Sunday, December 3:
R. had a restless night and feels he has caught a chill. While still in bed he spoke of the world’s monotony, saying that what change there is is due only to the fact that people are born and die—the idea of living forever is a terrible one! He makes this remark in connection with Fidi’s Catilina, which reminds him of his own dramatic work. Unfortunately a letter arrives at breakfast from Dr. Strecker, who, it seems, has utterly failed to understand his point of view in the Lucca affair. I shall probably reply to Dr. Strecker, but R. is annoyed all the same, continues to think about it, and summarizes his feelings toward other people by saying that those who are well disposed have no energy—only the hostile ones are energetic.
We attempt an outing, since the weather is fine, but he finds it too cold, and we soon turn back. He complains of the varying temperature in each room and wishes to take his meal alone. Around five o’clock he goes to bed, then gets up again and reads with interest some of Tolstoy’s Russian novel War and Peace, which I have recommended to him, starting at the point I myself have reached. He is pleased by the observations on the art of war, saying that he, too, regards the warrior genius simply as a schoolmaster, like Moltke, for instance. One cannot ascribe such deeds as the siege of Metz to a single warrior genius but, rather, to the disciplined character and intelligence of officers and men.
Each time I visit him he is feeling either contentment or extreme irritation, the latter provoking him into expressions of a hatred for life. (In the morning he showed me in the newspaper a quotation from Machiavelli in praise of the Germans and their religious feelings. —