At times, I was supposed to do this, at another time that, in any case something illegal. In the end, I only resisted like in a dream. If I had only told my parents or at least my grandmother what state I was in, the deep fall I was heading for would surely have been avoided. And it came, not at home, but in Leipzig, to where some business connected with the theatre had brought me. There I have, though I did not need anything of the kind, bought furs and ran off with them, without paying. How I was capable of doing something like this, I can no longer tell; I probably did not even know it then either. This is because I feel sure and certain, that I could not have possibly acted this way while being fully conscious of what I was doing. I remember nothing at all of the ensuing trail, neither any detail nor any general impression. I also cannot recall how the verdict read. Up until now, I had believed that the sentence had been four years of imprisonment; but according to what the newspapers have recently reported, it was even one month more. But this is irrelevant. What matters is that the gaping abyss had not opened for me in vain. I had plunged into it; I was committed to the state penitentiary of Zwickau. Before I elaborate on my imprisonment, I have to turn against some prejudices and wrong opinions, concerning everything connected with the penal system, which should finally be done away with. I have heard many an educated fellow prisoner threatening with understandable, but unfounded bitterness, that he would, after he had been released, write a book about his imprisonment, to disclose the equally severe as numerous shortcomings of our legal and penal system. A wise man would smile at such threats, which might be expressed, but are hardly ever carried out. Every released prisoner, if he possesses a sense of honour, is glad to have put the time of his punishment behind him. He would never consider making this public, what up to now only a few people knew about, now that he has managed to get through it. Thus, he will remain silent. And this is good, because his book, if he would write it, would surely prove that there is hardly one among a thousand prisoners who would be able to assess himself and his punishment impartially and objectively. But I believe that I have worked my way up to this objectivity and impartiality; I regard my conclusions as well considered and correct and feel obliged to set the following point straight, here: The times when the prisons could be described as "schools for criminals" are long gone. In our penitentiaries, conditions are not less moral and not less humane than in freedom. What was one denounced as "the world of the criminals", does not exist any more. The inmates of today's penitentiaries come from all classes of the population. In respect to their professions and intelligence, the same percentages are to be found here as among the "unpunished".