ngers of the Spirit, who cried aloud to youth or
manhood the words of the Spirit, that they must leave their former ways,
and thenceforth change to other beings! Pardon me, O God! that I would
fain be like them; I am weak and vile, and yet, methinks, there must be
words as yet unheard, unknown--oh! where are they, those words which at
once lay hold upon the soul?"

With such heavy thoughts went Gellert away from his college-gate to
Rosenthal. There was but one small pathway cleared, but the passers
cheerfully made way for him, and walked in the snow that they might
leave him the pathway unimpeded; but he felt sad, and "as if each tree
had somewhat to cast at him." Like all men really pure, and cleaving to
the good with all their might, Gellert was not only far from contenting
himself with work already done: he also, in his anxiety to be doing,
almost forgot that he had ever done anything, and thus he was, in the
best sense of the word, modest; he began with each fresh day his course
of action afresh, as if he now for the first time had anything to
accomplish. And yet he might have been happy, in the reflection how
brightly beamed his teaching for ever, though his own life was often
clouded. For as the sun which glows on summer days still lives as
concentrated warmth in wine, and somewhere on some winter night warms up
a human heart, so is the sunshine in that man's life whose vocation it
is to impart to others the conceptions of his own mind. Nay, there
is here far more; for the refreshing draught here offered is not
diminished, though thousands drink thereof.

Twilight had set in when Gellert returned home to his dwelling, which
had for its sign a "Schwarz Brett" or "black board." His old servant,
Sauer by name, took off his overcoat; and his amanuensis, Goedike, asked
whether the Professor had any commands; being answered in the negative,
Goedike retired, and Sauer lighted the lamp upon the study-table. "Some
letters have arrived," said he, as he pointed to several upon the table:
Gellert inclined his head, and Sauer retired also. Outside, however, he
stood awhile with Goedike, and both spoke sorrowfully of the fact that
the Professor was evidently again suffering severely. "There is a
melancholy," said Goedike, "and it is the most usual, in which the inward
depression easily changes to displeasure against every one, and the
household of the melancholic suffers thereby intolerably; for the
displeasure turns against t