The Poor Man of Toggenburg - Autobiography of Ulrich Bräker

28th Aug. Bräker has to work on a piece of cloth that had been woven of rotten yarn [Faules Garn, i.e. liable to break]. [Chronik, p 110]

10th Sept. Two earth tremors took place between 4 and 5 in the afternoon, causing chimney-pots and tiles to fall from roofs. [Chronik, p 111]

13th-14th Sept. Bräker dreams that there are two ghosts in the house, having the form of hideous little boys. He cries out and awakes, then having fallen asleep again dreams that a man is trying to hand over to him a boy who is being pursued, so that he can hide in his [Bräker's] house. Bräker refuses, from fear of being pursued in his turn. Over the night of the 15th-16th he dreams of an evil man, who sets a fire in the sky above his house in order to burn the house. But he does not succeed, the flames turn away from the house. In a second dream Bräker is running through deep water and saves a woman from its dark floods. On the 18th he arrives at an interpretation: the ugly boys are spirits in his heart, one of impurity and the other of wrath and resentment. The persecuted boy is Jesus. Bräker prays that the Saviour will come into his soul and drive out all the devilish spirits. [Chronik, p 112]

25th Sept. Bräker attends a meeting of the commune. He goes to church with all his children, where a curious tobacco-box is being passed round, which nobody can open. Bräker succeeds, and wins a bet of two measures of wine.

[This seems odd behaviour in church. Perhaps the meeting was being held there, but the day was Sunday and it is unlikely that children would have been present at the meeting. Possibly the puzzle whiled away the time between the service and the meeting. Bräker does not mention feeling guilty about this, the inevitable moral two days later compares the puzzle to striving after earthly happiness.]

4th Oct. Salome has gone to visit her family and the children are in school.. Bräker writes some verses on the theme of solitude. [Chronik, p 112]

10th Oct. Bräker counts the blessings of autumn on the neighbourhood: health, peace, cheap food, work for all, even for children, a good harvest of fruit and vegetables. [Chronik, p 113]

17th Oct. Heinrich Looser of the Thur valley collapses suddenly on the way to the market in Lichtensteig, and dies near Wattwil. [Chronik, p 113]

26th Oct. Bräker asserts that nobody can dictate to another what they should believe. That is why there are so many religions and so many sects within them. Even outward events, like signs from heaven, are often differently interpreted. "I believe in God and His Word." The entry for the 30th adds that Jesus never compelled anyone to believe in Him. On Nov. 6th he continues the theme by saying that all denominations contain people whose beliefs are justified by their works of love. [Chronik, p 113]

[This entry can be see as marking an important change in Bräker's thinking: his desire for a less rigid system of Christian belief.]

30th Oct. "Dissimilar belief makes for conflict. I have often been greatly amazed, when I have been reading controversial writings that learned men have heatedly written against one another, how they could arrive at imposing their beliefs on another person." Another extract of the same date: "I should not say that we Protestants had the right true faith: but I do not believe that He is to be met with in any one religion alone. But I believe that in our religion, and in other religions too, men of right belief are to be found, and can be found because God cannot be tied to any one outward religion or sect." [Böning, pp 88-89]

24th Nov. Since the beginning of the month the weather has been severe. The entry for the 30th adds that no two years are alike in their weather. On 1st Dec. Bräker notes that there has not been snowfall like this in living memory. [Chronik, p 114]