_Reverie is the Sunday of thought_; and who knows which is the more
important and fruitful for man, the laborious tension of the week, or
the life-giving repose of the Sabbath? The _flanerie_ so exquisitely
glorified and sung by Toepffer is not only delicious, but useful. It is
like a bath which gives vigor and suppleness to the whole being, to the
mind as to the body; it is the sign and festival of liberty, a joyous
and wholesome banquet, the banquet of the butterfly wandering from
flower to flower over the hills and in the fields. And remember, the
soul too is a butterfly.
May 2, 1852. (Sunday) Lancy.--This morning read the epistle of St.
James, the exegetical volume of Cellerier [Footnote: Jacob-Elysee
Cellerier, professor of theology at the Academy of Geneva, and son of
the pastor of Satigny mentioned in Madame de Stael's "L'Allemagne."] on
this epistle, and a great deal of Pascal, after having first of all
passed more than an hour in the garden with the children. I made them
closely examine the flowers, the shrubs, the grasshoppers, the snails,
in order to practice them in observation, in wonder, in kindness.
How enormously important are these first conversations of childhood! I
felt it this morning with a sort of religious terror. Innocence and
childhood are sacred.
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