Leopardi says...of young people and experience

I’ve noticed (and I have more than one example in mind) that young people who aren’t poor, or haven’t been crushed or disheartened by poverty, people with healthy and hardy physiques, courageous and busy, capable of looking after themselves and with little or no need, or rather little or no desire, for help from others, or for the physical or moral support of others, at least not as a rule; young people still untouched by misfortune, or rather (since just being born means suffering), touched only in such a way that thanks to the energy of their youth and constitution and the freshness of their mental energies, they have been able to shrug it off on their own, and pay little attention to it; young people like this, as I was saying, although on the one hand they won’t tolerate the slightest insult, have a tendency to lose their tempers and are more inclined than most to make fun of others, present or absent, and to be overbearing more often than not, both in the way they speak and even in the way they act, and although again they may have been let down by everyone, perhaps by the very people whose most sacred duty it was to look after them, so that they are all too familiar with people’s ingratitude and aware from experience of the lack of return or thanks resulting from being charitable, the damage rather that it may bring them; although also quick and shrewd of mind, not without a knowledge of the world, well aware that men are not customarily charitable or compassionate, far from it, on the contrary that their opinions actually lead them away from it, and then that most men are unworthy of other people’s help; despite all this these young people are more than ready to show compassion, more than willing to come to the aid of those in trouble, more than well disposed to show charity and to help those who ask them for it, even if such folk are undeserving, and again to offer their help spontaneously, overcoming another’s reluctance to accept it and unwillingness to ask for it; ready without reservation or fuss to meet the needs and secure the concerns of their friends: and in fact these people are almost constantly busy more on behalf of others than themselves, mostly with small, but all the same tiresome, boring, difficult chores and services, the sheer number of which, if nothing else, makes up for the smallness of each one, but sometimes in big and very impressive tasks, requiring a corresponding level of attention, effort, and even sacrifice. And it’s not that they attach any great importance to their generosity, or insist on it with those they’ve helped or anyone else, they neither make much of it nor consider it especially worthy of merit (as if they’d been blinded and driven mad by Zeus, as Homer says of Glaucus when he swaps his gold weapons with Diomedes’ copper ones): then they expect little or no gratitude, as if they had been obliged to be generous, or as if their generosity cost them nothing; and they never imagine they have the right to claim back what they’ve given, or that one ought to claim it back; they are extremely reserved about their giving and ask nothing in exchange, and if someone does return them part of what they’ve given, either spontaneously or at their request, they feel obliged themselves to this person who has only very poorly repaid the things they did for him.

I’ve seen all or part of this, sometimes more, sometimes less, in young people with the qualities described above, and not just in those who because of their inexperience of the world and natural kindness, their full hearts and attitude of trust, are simply carried away, transported toward virtue, generosity, magnanimity, finding their greatest pleasure and desire in doing good and being heroic, denying, renouncing, and sacrificing themselves; but even in those disillusioned with the world, who find themselves in the circumstances described above or in some of them, or others like them. All this, then, like I said, I’ve seen in these young people while they enjoy and feel the benefits of youth, health, and strength and are entirely self-sufficient. But with age, or even before they grow old, if they run into the kind of troubles, accidents, situations, the sort of physical or moral disasters, arising from nature or just bad luck, that undermine their self-sufficiency, placing them regularly or often in need of the support or generosity of others, that weaken or destroy their physical strength and with it their mental energy; then these people, as I have seen myself from experience, previously so compassionate and generous, little by little, in proportion to whatever change of circumstances they have undergone, become insensitive to other people’s ills or needs, or comforts, concerned only for themselves, no longer open to feeling compassion, they forget their generosity, and in both attitude and action they entirely reverse their position with regard to these qualities. And not just gradually either, but quickly even, almost instantly, while still in the flower of youth; I myself have seen such changes occur in people overcome by sudden or unexpected disaster, something physical or mental or some reversal of fortune, crushing their spirit and prostrating them in an instant, or in a very short while, leaving them wrecked or very shaky, with their lives now subject to all sorts of troubles and the sad necessity of seeking help from others, their health undermined, body weakened, and other similar changes in their earlier situation. In short, when this kind of instant or abrupt change of circumstances occurs, I have seen an equally instant or abrupt alteration of character and behavior in these people, when it comes to showing compassion, being charitable, or doing good of whatever kind on behalf of others.

And those who by nature, or for whatever reason, from childhood or adolescence, and from their first entry into the world have always been as the people described above eventually became—I mean weak in both body and mind, fearful, indecisive, disheartened by poverty or for some other reason, whether physical or moral, extrinsic or intrinsic, natural to them or accidental and casual—always or often in need of other people’s help, used from an early age to suffering and to seeing their efforts fail and their wishes disappointed, hence always diffident of the world, life and success, and so entirely lacking in self-confidence; more familiar with fear and foreboding than with hope; such people, and anyone like them, partly or entirely, from very early in their lives or from the moment they enter into society, will be more or less alien to compassion and charity, both the actual doing of it and the attitude toward it, showing no inclination or disposition for these virtues, interested as they are entirely in themselves and hardly or not at all able to interest themselves on behalf of others who are in need or in trouble, whether worthy or unworthy of help; and even less able to do anything for anyone not in trouble; thus hardly or not at all able to engage in a real, effective, active friendship, but clever simulators of the same so as to get the help and sympathy they need, and shrewd at turning friendships to their own advantage; in fact, they simulate and dissimulate on a regular basis and in every department. And these qualities become character traits, with the result that in people like this self-regard is never anything other than egoism, and egoism is their main character trait; but this is not their fault, it’s a necessity of nature; not that nature directly gave them any more of this miserable quality than it gives other people, but because the circumstances they found themselves in, whether naturally or by accident, led right from the start, naturally and necessarily, to this egoism, perhaps more necessarily and inevitably and to a greater extent than anything prompted by any other cause.