Oh, Goethe, thy letters are so dear to me that I have tied them up in a silk kerchief embroidered with bright flowers and golden ornaments. The last day before our Rhine trip I did not know what to do with them. I did not want to take them along, since we had only one portmanteau between us, and I did not want to leave them in my little room, which I could not lock because it was being used; I thought the boat might sink and I drown--and then these letters, one after the other of which has reposed close to my heart, would fall into strange hands. At first I wanted to leave them with the nuns in Vollratz (they are St. Bernard nuns who were driven from their convent and are now living there), but I changed my mind afterwards. The last time I was up here on the mountain I found a spot. Beneath the confession-chair still standing in the Rochus chapel, in which I'm also in the habit of keeping my writings, I dug a hole and lined it on the inside with shells from the Rhine and beautiful little pebbles that I found on the mountain. I placed the letters in it, wrapped in their silken covering, and before the spot planted a thistle which I had pulled up carefully by the roots together with the earth about them. On the journey I was often worried about them; what a shock it would have been if I had not found them again! My heart stands still at the very thought of it! August 24, 1808. * * * It was midnight; the moon rose dim. The ship, whose shadow sailed along beside it, like a monster, upon the illuminated Rhine, cast a dazzling light upon the woody meadow of Ingelheim along which it was moving. The moon appeared behind the meadow, mild and modest, and gradually wrapped itself in a thin cloud of mist as in a veil. Whenever we contemplate nature in calm meditation, it always lays hold of our heartstrings. What could have turned my senses more fervently to God, what could have more easily freed me from the trivial things that oppress me? I am not ashamed to confess to thee that at that moment thy image flamed up impetuously in my soul. It is true: Thy radiance pierces me as the sun pours into the crystal of the grape and, like the sun, thou dost ripen me with ever increasing fire and ever increasing purity. * * * February 23, 1809. If thy imagination is supple enough to accompany me into all the recesses of ruined walls, over mountains and chasms, then I shall venture farther and introduce thee to the recesses of my heart.