what will happen: The wild boar will be trapped, but the dog who
gets him will pay for it. I will gladly die. Then I will be certain that I
have accomplished the task. Often people would rather hear from a
dead person than from someone alive.”When Boesen asked whether Kierkegaard had anything else he wanted said
on his behalf, Kierkegaard replied:
“No. Yes, greet everyone for me—I have liked them all very much—
and tell them that my life is a great suffering, unknown and inexplicable
to other people. Everything looked like pride and vanity, but it wasn’t.
I am absolutely no better than other people, and I have said so and
have never said otherwise.”FRIDAY,OCTOBER19. Visitors from Copenhagen had informed Peter
Christian that his younger brother was sick, and had collapsed “between
the 27th and the 29th [of September].” In a letter dated October 7, Peter
Christian’s nephew Michael Lund, a young physician who had served his
internship at Frederik’s Hospital a few years earlier, explained the situation
to his uncle, adding that it was probably an “an infection of the spinal cord,
with paralysis of both legs.” Several days later, Michael’s father, the mer-
chant Johan Christian Lund, wrote that Søren Aabye’s condition was at best
“so-so.” Like his two sons, physicians Henrik and Michael, who visited
their uncle “every day,” Johan Christian was absolutely not optimistic about
Kierkegaard, inasmuch as “his condition is quite feeble.” He himself had
not seen Søren Aabye since the previous Sunday; he had attempted to visit
since then, but he had been turned away by the “nurse’s orderly,” who had
merely reported that the magister was feeling quite unwell and did not want
any visitors. Johan Christian Lund was going to visit the hospital again quite
soon, however, and he concluded his note to Peter Christian with these
words: “If you want to go there yourself, I’m afraid that you had better not
hesitate too long.”
Thus challenged, Peter Christian traveled to Copenhagen from Peders-
borg, but when he turned up at Frederik’s Hospital on Friday, October 19,
he was denied entry. His dying brother did not want to see him. As Søren
Aabye explained to Boesen later that same day, Peter Christian “could be
stopped not by debate but by action.” The incident made Boesen uneasy.
“Won’t you take Holy Communion?”“Yes, but not from a pastor, from a layman.”“That would be quite difficult to arrange.”