Zibaldone
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[4066] The familiar style which, as I have said several times [→Z 1808–10, 2639–40, 2836–41, 3014–17, 3415] had necessarily to be chosen by our classical ancient writers, or was one they necessarily slipped into without being aware of it and even when they were trying to avoid it, may escape people now in whole or in part, especially those who do not have a sharp eye and have little skill or depth in knowledge, feeling, and taste when it comes to the language and style of old Italian, which means nearly all present-day Italians. This comes about, among other reasons, because what was familiar language then, is now no longer, in fact it is ancient and elegant, or else archaic. However that is no reason for what I have said elsewhere being any less true. Actually it is all the more true, since even when the language had acquired the material, the means, and the capacity for elegance and a speech distinct from that of the common people and the everyday, many writers who cultivate and admire classical language both in the 16th and 17th centuries and in the present century have continued to use a familiar style, often not noticing nor understanding very well the property and qualities of the style they chose to adopt, and often even when they did, thought they were using an elegant style. And that has come about in two ways. The first is by adopting the ancient forms themselves, which are no longer familiar today. On the contrary, they are elegant, so people have thought that such styles and works, modeled on the ancients, are elegant, when actually there is an element of familiarity about them. For the ancient style they imitated, taken as a whole, necessarily had some of this element independently of forms, but more for their own reason and in order to conform and correspond with those forms which at the time were necessarily familiar. The second way is by adopting familiar modern forms following the example and in imitation of the recognizable familiarity of forms and style of the ancients, although not fully understanding it, and often confusing both the familiarity they imitated and the one [4067] they adopted to imitate it, with elegance, dignity, and nobility and with a language distinct from the everyday, because in actual fact generally a familiar style was and is no longer everyday, and its use is particularly proper to ancient writers. The third way, which would be that of using both ancient and modern forms and every resource of language, with a view to and with the intention of creating a style and a manner that were neither familiar nor ancient, but generally elegant, noble, grand, quite distinct from common speech, and proper to a language which is suited to a perfect style, like that of Cicero in prose and Virgil in poetry (a style used when the Latin language was in those very circumstances and had the same capacity that our language has now), this third way has not only not been used but not even thought of or understood by anyone. And yet is perhaps the only suitable one, the only one perfect enough, the only one appropriate to an already perfect language and literature. (8 April 1824.)
Bien or mal mirado for que bien or mal mira [who is shrewd or thoughtless]. We also say with a similar sense riguardato, mal riguardato, poco riguardato, etc., and the Spanish also have other such participles with a similar sense, noted elsewhere [→Z 3851, 3992, 4015, 4021–42, 4040–41, 4046]. Similarly the Latins have circumspectus with an active or neuter meaning from circumspicio [to consider, to look around oneself], and cautus [cautious] from caveo active, etc. (9 April 1824.)
Εὐθὺς ἐν ἀρχῇ [right from the beginning]. Lucian, Opera, 1687, tome 1, p. 515. (9 April, Friday of Passion Week, Feast of the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary, 1824.)
For p. 4053. See however the good Spanish dictionaries, under the entry dueña which I think in a passage in Don Quixote means donna [lady], and the Latin Glossary under domina or domna, and Forcellini and old French, whether they’ve got anything on the subject. Furthermore, not only etymologically but even today donna means signora [lady] in Italian, and donno, signore, padrone [lord]. (10 April 1824, Saturday in Passion Week.)
[4068] Divertido cuento, etc., for que divierte [an amusing tale]. (13 Apr. 1824.)
To what I said [→Z 2201–202, 2893] about quisto, chiesto [inquired], etc., add requête [request], old form requeste. (13 Apr. 1824.)
Couper—κόπτειν [to cut], 2nd aorist κοπεῖν, with its derivatives, most of which have the τ omitted. (13 Apr. 1824.)
Conforme for conformemente [analogously], adverb and preposition in Spanish and Italian, perhaps of Spanish origin. For what I said about adjectives used adverbially [→Z 2789–90, 2918–19, 4012, 4053]. (13 Apr. 1824.)
Honrado for onorevole [honorable], as in Italian onorato, mentioned elsewhere [→Z 4016]. (13 Apr. 1824.)
Positivized diminutives. Laurel–laurus [laurel tree]. Laurel is not a diminutive in Spanish in its form, but it is in Latin. See if Forcellini has Laurellus.
Abortus–avorton [abortion, runt] in French. (14 April, Wednesday in Holy Week, 1824.)
To what I said elsewhere [→Z 3754–56] about ignotus (for innotus) [unknown] add ignotitia for innotitia [ignorance], on which see Forcellini. See him also on innotus. (15 April, Maundy Thursday, 1824.)
To a wayward young man who, when trying to find an excuse for all his mistakes and failures and embarrassments and his wretched behavior in society, used to say and often to repeat that life is but a play, *** replied one day that even in a play it is better to be applauded than booed, and an actor who does not know how to do his job (profession), in the end dies of hunger. (17 April 1824.)
People who are always used to pouring everything out naturally let out a yell if a fly stings them, or if a vase tips over or breaks, even when they are on their own. Those who are used to their own company and hold everything in [4069] do not open their mouths to complain or to ask for help if something happens to them accidentally, even in a crowd. (17 April, Holy Saturday, 1824.)
“Comidos y bebidos, como suele decirse” [“Wined and dined, as they say”], Don Quixote, part 2, Madrid 1765, tome 4, p. 169, that is que han comido y bebido. (17 April, Holy Saturday, 1824.)
Not long ago I noted in these thoughts, pp. 4062ff., the greater natural disposition to happiness which Orientals and peoples of a warm climate have, as opposed to others. Now observe that in actual fact these were the climates that nature ordained for mankind, as is shown, at least for the Orient, by ancient traditions proving that the origin of the human race was in those countries, as I have said elsewhere in several places [→Z 3643ff., 4048], and for very warm climates in general by the fact that they are the only ones in which man may live naked, as nature intended, and without any protection against the elements, with which nature has not provided him, and which in other countries are a prime necessity, neither are they few or easy to come by, or taught to him by nature, for they need much experimentation, chance, etc.1 The structure, etc., of any of the other animals, and plants, makes plain to us the nature of the countries, places, element, etc., in which nature has destined it to live, because if it lives in a different climate, place, etc., that structure, part, member, etc., and form, etc., is of no use to it, hampers it in some way, etc., there is no doubt that it is not destined to live there, in fact that it has been destined not to live there. Now why are similar arguments invalid [4070] for man alone? As if he were not a son of nature, like every other created thing, but of himself, as God is. (17 April, Holy Saturday, 1824.)
Men who are ruled in public or in private by others, the more so the stricter the governance (children, young men, etc.), always charge, or tend naturally to charge those who govern them with their ills or lack of goods, with their misfortunes and dissatisfactions, even in those matters of which they must evidently be innocent and even if it is impossible to prevent or remedy their ills or to procure any goods for them, and those who govern them are completely independent from and lack any relation to these things. The reason is that since man is always unhappy, he naturally tends almost always to blame not the nature of things and men, even less to decide not to blame anyone, but always to blame some particular person or thing on whom he can vent the bitterness his ills cause him, and whom, on
their account, he can make the object of both his hatred and his complaint. And these themselves would be much less sweet than they are to the sufferer if they were not directed at someone judged culpable of the suffering. This natural tendency operates in such a way that the wretch even convinces himself in effect of what he imagines, and almost wants it to be true. That is how man came to imagine the names and persons of fortune, of fate, charged so long with human ills, and so sincerely hated by the unhappy ancients, and against whom even today, for lack of other [4071] objects, we direct in all seriousness the hatred and complaint of our misfortunes. But it was sweeter by far for the ancients and still is for the moderns to blame something tangible, and especially some other man,1 not only because it seems so much more likely to be the case, and it is therefore easier to convince ourselves of his guilt, which is what we need, but also because hatred and complaint are sweeter when they are directed at present things which can be witnesses of them, and be subjected to the vengeance which we, with our vain hatred and vain complaint, intend to carry out. Hatred and complaint are especially sweet when directed at our fellows, both because guilt can only truly belong to intelligent beings and for many other reasons. Those who govern us are easily chosen by us to act as the person guilty of our ills, which do not have any other who is manifest and accusable, and to serve as object and target of the vain vengeance that it is so sweet for us to exact for our own ills. Such persons are in fact in these circumstances the most suitable, and the ones whom we can most plausibly complain about outwardly and inwardly. Therefore anyone who governs publicly and privately is always the object of the hatred and complaint of those who are governed. Men are always discontented because they are always unhappy. For that reason they are discontented with their state, for that same reason with whoever governs them. (They feel and they are well aware that they are unhappy, that they suffer, that they do not find enjoyment, and in that they are not wrong. They think that they have the right to be happy, to enjoy life, not to suffer, and in that too they would not be wrong, if it were not for the fact that what they expect is, if nothing else, impossible.) [4072] And just as it cannot be that men are ever happy, and consequently not content either, so too no person who governs either publicly or privately, however much love he may have for his subjects, however much he cares about their welfare, however solicitous he is in helping them to avoid or in relieving their ills, however much merit he has in their regard, can never reasonably hope they will not hate him and complain about him, even the most wise among them, because it is the nature of men to complain about someone, almost as much as it is to be unhappy, and this someone is generally and naturally the man who governs them. Therefore as far as governance is concerned there are unfortunately only two wise courses of action, either to desist from governing, both publicly and privately, or to govern totally for one’s own advantage and not for those who are governed. (17 April 1824, Holy Saturday.)
Positivized diminutives. Piscis–poisson [fish]. Note that of the positivized diminutives in modern languages some of them have the Latin diminutive form which is also obvious in modern languages or not, other languages have an altogether modern diminutive form and not the Latin one (18 April, Easter, 1824) and such a diminutive ending is sometimes found in just that language, sometimes not, but may be found in other modern languages or in just one of them, whether a sister or foreign language, and whether the word itself actually exists in the other language or is no longer found there, at least with that diminutive form. E.g., it could be that some French words ending in in ine, etc., where this desinence is added on, since these words are found without such an ending in Latin or in Italian, etc., are originally positivized diminutives from the Italian, when [4073] in Italian they are no longer found, at least with that diminutive form, either positive or truly diminutive. (19 April 1824.) The same can be said of verbs, etc.
See p. 4044. Ferdinand the Catholic not only at the time of the League of Cambrai, but also several years later, when the league was already dissolved, always kept up the pretense that he wanted to fight against the infidels, not only the Moors of Africa, as he used to say, but also the Turks of Jerusalem. See Guicciardini, tome 3, p. 109. (19 April, Easter Monday, 1824.) And see there too, pp. 128 and 135, end. See p. 4081.
Senza [without] for oltre [besides] (see the French and the Spanish who also say with the same meaning a men de, oltre di, which amounts to the same thing). See p. 4081. So the Greeks ἄνευ. See Lucian, Vera historia, bk. 1, Opera, 1687, p. 647, tome 1, and Scapula on ἄνευ and its synonyms, and Forcellini on absque which is used for eccetto, [except] but that is not exactly the same. (19 April 1824, Easter Monday.)
Positivized diminutives. ῥάφανος, ῥαφανὶς ίδος [radish] with their compounds and derivatives, on which see Scapula who says that ῥαφανὶς is the Attic form of ῥάφανος. In which case the positivization of the diminutives would be proper to Attic in particular. The Latins say rhaphanus. That ῥαφανὶς really is positivized, see Lucian, Vera historia, bk. 1, Opera, 1687, tome 1, p. 649: “ῥαφανίδας ὑπερμεγέθεις” [“giant radishes”]. It is notable that we who have taken rafano from the Latin, and more vulgarly, although it is a corrupt form, ravano, have also like the Attics turned it into a diminutive and positivized it as ravanello, which means exactly the same as the two words already mentioned, and is much more common than both of them, in fact it is the only one now in use, at least in familiar and spoken language. See the Spanish and the French. (19 Apr. 1824.)
[4074] For p. 4043. Any poem or writing, or any part of it, that expresses pleasure and delight in its style or its feelings, also expresses, with the form of its style or its feelings or with both, a careless abandon, an indifference, a kind of forgetfulness of everything. And generally there is no other way to express delight. That is just how it is, pleasure is none other than an abandonment and forgetfulness of life, and a kind of sleep and death. Pleasure is rather the privation or the depression of feeling than a feeling as such and still less an intense feeling. It is like an imitation of insensibility and of death, the drawing as near as possible to a state contrary to life and to the privation of it, because life by its nature is pain. Hence it is pleasurable to be without life as much as one can, without any of the pain and suffering that comes from or is attached to such a privation. Therefore pleasure is not really pleasure, it does not have positive qualities, because it is only privation, indeed a simple diminution of displeasure which is its opposite.1 Such at least are the greatest and truest pleasures. Intense pleasures are also not even pleasures. They always bring with them some distress, some uncomfortable sensation, some disturbance, that is essentially attached to, caused by, and dependent on them. (19 April, Easter Monday, 1824.) Therefore life is an evil and the opposite of pleasure by its very nature, since to be deprived of it as much as possible is naturally pleasurable. Indeed, life is a naturally violent state, since it is naturally deprived of its highest and natural [4075] need, desire, end, and perfection, which is happiness.1 And since this violence never ends, there is not a single moment of conscious life that is without positive unhappiness and positive distress and displeasure. (20 April, Easter Tuesday, 1824.) Especially when on the one hand, with civilization, our inner life, the refinement of the faculties of our soul and our feeling has expanded, and therefore our self-love and our desire for happiness as well, and on the other, the impossibility of ever gaining happiness has multiplied, and our physical and moral ills have too, while physical action, occupation, intense and continual distraction are reduced. (20 Apr. 1824.)