Monday, July 17:
R. exclaims to me, “I don’t know if you are happy, but I am!” Loulou called to give evidence in our accident case; she conducts herself there very well, relaxed and assured.
At lunch I am very painfully affected. We are talking about the art historian Lübke, who again without any reason has heaped abuse on R., and R. exclaims, “One can escape this misery only in death, that alone brings peace.” Since my greatest pride is when R. wishes himself a long life, I am deeply disturbed, but R. chides me, saying, “It may not come for a thousand years, but I am saying it will come one day and put an end to the world’s misery.” “Lübke, probably Lübecker, a Jew.”
Yesterday I read a pamphlet by the theologian Overbeck, which Prof. Nietzsche sent me; it brings R. and me to a discussion of religion. “The Catholics are quite right when they say the Bible must not be read by profane people, for religion is for those who can neither read nor write. But they played such shameful havoc with their interpretations that Luther became the only one who could take his stand on the Bible. He did indeed in that way also open the doors to science and to criticism, but Christ will continue to live all the same.”
Siegfried has arrived; R. corrects the proofs in the afternoon. “Oh, if only we had a little place of our own and could live in it, and I could write my things and not have to think about what the world does with them!” R. exclaims as we are having our cozy lunch on the terrace.
Yesterday, on our drive, R. reminded me of the evening in Munich when he had sobbed so violently during a performance of Preciosa. He says: “The music reminded me of the indelible impression it made on me in my youth: all my ideas of southern fire and gracefulness are based on this impression. And how neatly the text was written; a short story could not be fashioned more finely. How clumsy in contrast what is being provided today!”