Tuesday, June 3:
R. had a good night. The letters still dominate our conversation. In the morning he writes to friend Cyriax with a little verse for his small godchild: 'that Richardis Cyriax may bloom and wax' was all he told me of it. He also writes to Herr Mosely.
In the afternoon he continues reading the letters with me, to immense enjoyment. Oh, my Siegfried, what you are heir to! There never was such a being as your father. R. is delighted with the way the hairs shed by Brange are carefully gathered by the birds to build their nests.
In the evening Dr. Schemann pays us a visit with friend Rubinstein; R. talks about Carlyle, saying that he has found exactly the right tone for the period which began with the founding of the Catholic Church, and nothing but lies and deception since, with a few great individuals who fell foul of these lies. It would be quite improper, he says, to treat the history of this time with solemn pathos, in the way Thucydides deals with the events he describes. Mention of Mommsen and his cult of J. Caesar annoys R. He says that M. is now championing Bismarck too, though it is true that J. C. had a bit more genius than Bismarck. R. denies Caesar’s magnanimity toward his opponents and maintains that Cromwell was 10,000 times the better man. I say that I always take the poets as law; Dante forbids me to regard Cato as a fool, as M. calls him, which R. finds so heartless, and Shakespeare shows me the theatrical element which seems to me to have entered the world with Caesar.
After laughing at himself for becoming so heated about these things, R. then becomes heated about the Schumannians, and he voices his utter contempt for this composer. He calms down at last. When we are alone again, we talk about the confusions in which even the best of our supporters are involved. 'I am now back again in Putbus,' R. says with a laugh, thinking of the letters which provide so much evidence of his isolation; things are not very different now, he feels. Except that his home has changed so completely.