As the barometer is falling, we forgo our excursion, despite the fair sunrise and the household’s persuasion. A triumph for science; the worst weather indeed arrives, met with great merriment. We think of Eckermann and Goethe. – Frau Wesendonck sends a poem on cremation, which leads us to Mephistopheles’ line: “’Tis past — a foolish word”, and from there to various passages in “Faust”, whose magnificence is inexhaustible. Written down for the children. –
Schopenhauer’s philosophy and “Parzival” as the crowning of artistic achievement! Thus we conclude, after having read — with some pleasure — an essay on the old and new faith in Vischer’s “Critical Essays”.[1] Though he treats the questions in somewhat of a dilettantish manner, he at least poses them — and in flowing language.
[1]“Kritische Gänge”, 2 volumes (1846), new series in 6 volumes (1860–1873), by Friedrich Theodor Vischer (1807–1887), a German writer and aesthetician, a combative publicist of anti-clerical conviction. In 1848, he served as a deputy in the Frankfurt Parliament, and thereafter held professorships in Zürich, Stuttgart, and Tübingen.
Revised English translation by Jo Cousins.