qu’il, apporter, moment and stances at the folded line margin. The ordinary astro-/nome and circon-/stances wraps do not create lexical losses. Native binarization degrades some of these starts more severely; the clearer color witness governs these bounded readings. Independent bounded comparison agrees with the named starts, wraps and one-paragraph topology, retaining the stated qualifications.

T65.The infinitive, separate parentheses, three fine formulations and exclamation remain. Better still, see/look and at least retain the corrective sequence. Clear-sighted is not an occult attribution; the abbreviated Bacon reference remains unlocated.

T192.The weekday and clear day 7 remain; the first M has a compressed/abraded left contour but a qualified identifiable overall form in color/native comparison. No different date is inferred from chronology. Both parentheses and roman inline (Vid. Bacon.) remain in the paragraph without an apparatus call or invented target. The three belle/belle/beau terms, exclamation, encore mieux and seeing/looking alternative retain their exact relations. The margin starts étude and de remain qualified identifiable, not supplied.

T66.The four wisdom occurrences remain in the same paragraph. Temper is contextual for humeur, preserving a distinction from heart and imagination.

T193.The opening nominal sentence and three repeated wisdom terms remain, with their distinct heart, disposition and imagination nouns. No finite predicate is added.

T67.The indefinite nominal phrase, negative and parenthetic restatement remain. No specific house, owner or folktale is identified.

T194.The initial word is Des, with a clear capital D in color and native pixels; the map incipit Les is preliminary and is not followed. The nominal relative fragment, negative and separate parenthesis remain. No source or allusion is expanded from the lamp image.