Diotimos Library · Journals, Notebooks & Fragments Collection · Bilingual Edition
The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume II
Complete Notebooks · French with an independent English translation.
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Facing Pages · Branch 2355 of 4529
YEAR 1811 · Entry 6136
French
p. 4709Des raisons et des motifs. Beaucoup de choses sont des motifs et ne sont pas des raisons. Je veux dire que beaucoup de choses déterminent la volonté et lui impriment leur mouvement, qui ne déterminent pas l’intelligence et n’y portent pas de clarté. L’orateur doit employer et les motifs et les raisons, car il tend à déterminer plus qu’à instruire ou à éclairer. Mais le but où il se propose d’arriver et d’amener les autres doit (autant qu’il se peut) paroître évidemment le plus sage et le plus juste à sa propre raison ou à sa propre intelligence. Son seul motif déterminant doit être l’équité ou la légitimité de sa cause, préalablement démontrée à sa conscience inférieure.
The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume II: YEAR 1811
p. 4710Reasons and motives. Many things are motives and are not reasons. I mean that many things determine the will and impress their movement upon it, which do not determine the intelligence and bring no clarity into it. The orator must employ both motives and reasons, for he aims more to determine than to instruct or enlighten. But the goal he proposes to reach and to bring others to must (as far as possible) appear evidently the wisest and the most just to his own reason or his own intelligence. His sole determining motive must be the equity or legitimacy of his cause, previously demonstrated to his inferior conscience.
Socrates
Reading The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volume II · YEAR 1811 · Entry 6136
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 II continues the notebooks and includes seventy undated pieces. 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.