Everything has been forgiven and blotted out.--There was dust on my
wings.--I soar aloft into the sun and into infinite space. I shall die
singing from the fullness of my soul. Shall I sing!
Enough.
* * * * *
I know that I shall again be gloomy and depressed and drag along a weary
existence; but I have once soared into infinity and have felt a ray of
eternity within me. That I shall never lose again. I should like to go
to a convent, to some quiet, cloistered cell, where I might know nothing
of the world, and could live on within myself until death shall call me.
But it is not to be. I am destined to live on in freedom and to labor;
to live with my fellow-beings and to work for them.
The results of my handiwork and of my powers of imagination belong to
you; but what I am within myself is mine alone.
* * * * *
I have taken leave of everything here; of my quiet room, of my summer
bench; for I know not whether I shall ever return. And if I do, who
knows but what everything may have become strange to me?
* * * * *
(Last page written in pencil.)--It is my wish that when I am dead, I may
be wrapped in a simple linen cloth, placed in a rough unplaned coffin,
and buried under the apple-tree, on the road that leads to my paternal
mansion. I desire that my brother and other relatives may be apprised of
my death at once, and that they shall not disturb my grave by
the wayside.
No stone, no name, is to mark my grave.