# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_April 1861_S104
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

104 Dr. Rudelbach's Childhood Years.

-what could bear fruit, remained. There one truly comes to understand what we have in the old devotional books, and how well one does to reproduce them (as the Berlin Bücherverein does) without any patching, without any botching, and likewise without any omissions."*) We remark here that we once, as a student, visited Dr. Rudelbach; he led us about through his splendid, richly stocked library and finally asked us which subject, of them all, was to us the dearest and most valuable. We pointed to the one that contained the old ascetic writings of our church. At this choice of ours the learned man thereupon expressed quite exceptional pleasure, agreed with us, and encouraged us to preserve this taste.

Rudelbach continues his narrative: "I had at first been intended for a trade; but the intention had to be abandoned, already while I was still in petticoats, for I never so much as learned to sew on a button or thread a needle. Very early there awoke in me the urge, if not to study, then at least to be forever gathering more knowledge; for that I made use of every stray leaflet, everything I could get my hands on in any way. When I was asked what I wanted to become, I answered: "First a priest, then a student." It seemed as though the dear Lord took His pleasure in the child's babbling; out of the mouths of babes hast Thou prepared praise for Thyself. To be sure, there was no prospect of realizing it, just as little as there was any regular pedagogical guidance at my side. God's wonderful guidance and direction had to do everything. In our house there lodged, as a tenant, an emigrant from Stockholm who supported himself by teaching languages. His name was L. Hilfling — a name that is surely inscribed in heaven. This man God used as an angel, to open the way for me. Hilfling soon noticed the, in his judgment, very promising gifts of the boy. It came about as if of itself that he gave me instruction in the modern languages, first, as I recall, in English; here at least, in the beginning, with the greatest success. Soon I had brought it so far that I could construe and understand the Vicar of Wakefield. What a world (the wide, wide world) opened itself to me in this masterpiece of Goldsmith's! Much of it I learned by heart; the ethically beautiful pressed itself deep into my soul. So I learned more and more, favored by the full approval of my mother (for although she had no other ambition, she did have this one, "that the children should learn something"), although as yet no firm plan had been drawn up for my future calling; the very modest income made my parents anxious. Hilfling, however, removed all misgivings, in that he later also undertook to stand by my side

*) Of another old Danish booklet, which left a similar unforgettable impression on Rudelbach's soul, he himself says: "The unassuming little book is often printed "in this year"; the title page was missing in my copy; but the spirit was there. The flowers of eternity go well together with "this year." To make such flowers [prießen — sense uncertain; perhaps sprießen, "to sprout"], quite a few more "reprints" would be desirable."