Zibaldone

by Leopardi, Giacomo

  3. Cicero, De finibus 5, 12, a passage translated in part by Leopardi himself in his “Comparazione” (for which see Z 316, note 2). Leopardi, following his ed. of Laertius, refers to this passage as being in bk. 4.

  4. That is: “not a vulgar hedonist or an egoist” (Timpanaro, “Epicuro, Lucrezio e Leopardi,” p. 164 [B12]). In the course of his erudite works Leopardi could have glanced at Epicurus’s “Letter to Menecaeus” and other Epicurean maxims included in the tenth book of Laertius, but he doesn’t show a thorough knowledge of Epicurus (or Lucretius: see Z 748 and note 1), whom he never quotes verbatim. His knowledge of Epicureanism seems to be filtered rather through Christian apologists such as Polignac (he owned two translations of the Anti-Lucretius), as Giovanni Pascoli has suggested (Saggi e lezioni leopardiane, ed. M. Castoldi, La Spezia: Agorà, 1999, pp. XLVIII–LIII, and see Fenoglio, pp. 133–91 [B11]). Note that Epicurus is not included in the catalogue of “ancient practical philosophies” that Leopardi, on Z 4190, says he is in “agreement” with.

  5. On the originality or otherwise of Theophrastus’s account, cf. Koraes’s introduction to his translation into French of the Characters (1799), later consulted by Leopardi in Bologna (see Z 4147).

  Z 318

  1. Cicero, De officiis 2, 56, a passage that Leopardi himself later translated into Italian in the “Comparazione” (March 1822); see note 2 to Z 316.

  Z 319

  1. Quintilian, Institutiones 10, 1, 82.

  Z 321

  1. One of the first to boast of the universality of the French language was Dominique Bouhours, in his Entretien d’Ariste et d’Eugène (1671); the argument was reiterated by Antoine Rivarol, in De l’universalité de la langue françoise (1784) (Damiani). See also Voltaire, Dictionnaire philosophique, art. “Langues,” tome 5, p. 104 (a passage cited on Z 4050).

  Z 323

  1. In her article “Sulla maniera e la utilità delle traduzioni,” mentioned on Z 94 (see note 1), Staël had criticized French translations for completely changing the original, and not retaining any flavor of it. Leopardi comments at length on German translations on Z 1947–49 (quoting Staël’s De l’Allemagne) and 2845–61.

  Z 324

  1. Leopardi cites Fénelon’s “Lettre à l’Académie” (1718) as paraphrased by Algarotti, Saggio sulla lingua francese, in Opere, tome 4, p. 45. See Z 687. The image is that of a single file, or “crocodile,” of schoolchildren.

  2. Diogenes Laertius 5, 82.

  3. Casaubon, in Diogenes Laertius, De vitis, tome 1, p. 310, note 26.

  4. An allusion, perhaps, to Horace, Odes 4, 12, 19–20.

  Z 325

  1. In October 1825 Leopardi embark upon a translation of the Characters but soon abandoned it. See Volgarizzamenti (B2), pp. 178–80, 355–56.

  2. There are in fact no further references to Massillon in the Zibaldone.

  3. Plutarch, Adversus Colotem, Moralia 1126f. Leopardi quotes here from his Frankfurt edition of 1620.

  4. The Bibliotheca Graeca, vol. 2, p. 235, in fact cites Moralia, 1097b, in support of the claim that Theophrastus twice saved his country.

  Z 329

  1. The growing importance of the “mass of the people” on the European scene was a crucial issue in the political thought of many intellectuals of the time, especially in France. Leopardi, on the one hand, recalls nostalgically the time when the “multitude,” considered as a whole body, shared common values expressed by the ancient chorus (Z 2804–809); on the other hand he was skeptical about a modern “mass society” that would endanger and oppress individuals (Z 4368). What reconciles these views is the idea that people today “are all the same and all separate, whereas in ancient times they were all different but all united” (Z 151).

  Z 330

  1. Pascal, Pensées (ed. Brunschvicg), § 311, though Leopardi derived this dictum from Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 1, tome 1, part 1, p. 113.

  2. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 1, tome 1, part 1. The examples of Luther and Mohammed on p. 118. Note that Lamennais adds the example of the French Revolution (p. 115) to reinforce his argument that “doctrines are the causes of all changes.” As often happens, Leopardi cites the title in French, although he makes use of a translation. Lamennais’s essay, published in 1817, though aligned with the traditionalist thinkers in France, allowed Leopardi to gain some sense of other works, among them Rousseau’s Du contrat social and Émile (see, for example, Z 357, note 1, and 912, note 1).

  Z 331

  1. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 2, tome 1, part 1, p. 147, where he cites Rousseau, Du contrat social, bk. 4, ch. 8.

  2. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 1, tome 1, part 1, p. 118.

  Z 332

  1. See Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 2, tome 1, part 1, p. 155.

  2. See Pascal, Pensées (ed. Brunschvicg), § 278, or § 282.

  3. Paraphrase of Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 2, tome 1, part 1, p. 214.

  Z 333

  1. The matter after the comma, and the date, represents an afterthought by Leopardi.

  Z 334

  1. Diogenes Laertius 4, 2.

  2. In De vitis, vol. 1, p. 228, note 10, Isaac Casaubon confirms Plato’s priority, quoting in this regard a comment by Apuleius.

  Z 338

  1. Gabriel Brizard’s Éloge historique is appended to G. Bonnot de Mably’s Observations sur l’histoire de France, loc. cit.

  Z 339

  1. Diogenes Laertius 3, 79–80.

  Z 340

  1. The words after the date, and the comma before it, were a later addition.

  2. See Z 124 and note.

  Z 342

  1. Leopardi probably refers here to Lamennais (Fenoglio, Un infinito, p. 36 [B11]).

  2. Homer, Iliad 8, 517. See also Odyssey 22, 356–70.

  3. Vico had contrasted “the first peoples, in their heroic times when the natural law of force reigned supreme,” with “human governments … popular or monarchical,” when “by the law of human gentes heralds were introduced to give warning of wars” (The New Science, § 30).

  Z 343

  1. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 4, tome 1, part 2, p. 29.

  Z 345

  1. Homer, Iliad 13, 636–37.

  Z 349

  1. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 5, tome 1, part 2, p. 57.

  Z 350

  1. Staël, De l’Allemagne, “Préface,” vol. 1, p. XXI.

  2. Leopardi means the Scots.

  Z 352

  1. Christoph Wilhelm Friedrich Hufeland, Die Kunst des menschlichen Leben zu verlängern, Jena 1797, later entitled Makrobiotik, and translated into Italian by Luigi Carena in 1798, which was not in the LL. In the operetta morale devoted to this theme, “Dialogo di un Fisico e di un Metafisico” (where Hufeland is mentioned), the Metaphysician would oppose “true life,” or an art of dying early, to the methods used to prolong life discovered by the Physician. Leopardi’s meditations on the theme of the duration of life (see also Z 3511–14, 4043, 4062–64, 4092) should be read against Seneca’s letter 93 to Lucilius, where the “width” (or “duration”) of life is opposed to its “weight” (the “performance”: actu).

  Z 353

  1. Leopardi is probably describing his mother, Adelaide Antici.

  Z 354

  1. On the difference between ancients and moderns with regard to expectations for their children see Z 112. On deformity cf. Z 2441–42 and note, 3058–59 and note.

  Z 355

  1. The “mother” portrayed here applies on this point the Epicurean “principal doctrine” XL (in Diogenes Laertius 10, 154), particularly opposed to Leopardi’s feeling of compassion toward young people whose lives have been prematurely truncated, which gives birth, in 1828–29, to two of his most celebrated poems, “A Silvia” and “Le ricordanze.” See also his autobiographical sketches (1819) “Vita abbozzata di Silvio Sarno,” § 73: “Benedetto, story of his death, etc., my pain at seeing young people die, like seeing a vine full of unripe grapes being beaten,” and Z 4277–79. The Stoic ethics of Epictetus is less harsh, insofar as it allo
ws for showing compassion, at least “as far as words go” (Handbook 16, translated by Leopardi; see Volgarizzamenti [B2], p. 302). On compassion in general, see Z 108 and note.

  Z 356

  1. The comma was inserted subsequently, after Leopardi had added the comment following the date. A case of “barbarousness” being “not primitive but corrupted by superstition,” as Leopardi says on Z 314.

  Z 357

  1. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 5, tome 1, part 2, p. 101, where a passage from Rousseau, Émile, bk. 3, is quoted.

  2. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 6, tome 1, part 2, pp. 116–17.

  3. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 5, vol. 1, part 2, p. 110, note. Leopardi writes in error 1820.

  Z 358

  1. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 6, tome 1, part 2, p. 136.

  2. This dictum, drawn from Machiavelli but reiterated by Montesquieu, also appears on Z 222.

  Z 359

  1. Montesquieu, Considérations, ch. 8, p. 96.

  Z 360

  1. Cornelius Nepos, De vita excellentium imperatorum, Preface, Padua 1720, p. 3.

  2. Ibid., p. 4. This edition read ad scenam eat, where modern editors read ad cenam eat. The first reading implies appearing on the stage, the second, prostitution.

  Z 361

  1. Muñiz (Letture di Leopardi [B12]) rightly argues that here Leopardi has in mind the article “Nombres” in the Encyclopédie méthodique (drawn from Locke), mentioned later, on Z 1075 (and, in particular, paragraphs 5 and 6). For the example of the “stones” (possibly from Defoe) see Z 2186, note 2.

  Z 362

  1. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 7, tome 1, part 2, p. 219.

  2. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 7, tome 1, part 2, p. 219. Lamennais here compares liturgical symbols to words: “when ideas are lost, the words disappear.”

  Z 363

  1. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 7, tome 1, part 2, p. 221.

  Z 364

  1. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 7, tome 1, part 2, p. 223.

  2. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 7, tome 1, part 2, p. 211. Here Leopardi has given both the correct spelling of the author’s name and the Italian translation of the title (after giving the English original). This paragraph is in fact a note to a passage in which Lamennais observes that since Scripture provides the sole rule of faith, and since Christ did not leave any earthly authority vested with the power to interpret it, each person had to advance his own interpretation and seek out his own religion.

  Z 366

  1. Gabriel Girard, Justesse de la langue française, Paris 1718, though the precise reference is not to be found in this book (Pacella).

  Z 370

  1. Leopardi had long been interested in this theme and as early as 1811 had written a dissertation on the soul of animals (Dissertazioni filosofiche, pp. 81–98), where we find secondhand quotations from, among others, Descartes, Maupertuis, Pope, and, in particular, Rousseau, in the statement that “All animals have ideas because they have senses” (p. 82). In subsequent entries (Z 1527, 1762, and 1787) Leopardi refutes a purely mechanical conception of animal being. A general survey of the debate on this theme is L. Cohen Rosenfield, From Beast-Machine to Man-Machine. The Theme of Animal Soul in French Letters from Descartes to La Mettrie, New York: Oxford U.P., 1941.

  Z 376

  1. Leopardi has slightly modified Bigoni’s translation of Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 9, tome 1, part 3, pp. 43–44.

  Z 377

  1. Here Leopardi makes use of the Aristotelian notions of potentiality and actuality.

  Z 379

  1. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 9, tome 1, part 3, p. 45.

  Z 381

  1. The quotation is from Dante, Paradiso 4, 1–3. The case of the ass between two meadows, impelled equally toward both of them, was suggested by the philosopher Jean Buridan (1290–1358), a pupil of Ockham. This case is also used by Leibniz to reassert his rejection of mechanicism and the necessity of choice, even when the motivations of the choice are frequently unknown even to those who are choosing. See G. W. Leibniz, Essais de théodicée, part 1, § 49; and also Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, 1st part, 2nd part, quaestio 13, art. 6 (cf. also Z 3595).

  Z 382

  1. Leopardi, “Discorso di un italiano intorno alla poesia romantica,” in Prose, pp. 360–65.

  Z 383

  1. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 9, tome 1, part 3, pp. 57–58, quotes from Pascal; see Pensées sur la religion, ch. 21, § 1, p. 109 (i.e., Pensées, § 434 ed. Brunschvicg; italics added by Leopardi).

  Z 385

  1. Jacopo Sannazaro, Arcadia, eclogue 8, l. 126, in Opere volgari, vol. 1, p. 75.

  Z 386

  1. That is, Lamennais’s book.

  2. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 9, tome 1, part 3, p. 45.

  Z 387

  1. In this reevaluation of opinion (doxa) against absolute truths Leopardi is certainly aware that he is using Platonic terminology, as becomes clear when we read Z 1342 (July 1821).

  2. Lamennais, Saggio, ch. 9, tome 1, part 3, p. 53.

  Z 392

  1. Leopardi did not have access to Leibniz’s works, which he clearly drew on from secondary sources.

  2. That is, Giovanni de’ Medici, pope from 1513 to 1521.

  Z 393

  1. Here begins a lengthy thought, drafted between 9 and 22 December 1820, in which Leopardi seeks to reconcile his own system with Christianity, employing original and sometimes heterodox interpretations of Genesis.

  Z 395

  1. Note that the phrase is not used in verse 23 or 24.

  Z 396

  1. “Material” probably means here “symbolic,” if this is an allusion to the work of Friedrich Creuzer, whose researches in comparative religion were widely reviewed in Restoration Europe. The LL contains his Meletemata e disciplina antiquitatis, Leipzig 1817–19.

  Z 402

  1. Diogenes Laertius 6, 78. See Z 831 and 4190.

  Z 403

  1. Leopardi’s historical analysis implies cyclical theories of culture elaborated, on the basis of classical precedents, by, among others, Machiavelli, Vico, and Gravina (see, e.g., Vico, The New Science, § 292). On his knowledge of Vico at this stage see Z 143, note 2; 314, note 1.

  Z 404

  1. Leopardi uses a number of different terms to evoke the concept of “middling civilization” (see Z 162 and note 3, 315, and passim), and he is probably indebted to Rousseau’s vision of a felicitous balance between nature and reason. As Leopardi further notes on Z 520–21, such a civilization can also make do with a “half-philosophy.” See also the redesigned “scale of nature” on Z 2899–900.

  Z 408

  1. Here Leopardi takes issue with Rousseau’s argument in Du contrat social, bk. 4, ch. 8, regarding the nature of Christian societies.

  2. Leopardi might be referring here to the guerrilla war conducted by the Spanish against Napoleon starting in 1809. The date 1820 would include the Restoration of 1814 under Ferdinand, challenged in March 1820 by a military revolt that obliged the king to accept the enactment of the liberal Cadiz Constitution of 1812. In this specific context, then, the liberalism of 1820 (which is in essence that of 1812) has undermined illusions (see also note 1 to Z 622); in other contexts, however, the French Revolution, “reviving every type of illusion, brought France closer to nature” (Z 2334), and cf. also the mention, from the same point of view, of both the French and the Spanish revolutions on Z 520.

  Z 410

  1. Given the context, the reference here is presumably to Romantic philosophy of the kind promoted by Chateaubriand and his followers.

  Z 412

  1. See the gloomy landscape described on Z 4175–77, an evil world where only “things that are not things” are good.

  Z 415

  1. See “Ad Angelo Mai,” ll. 87–90, cited in note 1 to Z 168. On the geometricization of the world see Z 160 and note 2.

  Z 416

  1. A straightforward return to the past (see Z 162, 304–305 and note) is impossible “without a miracle” (Z 403). Leopardi’s thought is influenced by the myth of
the fall. The return will have to take a route that incorporates time, change, and chance (Z 3799): a “spiral” form typical of Romantic imagination (see M. H. Abrams, Natural Supernaturalism. Tradition and Revolution in Romantic Literature, New York: Norton, 1973, pp. 183–87). For the form of the “cycle” see Z 403. Whether it is possible or not to return to a previous state of civilization is discussed on, e.g., Z 431–32, 867–70, 1550–51, 3802, 4171, 4186–87, 4289.

  Z 417

  1. See Z 2712 and note.

  Z 418

  1. This idea is developed on Z 2899–900 (see note).

  Z 419

  1. See Job 1:6–12, which inspired the scene “Prolog im Himmel” [“Prologue in Heaven”], composed by Goethe around 1800 (Faust, ll. 312–29).

  Z 420

  1. In later years Leopardi admits this hypothesis as the only true one; see Z 4174 and note 2, and in particular Z 4257–59, 4485–86 (on a malevolent God), 4510–11 (on evil in the order of the world).

  Z 423

  1. For the distinction between a first and a “returned” barbarism see Z 314 and note 1.

  Z 427

  1. Bk. 9 of Diogenes Laertius’s De vitis is devoted to Pyrrho, the founder of Skeptic philosophy. Sextus Empiricus was the author of Outlines of Pyrrhonism, while the satirist Lucian considered the Skeptics in a number of different works. On the role of skepticism in the Enlightenment see R. H. Popkin, History of Scepticism, from Savonarola to Bayle, expanded ed., Oxford: Oxford U.P., 2003.

  2. In Christian doctrine the “plenitudo temporum” witnessed the Incarnation, or the Word become flesh.

  3. The circumlocution “a great revelation of truth in relation to man” was substituted for “Christianity,” and the dubitative parenthesis is an interlinear addition. The scorings in the ms. may point to Leopardi’s being in a particularly tormented mental state at this point.

  Z 432

  1. Leopardi probably refers to Z 253–55. On the possibility of returning to a previous stage see Z 416 and note.

  Z 434

  1. Genesis 3:22.

  Z 435

  1. Leopardi refers here to the Catholic theologians of the Enlightenment like Jean Sauri, whose Elementi di metafisica, translated from French (1777), is one of the books that were most influential in his education and is one of the main sources of his Dissertazioni filosofiche, written 1811–12 (Damiani).