Yes, I feel certain, Wilhelm, and every day I become more certain, that
the existence of any being whatever is of very little consequence. A
friend of Charlotte's called to see her just now. I withdrew into a
neighbouring apartment, and took up a book; but, finding I could not
read, I sat down to write. I heard them converse in an undertone: they
spoke upon indifferent topics, and retailed the news of the town. One
was going to be married; another was ill, very ill, she had a dry cough,
her face was growing thinner daily, and she had occasional fits. "N— is
very unwell too," said Charlotte. "His limbs begin to swell already,"
answered the other; and my lively imagination carried me at once to the
beds of the infirm. There I see them struggling against death, with all
the agonies of pain and horror; and these women, Wilhelm, talk of all
this with as much indifference as one would mention the death of a
stranger. And when I look around the apartment where I now am—when I
see Charlotte's apparel lying before me, and Albert's writings, and all
those articles of furniture which are so familiar to me, even to
the very inkstand which I am using,—when I think what I am to this
family—everything. My friends esteem me; I often contribute to their
happiness, and my heart seems as if it could not beat without them; and
yet—-if I were to die, if I were to be summoned from the midst of this
circle, would they feel—or how long would they feel the void which my
loss would make in their existence? How long! Yes, such is the frailty
of man, that even there, where he has the greatest consciousness of his
own being, where he makes the strongest and most forcible impression,
even in the memory, in the heart, of his beloved, there also he must
perish,—vanish,—and that quickly.