Zibaldone

by Leopardi, Giacomo

  And what I have said occurs because few of the most learned are capable of retracing in detail, and holding accurately in their minds the origins, progress, mode of development, in short, the history of their own notions and thoughts, their knowledge and their intellect.1 This is characteristic only of the loftiest minds, whose progress, though necessarily based on habit, circumstance, and chance, was also [1377] less material and less accidental than that of others, even the most eminent. And the imagination needed for the power to communicate is always characteristic of geniuses, even philosophical or metaphysical or mathematical geniuses. See another thought of mine [→Z 58] on the power to communicate in writers, who need to have something of a poetic spirit in order to achieve this goal.

  The utmost extent of reason consists in knowing that whatever it has taught us beyond nature is useless and harmful, and whatever it has taught us that is good we already knew from nature, and our having been made to unlearn it, and then returning to learn it again and to believe it has done us the utmost harm, not only during that period of time but irreparably, throughout life, because teachings received from reason, even if consistent with natural teachings, no longer have anything like either the force or the usefulness of those received from nature, and come from a bad source, poisonous to life, indeed, they come from death and not from life, etc. (23 July 1821.)

  [1378] An animal that is attacked either in its own self, or in those things that are especially dear to it, does not calculate whether it can or cannot resist, whether resistance will be of any use or not, whether it would be better to yield, whether the danger is great or small, whether the forces balance out, whether resisting could cause it greater harm, etc., but resists immediately, and fights with all the forces it can muster, even though it be a very small force against a very great one. Disturb a hen with her chicks and she will launch herself at you with beak and claws, and will do you all the damage she can. That is what the ancient nations used to do, even if they were very small, ranged against the very great, as I have said elsewhere [→Z 1004–1007]. The same goes for private citizens in the face of the stronger or more powerful. See Gelli, Circe, in the Dialogue where he speaks of the fortitude of the beasts, and Segneri, Incredulo, where he speaks of their wars.1 It is shameful that calculation renders us less high-minded, less courageous than the beasts. From this, one can grasp just how much the great art of computation, so characteristic of our own times, enhances and fosters the greatness of deeds, acts, life, events, minds, and men. (23 July 1821.)

  The facility, almost indeed the faculty for paying attention that is so necessary to habituation, or that facilitates, shortens, and produces it, does also itself, however, grow and become perfect and all but originate through habituation. (23 July 1821.)

  [1379] Since the part of man to which we pay the most attention is the face, the child almost never has a fully formed idea of people’s beauty or ugliness except with respect to the face, and this is the first idea of human ugliness of which it conceives. For a long period, judgments as to people’s beauty or ugliness are based on this idea. Indeed, it is noticeable that until a man has begun to feel sensuality distinctly, he never conceives a precise idea of the merits or flaws of a person’s figure; that when he does begin to take note of them, he starts to form for himself an idea of the beautiful in this regard, but he only comes to complete it after a certain period of time; that excessively temperate persons ordinarily form so unreliable a judgment regarding this beauty, just as the excessively intemperate do, as I have remarked in another thought [→Z 1315–16]; that generally women, since their social status requires them to be more chaste than men are, have an external and internal inclination to show greater restraint, and a less relaxed attitude, etc., and are therefore struck by the beauty of face evident in men rather than by their figures, and more so, relatively speaking, than are men [1380] by the faces of women as against their figures (and I would say the same of ugliness). It is, however, noticeable that our being naturally accustomed to observing the face more than other parts derives in part from: (1) our alwaysa1 having a clearer idea of the beauty or ugliness of the former than the latter, whether apprehended generally, that is to say, an idea of the figure, or particularly, as of the hands, etc., which indeed are also uncovered; (2) the preference and importance we ascribe to the beauty or ugliness of the face as against the rest of the body, and our paying particular attention to the face, whether in observing it or in judging its beauty or ugliness, a habit that lasts our whole life long. And as proof of the fact that it does not come solely from the natural features of the face, observe it in savages who go about naked, and certainly pay somewhat more attention than do we to the other parts, and have a more certain, clear, and routine ability to discern what is beautiful or ugly about them; observe it in the lecherous, who will always prefer a woman with a fine figure, etc., and a mediocre or even less than beautiful face, to the most beautiful face and mediocre or less than beautiful figure. And the preference that is accorded [1381] to the forms of the face, and the greater or lesser attention paid to them, is always in proportion to the greater or lesser habit of restraint or of license, both in men and in women. And sentimental love, of which the unbridled are not capable, always derives somewhat more from the forms of the face than from those of the person, etc. etc. Finally, it is noticeable that women’s judgment as to the beauty or ugliness of both face and person in their own sex is always slower to take shape than is that of men, and never in fact goes so far, and the same may be said vice versa, regarding men’s judgment. In which it is again noticeable that the sort of judgment on human beauty or ugliness children can acquire prior to any sensuality, is more or less equally and indifferently formed regarding their own sex and regarding the other. I say more or less, because a somewhat greater inclination toward the opposite sex is felt in man from the earliest years, and this always gives rise in him to a somewhat closer observation of that sex, etc. etc. (23 July 1821.)

  [1382] To satisfy a need, to rid oneself of a discomfort, is a far greater pleasure than not to have experienced it at all. Indeed, the latter is not pleasure, whereas the former is, and it very often is so simply as the mere satisfaction of the need, etc., even though nature has not vested any particular, distinct, and independent pleasure in the action that satisfies it, as it has vested in, e.g., feeding oneself. And it is for the most part in proportion to the greater or lesser intensity of the need, etc. (24 July 1821.)

  To my theory of pleasure add that the more the organs of a creature are receptive, sensitive, mobile, keen, in short, the greater the natural life of a living being is, the more sensitive and keen is its self-love (which is almost identical to life) and hence its desire for a happiness that is impossible, and hence its unhappiness. As it is with beasts so too it is with men, so too it is with the former to varying degrees, so too with the more sensitive, imaginative, etc., human individuals, etc., as compared to other individuals of the same species. And man also in nature is therefore very logically the unhappiest of the animals (as we see), through the very fact of his having more life, more strength and feeling of life than other living beings. (24 July 1821.)

  [1383] Despite what I have said [→Z 1228–29, 1231, 1313, 1359–61] about the incompatibility of present-day philosophy with poetry, truly remarkable and lofty minds that scoff at precepts and warnings and scarcely care about the impossible, and consult only themselves, can overcome any obstacle and be supreme modern philosophers able to write perfect poetry. But because this phenomenon borders on the impossible, it cannot help but be very rare and singular. (24 July 1821.)

  For p. 1365, end. Memory is scarcely anything other than the virtue of imitation, for each reminiscence is effectively an imitation that memory, that is, the organs proper to memory make of past sensations (repeating them, refitting them, and virtually counterfeiting them), and they acquire the capacity to do it by means of an apposite and particular habituation, which is different from general habituation, or exercise of
the memory, on which see pp. 1370ff. The same is true of other imitations and habituations, which are virtually imitations, etc. All the more so given that every habituation and hence every habitual attitude acquired by the mind depends in large part on memory, etc. (24 July 1821.)

  From the above, it may be seen that the attribute of memory is not strictly speaking to recall, which is impossible, it being a question of things placed outside [1384] it and its power, but of counterfeiting, representing, imitating, which does not depend on things but on habituation to things and their impressions, that is, to sensations, and is characteristic also of other organs of the same kind. And memories are not instances of recall but imitations, or repetitions of sensations, by means of habituation. A similar argument (and note this point) could be developed in relation to ideas. This observation greatly illuminates the nature of memory, which many quite impossibly have seen as consisting of a power to depict or receive stable impressions of each sensation or image, etc., whereas, in fact, an impression is not stable, nor can it be. And see in this regard what I have said elsewhere [→Z 183–84] about the visible images of things, which, without either will or study on the part of memory, present themselves to us in the evening, when we shut our eyes, etc. A simple consequence of the habituation of the organs to those sensations and not of a continuation of them. (24 July 1821.)

  For p. 1367, end. Anyone who wants to see that the Italian language in the 14th century was not mature despite the 3 above-mentioned supreme geniuses, should note that Boccaccio, the last of the three in time, grossly deceived himself and made an unsuccessful attempt at [1385] Italian prose, divesting it of “the direct and natural unfolding of the syntax, and attempting unsuccessfully by means of intricate and clumsy transpositions to impart to it” (syntax) “the processes characteristic of Latin.” (Monti, Proposta, tome 1, p. 231.) Which therefore demonstrates that if one wanted to locate the perfecting, etc., of Italian poetic language in these three supreme geniuses (which is completely false) one cannot, by invoking the 3 supreme geniuses, locate the perfecting of the language of Italian prose in the fourteenth century. Now, how can a language without prose be said to be mature? Prose is the most natural, ordinary, and hence crucial part of a language, and the perfection of a language lies essentially in its prose. But Boccaccio, the first and only writer in the 14th century to apply Italian prose to literature, without which application the language is not mature, cannot serve as a model for prose. And note further that Boccaccio, therefore, although he was so great a talent, writing after the 2 great masters mentioned above, and after so many other minor Italian writers of prose, made a great mistake about the very character of the [1386] Italian language, about the form that was proper to it when applied to literature, that is, in short, its appropriate form, or he gave it a form that it has since wholly abandoned, and which immediately became wholly improper. Consequently, the Italian language, at any rate so far as prose was concerned, which is the main point, was not yet mature; Boccaccio was not able to form it, and indeed he went very far astray. How, then, can the Italian language have been formed by those three, and how was it formed in the 14th century, if the principal writer of Italian prose of that century, and the only one belonging to literature, did not know its appropriate form, and if it cannot serve as a model for any prose? (25 July 1821.)

  Just how much civilization by its nature tends to render men and human affairs uniform, and how this is one of its principal ends, or one of the principal means used to pursue its ends, may also be seen in the language, the orthography, the style broadly understood, the literature, etc. All things that are [1387] more uniform in a nation, the more civilized, or gradually becoming civilized, it is, and more varied the further it is from perfected civilization, or the closer it is to its origins, etc. And in its origins all these things were extremely varied, uncertain, discordant, arbitrary, etc., in any of the nations that nowadays are among the most cultured. The establishment and formation of a language, an orthography, etc., or its being established and formed, is virtually the same as making it uniform. For even if it is highly regular in one or other writer or speaker, it is not established or formed or good unless it is uniform in the nation, and even if it is highly irregular (like Greek, etc.), it is established, etc., if in that particular condition it is acknowledged, understood, and enduringly and regularly used by the nation. Irregularity is, then, the rule, and in the opposite case regularity is irregular. (25 July 1821.) See if you will, pp. 1516–17.

  Grace that derives from the unusual or from contrast. A somewhat manly voice in women. It is a splendid ragoût [sauce], provided that it is not taken to extremes, etc. etc.1 (25 July 1821.)

  The young, especially if they are educated to some degree before they go into the wide world, have a firm and ready belief in what they hear or read about the affairs of men in general, but never in particular. And the fruit of experience lies in persuading the young that, where human existence is concerned, the general is actually borne out in all or in almost all particulars, and in each and every one of them.2 (25 July 1821.)

  [1388] For p. 1262, at paragraph 1. Anyone who could carefully observe and uncover the ultimate origins of words, in any language, would see that there is no human action or idea, nor any thing—unless it is precisely perceptible to the senses—that is expressed by a word originally designed for it and applied to it. All such things, aside from the fact that they were only named later, even if they were very common, routine, and necessary to the language, and to life, etc., only received their names through metaphors, similes, etc., drawn from wholly perceptible things, whose names have served in whatever way, and with whatever modification in meaning or in form, to express things that are not perceptible. And often they have continued to be the property of the latter, while losing their original value. Observe, e.g., the action of waiting. This action is wholly external and material, but because it is not exactly perceptible to the senses it has therefore only been expressed in our languages by means of a metaphor drawn from the action of looking at, which is a wholly perceptible action.1 See p. 1106. Even if this metaphor [1389] then became a proper word, losing the original sense.

  Such is the nature and condition of the human mind. It has never managed to form a wholly clear idea of a thing that was not wholly perceptible except by contrasting, comparing, and likening it to perceptible things, and thus in some way embodying it. Therefore it has never been able to express directly any such ideas with a word that is entirely their own, and the foundation and model of whose meaning was not in a perceptible thing. Suchlike ideas having then been expressed and fixed and defined by means of words of such a kind, man by degrees has been able to rise up high enough, first to conceive confusedly, and then clearly, then to express and fix with words some other ideas that were at first a little further from pure sense-perception, then somewhat further still, and finally, entirely metaphysical and abstract. But he has only expressed all these ideas in the manner stated, that is, either with metaphors, etc., drawn directly from what is perceptible, or with new modifications and applications of words previously applied, as I have said, to things less [1390] subject to the senses, fashioning himself a ladder from uses made earlier and accepted and well understood to others that were more subtle and unphysical, etc. In such a way that even the most modern names of the most subtle and far-fetched abstractions derive originally from those of entirely perceptible things and from names which in the original languages used to signify such things. And the source and universal root of all the words in any language are the pure names of things that are wholly perceptible to the senses.

  It is intriguing to note that the substantive verb essere [to be], so necessary that without it one cannot construct a coherent argument, a word that expresses an idea that is so universal and pertains to all things and all ideas, is nonetheless, because it is one of the most abstract and ultimate ideas (precisely on account of its universality, which proves that it is an elementary idea, etc.), imperfect and ir
regular, or so I believe at any rate, in virtually all languages. In the case of Greek, it is supremely defective, and is not reinforced by words drawn from other roots, as it is in Latin, Sanskrit, and Persian. In Hebrew the verb esse, existere [to be, to exist], aside from the fact that it is quiescent, that is to say, imperfect, has *“extraordinary irregularities,”* Zanolini says.1 The reason for this (and I cannot believe that it is by chance) could be that this verb may have been one of the first invented, on account of its necessity, and it was therefore confused and irregular both because of its antiquity, [1391] and because of the few rules to which the very earliest peoples could subject it, and because of the abstractness, subtlety, immateriality, in short, the difficulty of the idea that it expresses, which none of the very earliest speakers could clearly conceive. Similar observations can be made about other verbs that tend to be anomalous in languages, even highly diverse ones, and it is noteworthy that these are ordinarily the most common and necessary in conversation, such as to have, to be able to, etc. And precisely for this reason they are anomalous, because they are only so necessary inasmuch as they express universal ideas, and the ideas are only universal inasmuch as they are elementary and abstract. Now, elementary and abstract ideas are naturally the most difficult, indeed, the last to be attained and clearly conceived, and hence to be formally and regularly expressed. (26 July 1821.) See p. 1205.

  I have said in a separate thought [→Z 1055] how incredulity often comes from small-mindedness. I would now add that it very often arises out of obstinacy, not only of the will but also of the mind, which is a sign of its smallness, which then also influences the will and the decisions taken. It is very common to see [1392] a person obstinately determined to deny a true fact or to assert a false one without ever suspecting even for a single instant that he could be deceived in seeing, etc. etc. In short, incredulity very often, indeed generally speaking, simply comes from supreme, and supremely foolish credulity. In order to arrive at credulity, a small-minded person so persuades himself of the truth and certainty of his principles, of his manner of seeing and judging, of the impossibilities he conceives, etc., that everything that disagrees with them seems to him to be absolutely false, whatever proof there may be to the contrary, because the credulity that attaches him firmly to his previous ideas, detaches him from the new ones, and renders him utterly incredulous. And thus the excess of credulity causes the excess of incredulity, and hinders the advance of the mind, etc. Those men who are most convinced of a thing are the hardest to convince, unless it is a matter of beliefs wholly consistent with their first ones, etc. See, if you will, p. 1281, beginning. (26 July 1821.)