and when Theodor
became old enough to join it he soon outstripped the rest, giving his
father no little pride by his fluent rendering of Homer. Theodor
Fliedner was not quite fourteen years old when the sudden death of the
father changed the whole life of the family, and left the mother with
eleven children to maintain and educate. Now began for Fliedner a
struggle to complete his education. The simple, kindly hospitality that
had been so generously exercised in the village parsonage met its
reward. Friends came forward to offer help, and at the beginning of the
New Year Fliedner and his brother went to the gymnasium at Idstein. Here
he was obliged to live sparingly, and earned his bread by teaching, but
he was happy and contented, and found in study his great delight. He was
fond of reading books of travel and the lives of great men, which
stirred him to emulation. In 1817 he went to the University of Giessen.
Here he kept aloof from the political agitations among the students.
Neither was he affected by the rationalistic teachings of the
professors. His shy, retired nature aided him in this course, and his
leisure hours were passed in reading the writings of the Reformers. The
jubilee festival of the Reformation occurred in 1817, and the lives of
the heroes of the faith were brought freshly home to him. Their strength
of faith shamed him, but he had not yet learned the secret of their
power. He was yet without a deep, spiritual life. From Giessen he went
to Goettingen, where he devoted himself to a year's study of history,
philosophy, and theology. During the holidays, as is the custom with
German students, he made repeated pedestrian tours. In this way he
visited the great free cities of the north, Bremen, Hamburg, and
Lubeck. From Goettingen he and his brother went to the theological
seminary at Herborn, where the following summer he passed with credit
his theological examination. He was now ready to enter God's great
school of practical life to be further fitted for the mission he was to
accomplish. In September he went to Cologne and was employed in the
house of a wealthy merchant as a private tutor. This was a great change
for the quiet youth of country habits. He took great pains to
accommodate himself to his surroundings, and to acquire the truly
Christian art of becoming all things to all men. In after life, when
speaking of this period and its usefulness to him, he wrote: "It is a
great hinderance to a man, ev