ving wife! To me, while she drives me
restless abroad, may she leave but just so much time as to allow me
fairly to discern my relations with my inmost self and with the world."
Then my thoughts grew clear, and I continued, "Thou givest man bread;
let my aim be to give man himself."

I did not even then fully apprehend the meaning of what I had said and
written, or I could not of course have held so firmly to my architecture
scheme. I knew as yet neither myself nor my real life, neither my goal
nor my life's path thither. And long afterwards, when I had for some
time been engaged upon my true vocation, I was not a little astonished
over the prophetic nature of this album-phrase of mine.

In later life I have often observed that a man's spirit, when it first
begins to stir within him, utters many a far-away prophetic thought,
which yet, in riper age, attains its realisation, its consummation.
I have especially noticed this recently in bright-minded and active
children; in fact, I have often been quite astounded at the really
deep truths expressed by them in their butterfly life. I seemed to
catch glimpses of a symbolic truth in this; as if indeed the human
soul were even already beginning to shake itself free from its
chrysalis-wrapping, or were bursting off the last fragments of the
eggshell.

In May 1805, while on my journey, I visited my eldest brother, of whom I
have so often spoken, and shall have yet so often to speak, and found
him in another district, to which he had been appointed minister. He was
as kind and full of affection as ever; and instead of blaming me, spoke
with especial approval of my new plans. He told me of projects which had
allured him in his youth, and still allured, but which he had lacked
the strength of mind to speak of. His father's advice and authority
had overawed him in youth, and now the chain of a settled position in
life held him fast. To follow the inward voice faithfully and without
swerving was the advice he offered me, and he wrote this memorandum
in my album when I left him, as a life motto:--"The task of man is a
struggle towards an end. Do your duty as a man, dear brother, with
firmness and resolution, fight against the difficulties which will
thrust themselves in your path, and be assured you will attain the end."

Thus cheered by sympathy and approval, I went my way from my brother's,
strengthened and confirmed in my determination. My road lay over the
Wartburg.[36] Luther