The Sleepwalkers (107 page)

The
notes on his own childhood and youth, in the family horoscope, read
like the diary of Job:

"On
the
birth
of
Johann
Kepler.
I
have
investigated
the
matter
of
my
conception,
which
took
place
in
the
year
1571,
May
16,
at
4.37
a.m...
My
weakness
at
birth
removes
the
suspicion
that
my
mother
was
already
pregnant
at
the
marriage,
which
was
the
15th
of
May...
Thus
I
was
born
premature,
at
thirty-two
weeks,
after
224
days,
ten
hours...
1575
[aged
four]
I
almost
died
of
small
pox,
was
in
very
ill
health,
and
my
hands
were
badly
crippled...
1577
[aged
six].
On
my
birthday
I
lost
a
tooth,
breaking
it
off
with
a
string
which
I
pulled
with
my
hands...
1585-86
[fourteen-fifteen].
During
these
two
years,
I
suffered
continually
from
skin
ailments,
often
severe
sores,
often
from
the
scabs
of
chronic
putrid
wounds
in
my
feet
which
healed
badly
and
kept
breaking
out
again.
On
the
middle
finger
of
my
right
hand
I
had
a
worm,
on
the
left
a
huge
sore...
1587
[sixteen].
On
April
4
I
was
attacked
by
a
fever...
1589
[nineteen].
I
began
to
suffer
terribly
from
headaches
and
a
disturbance
of
my
limbs.
The
mange
took
hold
of
me...
Then
there
was
a
dry
disease...
1591
[twenty].
The
cold
brought
on
prolonged
mange...
A
disturbance
of
body
and
mind
had
set
in
because
of
the
excitement
of
the
Carnival
play
in
which
I
was
playing
Mariamne...
1592
[twenty-one].
I
went
down
to
Weil
and
lost
a
quarter
florin
at
gambling...
At
Cupinga's
I
was
offered
union
with
a
virgin;
on
New
Year's
Eve
I
achieved
this
with
the
greatest
possible
difficulty,
experiencing
the
most
acute
pains
of
the
bladder..."

Only
two brief memories mitigate the gloom and squalor of this childhood.
At the age of six:

"I heard much of the comet
of that year, 1577, and was taken by my mother to a high place to
look at it."

And
at the age of nine:

"I
was
called
outdoors
by
my
parents
especially,
to
look
at
the
eclipse
of
the
moon.
It
appeared
quite
red."

So
much for the sunny side of life.

No
doubt,
some
of
his
miseries
and
ailments
existed
only
in
his
imagination;
while
others
–
all
these
cold
sores,
worms
on
the
finger,
scabs
and
manges
–
seem
like
the
stigmata
of
his
self-detestation,
physical
projections
of
the
image
he
had
formed
of
himself:
the
portrait
of
a
child
as
a
mangy
dog.
He
meant
this
literally,
as
we
shall
see.

3.
Orphic Purge

There
are
always
compensations.
In
Kepler's
case,
the
compensations
offered
by
destiny
were
the
exceptional
educational
facilities
in
his
native
land.

The
Dukes
of
Wuerttemberg,
after
embracing
the
Lutheran
creed,
had
created
a
modern
educational
system.
They
needed
erudite
clergymen
who
could
hold
their
own
in
the
religious
controversy
that
was
raging
across
the
country,
and
they
needed
an
efficient
administrative
service.
The
Protestant
universities
in
Wittenberg
and
Tuebingen
were
the
intellectual
arsenals
of
the
new
creed;
the
confiscated
monasteries
and
convents
provided
ideal
accommodation
for
a
network
of
elementary
and
secondary
schools,
which
fed
the
universities
and
chancelleries
with
bright
young
men.
A
system
of
scholarships
and
grants
for
"the
children
of
the
poor
and
faithful
who
are
of
a
diligent,
Christian
and
god-fearing
disposition"
vouchsafed
an
efficient
selection
of
candidates.
In
this
respect,
Wuerttemberg
before
the
Thirty
Years
War
was
a
modern
welfare
state
in
miniature.
Kepler's
parents
would
certainly
not
have
bothered
about
his
education;
the
precocious
brilliance
of
the
child
automatically
guaranteed
his
progress
from
school
to
seminary
and
from
there
to
university,
as
on
a
moving
belt.

The
curriculum
at
the
seminary
was
in
Latin,
and
the
pupils
were
rigorously
held
to
use
only
Latin
even
among
themselves.
In
the
elementary
school
already,
they
were
made
to
read
the
comedies
of
Plautus
and
Terence,
to
add
colloquial
fluency
to
scholarly
precision.
The
German
vernacular,
though
it
had
acquired
a
new
dignity
through
Luther's
Bible
translation,
was
not
yet
considered
a
worthy
medium
of
expression
for
scholars.
As
a
happy
result
of
this,
Kepler's
style,
in
those
pamphlets
and
letters
which
he
wrote
in
German,
has
an
enchantingly
naive
and
earthy
quality
which,
in
contrast
to
the
dehydrated
mediaeval
Latin,
sounds
like
the
joyous
din
of
a
country
fair
after
the
austerities
of
the
lecture
room.
Canon
Koppernigk's
German
was
modelled
on
the
stilted
and
devious
"Chancellery
Style"
of
the
bureaucracy;
Kepler's
German
seems
modelled
on
Luther's
pronouncement: