When I was seventeen, my parents decided that I should leave Geneva and study at the University of Ingolstadt.
Until then, I had received my education in Geneva. But my father believed that I needed to see more of the world and learn about customs beyond those of my own country.
My departure was planned for the near future.
But before I could leave, tragedy entered my life for the first time.
Elizabeth had caught scarlet fever.
Her illness quickly became serious, and for a while we feared she might die. Everyone warned my mother not to go near her. She was begged to stay away from the sickroom.
At first, my mother listened.
But when she learned how serious Elizabeth’s condition had become, she could no longer control her worry.
“She needs me,” Mother said. “I cannot simply sit here while she suffers.”
Despite everyone’s protests, she went to Elizabeth’s bedside.
For several days, she cared for her with tireless devotion. Her efforts succeeded. Elizabeth survived the illness.
But my mother had paid the price.
Three days later, she became sick.
Her fever rose quickly, and the doctors soon realized that her condition was extremely dangerous.
We watched helplessly as the woman who had always cared for us slowly lost her strength.
Even on her deathbed, however, she remained gentle and calm.
One day, she called Elizabeth and me to her side. She took each of our hands and placed them together.
“My dear children,” she said softly, “I had always hoped that the two of you would one day marry. That dream gave me great happiness, and I believe it will also bring comfort to your father.”
She looked at Elizabeth.
“Elizabeth, my dear, you must now take my place with the younger children. I am so sorry that I have to leave you all.”
She paused and smiled sadly.
“I have been deeply loved and very happy in this life. It is painful to leave you, but I must accept what is coming. I will try to face death peacefully.”
Then she looked at both of us.
“Perhaps we will meet again in another world.”
She died peacefully soon afterward.
Even in death, her face still carried the warmth and affection that had always made her so dear to us.
I cannot truly describe what followed.
When someone we love dies, the world seems impossible to understand. You keep expecting to hear their voice or see them walk into the room. Your mind refuses to accept that the person who was part of your everyday life is simply gone.
At first, grief feels unreal.
Then, as the days pass and the truth becomes impossible to deny, the pain grows deeper.
But this is a sorrow that almost everyone eventually experiences.
Life does not stop simply because someone we love has died.
My mother was gone, but we still had responsibilities. We had to continue living, even though one of the people we loved most had been taken from us.
My journey to Ingolstadt had been postponed because of Mother’s illness and death. Now my father and I agreed that I should leave after a few more weeks.
I was reluctant to go.
It seemed almost cruel to leave so soon after Mother’s funeral. The house was still filled with grief, and I could not imagine walking away from it and returning to ordinary life.
More than anything, I wanted to stay with the people I loved.
I especially wanted to make sure that Elizabeth was recovering from her sorrow.
Elizabeth tried to hide her own pain.
Instead of allowing herself to collapse under her grief, she became the one who comforted everyone else.
She took care of my father, my brothers, and me. She devoted herself to the family and tried to bring some happiness back into the house.
Her smile seemed brighter than ever because she was using it to cheer us up.
She almost forgot her own suffering while trying to ease ours.
At last, the day of my departure arrived.
Henry Clerval spent my final evening with us. He had desperately wanted to accompany me to Ingolstadt and study there as well, but his father had refused.
Henry’s father was a practical businessman who believed that his son should learn commerce rather than waste time on books and ambitious dreams.
Henry was deeply disappointed.
He rarely complained, but I could see what he was thinking. Whenever he spoke about his future, there was determination in his eyes.
He had no intention of spending his entire life trapped in his father’s business.
That final evening, we stayed together late into the night.
None of us wanted to say goodbye.
Eventually, someone finally whispered the word.
“Farewell.”
We went to our rooms, pretending that we were going to sleep.
None of us really believed the others had been fooled.
At dawn, I came downstairs and found everyone waiting for me.
My father embraced me and gave me his blessing.
Henry took my hand.
“I wish I could go with you,” he said.
“I wish you could too,” I replied.
Elizabeth came forward last.
“Please write to us often,” she said. “Don’t disappear into your new life.”
“I promise.”
She smiled sadly.
“Take care of yourself, Victor.”
I climbed into the carriage and looked back at them one last time.
Then we began the journey to Ingolstadt.
As the carriage moved farther away from home, I felt deeply alone.
Until then, I had always been surrounded by people who loved me. My brothers, Elizabeth, Henry, and my parents had filled my life with affection and companionship.
Now I would have to make new friends.
I had lived a sheltered and comfortable life, and I had never been good at meeting strangers. The people I loved were familiar to me in every possible way.
I wondered how I would manage among people I had never seen before.
But as the journey continued, my mood slowly changed.
I began thinking about the future.
I was going to study.
I was finally going to learn everything I had always wanted to know.
For years, I had complained that life in Geneva was too narrow. I had wanted to leave home, see the wider world, and discover my place in it.
Now that opportunity had finally arrived.
There was no reason to regret it.
The journey to Ingolstadt was long and exhausting, but I had plenty of time to think.
Eventually, I saw the town’s tall white church tower rising in the distance.
I had arrived.
I was taken to a small apartment where I would live alone. That evening, I had nothing to do but settle in and prepare for my new life.
The next morning, I delivered my letters of introduction and visited several of the university’s professors.
By chance—or perhaps by something much darker—I met Professor Krempe first.
He taught natural philosophy.
He was a short, unpleasant-looking man with a rough voice, but he clearly knew his subject.
He asked me several questions about what I had studied before coming to the university.
I answered casually and mentioned the old alchemists whose works I had spent years reading.
Professor Krempe stared at me.
“Did you really spend your time studying those books?”
“Yes,” I replied.
He shook his head.
“Then you’ve wasted your time.”
I frowned.
“How can you say that?”
“Every hour you spent reading those books was wasted,” he said bluntly. “You’ve filled your head with outdated theories and meaningless names.”
He sighed impatiently.
“Where have you been living? Didn’t anyone tell you that these ideas are centuries old?”
I said nothing.
“I can hardly believe that someone your age is still studying Albertus Magnus and Paracelsus,” he continued. “If you want to become a serious student of science, you must start again from the beginning.”
He wrote down the names of several books.
“Buy these. You need to learn modern natural philosophy.”
Then he told me that he would begin a series of lectures the following week.
“Professor Waldman will teach chemistry on the days when I do not lecture,” he added.
I thanked him and left.
I was not exactly disappointed.
I already knew that the old alchemists were no longer considered important by modern scientists. But Professor Krempe had certainly done nothing to make me interested in modern science.
His personality was as unpleasant as his appearance.
For most of my childhood, I had been dissatisfied with the science taught by modern scholars.
When I was young, I had wanted something greater.
Modern science seemed interested in practical discoveries, while the old alchemists had dreamed of extraordinary things—immortality, unlimited power, and the secrets of life itself.
Their dreams had been impossible, but to me they had seemed magnificent.
Modern science, by comparison, appeared ordinary.
It seemed to be destroying the very mysteries that had made science fascinating to me.
For the first few days at Ingolstadt, I spent most of my time exploring the town and becoming familiar with the university.
Then the following week arrived.
I remembered Professor Krempe’s lectures.
I had no desire to sit in a room and listen to that arrogant little man speak.
But I was curious about Professor Waldman.
I had not met him yet because he had been away from the university.
So, partly out of curiosity and partly because I had nothing better to do, I went to his lecture.
Professor Waldman arrived shortly afterward.
He was completely different from Krempe.
He appeared to be around fifty years old. A few gray hairs showed at his temples, while the hair at the back of his head was still dark.
He was short but stood very straight.
And his voice was remarkably gentle.
He began by explaining the history of chemistry and describing the discoveries made by earlier scientists.
Then he explained how the science had developed into what it was in his own time.
After a few simple experiments, he began talking about the achievements of modern chemistry.
His words caught my attention.
“The old teachers of this science promised impossible things,” he said. “They dreamed of turning ordinary metals into gold and discovering the secret of eternal life. But they never achieved those things.”
He paused.
“Modern scientists make much smaller promises. We know that metals cannot simply be transformed into one another, and we know that the so-called elixir of life is nothing more than a fantasy.”
I expected him to criticize science further.
Instead, his expression became more excited.
“But don’t mistake modest goals for insignificant achievements.”
He looked around the room.
“Modern scientists have accomplished things that would have seemed like magic to earlier generations.”
“They have entered the hidden workings of nature. They have discovered how blood moves through the body and what the air around us is made of.”
His voice grew stronger.
“They have learned to control forces that once seemed completely beyond human power.”
I sat perfectly still.
“They can create forces that imitate thunder and earthquakes,” he continued. “They have pushed the boundaries of what humanity thought possible.”
Something changed inside me.
His words seemed to unlock something that had been buried in my mind for years.
I could hardly breathe.
Suddenly, one thought overwhelmed everything else.
If so much had already been discovered, then how much more might still be possible?
I thought to myself:
Others have already gone this far.
Then I can go farther.
I will discover what no one else has discovered.
I will enter places where science has never been.
I will uncover the deepest secrets of creation.
That night, I could not sleep.
My mind was racing.
I felt as though something inside me had been awakened, something powerful that I could neither control nor understand.
Eventually, toward morning, exhaustion overcame me.
When I woke, the intensity of the previous night seemed almost like a dream.
But one decision remained.
I would return to the subjects I had once studied.
I would devote myself completely to science.
The very same day, I went to Professor Waldman’s home.
He was even more pleasant in private than he had been during his lecture.
At the university, he had seemed dignified and serious. At home, he was warm, friendly, and approachable.
I told him about my earlier studies and admitted that I had spent years reading the works of the old alchemists.
When I mentioned the names of Cornelius Agrippa and Paracelsus, he smiled.
But unlike Professor Krempe, he did not laugh at me.
“Those men were wrong about many things,” he said, “but their work was not completely useless.”
I looked at him carefully.
“Modern science owes them more than most people realize,” he continued. “They gathered many observations and laid some of the foundations that later scientists built upon.”
He smiled.
“Even when great minds follow the wrong path, their work can eventually help humanity.”
His words made sense to me.
Then I told him that his lecture had changed my opinion of modern chemistry.
“I had always thought modern science was dull compared with the dreams of the old alchemists,” I admitted. “But after hearing you, I realize I may have been wrong.”
Professor Waldman smiled.
“I’m pleased to hear that.”
“I want to study seriously,” I said. “What books should I begin with?”
“I am happy to have gained a new student,” he replied. “And if you work as hard as you are capable of working, I believe you can succeed.”
He paused.
“Chemistry is one of the areas of natural philosophy where the greatest discoveries are still being made. That is why I have devoted so much of my own time to it.”
“But don’t study chemistry alone.”
“Why not?”
“Because a true scientist needs a broad understanding of nature. You should study physics, mathematics, and every other important branch of natural philosophy.”
He then took me into his laboratory.
The room was filled with strange machines and scientific instruments.
He showed me how each one worked and explained what I would eventually need for my own experiments.
“You may use some of my equipment later,” he told me, “once you know enough not to damage it.”
I laughed.
“I’ll be careful.”
He gave me a list of books and explained where I could obtain them.
I thanked him and left.
That day changed my life.
I did not know it then, but my meeting with Professor Waldman had set me on a path that would determine my entire future.
And once I had taken that first step, there would be no turning back.