From the book
The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volumes I–II
Joseph Joubert · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Ornament
ornement
Ornement can enrich appearance without being intrinsically opposed to truth, but excess or a misleading model can make it objectionable.
Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordOrnement can enrich appearance without being intrinsically opposed to truth, but excess or a misleading model can make it objectionable.
- In JoubertPersonified Truth loves adornments, although the fragment stops before explaining when she appears adorned.
- In this editionThe English translation keeps the condition in the Voltaire judgment and the feminine she for Truth.
- A place to beginTruth’s love of adornment remains an unfinished personification.
- English renderings
- ornament; adornment
Meaning
Ornement can enrich appearance without being intrinsically opposed to truth, but excess or a misleading model can make it objectionable.
Use in the book
Personified Truth loves adornments, although the fragment stops before explaining when she appears adorned. The overloaded Cybele shows a different effect: clothing and accessories make the divine figure merely a queen with a country. Ornament can restrict a figure’s kind or reach rather than simply make it more beautiful. Voltaire’s ornaments may then be faulted for their example without being condemned as bad taste in themselves. The distinction asks what other writers will learn from the practice, not only whether the immediate effect pleases.
Places to read
- I, p. 59, entry 7, ¶1Truth’s love of adornment remains an unfinished personification.
- II, p. 477, entry 6, ¶1Overloaded ornaments make Cybele human and geographically particular.
- II, p. 848, entry 4, ¶1An ornament may set a bad example without being in bad taste.
Translation in this edition
The English translation keeps the condition in the Voltaire judgment and the feminine she for Truth. “Proper word” means the apt word in the criticism of globe, not a proper name. Neither unfinished statement is supplied with a conclusion.
Source note
Beaunier 1938, I, pp. 59; II, pp. 477, 848.
From the book
Centuries of Meditations
Thomas Traherne · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Ornament
ornament; adorning; decoration; excellence conferred
An ornament adorns and lends distinction.
Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordAn ornament adorns and lends distinction.
- In TraherneIII.55 makes ornament reciprocal.
- In this editionOrnament here can be constitutive of expressed excellence.
- A place to beginEach person in the blessed assembly is a light and ornament of the kingdom.
Meaning
An ornament adorns and lends distinction. In Traherne it may be an integral excellence of a person or whole, not a dispensable embellishment.
Use in the book
III.55 makes ornament reciprocal. A part receives beauty from the larger composition while also contributing beauty to it. Isolated from its place and relations, the same part loses the value it possessed. Ornament consequently helps explain why felicity requires broad knowledge: one cannot understand a treasure without knowing what it gives and receives.
People themselves become ornaments of the divine kingdom. The prayer in I.97 asks to join a company whose members are each other’s joy and light. The language dignifies the person as a contributor to shared glory, rather than reducing the person to an attractive object arranged for someone else’s pleasure.
Places to read
In this edition
Ornament here can be constitutive of expressed excellence. The modern implication of something merely superficial would distort III.55’s account of relation.