The moon is shining from afar over the mountains and winter clouds drive by in droves.  I have been standing at the window awhile and watching the tumult in the heavens.  Dear Goethe!  Good Goethe!  I am all alone; it has taken me out of myself again and up to thee.  I must nurse this love between us like a new-born babe.  Beautiful butterflies balance themselves on the flowers I have planted about his cradle, golden fables adorn his dreams; I jest and play with him, and employ all my cunning to gain his favor.  But thou dost master it without effort by the splendid harmony of thy spirit; with thee there is no need of tender outbursts, of protestations.  While I look after each moment of the present, the power of blessing emanates from thee that transcends all reason and all the universe. * * *

Last night I dreamed of thee!  What could have been more beautiful?  Thou wast serious and very busy and didst ask me not to disturb thee.  That made me sad and then thou didst press my hand tenderly to my bosom and didst say, “Be quiet; I know thee and understand all.”  Then I awoke, and thy ring, which I had pressed to myself in my sleep, had left its imprint on my bosom.  I pressed it more firmly against the same spot, since I could not embrace thee.  Is there nothing, then, in a dream?  To me it is everything, and I will gladly give up the activities of the day if I can be with thee and speak with thee at night.  Oh, be thou my happiness in my dreams!

Munich, November 9, 1809.

* * * This is my vow:  I will gather flowers for thee and bright garlands shall adorn thy entrance; should thy foot stumble, it will be over the wreaths which I have laid on thy threshold, and shouldst thou dream, it is the balsam of magic blossoms that intoxicates thee—­flowers of a strange and distant world where I am at home and not a stranger as in this book[12] where a ravenous tiger devours the delicate image of spiritual love.  I do not understand this cruel riddle; I cannot comprehend why they all make themselves unhappy and why they all serve a malicious demon with a thorny sceptre, why Charlotte, who strews incense before him daily, yes, hourly, should prepare misfortune for them all with mathematical precision!  Is not love free?  Are those two not affinities?  Why should she prevent them from living this innocent life with and near each other?  They are twins; twined round each other they ripen on to their birth into the light, and she would separate these seedlings because she cannot believe in innocence, which she inoculates with the monstrous sin of prejudice!  O what a fatal precaution!

Let me tell you:  No one seems to comprehend ideal love; they all believe in sensual love, and consequently they neither experience nor bestow any happiness that springs from that higher emotion or might be fully realized through it.  Whatever may fall to my lot, let it be through this ideal love that tears down all barriers to new worlds of art, divination, and poetry.  Naturally it can live only in a noble element just as it feels at home only in a lofty mind.