My Notebook

Maurice de Guérin, Journal, tr. Edward Thorton Fisher (New York: Leypoldt & Holt, 1867), p. 115:

O my note-book, thou art not for me a heap of paper, something insensible, inanimate; no, thou livest, thou hast a soul, an understanding, love, kindness, compassion, patience, charity, sympathy, pure and unchangeable. Thou art for me what I have not found among men, that tender and devoted being who attaches himself to a feeble and sickly soul, who enfolds it in affection, who alone comprehends its language, divines the thoughts of its heart, sympathizes with its sorrows, partakes of the intoxication of its joys, lets it rest upon his bosom, or, in his turn, leans upon it for rest.