Alberti was the son of a flour miller. He did not regularly attend school due to the distance between his parents' house and the local school. However, the miller's apprentice, Jan Mulder, taught the boy to read. He made good progress, and soon the teacher took his student with him to the church. To his amazement, he noticed that the boy kept his attention on the pulpit. When Alberti returned home, his mother asked him if he remembered anything that had been said. He stood upon a wooden crate in the living room, recited the text of the sermon, and declaimed parts of it with such simplicity that his mother had tears in her eyes. From that moment on, the parents had the hope that their child could aim for something higher than the work of his parents. And he did not disappoint them: after having risen to the top of his class at the Latin school, he was sent to the University of Franeker in 1718. Here, he immersed himself in the study of Antiquity with Lambertus Bos and Campegius Vitringa. Vitringa also gave him a thorough education in theology. When he finished his studies in Franeker after six years, he was known as a person with excellent ability who held great promise for the advancement of science and his homeland.
