Lectures these few days on historical women. Paula, Queen Elizabeth, and Madame de Maintenon, thus far. Paula, the friend of St. Jerome, and the woman whom the speaker made to illustrate friendship, pleased me most, as presenting a higher ideal than either of the others. Christianity gave woman the privilege of a pure friendship with man; before unknown, we are told. It is one of the noblest gifts of religion, and I wish people believed in it more thoroughly. But only a truly elevated and chastened nature can understand real friendship,--not a Platonic ideal only, though that is elevated, let who will sneer at it: but a drawing of the noblest souls together, and to the Soul of souls, for the highest ends. This is Christian friendship; union in Christ for all beauty, all purity, all true and noble life, which He illustrated in His own glorious life and death, and of which He is now the inspiring power. “We are complete in Him.” Yes, I am sure that it is in drawing near to Him that I feel the loveliness of such beauty as that into which the world now blossoms; for is not He the Lord of nature, and also my Lord and Friend? And through His great love for us, I see the ideal of all true human love. “As I have loved you,” He said, “so must we love each other, with tenderness, forbearance, generosity, and self-sacrifice.” Such friendship is possible, is eternal; and it is almost the most precious thing in the soul’s inheritance. June 12. I have been free for a few days, and have taken a journey,--a flying tour among some of my friends. How it quieted me, to be with my peace-loving friends in these wild times of war! There are some friends whose presence is encouragement in all that is good, whom to look upon is to grow stronger for the truth. There are homes, too, over which saintly memories hang, making all within and around them sacred, blending earth with heaven by holy sympathies. How blessed I am, to know such friends, to enter such homes as these! Sometimes I can truly say, “My cup runneth over!” June 14. Still the same old weariness of study; “weariness of the flesh.” Books are treasures, but one may work among treasures even, digging and delving, till there is little enjoyment in them. And the greater pain is, that, by becoming numb to the beautiful and true, in any form, one does not feel its power entirely, anywhere. So I felt this morning, which I stole from my books. I sat on a ledge in a distant field, all around me beautiful with June, and no sight or sound of human care in sight. I sat there like a prisoner, whose chains had dropped for the moment, but the weight and pain of them lingered still. Yet I began to feel what it is to be free, and how sweet and soothing nature always is, before I rose to return. I think it would not take me long to get accustomed to freedom, and to rejoice in it with exceeding joy.