to the dying Correggio, beside the fountain.

’I am astonished to see how much Bettine’s book is to all these people.  This shows how little courage they have had to live out themselves.  She really brings them a revelation.  The men wish they had been loved by Bettine; the girls wish to write down the thoughts that come, and see if just such a book does not grow up. ——­, however, was one of the few who do not over-estimate her; she truly thought Bettine only publishes what many burn.  Would not genius be common as light, if men trusted their higher selves?’

* * * * *

’I heard in town that ——­ is a father, and has gone to see his child.  This news made me more grave even than such news usually does; I suppose because I have known the growth of his character so intimately.  I called to mind a letter he had written me of what we had expected of our fathers.  The ideal father, the profoundly wise, provident, divinely tender and benign, he is indeed the God of the human heart.  How solemn this moment of being called to prepare the way, to make way for another generation!  What fulfilment does it claim in the character of a man, that he should be worthy to be a father!—­what purity of motive, what dignity, what knowledge!  When I recollect how deep the anguish, how deeper still the want, with which I walked alone in hours of childish passion, and called for a Father, often saying the word a hundred times, till stifled by sobs, how great seems the duty that name imposes!  Were but the harmony preserved throughout!  Could the child keep learning his earthly, as he does his heavenly Father, from all best experience of life, till at last it were the climax:  “I am the Father.  Have ye seen me?—­ye have seen the Father.”  But how many sons have we to make one father?  Surely, to spirits, not only purified but perfected, this must appear the climax of earthly being,—­a wise and worthy parentage.  Here I always sympathize with Mr. Alcott.  He views the relation truly.’

* * * * *

’Dec. 3, 1840. ——­ bids me regard her “as a sick child;” and the words recall some of the sweetest hours of existence.  My brother Edward was born on my birth-day, and they said he should be my child.  But he sickened and died just as the bud of his existence showed its first bright hues.  He was some weeks wasting away, and I took care of him always half the night.  He was a beautiful child, and became very dear to me then.  Still in lonely woods the upturned violets show me the pleading softness of his large blue eyes, in those hours when I would have given worlds to prevent his suffering, and could not.  I used to carry him about in my arms for hours; it soothed him, and I loved to feel his gentle weight of helpless purity upon my heart, while night listened around.  At last, when death came, and the soul took wing like an