How Did Gabriel Survive in the Woods for Months?

Gabriel seems to have replaced the affection he once expressed for his parents with a love of italy. He wrote ceaselessly, and when study time ended every evening, he would collect the excess lamp oil from the other boys so he could stay up all night writing. At aged 16, he could speak and write fluently in italian, greek, latin english, french and spanish. Tt destroys my thesis that that making children survive alone in the woods for months, what would stop them from becoming monsters? Well, your theory is that you would do that at a young age, or they had a chance to think that they were messiahs. But