June 13. These weeks that have been spent over a discussion of Eastern and Western mythologies, have allowed little time for reading or thinking of anything else. I have learned to value the thoughts of thinkers, and to perceive the difference between them and pleasant surface-writers. I expected to gain much from Mrs. Child’s “History of Religious Ideas,” and I have found it full of entertaining and instructive facts, told in a very kind and impartial way; but hers is not the philosophic depth of Carlyle, nor the broad and deep spiritual insight of Maurice,--the latter always pours light into the windows of my soul, and makes truth seem all near and clear. Mrs. C.’s work is still a most valuable one, because it makes so much comprehensible that had been shut up for the general reader, and such a spirit as hers makes everything that she writes good to read. This reading and writing have impressed me more fully than ever before with the certainty that truth is one, radiating from one source through all manner of mediums, colored and distorted by all sorts of error; yet wherever a good word has been spoken, there is the voice of God, whether the speaker were Christian or Pagan. June 20. After reading the addresses at the Music Hall, in memory of Theodore Parker, and what is said of him in the religious papers, it seems to me a great relief that there is a perfect Judge of human character and human life above. Neither friends nor foes could know this man truly; his works will follow him, right or wrong, for he wrote himself in innumerable hearts, with all the energy of confidence in his own views. I did not like the tone of his preaching and lecturing,--it seemed to me often dogmatic, and abusive of other beliefs; certainly never very patient with what he did not like. Yet the noble impulses he communicated, the perfect freedom of thought which he advised, cannot be without their good results. The fire will try his work, as it does and will that of all human workers, to prove of what sort it is. August 12, Gardiner, Maine. Now in the seclusion of this little bird’s nest in the woods, I feel easy and free, like the winds that sweep through pine and hemlock, and the birds that go singing or silent from the glen to the orchard. Heartsease grows here, best of all blossoms; I surely did not bring it with me, for I was very uneasy at home. August 14. Leisure,--is it anything to be thankful for, or not? I never do what I mean to do, nor so much, as when I think my time all occupied. This vacation is almost gone, and not one of the achievements I had planned, in the way of writing, is executed. It is something to rest, but not so much, if one feels that it is not exactly right or necessary to rest! August 18. The prospect of a journey to the mountains to-day. There is a thick fog from the river, but the birds are singing through it. I can scarcely let the summer go without giving me a glimpse of the mountains.