(April 3d.)--At first, there is so much to observe. The whole world seems like a young child, or like the first verdure of spring. Later, one grows accustomed to it all, and it seems as if things were always and everywhere alike. It seems to me that life would be insupportable, if the world were ever new and left us no repose.
Habit, our second mother, is a good mother, too.
They have fastened a rope to the feet of my white foal, so that it cannot run away. It can now only move about slowly. The freedom and grace of its movements are gone, even before it is put in harness.
Oh, how many human beings have a like fate!
I love to watch the rain calmly descending upon the earth. If I were not obliged to work, I could remain by my window for hours, lost in reverie and looking out and listening, for it seems to me as if I were endowed with a million eyes and could see every drop as it falls on the half-open buds. But here, we are all constantly at work. I am ashamed to sit here with my hands in my lap. The rain in springtime is soft and beautiful, lending voice, form and substance to the air, and to every tiny rill.
Formerly, I always required a spyglass, where I no longer need it.