stir it as
occasion requires, I figure to myself the illustrious suitors of
Penelope, killing, dressing, and preparing their own oxen and swine.
Nothing fills me with a more pure and genuine sense of happiness than
those traits of patriarchal life which, thank Heaven! I can imitate
without affectation. Happy is it, indeed, for me that my heart is
capable of feeling the same simple and innocent pleasure as the peasant
whose table is covered with food of his own rearing, and who not only
enjoys his meal, but remembers with delight the happy days and sunny
mornings when he planted it, the soft evenings when he watered it, and
the pleasure he experienced in watching its daily growth.

JUNE 29.

The day before yesterday, the physician came from the town to pay a
visit to the judge. He found me on the floor playing with Charlotte's
children. Some of them were scrambling over me, and others romped with
me; and, as I caught and tickled them, they made a great noise. The
doctor is a formal sort of personage: he adjusts the plaits of his
ruffles, and continually settles his frill whilst he is talking to you;
and he thought my conduct beneath the dignity of a sensible man. I could
perceive this by his countenance. But I did not suffer myself to be
disturbed. I allowed him to continue his wise conversation, whilst I
rebuilt the children's card houses for them as fast as they threw them
down. He went about the town afterward, complaining that the judge's
children were spoiled enough before, but that now Werther was completely
ruining them.

Yes, my dear Wilhelm, nothing on this earth affects my heart so much
as children. When I look on at their doings; when I mark in the little
creatures the seeds of all those virtues and qualities which they will
one day find so indispensable; when I behold in the obstinate all the
future firmness and constancy of a noble character; in the capricious,
that levity and gaiety of temper which will carry them lightly over
the dangers and troubles of life, their whole nature simple and
unpolluted,--then I call to mind the golden words of the Great Teacher
of mankind, "Unless ye become like one of these!" And now, my friend,
these children, who are our equals, whom we ought to consider as our
models, we treat them as though they were our subjects. They are allowed
no will of their own. And have we, then, none ourselves? Whence comes
our exclusive right? Is it because we are older and more experienced?