After a while he married a young woman of the middle class; _Historic Oddities and Strange Events

have doubted whether they would be happy together, after he had

proposed, accordingly he wrote her a long epistle, in the most pedantic

and dictorial style, informing her of what his requirements were, and

warning her to withdraw from the contemplated union, if she were not

sure she would come up to the level of the perfect wife. The poor

creature no doubt wondered at the marvellous love letter, but had no

hesitation in saying she would do her duty up to her lights. The result

was not happy. They led together a cat-and-dog life for ten years. She

was a homely person without intellectual parts, and he was essentially a

book-worm. He admits that he did not shine in society, and leaves it to

be understood that the loss was on the side of inappreciative society,

but we can not help suspecting that he was opinionated, sour, and

uncouth. All these qualities were intensified in the narrow circle of

home. After ten years of misery he divorced his wife on the ground of

mutual incompatibility. For a livelihood he took up Freemasonry, and

went about founding lodges. There were three rogues at that period who

worked Freemasonry for their own ends, the Darmstadt Court Chaplain,

Starck, a Baron von Hundt, and a certain Becker, who called himself

Johnson, and pretended to be a delegate from the mysterious, unknown

head of the Society in Aberdeen. They called themselves Masons of the

Strict Observance, but were mere swindlers.

After a while, Freemasonry lost its attractions for Fessler, probably it

ceased to pay, and then he left Breslau, and wandered into Prussia. He

wrote a novel called "Marcus Aurelius," glorifying that emperor, for

whom he entertained great veneration, and did other literary work, which

brought him in a little money. Then he married again, a young, beautiful

and gifted woman, with a small property. He was very happy in his

choice, but less happy in the speculation in which he invested her money

and that of her sisters. It failed, and they were reduced to extreme

poverty. What became of the sisters we do not know. Fessler with his

wife and children went into Russia, and sponged for some time on the

Moravian Brothers, who treated him with great kindness, and lent him

money, "Which," he says, in his autobiography, "I have not yet been able

to pay back altogether."

He lost some of his children. Distress, pecuniary embarrassments, and

sickness, softened his heart, and perhaps with that was combined a

perception that if he could get a pastorate he would be provided

for;[22] this led to a conversion, which looks very much as if it were

copied from the famous conversion of St. Augustine. It possibly was, to

some extent, sincere; he recovered faith in God, and joined the Lutheran

community. Then he had his case and attainments brought under the notice

of the Czar, who was, at the time, as Fessler probably knew, engaged in

a scheme for organising the Lutheran bodies in Finland into a Church

under Episcopal government. He chose Fessler to be bishop of Saratow,

and had him consecrated by the Swedish bishops, "Who," says Fessler,

"like the Anglican bishops, have preserved the Apostolic succession." He

makes much of this point, a curious instance of the revival in his mind

of old ideas imbibed in his time of Catholicity. . According to his own

account, he was a bishop quite on the Apostolic model, and worked very

hard to bring his diocese into order. His ordination was in 1820. In

1833, the Saratow consistory was dissolved, and he retired to St.

Petersburg, where he was appointed general superintendent of the

Lutheran community in the capital. He married a third time, but says

very little of the last wife. He concludes with this estimate of his own

character, which is hardly that at which a reader of his autobiography

would arrive. "Earnestness and cheerfulness, rapid decision, and

unbending determination, manly firmness and childlike

trueheartedness--these are the ever recurring fundamental

characteristics of my nature. Add to these a gentle mysticism, to

surround the others with colour and unite them in harmony. Sometimes it

may be that dissonances occur, it may be true that occasionally I

thunder with powerful lungs in my house, as if I were about to wreck and

shatter everything, but that is called forth only by what is wrong. In

my inmost being calm, peace, and untroubled cheerfulness reign supreme.

Discontent, wrath, venom and gall, have not embittered one moment of my

life."[23]

FOOTNOTES:

[22] He had, however, just received a pension from the Czar, so that he

was relieved from abject poverty.

[23] "Of myself," he says, "I must confess that I have heard great and

famous preachers, true Bourdaloues, Massillons, Zollikofers, &c, in

Vienna, Carolath, Breslau, Berlin, Dresden, Leipzig, Hanover, and have

been pleased with the contents, arrangement, and delivery of their

sermons; but never once have I felt my heart stirred with religious

emotion. On the contrary, on the 25th March, 1782, when Pius VI. said

mass in the Capuchin Church, and on the 31st March, when he blessed the

people, I trembled on the edge of conviction and religious faith, and

was only held back by my inability to distinguish between religion and

the Church system. Still more now does the Sermon on the Mount move me,

and for the last 23 years the divine liturgical prayer in John xvii.,

does not fail to stir my very soul."

THE END.

_S. Cowan & Co., Printers, Perth._

After a while he married a young woman of the middle class; he seems to