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secondary significance and did not increase to any marked degree his difficulty in forming intimate friendships with his fellow pupils. The difficulty was due fundamentally to his character.
    Albert received regular instruction in the Catholic religion and he derived a great deal of pleasure from it. He learned this subject so well that he was able to help his Catholic classmates when they could not answer the teacher’s questions immediately. Einstein has no recollection of any objection having arisen to the participation of a Jewish pupil in Catholic religious instruction. On one occasion the teacher attempted a somewhat strange kind of object lesson by bringing a large nail to the class and telling the pupils: “The nails with which Christ was nailed to the cross looked like this.” But he did not add, as sometimes happens, that the Crucifixion was the work of the Jews. Nor did the idea enter the minds of the students that because of this they must change their relations with their classmate Albert. Nevertheless Einsteinfound this kind of teaching rather uncongenial, but only because it recalled the brutal act connected with it and because he sensed correctly that the vivid portrayal of brutality does not usually intensify any sentiments of antagonism to it but rather awakens latent sadistic tendencies.
    It was very characteristic of young Einstein’s religious feeling that he saw no noticeable difference between what he learned of the Catholic religion at school and the rather vaguely remembered remnants of the Jewish tradition with which he was familiar at home. These elements merged in him into a sense of the existence of lawfulness in the universe and in the representation of this harmony by means of different kinds of symbols, which he judged rather on the basis of their æsthetic value than as symbols of the “truth.”
    On the whole, however, Einstein felt that school was not very different from his conception of barracks — that is, a place where one was subject to the power of an organization that exercised a mechanical pressure on the individual, leaving no area open within which he might carry on some activity suited to his nature. The students were required to learn mechanically the material presented to them, and the main emphasis was placed on the inculcation of obedience and discipline. The pupils were required to stand at attention when addressed by the teacher and were not supposed to speak unless asked a question. Independent questions addressed by students to the teacher and informal conversations between them were rare.
    Even when Albert was nine years old and in the highest grade of the elementary school, he still lacked fluency of speech, and everything he said was expressed only after thorough consideration and reflection. Because of his conscientiousness in not making any false statements or telling lies he was called
Biedermeier
(Honest John) by his classmates. He was regarded as an amiable dreamer. As yet no evidence of any special talent could be discovered, and his mother remarked occasionally: “Maybe he will become a great professor some day.” But perhaps she meant only that he might develop into some sort of eccentric.
     
3.
Gymnasium in Munich
    At the age of ten, young Einstein left the elementary school and entered the Luitpold Gymnasium in Munich. In Germanythe period between the ages of ten and eighteen, the years that are of decisive importance in the intellectual development of adolescents, are spent in the gymnasium. The aim of these institutions was to give the young people a general education based upon the acquisition of ancient Greek and Roman culture, and for this purpose most of the time was devoted to learning Latin and Greek grammar. Because of the complications of these subjects, and since the students were required to learn all the rules pedantically, little time was left to acquire a real understanding of the culture of antiquity. Furthermore, it would have been a