DOCS.
132,
133
OCTOBER
1915 139
I
beg you
not
to be
angry
with
me
for
my
words;
I
assure
you
that
what
I
said is
my
conviction.[4]
With
all due
respect,
yours very truly,
A.
Einstein.
133. From
Michele Besso
[Zurich,
ca.
30
October
1915]
We
acknowledge
the
legitimacy
of
your
wish
to
communicate with
your
chil-
dren without
disturbance,
but
also
the
legitimacy
of
your
wife’s
reservations
that
this
not
take
place
close to
your
Berlin
relatives.[1]
The discord
resulting from
this
can only eventually place
the
child’s
emotional
harmony
at risk. If
you
enforced
it,
then
in
both
of
our
views[2]
the
time would
inevitably
come
when
the
suffering
caused
by
it,
also for
you,
would far
outweigh
the
present
conveniences. For the
children,
no
contact would
without
a
doubt
be
better than
contact in
Berlin,
therefore
the
desirability
of
a
stay, initially
of
the
older
boy,
together
with
you
at
a good
Swiss
inn
or
boarding
house
or
of
a
trip through
Switzerland for
the
duration
of time
you
can
devote to
your
boy.
We
also
acknowledge
that
you
both,
your
wife
and
you, are
entitled to
mutual
good
faith and
respect,
which
you
are
to show toward each
other;
in
particular,
there
is
no
basis
(to
the
extent
that
lawyer’s
tricks
are
disapproved
of, as
is
your
way
of
thinking)
for
denying
the
woman a
written confirmation
of
the
conditions
under
which
you are willing
to
meet
the
(specified)
financial
obligations, so as
to
exclude
the
possibility
that
a means
of financial
pressure
remain
that
could be
used toward
achieving
some
unforeseen
purpose.
Independent,
in
principle,
of
the
above
is
the
question
of
your
divorce
and
remarriage.
We
both
certainly dearly hope
that
your
contacts
with the
children
are
arranged favorably,
also because it would make it easier for
you
to main-
tain
your present single
state,
which
undoubtedly ought
to
be
the
only
desirable
and
tolerable
state
for
you
during
your holidays,
knowing
how
people
unfortu-
nately
are,
as
well
as
for
your
mental
strength, which is
being
taxed
by powerful
“otherworldly”
interests.
You
told
us,
as
you
know,
how
an
almost churchlike
atmosphere is
pervading your
desolate house
now.
And
justifiably
so,
for unusual
divine
powers
are
at work in there.
Your
Albert
will
visit
us (Besso)
this winter
during
the Christmas
holidays
simultaneously
with
Vero;
perhaps you
would
like
to
spend
that
time in
part
or