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This letter by Julian Onderdonk to his wife, Gertrude , seems to have been written during the time of marital stress for the couple in 1910. It also reveals a great deal of his philosophy of art. The letter is from the Estate of Adrienne Onderdonk, are in the Onderdonk Family Papers at the Witte Museum, and were transcribed by Cecilia Steinfeldt. (The beginning of the letter is missing, as is the end of the first sentence in this transcription.) I dimly glimpse some wonderful…. …that I have been given a glimpse of something that is to come in the future. We live and touch and deal with real things. All things we know, have form, and can be seen and felt, but from these things sometimes there comes a collective memory or half formed vision that goes beyond the realities we know and so is lost because we have not reached the state where the bodily senses disappear and become indistinct as these intangible thoughts are now. Then perhaps, the now intangible thoughts become the realities. There is something in art that approached the intangible. There is that spiritual force that lies behind the whole universe that enters into the being of a great work of art. It is so illusive, so indescribable that it is only occasionally that it becomes present at all, and at the most it is the faintest suggestion of something to come later on. I feel the force occasionally but it is only occasionally that it takes possession of my mind. It is a matter that can not be controlled . It comes through earnest seeking for the truth in nature. It comes when the mind is laid before nature in the spirit of seeking to receive. Therefore it becomes the rarest thing in art, for it is only present when the artist faces nature with a sense of worship. Something of the same feeling exists when two persons love one another. The highest and most beautiful feelings can only come when there is the earnest sincere longing to receive, and in receiving to accept with absolute faith and trust the will of the one to return the affection of the other. Then there leaps that spark or force that seems to flow and fuse together the very souls. Gertrude, I have felt that force today. You have given it to me and it is the most wonderful of all experiences that I can conceive as being possible in this life. Oh, how I wish that I might have the controlling wisdom to guide me through the future so that I would never give you pain or grief. Gertrude, I can only keep on trying, and I know that occasionally I will succeed in bringing you this same wonderful and glowing feeling which you have given to me today. I know equally well that there will be many times when things go wrong, that I will get cross, and that you will get cross, but when I hold the firm conviction of love and regard for you that is mine, I know that troubles can only be temporary and of no real consequence if each one of us will only think and try to act that way. Gertrude, I am not strong and well balanced mentally, as some or most men are. I feel deeply and I give way to my feelings because I am unable to help it. If I were the kind of man who was always the same every day, and followed a certain fixed course all the time, I could not see and feel deeply in my work. I would only be a grubbing human being. But I might be a more certain quantity as a husband. But, Gertrude, I know that I have deeper and different feelings that most men do, and that the fire that burns in my mind is worth more while it lasts than the cool indifferent regard that some men feel. I know that I slip up and lose my temper and fly all to pieces, but Gertrude, I love you so deeply that perhaps you can try to overlook the slips I make, when you know that deep down in my mind I have no intention of making them. I am trying hard to overcome my thoughtlessness and selfishness. It is the little things that please you and mean so much to you as you say in your letter. I will try to be careful, and...

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