Goethe is considered by Germans as the head of all their literature. He has for a long time past carried away with him the suffrages of all, and this must be admitted to show a great degree of power. But when I look for it in Werther I do not see it. To be sure it is a very natural 29picture of a particularly morbid condition of the human frame and might answer particularly well for the study of a physician. But there is not a single healthy view of human life, hardly a single sound general principle in the book. And I cannot enjoy much a book which has neither of these.

Office. Writing and Accounts. I devote myself almost exclusively to my Diary. But I took my walk and called upon Mr. Sharpe by request of Mr. Brooks as also upon Clark to pay him for a marble mosaic table I have induced him to get, which Sharpe is setting.1

Home where I read part of the eighth book of the Metamorphoses. Afternoon, pursuing my examination of the Official papers. They contain little or nothing of a very interesting character for they give results without showing the mode in which these were reached. Pickering shows his character more than any of the Officers. The same stubborn, opinionated man that he always was.2 Evening, my Wife being alone, I read aloud part of Miss Austen’s Novel of Mansfield Park, after which German in my study.

I was engaged all the morning in preparing letters and papers for the Mail. I was to transmit to Mr. Giusta at Washington the balance of the money for my purchase of silver, and the payment of the paper currency of the Northern States which he gave to me to pass. The day my Note was due being Monday the 8th a draught upon the Branch Bank at Washington would be just in time. I accordingly prepared letters to my Mother, to my father and to Mr. Giusta by which I hope the business will be completed.1 But they are such very dilatory persons in business that I am fearful of trusting them with such little matters. Poor John in his bright days had activity and punctuality, and I might have entrusted him, but even that went in his later times. There is something enervating in the climate and the manners, I am satisfied.

Took a walk. Afternoon papers as usual. Miss Julia Gorham spent the day and evening here. She is a pleasing girl and much more worthy than you commonly see. But her claims to notice are not shining and she remains unmarried.