First of all, a line-by-line **transcription** of what is supposed to be the **final version**. The parts in **bold** are the result of cancellations, substitutions or other changes. A few corrections to the punctuation are in [square brackets]. I also included in (round brackets) the rest of the first and last line, which you omitted. >(der hiesigen Universität nicht gekannt.) Die theologischen Professoren hatten von ihm **eben genug gehört, um** Vorurtheil gegen diesen “modernen Rationalismus”, wie es systematisch hieß[,] **zu hegen**[;] **auch** mich hatte dieß Vorurtheil angesteckt; es war mir zu lieb[,] durch ein allgemeines Verdammungsurtheil gegen das System, **der schweren Mühe des Durcharbeitens** überhoben zu sein. (Aber **dieß[e]** Befreiung war ein gewaltsamer,) A loose **paraphrase**: >The professors knew little about him – just enough to harbor a prejudice against his “rationalism”. >This prejudice had also caught on to me: it was all too convenient for me, by subscribing to a wholesale condemnation of the system, to be relieved from doing the heavy work of going through [his writings]. The word you tentatively read as “lens” is “lieb”, in the meaning “willkommen, angenehm”. “fügen” is actually “hegen”: to harbor (a prejudice). Finally, here is a reconstruction of the **parts that were crossed out or changed** (the ones in bold above). In the second-to-last case, there seem to have been 3 layers before the final version, which I labelled (1)-(4). Conjectures for unfinished words are in {braces}. > - eigentlich nur gehört, und hegten nur [...] systematisch hieß; > - mich hatte dieß Vorurtheil auch > - (1) der schweren Arbeit[,] es mir anzu{eignen} (2) der schweren Arbeit[,] es zu durchgeh{en} (3) einer schweren Mühe (4) der schweren Mühe des Durcharbeitens [final version]. > - dies Gefühl der Befreiung