In spite of my hopes that Weiss’s lectures would do me much good, I was not capable of continuing to attend them, as my desires in those days drove me to anything but the study of aesthetics.  Nevertheless, my mother’s anxiety at this time on my behalf made me try to take up music again.  As Muller, the teacher under whom I had studied till that time, had not been able to inspire me with a permanent love of study, it was necessary to discover whether another teacher might not be better able to induce me to do serious work.

Theodor Weinlich, who was choirmaster and musical director at St. Thomas’s Church, held at that time this important and ancient post which was afterwards occupied by Schicht, and before him by no less a person than Sebastian Bach.  By education he belonged to the old Italian school of music, and had studied in Bologna under Pater Martini.  He had made a name for himself in this art by his vocal compositions, in which his fine manner of treating the parts was much praised.  He himself told me one day that a Leipzig publisher had offered him a very substantial fee if he would write for his firm another book of vocal exercises similar to the one which had proved so profitable to his first publisher.  Weinlich told him that he had not got any exercises of the kind ready at the moment, but offered him instead a new Mass, which the publisher refused with the words:  ’Let him who got the meat gnaw the bones.’  The modesty with which Weinlich told me this little story showed how excellent a man he was.  As he was in a very bad and weak state of health when my mother introduced me to him, he at first refused to take me as a pupil.  But, after having resisted all persuasions, he at last took pity on my musical education, which, as he soon discovered from a fugue which I had brought with me, was exceedingly faulty.  He accordingly promised to teach me, on condition that I should give up all attempts at composing for six months, and follow his instructions implicitly.  To the first part of my promise I remained faithful, thanks to the vast vortex of dissipation into which my life as a student had drawn me.

When, however, I had to occupy myself for any length of time with nothing but four-part harmony exercises in strictly rigorous style, it was not only the student in me, but also the composer of so many overtures and sonatas, that was thoroughly disgusted.  Weinlich, too, had his grievances against me, and decided to give me up.

During this period I came to the crisis of my life, which led to the catastrophe of that terrible evening at the gambling den.  But an even greater blow than this fearful experience awaited me when Weinlich decided not to have anything more to do with me.  Deeply humiliated and miserable, I besought the gentle old man, whom I loved dearly, to forgive me, and I promised him from that moment to work with unflagging energy.  One morning at seven o’clock Weinlich sent for me to begin the rough sketch for a fugue; he devoted the whole morning to me, following my work bar by bar with the greatest attention, and giving me his valuable advice.  At twelve o’clock he dismissed me with the instruction to perfect and finish the sketch by filling in the remaining parts at home.