Morning clear and warm. Having finished Aristotle’s Poetic, I now took up Horace’s Art of Poetry again being about to read through the Quatres Poetiques of Batteux.1 This pleases me more every time I take it up. Every thing satisfies me that one reading of a Classic is nothing for the purpose of understanding him. Went to the Office. Wrote my regular Journal and copied No. 7 of the Bible letters. My father came in, but remained a very short time, being engaged in this business of the ΦBK again. Mr. Curtis called with a little Law matter. I went to the Athenaeum where I wasted an hour in fingering books. My father dined with me.

Afternoon, read a part of the Ninth Book of Cicero ad Diversos. Letters to Varro and Dolabella. He wrote to the latter after the divorce of his daughter. This shows that little shame attended these divorces. But I cannot get over the evident political arrangement which gave cause to the marriage.

Evening quietly at home excepting a short walk. Mr. Degrand spent part of the evening here. I read more of Horace and began the fifth volume of the Spectator.