From the book
Centuries of Meditations
Thomas Traherne · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordPropriety here usually means property, ownership, or a relation by which something is properly one’s own.
- In TraherneThe term is not uniformly condemned.
- In this editionThe older property sense is essential.
- A place to beginChurlish proprieties and divisions are absent from the child’s original enjoyment.
Meaning
Propriety here usually means property, ownership, or a relation by which something is properly one’s own. It does not primarily mean polite or socially correct behaviour.
Use in the book
The term is not uniformly condemned. False or churlish proprieties express an exclusive division that limits enjoyment, but III.39 asks whether all things are truly one’s own in propriety. The question of rightful belonging is retained while the criterion expands.
II.79 openly includes love of propriety among human inclinations. Its apparent conflict with communicative joy is answered by a world given wholly to each and shared with all. IV.96 then says that familiar meditation makes celestial things appear one’s own by the strictest rules of propriety. Traherne challenges narrow assumptions about what can belong to a person rather than abandoning every language of title.
Places to read
- III.3Churlish proprieties and divisions are absent from the child’s original enjoyment.
- III.39The inquiry asks whether the world is genuinely one’s own in propriety.
- II.79The desire for propriety is reconciled with the desire for companions.
- IV.96Celestial goods become recognizable as one’s own under strict rules of belonging.
In this edition
The older property sense is essential. Importing modern decorum into the love of propriety in II.79 would make its contrast with communication unintelligible.