WYTTE.NBACH. 181 



'•'VVyttenbacli," says one of his biographers, "seems to have been 

 born lor the study of antiquity. He was so imbued with classical learn- 

 ing from a child, that all whicli he said, all which he wrote, and all 

 which he thought had an ancient coloring about it, and seemed to have 

 sprung from antiquity itself. He spoke Latin in his public lectures as 

 one does his native language ; indeed as few are able to use it. For his 

 diction flowed pure, limpid, harmonious, luminous, wholly free from the 

 detilement of a later age ; it gushed out, as it were, spontaneousiv, so 

 that he seemed not to have premeditated either vvhat he should say or 

 how he should say it." His elementary education he received under 

 the direction of his father, and even in boyhood he showed all that en- 

 thusiasm which is so essential to success in study. On one occasion, 

 having accidentally met with Xenophon's MemorahUia for the first time, 

 he thus speaks of the emotions of pleasure which its perusal excited : 

 "I was captivated with the indescribable sweetness of the author. The 

 grounds of it I had better understood afterwards. In studying this trea- 

 tise, I made it a point never to begin a section without re-perusing the 

 preceding; nor a chapter or book, without studying the preceding chap- 

 ter and book a second time. Having, at length, completed the work iti 

 this manner, 1 again read the vviiole in course. It occupied me almost 

 three months; but such unceasing repetition was most serviceable to 

 me." He then read all the works of Xenophon four times in four 

 months. 



We refer to the plan he adopted and the success which crowned his 

 efforts in studying the classics, supposing it may be interesting to others 

 engaged in similar pursuits. He read the Greek authors in clironologi- 

 cal order, commencing with the Iliad of Homer. This he finished in 

 two months, revising it in the same manner as he had the MemorahUia. 

 At first, the reading of Homer was more irksome than pleasant; it was 

 only by repeated readings that he was enabled to appreciate the merits 

 of the author, or recognize the divine genius of the poet. He now im- 

 agined that he could read any author with equal facility. He took up 

 JJemoslJicnes ; but here all was darkness — he was perplexed on all sides. 

 He, however, had determined not to shrink from any difficulties, to be 

 deterred by any discouragements. He writes : "I went on. I found 

 greater difficulties than 1 had ever had before, both in the words and in 

 the length of the sentences. At last with much ado, I reached the end 

 *of the first Olynihiac^ and then read it a second and a third ti me. Ev- 

 ery thing now appeared plain and clear. Still I did not perceive the fire 

 of eloquence for which he is distinguished. 1 hesitated whether to pro- 

 ceed to the second oration, or asiain read the first. I resolved to do the 



