Page:Stories by Foreign Authors (German II).djvu/26

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CHRISTIAN GELLERT'S LAST CHRISTMAS.

real God's word. Yes, and all your life you've never made such nice porridge before. You must have put something special in it!"

"I don't know what you mean. Stop! There's the book lying there—ah! that's it—and it's by Gellert, of Leipzig."

"What! Gellert, of Leipzig! Men with ideas like that don't live now; there may have been such, a thousand years ago, in holy lands, not among us; those are the words of a saint of old."

"And I tell you they are by Gellert, of Leipzig, of whom your brother has told us; in fact, he was his tutor, and have n't you heard how pious and good he is?"

"I would n't have believed that such men still lived, and so near us, too, as Leipzig."

"Well, but those who lived a thousand years ago were also once living creatures: and over Leipzig is just the same heaven, and the same sun shines, and the same God rules, as over all other cities."

"Oh! yes, my brother has an apt pupil in you!"

"Well, and why not? I've treasured up all he told us of Professor Gellert."

"Professor!"

"Yes, Professor!"

"A man with such a proud, new-fangled title could n't write anything like that!"

"He did n't give himself the title, and he is