My life the whole time of my stay with my uncle had three aspects:  the religious life developing and building up my moral being; the external life made up of boyish play, into which I threw my whole energy; and the life of thought quietly showing itself within my uncle’s peaceful home.  To this last influence also I yielded myself with equal earnestness, and felt no suspicion of the apparent contradiction which my outward life exhibited to such a mood.  Like my school-fellows, I lived without control; as far as I saw or felt, I was untrammelled; and yet I do not call to mind that any of us ever committed a seriously culpable action.

Here I am obliged to mention something which as an educationist I can by no means pass lightly by.  We received instruction from two schoolmasters:  one was pedantic and rigid; the other, more especially our class-teacher (conrector), was large-hearted and free.  The first never had any influence over his class; the second could do whatever he pleased with us, and if he had but set his mind to it, or perhaps if he had been aware of his power, he might have done some thoroughly good sound work with his class.  In the little town of Stadt-Ilm were two ministers, both ephors[15] of the school.  My uncle, the principal minister, was mild, gentle, and kind-hearted, impressive in daily life as in his sacred office or in the pulpit; the other minister was rigid even to sternness, frequently scolding and ordering us about.  The first led us with a glance.  A word from him, and surely few were so brutish as to refuse that word admittance to their heart.  The long exhortations of the other went, for the most part, over our heads, leaving no trace behind.  Like my father, my uncle was a true shepherd of his flock; but a gentle lovingkindness to all mankind reigned in him.  My father was moved by the conviction of the rectitude of his actions; he was earnest and severe.  Both have been dead over twenty years; but how different is the spirit they have left behind amongst their congregations.  Here, they are glad at being released from so strict a control, and, if I am rightly informed, unbridled license has sprung up amongst them; there, the little town raises itself to higher and ever higher prosperity, and all things are made to serve towards mental culture, as well as towards a right citizen-like business activity.  I permit myself this digression, because these results were paralleled as a life-experience in my own life.

In this manner I lived, up to my confirmation; all but a few weeks, that is, which I spent at my parents’ house during the long holidays.  Here, too, everything seemed to take a gentler turn, and the domestic, thrifty activity which filled the place, and always struck me anew in my periodical visits home, wrought upon me with most beneficial effect.  The copper-plate engravings in my father’s library were the first things I sought out, especially those representing scenes in the history of the world.  A table showing