Monday, December 26:
Aunt “Isa” sends the children some little things and exhorts them to think of their father! If the dear lady only knew how such thoughts are being kept alive in the children, she would leave the subject alone. At the same time Frl. v. M[eysenbug] reports that the cup and the poem have arrived and are being passed on to Hans. The whole day long I go about as if in a dream, my spirit listens for the vanished sounds and brings them back to birth for itself, my heart, oppressed by its emotions, seeks redemption in music; a twilight dream emerges—seeing nothing more, hearing everything in the depths of silence, love ruling supreme, boundaries melting away, an unawareness of existence—“the height of bliss.”
In the evening R. reads aloud passages from the manuscript Prof. Nietzsche gave me as a birthday gift; it is entitled The Birth of the Tragic Concept and is of the greatest value; the depth and excellence of his survey, conveyed with a very concentrated brevity, is quite remarkable; we follow his thoughts with the greatest and liveliest interest. My greatest pleasure is in seeing how R.’s ideas can be extended in this field.
Christmas Eve brought us a letter from Alex. Serov, who made an official journey from St. Petersburg to Vienna for the Beethoven festivities. His highly original description of this shows that it was Judea which celebrated the greatest of our heroes. All of it must have been absurd and ridiculous and, for us, an affront. We would much welcome the proclamation of the emperor as a fitting celebration for Beethoven, but Herr v. Mühler’s solution for Alsace does not give much cause for joy! (Hermann Brockhaus invites us to his daughter’s wedding.)