"Ah! what bliss is the aspiration
To dangle from a lamp-post
As a martyr for the nation!"

During these vacations politics was naturally a matter of utter
indifference to us, and toward their close we usually paid a visit to my
grandmother and aunt in Dresden.

So the years passed till Easter (1852) came, and with it our confirmation
and my separation from Ludo, who was to follow a different career. We
had double instruction in confirmation, first with the village boys from
the pastor of Eichfeld, and afterwards from Middendorf at the institute.

Unfortunately, I have entirely forgotten what the Eichfeld clergyman
taught us, but Middendorf's lessons made all the deeper impression.

He led us through life to God and the Saviour, and thence back again to
life.

How often, after one of these lessons, silence reigned, and teachers and
pupils rose from their seats with tearful eyes!

Afterwards I learned from a book which had been kept that what he gave us
had been drawn chiefly from the rich experiences of his own life and the
Gospels, supplemented by the writings of his favourite teacher,
Schleiermacher. By contemplation, the consideration of the universe with
the soul rather than with the mind, we should enter into close relations
with God and become conscious of our dependence upon him, and this
consciousness Middendorf with his teacher Schleiermacher called