Cold morning. I read Schiller’s Preface to his Bride of Messina—An attempt to bring back the Antique Theatre with it’s chorus. He opens some views of the dramatic art which are in a manner new and insists upon it that the chorus is a great instrument to raise the character of the poem to the height which Author and Spectator equally require. I am doubtful upon this point. That it is an avenue for the introduction of lyric poetry which no other portion of the drama can furnish is certainly true, but it becomes a poem and not a drama. Schiller maintains that it is a merit in a Chorus that it checks the interest and the illusion which might in many cases become more painful than is consistent with the only purpose of scenic representation. This seems to me erroneous. The most painful plays that are not 99disgusting are the most popular. At least it is so in England. Notwithstanding all this, I think the argument has some weight when applied to operatic performances in which illusion is of less consequence and music of the most. The chorus here is a great thing.

I went to the Office. Engaged in writing, and copying a Letter to my father,1 also Diary. Received a letter from T. B. Adams approving of my transactions on his Account.2 Mr. G. W. Beale came in and wished a message sent to my father upon the settlement of Mr. Lunt, as Minister at Quincy. I was kept at the Office so long as to lose my walk. Read Ovid and nearly finished Ibis.

Afternoon, Mr. Brooks got me to draw a Deed for him of the land in question behind my house. Finished a history of the greatest happiness principle as impudent a piece of ipse dixitism according to their own barbarous jargon as any they abuse. Evening, read to my Wife, Hannah More’s Thoughts on the Manners of the great.3

Morning snow and rain with the Streets under water. I continued reading the Bride of Messina which appears to me to be a fine subject for an Opera but it will not bear so well performing. It does not sustain Schiller’s positions. I went to the Office although the day was such as to render it somewhat imprudent to do so. And after I got there my time was not very well employed. Read a treatise of Diderot upon Education in which he advises the studies of every year from eight upwards.1 This is a matter of extreme difficulty and one which must soon press itself upon our attention. I did not walk today. Finished the Ibis and with it all the works of Ovid. I have been about eleven months in reading them and have enjoyed them quite. It has been my rule for a long time past to devote an hour to the Classics daily. What shall I take up next?

Mr. Brooks had company to dine. Professor Silliman, Mr. W. Dalton, Dr. Wainwright, I. P. Davis, Mr. E. Everett, Mr. Frothingham and Edward Brooks. A very pretty dinner but I was very awkwardly placed and was suffering so much from my cold and cough that I did not enjoy it. The conversation much of it political, and of a description which I do not at all sympathize with at the present moment. 100The incidents of the last Winter have so utterly disgusted me with this arrogant, self-sufficient Whig party that I have no wish to see them successful in any thing. The company left quite late and I could do very little afterwards. Read some pages of Grimm and of the Bride of Messina. Read aloud to Mr. Brooks Mr. Binney’s Speech in Congress upon the French question,2 but I felt quite poorly.