For p. 3700, margin. That the desinence ui in the perfect of the second conjugation was introduced in the way which we have described [→Z 3698], is again shown when it is considered in certain verbs of the first conjugation. No one doubts that its regular and proper perfect is that in avi. However quite a few of its verbs have their perfect in ui: domui [to tame], secui [to cut], vetui [to prohibit], necui [to kill], crepui [to rattle], etc., together with their compounds enecui [to destroy], perdomui [to subdue thoroughly], etc. See pp. 2814–15 and 3570. Now where does this anomaly come from? From the same cause which introduced it into the verbs of the second conjugation, [3716] in which the anomaly, since it is much more common than in the first, and more common than each of the other desinences, is not called an anomaly, but instead the rule; and anomaly is a better designation of the desinence in evi because it has become rarer, and one of the other less common ones. But if we speak precisely and look at its origin, the desinence in ui is the anomaly or alteration in the second conjugation just as much as in the first, and that in evi is as regular in the 2nd as that in avi is in the first. And the desinence in ui is more common in the second than in the first because the omission of the vowel, from which it derives, was and is easier and more natural in relation to the e than to the a, a harsher-sounding letter, to employ Cicero’s phrase in another context (Orator, ch. 45, on the letter x).1 At any rate, just as many second-conjugation verbs have their perfect in both evi and ui, whichever of the two is more common, so all or almost all first-conjugation verbs which have their perfect in ui, still keep the perfect in avi, whether this is the more used, or vice versa. [3717] Plico as (see Forcellini) plicatus. Adplico, explico, etc., avi atum, ui ĭtum. Frico as ui ctum, fricatum. Perfrico, etc. Sono as avi atum, ui, sonitus us. See p. 3868. Mico as ui, micatus us. Emico as ui, emicatio, emicatim.1 And all of them likewise, if I am not mistaken, have their supine in ĭtum, like those of the second conjugation which have their perfect in ui (while those whose perfect is in evi likewise preserve the true supine in etum, I think, all of them); or in ctum contracted from cĭtum (nectum, sectum, etc.) as precisely is normal with those of the second conjugation which have their perfect in ui, like docui‒doctum contracted from docĭtum. See p. 3723. But many of those first-conjugation verbs which have their supine in ĭtum, likewise preserve, both the true perfect in avi, and the true supine in atum (or the participle in atus or in aturus, etc., which is all the same thing, as it shows) more or less commonly used than that in ĭtum, in the same way as some second-conjugation verbs perhaps preserve alongside the supine in ĕtum the true one in ētum. I say, perhaps, because I cannot at the moment call an example to mind. (17 Oct. 1823.)
For p. 2980. Imagination which is continually fresh and at work is needed to be able to saisir [grasp] the links, the affinities, the similarities, etc. etc., either real, or apparent, poetic, etc., of objects and things between themselves, or to discover these links, or to [3718] invent them, etc.,1 and this must be done continually if one wishes to talk metaphorically and figuratively, and to ensure that these metaphors and figures and this way of talking have aspects that are new and original and that are proper to their author. I leave aside similes: a new metaphor which is contained even just in a single word has need of the imagination and invention of which I have spoken. Now from these metaphors and figures, etc., the whole style and the whole expression of the poet’s concepts must be composed. Continual imagination is required—always alive, always showing things to the eyes of the poet, and showing them to him as present—in order to be able to indicate the meaning of things or actions or ideas, etc., by means of one or two circumstances or qualities or parts thereof, and these the tiniest, the most fleeting, the least noted, the least likely to be expressed by other poets or used to represent the whole image, the most effective and fitting because of this very newness or rareness of their being noted or expressed, or of their application [3719] and use, etc., the most fitting, I say, to signify the idea to be expressed, to represent it to the life, to awaken it with efficacy, etc. Such very often are the expressions, or we could say the means of expression, and the way of representing things and awakening new images, etc., or in a new way, and by virtue of the newness of the method, etc. etc., which are used by Virgil, and especially, indeed uniquely, by Dante, as characteristic both of his style and his poetry. All these things are required in a style such as Virgil’s (and to a greater or lesser degree in other styles, but Virgil’s, so far as style is concerned, is precisely the most poetic of the known styles, perhaps the acme of the poetic), and in fact these are the means he adopts and the effects he achieves. Now such methods cannot be adopted, nor such effects produced (for there is no other way to obtain them as far as style is concerned), without a continuous and uninterrupted activity, vivacity, and freshness of imagination. For wherever that flags, so does the style, no matter how outstandingly imaginative and poetic is the invention and the quality of things treated and expressed in that style. The things may well be poetic, but the style is not. The effect will be worse even than if those things were unpoetic, and this because of the contrast and inappropriateness, etc., which will be all the greater where they and the invention, etc., are more full of imagination and poetry. [3720] In any case pp. 3388–89 should be looked at. (17 Oct. 1823.)
For p. 3546. These effects occur in a great literary figure, in a great philosopher, in a great poet, in a great practitioner of anything, be it literature or art or science or practical skill, etc., toward those who claim competence in that same art, and profess it, etc. Very severe, very contemptuous, very intolerant at first, not out of haughtiness (on the contrary these people are always very modest) but through not having found anyone who is worthy of esteem in themselves, or who merits more than very little in their profession, and contemptuous in their hearts, rather than through outward show. Then gradually persuading themselves that in the end there is nothing better than the people they despised, from the absence of truly estimable people they persuade and then habituate themselves to tolerate what has no merit, and to esteem and praise what has very little, and to celebrate and even admire the mediocre (not as such, but because its rarity is finally recognized, and recognized as universal) and in short to content themselves with what is of small or very little account, and to give things not their [3721] absolute weight but the relative weight which they deserve. So that they very rarely come across a case in which they can and do hold something in total contempt.
I go further, and say that being contemptuous, indifferent, very severe, demanding, hard to please, intolerant, etc., either toward men in general, or toward those of their own profession, is a sure sign, given the quality of the world, either of inexperience, and little or no knowledge and familiarity with men, or of little talent, which is not convinced by experience and does not draw from it the profit and the consequences which it ought, and is never capable of generalizing from a few particulars, but for each particular which it comes across in life needs new and apposite experience, which is the case, the proper nature, and the distinguishing mark of men of little intelligence. Or in the end it is a sign of little or no worth either in general, or in one’s profession, because it is always the case that a person who is worth little, since he cannot justly appraise himself or others, is haughty in relation to himself, and contemptuous toward others. While he who is worth much, since he is very capable of understanding and appraising his own and others’ worth, both in general and in his profession, and comparing it, [3722] etc., can justly apportion and does apportion, at least inside himself, both to himself and to others, the level of esteem, whether absolute or at least relative, which is appropriate for each, and places himself either above or below the others, and of these some above the others, according to their relative merit, etc. (17–18 Oct. 1823.)
To the things I said in my theory of continuatives (at the beginning) and elsewhere [→Z 1106, 1388, 2779], concerning the verb exspectare [to look out for], etc., add the French guetter [to
watch over, to watch out for], which properly means to watch, etc., and metaphorically to await, to expect, etc. (18 Oct. 1823.)
Participles in us of active verbs used in an active sense, or neuter, or active intransitive. Desperatus [desperate]. Cornelius Nepos, Atticus, ch. 8, last line. Where it seems that desperatus means qui desperavit [one who despaired]. (18 Oct. 1823.) Certus [resolved]: qui crevit [he who has resolved]. Certa mori [resolved to die]: quae crevit [she who has resolved], that is decrevit [has resolved, has decided], mori [to die], active meaning, in fact in a certain way, transitive, etc. And here and in very many similar cases, certus is used in its meaning as a participle, not as an adjective, as in many other cases, especially when one is speaking of things. But when one is speaking of persons, I doubt that it is ever other than a participle, hence certior [more certain] can also serve well for our case, etc. etc.
Monosyllable root of dico [to say]. Charisius and Vossius1 believe that the genitive dicis does not come from δίκη [order, law], but from a dix, and relates to dico, etc. [3723] Probably they would like dix to come from dico, but the opposite would be the case, as I have said in the theory of continuatives about lex [law], rex [king], etc. Add the monosyllable grex [herd], signifying a very primitive idea and the root of several simple and compound forms, such as congregare [to assemble], etc. The same can be said of nubs [cloud]. See Forcellini. (18 Oct. 1823.)
For p. 3717. This observation of finding constantly or almost constantly the supine in ĭtum in the verbs of the first and second conjugations which have their perfect in ui, even if that supine and that perfect in first-conjugation verbs are without controversy, and in second-conjugation verbs in conformity with our observations, they are anomalous, etc.; this appears to demonstrate a correspondence, a dependence which passed in Latin between the perfect and the supine (as between the perfect and the tenses which are already known to be formed from it, among which no one, as far as I know, has ever counted the supine); and that the formation of the supine followed and was determined and modified by the form of the perfect, and that in a word the supine too was born somehow from the perfect, just as absolutely, completely, and without controversy are born the pluperfect, the future of the optative, etc. etc. This suspicion could also, [3724] I believe, be confirmed with many other observations. E.g., juvo as [to help, to please] forms its perfect in iuvi, a contraction of iuvavi either to avoid that double v,a1 or through the effect of quickened and fused pronunciation of those two vs together: a fusion and quickening which then became the norm, from where came iuvi as the only perfect of iuvo, and with a single and simple v. A perfect which came to be anomalous, but an anomaly whose origin and cause is well known. Now in the supine iuvo has iutum in place of iuvatum. An anomalous participle, of which anomaly the origin and cause are not known, unless we say that it is formed from the perfect, which since it is iuvi, gives logically iutum, as equally from iuvavi we would get iuvatum. See Forcellini under Juve, end. One could therefore say that iutum is formed from iuuatum to avoid that double u, although one is a consonant and the other a vowel, and through syncope and elision of the a, and because of the effect of the pronunciation, etc. And indeed one cannot deny, because it is so obvious, that here the supine corresponds with the perfect (and this is the case with all the compounds of iuvo: adiuvi [to help], adiutum, etc. etc.), and it would be foolish to attribute this correspondence to chance, and not to accept, as seems evident, that the anomaly in the supine for which one sees no reason, comes [3725] from that anomaly in the perfect whose reason can be seen, and when compared with that perfect, and on account of it, that supine is not anomalous, etc. etc., and equally foolish to claim instead that the anomaly of the supine is fortuitous, etc. (18 Oct. 1823.) See p. 3732.
For p. 3687.1 That is, if they have them. For a very large and perhaps the greater part of verbs in sco, have neither perfect nor supine of any sort, and neither do the grammarians attribute any to them. Another proof that none of them has its own perfect or supine. I mean that none of them has them today, and where they do, they are not their own. Since in ancient times they did have them, and they were their own, but different to the ones they have today (if they have them), and different from the ones which are or would be consistent with their original verbs, and from the one which those verbs have (if they exist and have perfect and supine), and would be regular, etc., as has been demonstrated with noscitus, nascitus, etc., pp. 3690, 3692, 3758. As also is an important proof, the fact that all verbs in sco whose original verbs are known, if they have perfect and supine (or only one or the other as frequently happens) which in meaning is their own, or which has been attributed to them by the grammarians, this perfect and this supine is never, as far as its material form is concerned, either different from or other than that of the said verbs, no matter what conjugation these latter are. And this observation confirms the other part of my proposition (in fact it demonstrates it, one could say, totally), that is that all the perfects and supines of verbs in sco where they have them, [3726] or to which the grammarians have attributed them, have been borrowed from the original verbs (in which they would be or are regular, etc., where in the others they are not), whether these verbs are known or unknown. Since from what happens universally whenever the original verbs are known, one can justifiably deduce what must have happened when they are unknown, and that although they are unknown today, they once existed, etc. Because in a word verbs in sco either have no perfect or supine at all, or one which grammatically does not fit, but would fit an original verb, and if this verb is found, the perfect or supine of the verb in sco (where it has it) is always materially the same.
Besides, for original verb I mean a stem not in sco which has given the origin to the verb in sco either directly or indirectly. E.g., when one finds the verb reminiscor [to recollect] there is no need to suppose the direct original remeno: it is enough to have the indirect meno, of which we have more detailed information, or at least traces. [3727] When we have dignosco [to distinguish], there is no need to suppose the direct original dignoo or digno: it is enough to have the indirect no or noo or gnoo; or the verb nosco which comes from it, from which of course through composition the verb dignosco and cognosco, etc. etc., could have been formed (p. 3709) and that was probably the case. (18 Oct. 1823.)
For p. 3695. And as for nosco, not only in its compounds, but even in the simple form one finds the g. See Forcellini under gnosco, gnobilis, etc. In any case seeing that this protactic g is properly used no less in Latin than in Greek, will serve as a reply to those who would like to deduce from the fact that it is found in both simple and compound forms of nosco, as in the Greek γνόω and γιγνώσκω [to perceive, to know], etc., that nosco must be of direct Greek origin, and formed from νοΐσκω, etc., contrary to our statement on p. 3688. What then the origin in general is of the use of the protactic g in Latin, whether it comes from the Aeolians, or from a source common to both, etc., has no bearing on our case. And the Romans, from a usage received from the [3728] Aeolians, and therefore of Greek origin, could well have preposed (or interposed) the g in words which are however not Latin at all, or we might say not Greek, as one can in fact see they did in adgnascor, etc. (and the form nascor shows itself to be properly Latin because of the things said on pp. 3688–89 in the same way as nosco), etc. etc. (18 Oct. 1823.) See p. 3754.
For p. 3390. Even in our most ancient writers, that is those of the 14th century as well as those of the 16th who most closely imitate them, or to the extent that they use antiquated words (as Davanzati does frequently and many others), and perhaps also in thirteenth-century writers a great number of Spanish words are to be found, which are completely out of use among us, or more or less rare, and still current and usual among the Spanish, or more or less still fresh. And even those who know both Spanish and Italian do not know whether they are or were common to both languages, and are amazed when they find them in our ancient writers, because they are absolutely pure Spanish. These were either taken from the Spani
sh (perhaps via the Provençal writers who had [3729] links with the Catalan, etc., and took from them and gave to them words and expressions and poetry and style and meters, etc.: see Andrés),1 or perhaps more probably from the source common to both tongues, whether that was Vulgar Latin, or some other of the many secondary languages which gave words to our languages, since it is possible that the words were received from one of these both by Italy and Spain, independently of each other. E.g., from the Provençals, etc. etc. In any case we see the same thing in our ancient writers in relation to French words and phrases, etc. But as far as these are concerned the causes are partly known, and are partly explained by Perticari in the Apologia.2 See p. 3771, and they were already proper to Italian (without at all having to be taken from Spain), and then they fell into disuse, while in Spain they are still preserved: and who can say that Spain did not receive them originally from Italian? Whatever the case may be, such words (or phrases, etc.) in our ancient writers have absolutely nothing foreign about them, except for someone who knows they are now Spanish, and is used to hearing them, reading them, speaking them in Spanish, and believes that is where they came from, etc., but in themselves they have a completely natural appearance.
Zibaldone Page 259