Wednesday, April 16:
R. slept well, and this brings me, as now almost every morning, a divine greeting. Before work he reads Carlyle’s “Novalis” with great enjoyment, and he reads several passages aloud to me.
At lunch he says to me, “With my ending I am now like General Bonaparte and Venice; I can say, ‘I know how to take you, it’s all clear to me now.’” In the afternoon vexation caused by Herr Feustel, who is of the opinion that the concerts would not be in accordance with the agreement! (An Englishman has sent 2,000 marks for the fund.) And an overcast sky frowning down on the vexation! . . .
R.’s head always full of construction plans, but he promises not to carry them out. In the evening cards and chat. Over coffee he told me some things about Novalis’s life and quoted Carlyle’s remark that renunciation is not the aim but the beginning of education; then he says that the thought of losing a child makes him shudder, he knows it would drive him mad.
I tell him that, for all my constant worry, I have been granted unquestioning faith, and I do not believe he could ever lose anyone he loves. May Heaven not punish me for this seeming blasphemy!