To-day, lying on the bed, I thought about love towards God ... I wish I could say, the love of God, i.e., divine love--that the first and principal commandment is divine love, but that the other resembling it and flowing from it, especially flowing from it, is the love for neighbour. Yesterday I wrote 18 pages of introduction to Art.[142] It is wrong to say of a work of art, “You don’t yet understand it.” If I don’t understand it, that means that the work of art is poor, because its task is in making understandable that which is not understandable. _November 6. Y. P. If I live._ _November 6. Y. P._ Am alive. It is the third day that I continue to write on art. It seems to me it is good. At least I am writing willingly and easily. ... Have received a good letter from Vanderveer. Wrote another letter to the commander of the battalion in the Caucasus. Chertkov sent me his copy of a similar letter. To-day I rode horseback to Tula. A marvellous day and night. I am just now going to take a walk to meet the girls. Have been thinking. 1) Natural sciences, when they wish to determine the very essence of things, fall into a crude materialism, i.e., ignorance. Such, besides Descartes’ whirlwinds, are atoms and ether and the origin of species. All that I can say, is that it appears to me so, just as the heavenly vault appears round to me, while I know that it is not round and that it appears to me so, only because my sight for all directions extends on only one radius. 2) The highest perfection of art is its cosmopolitanism. But on the contrary, with us at present it is becoming more and more specialised, if not according to nations, then according to classes. 3) The refinement of art and its strength are always in inverse proportion. 4) “Conservatism lies in this” ... That is the way I have it noted, but further I can’t remember now. 5) Why is it pleasant to ride? Because it is the very emblem of life. Life--you ride. I wanted to take a walk.... _November 7. Y. P. If I live._ _To-day November 12. Y. P._ I haven’t noted down anything during this time. I was writing the essay on Art. To-day a little on the Declaration of Faith. A weakness of thought and I am sad. One must learn to be satisfied with stupidity. If I do not love, at least not _not_ to love. That, thank the Lord, I have attained. _November 16. Y. P. Morning._ I still work just as badly and am therefore depressed. The day after to-morrow I am going to Moscow, if God commands.[143] ... In the meantime I received a strange letter from the Spaniard Zanini, with an offer of 22,000 francs for good works. I answered that I would like to use them for the Dukhobors. What is going to happen?[144] I wrote to Kuzminsky on Witte and Dragomirov[145] and the day before yesterday I wrote diligently all morning on War.[146] Something will come of it.