The New International Encyclopædia/Gellert, Christian Fürchtegott

GELLERT, gĕl'ẽrt, (1715-69). The most important of the forerunners of the golden age of German literature that was ushered in by Lessing. He was born at Hainichen, Saxony, and studied theology at Leipzig, where he afterwards passed most of his life as tutor, teacher, and professor, and where he died. His didactic and religious poems, fables, and stories were in their day immensely popular, as were his lectures on morals and literature. His Works (10 vols., 1769-74 and 1867) are types of the innocuous and rationalistic. His Fabeln und Erzählungen (1746) and the religious poems are still often republished separately. His Tagebuch (1869) is the best available biography. Consult also his Life by Döring (Greiz, 1833).