Wednesday, October 30:
Long discussion about the children with R., who in the course of it reveals all his infinite love and kindness toward me. As the three little ones were romping yesterday, singing and shouting beside us, as always in the evenings, R. said, “We do not realize how happy we are!”
Visit from Frau von Lerchenfeld. In the afternoon we go through the scene between Hamlet and his mother. I had always thought that Hamlet becomes angry toward her when annoyed by her falseness in labeling him mad, yet his disgust overcomes him only at the end, as if he had expected a sign of affection from her, as it were, and loses his temper when all he sees is a mood of humility. He also realizes that he is being sent to England, that it has all been planned and his mother knows about it; his final words to her are terrible. Without preparation, without explanation, it is simply there, like life.
After lunch R. recalled my communings with my father, and he becomes so heated that I am reduced to silence. I must doubtless have been remiss in some way during this time, that R. can remain so jealous, but it is not right of him, I feel, to reproach me so repeatedly.
Still, the evil done to us does not reach down to the depths of the heart, as does the evil we do; and though R. may now be suffering, too, I cannot recall any injustice I have done him, except perhaps on that one morning when the sad disclosures regarding Hans so upset me that I did not dare approach him in this mood. Now, for the sake of peace, I ought to wish that my father would stop coming. This I do not do, because I hope next time to be happier and more skillful.
Hans’s letter to Daniella also gives us a great deal to think about.
In the evening I am faced with the awful problem of whether it is better to soil one’s soul with a lie or, by being truthful, to ignite in the soul of the other person an agony which cannot be extinguished. Deep reflection; where to find help? In prayer and meditation.