“Patience is the most heroic of virtues, precisely because it has no appearance of heroism.”

Finding quiet moral strength in endurance rather than spectacle · Zibaldone

• Despair
• Hope

“Silence is the language of all strong passions: love, even in its tender moments, anger, wonder, fear, and so on.”

Original: Il silenzio è il linguaggio di tutte le forti passioni, dell’amore (anche nei momenti dolci), dell’ira, della maraviglia, del timore ec. — Leopardi suggests that the strongest emotions can overwhelm language rather than find fulfilment in it. · Zibaldone, entry 142, 27 June 1820 (Italian)

• Emotion
• Language
• Silence

“Nothing shows a lack of philosophy and wisdom more than wanting the whole of life to be wise and philosophical.”

Original: Nessun maggior segno d'essere poco filosofo e poco savio, che volere savia e filosofica tutta la vita. — A witty warning against allowing reflection and seriousness to crowd ordinary life out altogether. · Pensieri, XXVII, published posthumously in 1845 (Italian)

• Humour
• Life
• Wisdom