Today I forgot among other things that it was time to send my letter off.  Oh well, so much the more joy and excitement will you have when you receive it.

* * * * *

People are really very good to me.  They not only forgive me for not taking any part in their conversation, but also for capriciously interrupting it.  In a quiet way they seem even to derive hearty pleasure from my joy.  Especially Juliana.  I tell her very little about you, but she has a good intuition and surmises the rest.  Certainly there is nothing more amiable than pure, unselfish delight in love.

I really believe that I should love my friends here, even if they were less admirable than they are.  I feel a great change in my being, a general tenderness and sweet warmth in all the powers of my soul and spirit, like the beautiful exhaustion of the senses that follows the highest life.  And yet it is anything but weakness.  On the contrary, I know that from now on I shall be able to do everything pertaining to my vocation with more liking and with fresher vigor.  I have never felt more confidence and courage to work as a man among men, to lead a heroic life, and in joyous fraternal cooeperation to act for eternity.

That is my virtue; thus it becomes me to be like the gods.  Yours is gently to reveal, like Nature’s priestess of joy, the mystery of love; and, surrounded by worthy sons and daughters, to hallow this beautiful life into a holy festival.

* * * * *

I often worry about your health.  You dress yourself too lightly and are fond of the evening air; those are dangerous habits and are not the only ones which you must break.  Remember that a new order of things is beginning for you.  Hitherto I have praised your frivolity, because it was opportune and in keeping with the rest of your nature.  I thought it feminine for you to play with Fortune, to flout caution, to destroy whole masses of your life and environment.  Now, however, there is something that you must always bear in mind, and regard above everything else.  You must gradually train yourself—­in the allegorical sense, of course.

* * * * *

In this letter everything is all mixed up in a motley confusion, just as praying and eating and rascality and ecstasy are mixed up in life.  Well, good night.  Oh, why is it that I cannot at least be with you in my dreams—­be really with you and dream in you.  For when I merely dream of you, I am always alone.  You wonder why you do not dream of me, since you think of me so much.  Dearest, do you not also have your long spells of silence about me?

* * * * *

Amalia’s letter gave me great pleasure.  To be sure, I see from its flattering tone that she does not consider me as an exception to the men who need flattery.  I do not like that at all.  It would not be fair to ask her to recognize my worth in our way.  It is enough that there is one who understands me.  In her way she appreciates my worth so beautifully.  I wonder if she knows what adoration is?  I doubt it, and am sorry for her if she does not.  Aren’t you?