Occupation with books was accounted idleness and laziness by my father. I was driven to work with blows and ill-treatment; and, that I might the sooner equal my father as a good shoemaker, I was bound to the stool near his own. During the long, fearful days I was forced to sit and draw the pitched, offensive thread through the leather, and when my arms were lame, and sank weary at my side, then I was invigorated to renewed exertion with blows. Finally, with the courage of despair, I fled from this life of torture. Unacquainted with the world, and inexperienced, I hoped for the sympathy of men, but in vain. No one would relieve or assist me! Days and weeks long I have wandered around in the forest adjoining our little village, and lived like the animals, upon roots and herbs. Yet I was happy! Ihad taken with me in my flight two books which I had received as prizes, in the happy days that my father permitted me to go to the Latin school. The decision of the teacher that I was created for a scholar, so terrified my father, that he took me from the school, to turn the embryo savant, who would be good for nothing, into a shoemaker, who might earn his bread. My two darling books remained to me. In the forest solitude I read Ovid and Virgil until I had memorized them, and recited them aloud, in pathetic tones, for my own amusement. To-day I recall those weeks in the forest stillness as the happiest, purest, and most beautiful of my life.""And they undoubtedly are," said Goethe, kindly. "The return to Nature is the return to one's self. Who will be an able, vigorous man and remain so, must, above all things, live in and with Nature.""But oh! this happy life did not long continue," sighed Moritz. "My father discovered my retreat, and came with sheriffs and bailiffs to seize me like a criminal--like a wild animal. With my hands bound, Iwas brought back in broad day, amid the jeers of street boys. Permit me to pass in silence the degradation, the torture which followed. Ibecame a burden to myself, and longed for death. The ill-treatment of my father finally revived my courage to run away the second time.
I went to a large town near by, and decided to earn my living rather than return to my father. To fulfil the prophecy of my teacher was my ambition. The privations that I endured, the life I led, I will not recount to you. I performed the most menial service, and worked months like a beast of burden. For want of a shelter, I slept in deserted yards and tumble-down houses. Upon a piece of bread and a drink of water I lived, saving, with miserly greediness, the money which I earned as messenger or day-laborer. At the end of a year, Ihad earned sufficient to buy an old suit of clothes at a second-hand clothing-store, and present myself to the director of the Gymnasium, imploring him to receive me as pupil. Bitterly weeping, I opened my heart to him, and disclosed the torture of my sad life as a child, and begged him to give me the opportunity to educate myself. He repulsed me with scorn, and threatened to give me over to the police, as a runaway, as a vagabond, and beggar. 'I am no beggar!' Icried, vehemently, 'I will be under obligation to no one. I have money to pay for two years in advance, and during this time I shall be able to earn sufficient to pay for the succeeding two years.'
This softened the anger of the crabbed director; he was friendly and kind, and promised me his assistance.""Poor boy!" sighed Goethe. "So young, and yet forced to learn that there is a power to which not only kings and princes, but mind must bow; to which science and art have submitted, as to their Maecenas!
This power opened the doors of the Gymnasium to you.""It was even thus. The director took pity upon me, and permitted me to enter upon my studies at once; he did more, he assured my future.
Oh, he was a humane and kind man! When he learned that I possessed nothing but the little sum to which the drops of blood of a year's toil still clung, then--""He returned it to you," interrupted Goethe, kindly.
"No, he offered me board, lodging, and clothing, during my course at the Gymnasium.""That was well," cried Goethe. "Tell me the name of this honorable man, that I may meet him and extend to him my hand."A troubled smile spread over Philip's face. "Permit me for the time being to conceal the name," he replied. "I received the generous proposal gratefully, and asked, deeply moved, if there were no services which I could return for so much kindness and generosity.
It proved that there were, and the director made them known to me.
He was unmarried, hence the necessity of men's service. I should be society for him--be a companion, in fact; I should do what every grateful son would do for his father--help him dress, keep his room in order, and prepare his breakfast.""That meant that you should be his servant!" cried Goethe, indignant.
"Only in the morning," replied Moritz, smiling. "Evenings and nights I should have the honor to be his amanuensis; I should look over the studies of the scholars, and correct their exercises; and when I had made sufficient progress, it should be my duty to give two hours to different classes, and I should read aloud or play cards with the director on leisure evenings. Besides, I was obliged to promise never to leave the house without his permission; never to speak to, or hold intercourse with, any one outside the hours of instruction.
All these conditions were written down, and signed by both parties, as if a business contract.""A transaction by which a human soul was bargained for!" thundered Goethe. "Reveal to me, now, the name of this trader of souls, that Imay expose him to public shame!"