I am still as unproductive intellectually. In the morning it flashed across my mind that I left out the places in _Art_ about the trinity, and doing no work, I went to Grot and from there to the publishing house. I returned past two, read, lay down, dined. _Tarovat_[285] arrived, then Menshikov, Popov, Gorbunov, and then--Gulenko,[286] Suller.[287] Read Liapunov’s _The Ploughman_. I was very touched.[288] Have noted down the following: 1) In moments of depression I want to ask help from God. And I may ask it. But only such help which might help me and not interfere with any one else. And such help is only one thing: love. Every other kind of help, material help, not only might, but must come in conflict with the material good of others. Only love alone--the enlargement of love in oneself--satisfies everything which one can want and does not come in conflict with the good of others. “_Come and dwell within us._” 2) Women do not use words to express their thoughts, but to attain their ends, and it is this purpose they hunt in the words of others. That is why they so often understand people wrong side out. And this is very disagreeable. 3) The meaning of life is only one: self-perfection--the bettering of one’s soul. “Be perfect like our Father in Heaven.” When things are difficult, when something tortures you, remember that in life, only you are the life--and immediately it will become easier. And joyful. As a rich man rejoices when he gathers his wealth, so will you rejoice if you place your life only in this. And for the attainment of this, there are no barriers. Everything which appears like sorrow, like a barrier in life--is a wide step which offers itself to your feet that you may ascend. 4) If you have the strength of activity then let it be a loving one; if you have no strength, if you are weak, then let your _weakness_ be a loving one. 5) Inorganic matter is simply the life of that which we do not understand. For fleas the inorganic is my finger-nail. In the same way, evil is the non-understood good.[289] 6) To serve God and man, but how, with what? Perhaps the possibility doesn’t exist? It is not true: the possibility has always been given you--to become better. 7) Man is an ambassador, as Christ said, an ambassador indeed for whom the important thing is only to fulfil the errand given to him, and it doesn’t matter what is thought about him. Let them think badly--sometimes it is necessary. Only let the errand be fulfilled. 8) One of the most common errors consists in this, that people are considered good, malicious, stupid, intelligent. Man flows on and every possibility is in him: he was stupid, and has become intelligent; he was wicked and has become good, and the reverse. In this is the greatness of man. And therefore it is impossible to judge man as he is. You have judged and he is already another. It is impossible to say--I do not love him: you have said it and he is already another. 9) ...