“The best moments of love are those of a quiet, gentle melancholy, when you weep without knowing why.”

Original: I migliori momenti dell’amore sono quelli di una quieta e dolce malinconia, dove tu piangi e non sai di che. — Love reaches its deepest intensity for Leopardi where happiness and inexplicable sadness become inseparable. · Zibaldone, entry 142, 27 June 1820 (Italian)

• Emotion
• Love
• Sadness

“No human quality is more intolerable in ordinary life, nor in fact less tolerated, than intolerance.”

Original: Nessuna qualità umana è più intollerabile nella vita ordinaria, né in fatti tollerata meno, che l’intolleranza. — A neatly paradoxical observation on how readily people condemn the very intolerance they themselves display. · Pensieri, XXXVII, published posthumously in 1845 (Italian)

• Society
• Tolerance
• Wit

“Boredom exists only in those whose spirit has some substance.”

Original: La noia non è se non di quelli in cui lo spirito è qualche cosa. — For Leopardi, profound boredom is not mere idleness but evidence of a mind whose desires exceed ordinary distractions. · Pensieri, LXVII, published posthumously in 1845 (Italian)

• Desire
• Mind
• Suffering