No More Learning

The third and last reason for the icy silence
which has greeted Nietzsche in this country is due
to the fact that he has—as far as I know—no
literary ancestor over here whose teachings could
have prepared you for him. Germany has had
her Goethe to do this; France her Stendhal; in
Russia we find that fearless curiosity for all
problems, which is the sign of a youthful, perhaps
too youthful nation; while in Spain, on the other
hand, we have an old and experienced people, with
a long training away from Christianity under the
dominion of the Semitic Arabs, who undoubtedly
left some of their blood behind,—but I find great
difficulty in pointing out any man over here who
could serve as a useful guide to the heights of the
Nietzschean thought, except one, who was not a
Britisher. I am alluding to a man whose politics
you used to consider and whose writings you even
now consider as fantastic, but who, like another
fantast of his race, may possess the wonderful gift
of resurrection, and come again to life amongst
you—to Benjamin Disraeli.
The Disraelian Novels are in my opinion the
best and only preparation for those amongst you
who wish gradually to become acquainted with
the Nietzschean spirit. There, and nowhere else,
will you find the true heroes of coming times,



## p. xxi (#59) #############################################

AN INTRODUCTORY ESSAY.
xxi
men of moral courage, men whose failures and
successes are alike admirable, men whose noble
passions have altogether superseded the ordinary
vulgarities and moralities of lower beings, men
endowed with an extraordinary imagination,
which, however, is balanced by an equal power of
reason, men already anointed with a drop of that
sacred and noble oil, without which the High
Priest-Philosopher of Modern Germany would not
have crowned his Royal Race of the Future.
Both Disraeli and Nietzsche you perceive start-
ing from the same pessimistic diagnosis of the
wild anarchy, the growing melancholy, the threat-
ening Nihilism of Modern Europe, for both
recognised the danger of the age behind its loud
and forced "shipwreck gaiety," behind its big-
mouthed talk about progress and evolution, behind
that veil of business-bustle, which hides its fear
and utter despair—but for all that black outlook
they are not weaklings enough to mourn and let
things go, nor do they belong to that cheap class
of society doctors who mistake the present
wretchedness of Humanity for sinfulness, and
wish to make their patient less sinful and still
more wretched. Both Nietzsche and Disraeli have
clearly recognised that this patient of theirs is
suffering from weakness and not from sinfulness,
for which latter some kind of strength may still be
required; both are therefore entirely opposed to a
further dieting him down to complete moral ema-
ciation, but are, on the contrary, prescribing a
tonic, a roborating, a natural regime for him
-advice for which both doctors have been


## p. xxii (#60) ############################################

xxil NIETZSCHE IN ENGLAND.
reproached with Immorality by their contemporaries
as well as by posterity. But the younger doctor
has turned the tables upon their accusers, and has
openly reproached his Nazarene colleagues with
the Immorality of endangering life itself, he has
clearly demonstrated to the world that their
trustful and believing patient was shrinking
beneath their very fingers, he has candidly foretold
these Christian quacks that one day they would
be in the position of the quack skin-specialist at
the fair, who, as a proof of his medical skill, used
to show to the peasants around him the skin of
a completly cured patient of his. Both Nietzsche
and Disraeli know the way to health, for they
have had the disease of the age themselves, but
they have—the one partly, the other entirely—
cured themselves of it, they have resisted the spirit
of their time, they have escaped the fate of their
contemporaries; they therefore, and they alone,
know their danger. This is the reason why they
both speak so violently, why they both attack
with such bitter fervour the utilitarian and mat-
erialistic attitude of English Science, why they
both so ironically brush aside the airy and fantastic
ideals of German Philosophy—this is why they
both loudly declare (to use Disraeli's words) "that
we are the slaves of false knowledge; that our
memories are filled with ideas that have no origin
in truth; that we believe what our fathers
credited, who were convinced without a cause;
that we study human nature in a charnel house,
and, like the nations of the East, pay divine
honours to the maniac and the fool. " But if these


## p. xxiii (#61) ###########################################

AN INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. XXlli
two great men cannot refrain from such outspoken
vituperation—they also lead the way: they both
teach the divinity of ideas and the vileness of
action without principle; they both exalt the value
of personality and character; they both deprecate
the influence of society and socialisation; they
both intensely praise and love life, but they both
pour contempt and irony upon the shallow
optimist, who thinks it delightful, and the quietist,
who wishes it to be calm, sweet, and peaceful.
They thus both preach a life of danger, in opposi-
tion to that of pleasure, of comfort, of happiness,
and they do not only preach this noble life, they
also act it: for both have with equal determination
staked even their lives on the fulfilment of their
ideal.
It is astonishing—but only astonishing to your
superficial student of the Jewish character—that
in Disraeli also we find an almost Nietzschean
appreciation of that eternal foe of the Jewish race,
the Hellenist, which makes Disraeli, just like
Nietzsche, confess that the Greek and the Hebrew
are both amongst the highest types of the human
kind. It is not less astonishing—but likewise
easily intelligible for one who knows something
of the great Jews of the Middle Ages—that in
Disraeli we discover that furious enmity against
the doctrine of the natural equality of men which
Nietzsche combated all his life. It was certainly
the great Maimonides himself, that spiritual father
of Spinoza, who guided the pen of his Sephardic
descendant, when he thus wrote in his Tancred:
"It is to be noted, although the Omnipotent


## p. xxiv (#62) ############################################

XXIV NIETZSCHE IN ENGLAND.
Creator might have formed, had it pleased him, in
the humblest of his creations, an efficient agent
for his purpose that Divine Majesty has never
thought fit to communicate except with human
beings of the very highest order. "
But what about Christianity, to which Disraeli
was sincerely attached, and whose creation he
always considered as one of the eternal glories of
his race? Did not the Divine Majesty think it
fit then to communicate with the most humble of
its creatures, with the fishermen of Galilee, with
the rabble of Corinth, with the slaves, the women,
the criminals of the Roman Empire? As I wish
to be honest about Disraeli, I must point out here,
that his genius, although the most prominent
in England during his lifetime, and although
violently opposed to its current superstitions, still
partly belongs to his age—and for this very
pardonable reason, that in his Jewish pride he
overrated and even misunderstood Christianity.
He all but overlooked the narrow connection
between Christianity and Democracy. He did
not see that in fighting Liberalism and Noncon-
formity all his life, he was really fighting Christi-
anity, the Protestant Form of which is at the root
of British Liberalism and Individualism to this
very day. And when later in his life Disraeli
complained that the disturbance in the mind of
nations has been occasioned by "the powerful
assault on the Divinity of the Semitic Literature
by the Germans," he overlooked likewise the
connection of this German movement with the
same Protestantism, from the narrow and vulgar


## p. xxv (#63) #############################################

AN INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. XXV
middle-class of which have sprung all those
rationalising, unimaginative, and merely clever
professors, who have so successfully undermined
the ancient and venerable lore. And thirdly, and
worst of all, Disraeli never suspected that the
French Revolution, which in the same breath he
once contemptuously denounced as "the Celtic
Rebellion against Semitic laws," was, in spite of
its professed attack against religion, really a pro-
foundly Christian, because a democratic and
revolutionary movement. What a pity he did
not know all this! What a shower of splendid
additional sarcasms he would have poured over
those flat-nosed Franks, had he known what I
know now, that it is the eternal way of the Chris-
tian to be a rebel, and that just as he has once
rebelled against us, he has never ceased pestering
and rebelling against any one else either of his own
or any other creed.
But it is so easy for me to be carried away by
that favourite sport of mine, of which I am the
first inventor among the Jews—Christian baiting.
You must forgive this, however, in a Jew, who,
while he has been baited for two thousand years
by you, likes to turn round now that the oppor-
tunity has come, and tries to indulge on his part
also in a little bit of that genial pastime. I
candidly confess it is delightful, and I now quite
understand your ancestors hunting mine as much
as they could—had I been a Christian, I would,
probably, have done the same; perhaps have done
it even better, for no one would now be left to
write any such impudent truisms against me—


## p. xxvi (#64) ############################################

XXVI NIETZSCHE IN ENGLAND.
rest assured of that! But as I am a Jew, and
have had too much experience of the other side
of the question, I must try to control myself in
the midst of victory; I must judge things calmly;
I must state fact honestly; I must not allow my-
self to be unjust towards you. First of all, then,
this rebelling faculty of yours is a Jewish in-
heritance, an inheritance, however, of which you
have made a more than generous, a truly Christian
use, because you did not keep it niggardly for
yourselves, but have distributed it all over the earth,
from Nazareth to Nishni-Novgorod, from Jerusalem
to Jamaica, from Palestine to Pimlico, so that
every one is a rebel and an anarchist nowadays.
But, secondly, I must not forget that in every
Anarchist, and therefore in every Christian, there
is also, or may be, an aristocrat—a man who,
just like the anarchist, but with a perfectly holy
right, wishes to obey no laws but those of his own
conscience; a man who thinks too highly of his
own faith and persuasion, to convert other people
to it; a man who, therefore, would never carry it
to Caffres and Coolis; a man, in short, with whom
even the noblest and exclusive Hebrew could shake
hands. In Friedrich Nietzsche this aristocratic
element which may be hidden in a Christian has
been brought to light, in him the Christian's
eternal claim for freedom of conscience, for his
own priesthood, for justification by his own faith,
is no longer used for purposes of destruction and
rebellion, but for those of command and creation;
in him—and this is the key to the character of
this extraordinary man, who both on his father's


## p. xxvii (#65) ###########################################

AN INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. XXVII
and mother's side was the descendant of a long line
of Protestant Parsons—the Christian and Protes-
tant spirit of anarchy became so strong that he
rebelled even against his own fellow-Anarchists,
and told them that Anarchy was a low and con-
temptible thing, and that Revolution was an
occupation fit only for superior slaves. But with
this event the circle of Christianity has become
closed, and the exclusive House of Israel is now
under the delightful obligation to make its peace
with its once lost and now reforming son.
The venerable Owner of this old house is still
standing on its threshold: his face is pale, his
expression careworn, his eyes apparently scanning
something far in the distance. The wind—for
there is a terrible wind blowing just now—is
playing havoc with his long white Jew-beard, but
this white Jew-beard of his is growing black again
at the end, and even the sad eyes are still capable
of quite youthful flashes, as may be noticed at
this very moment. For the eyes of the old Jew,
apparently so dreamy and so far away, have
suddenly become fixed upon something in the
distance yonder. The old Jew looks and looks—
and then he rubs his eyes—and then he eagerly
looks again. And now he is sure of himself.
His old and haggard face is lighting up, his
stooped figure suddenly becomes more erect, and
a tear of joy is seen running over his pale cheek
into that long beard of his. For the old Jew has
recognised some one coming from afar—some one
whom he had missed, but never mentioned, for
his Law forbade him to do this—some one, how-


## p. xxviii (#66) ##########################################

XXVlii NIETZSCHE IN ENGLAND.
ever, for whom he had secretly always mourned,
as only the race of the psalmists and the prophets
can mourn—and he rushes toward him, and he
falls on his neck and he kisses him, and he says
to his servants: "Bring forth the best robe and
put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and
shoes on his feet. And bring hither the fatted
calf, and kill it and let us eat and be merry! "
AMEN.
OSCAR LEVY.
London,
January 1909.


## p. xxix (#67) ############################################

TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.
To the reader who knows Nietzsche, who has
studied his Zarathustra and understood it, and
who, in addition, has digested the works entitled
Beyond Good and Evil, The Genealogy of Morals,
The Twilight of the Idols, and The Antichrist,—
to such a reader everything in this volume will
be perfectly clear and comprehensible. In the
attack on Strauss he will immediately detect the
germ of the whole of Nietzsche's subsequent
attitude towards too hasty contentment and the
foolish beatitude of the "easily pleased"; in the
paper on Wagner he will recognise Nietzsche the
indefatigable borer, miner and underminer, seeking
to define his ideals, striving after self-knowledge
above all, and availing himself of any contemporary
approximation to his ideal man, in order to press
it forward as the incarnation of his thoughts.
Wagner the reformer of mankind! Wagner the
dithyrambic dramatist! —The reader who knows
Nietzsche will not be misled by these expressions.
To the uninitiated reader, however, some words
of explanation are due, not only in regard to the
two papers before us, but in regard to Nietzsche
himself. So much in our time is learnt from hear-
say concerning prominent figures in science, art


## p. xxx (#68) #############################################

XXX translator's preface.
religion, or philosophy, that it is hardly possible
for anybody to-day, however badly informed he
may be, to begin the study of any great writer or
scientist with a perfectly open mind. It were well,
therefore, to begin the study of Nietzsche with some
definite idea as to his unaltered purpose, if he ever
possessed such a thing; as to his lifelong ideal, if
he ever kept one so long; and as to the one direc-
tion in which he always travelled, despite apparent
deviations and windings. Had he such a purpose,
such an ideal, such a direction? We have no wish
to open a controversy here, neither do we think
that in replying to this question in the affirmative
we shall give rise to one; for every careful student
of Nietzsche, we know, will uphold us in our view.
Nietzsche had one very definite and unaltered
purpose, ideal and direction, and this was "the
elevation of the type man. " He tells us in The
Will to Power: "All is truth to me that tends to
elevate man! " To this principle he was already
pledged as a student at Leipzig; we owe every line
that he ever wrote to his devotion to it, and it is the
key to all his complexities, blasphemies, prolixities,
and terrible earnestness. All was good to Nietzsche
that tended to elevate man; all was bad that kept
man stationary or sent him backwards. Hence he
wrote David Strauss, the Confessor and Writer
(i873).
The Franco-German War had only just come
to an end, and the keynote of this polemical
pamphlet is," Beware of the intoxication of success. "
When the whole of Germany was delirious with
joy over her victory, at a time when the unques-


## p. xxxi (#69) ############################################

TRANSLATORS PREFACE. XXXI
tioned triumph of her arms tended rather to reflect
unearned glory upon every department of her social
organisation, it required both courage and discern-
ment to raise the warning voice and to apply the
wet blanket. But Nietzsche did both, and with
spirit, because his worst fears were aroused. Smug
content {erbdrmliches Behageii) was threatening to
thwart his one purpose — the elevation of man;
smug content personified in the German scholar
was giving itself airs of omniscience, omnipotence,
and ubiquity, and all the while it was a mere cover
for hidden rottenness and jejune pedantry.
Nietzsche's attack on Hegelian optimism alone
(pp. 46, 53-54), in the first paper, fully reveals the
fundamental idea underlying this essay; and if the
personal attack on Strauss seems sometimes to
throw the main theme into the background, we
must remember the author's own attitude towards
this aspect of the case. Nietzsche, as a matter of
fact, had neither the spite nor the meanness re-
quisite for the purely personal attack. In his Ecce
Homo, he tells us most emphatically: "I have no
desire to attack particular persons—I do but use a
personality as a magnifying glass; I place it over
the subject to which I wish to call attention, merely
that the appeal may be stronger. " David Strauss,
in a letter to a friend, soon after the publication of
the first Thought out of Season, expresses his utter
astonishment that a total stranger should have
made such a dead set at him. The same problem
may possibly face the reader on every page of this
essay: if, however, we realise Nietzsche's purpose,
if we understand his struggle to be one against
c


## p. xxxii (#70) ###########################################

XXX11 TRANSLATORS PREFACE.
"Culture-Philistinism" in general, as a stemming,
stultifying and therefore degenerate factor, and
regard David Strauss—as the author himself did,
that is to say, simply as a glass, focusing the whole
light of our understanding upon the main theme—
then the Strauss paper is seen to be one of such
enormous power, and its aim appears to us so lofty,
that, whatever our views may be concerning the
nature of the person assailed, we are forced to con-
clude that, to Nietzsche at least, he was but the
incarnation and concrete example of the evil and
danger then threatening to overtake his country,
which it was the object of this essay to expose.
When we read that at the time of Strauss's death
(February 7th, 1874) Nietzsche was greatly tor-
mented by the fear that the old scholar might have
been hastened to his end by the use that had been
made of his personality in the first Unzeitgemasse
Betrachtung; when we remember that in the midst
of this torment he ejaculated, "I was indeed not
made to hate and have enemies ! "—we are then in
a better position to judge of the motives which,
throughout his life, led him to engage such formid-
able opponents and to undertake such relentless
attacks. It was merely his ruling principle that
all is true and good that tends to elevate man;
everything is bad and false that keeps man station-
ary or sends him backwards.
Those who may think that his attacks were often
unwarrantable and ill-judged will do well, there-
fore, to bear this in mind, that whatever his value
or merits may have been as an iconoclast, at least
the aim he had was sufficiently lofty and honour-


## p. xxxiii (#71) ##########################################

translator's preface. XXXlii
able, and that he never shirked the duties which
he rightly or wrongly imagined would help him to
achieve it.
In the Wagner paper (1875-1876) we are faced
by a somewhat different problem. Most readers
who will have heard of Nietzsche's subsequent de-
nunciation of Wagner's music will probably stand
aghast before this panegyric of him; those who,
like Professor Saintsbury, will fail to discover the
internal evidence in this essay which points so
infallibly to Nietzsche's real but still subconscious
opinion of his hero, may even be content to regard
his later attitude as the result of a complete volte-
face, and at any rate a flat contradiction of the one
revealed in this paper. Let us, however, examine
the internal evidence we speak of, and let us also
discuss the purpose and spirit of the essay.
We have said that Nietzsche was a man with a
very fixed and powerful ideal, and we have heard
what this ideal was. Can we picture him, then,—a
young and enthusiastic scholar with a cultured
love of music, and particularly of Wagner's music,
eagerly scanning all his circle, the whole city and
country in which he lived—yea, even the whole
continent on which he lived—for something or
some one that would set his doubts at rest concern-
ing the feasibility of his ideal? Can we now picture
this young man coming face to face with probably
one of the greatest geniuses of his age—with a man
whose very presence must have been electric, whose
every word or movement must have imparted some
power to his surroundings—with Richard Wagner?
If we can conceive of what the mere attention,


## p. xxxiv (#72) ###########################################

XXXIV TRANSLATORS PREFACE.
even, of a man like Wagner must have meant to
Nietzsche in his twenties, if we can form any idea
of the intoxicating effect produced upon him when
this attention developed into friendship, we almost
refuse to believe that Nietzsche could have been
critical at all at first. In Wagner, as was but
natural, he soon began to see the ideal, or at least
the means to the ideal, which was his one obsession.
All his hope for the future of Germany and Europe
cleaved, as it were, to this highest manifestation of
their people's life, and gradually he began to invest
his already great friend with all the extra greatness
which he himself drew from the depths of his own
soul.
The friendship which grew between them was of
that rare order in which neither can tell who in-
fluences the other more. Wagner would often
declare that the beautiful music in the third act of
Siegfried was to be ascribed to Nietzsche's influence
over him; he also adopted the young man's ter-
minology in art matters, and the concepts implied
by the words " Dionysian " and " Apollonian " were
borrowed by him from his friend's discourses. How
much Nietzsche owed to Wagner may perhaps
never be definitely known; to those who are suffici-
ently interested to undertake the investigation of
this matter, we would recommend Hans B^lart's
book, Nietzsche's Ethik; in it references will be
found which give some clue as to the probable
sources from which the necessary information may
be derived. In any case, however, the reciprocal
effects of their conversations will never be exactly
known; and although it would be ridiculous to


## p. xxxv (#73) ############################################

TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. XXXV
assume that Nietzsche was essentially the same
when he left as when he met him, what the real
nature of the change was it is now difficult to say.
For some years their friendship continued firm,
and grew ever more and more intimate. The Birth
of Tragedy was one of the first public declarations
of it, and after its publication many were led to
consider that Wagner's art was a sort of resurrec-
tion of the Dionysian Grecian art. Enemies of
Nietzsche began to whisper that he was merely
Wagner's " literary lackey "; many friends frowned
upon the promising young philologist, and
questioned the exaggerated importance he was
beginning to ascribe to the art of music and to art
in general, in their influence upon the world; and
all the while Nietzsche's one thought and one aim
was to help the cause and further the prospects of
the man who he earnestly believed was destined
to be the salvation of European culture.
Every great ideal coined in his own brain he
imagined to be the ideal of his hero; all his
sublimest hopes for society were presented gratis,
in his writings, to Wagner, as though products of
the latter's own mind; and just as the prophet
of old never possessed the requisite assurance to
suppose that his noblest ideas were his own, but
attributed them to some higher and supernatural
power, whom he thereby learnt to worship for its
fancied nobility of sentiment, so Nietzsche, still
doubting his own powers, created a fetich out of
his most distinguished friend, and was ultimately
wounded and well-nigh wrecked with disappoint-
ment when he found that the Wagner of the


## p. xxxvi (#74) ###########################################

xxxvi translator's preface.
Gotterdammerung and Parsifal was not the Wagner
of his own mind.
While writing Ecce Homo, he was so well aware
of the extent to which he had gone in idealising
his friend, that he even felt able to say: " Wagner
in Bayreuth is a vision of my own future. . . . Now
that I can look back upon this work, I would not
like to deny that, at bottom, it speaks only of
myself" (p. 74). And on another page of the
same book we read: ". . . What I heard, as a
young man, in Wagnerian music, had absolutely
nothing to do with Wagner: when I described
Dionysian music, I only described what / had
heard, and I thus translated and transfigured all
that I bore in my own soul into the spirit of the
new art. The strongest proof of this is my essay,
Wagner in Bayreuth: in all decidedly psychological
passages of this book the reader may simply read
my name, or the name ' Zarathustra,' wherever the
text contains the name 'Wagner'" (p. 68).
As we have already hinted, there are evidences
of his having subconsciously discerned the real
Wagner, even in the heyday of their friendship,
behind the ideal he had formed of him; for his
eyes were too intelligent to be deceived, even
though his understanding refused at first to heed
the messages they sent it: both the Birth of
Tragedy and Wagner in Bayreuth are with us to
prove this, and not merely when we read these
works between the lines, but when we take such
passages as those found on pp. 115, 149, 150, 151,
156, 158, 159 of this book quite literally.
Nietzsche's infatuation we have explained; the


## p. xxxvii (#75) ##########################################

translator's preface. xxxvii
consequent idealisation of the object of his infatua-
tion he himself has confessed; we have also pointed
to certain passages which we believe show beyond
a doubt that almost everything to be found in The
Case of Wagner and Nietzsche contra Wagner was
already subconscious in our author, long before he
had begun to feel even a coolness towards his hero:
let those who think our interpretation of the
said passages is either strained or unjustified turn
to the literature to which we have referred and
judge for themselves. It seems to us that those
distinguished critics who complain of Nietzsche's
complete volte-face and his uncontrollable recanta-
tions and revulsions of feeling have completely
overlooked this aspect of the question.
It were well for us to bear in mind that we are
not altogether free to dispose of Nietzsche's attitude
to Wagner, at any given period in their relation-
ship, with a single sentence of praise or of blame.
After all, we are faced by a problem which no
objectivity or dispassionate detachment on our
parts can solve. Nietzsche endowed both Schopen-
hauer and Wagner with qualities and aspirations
so utterly foreign to them both, that neither of
them would have recognised himself in the images
he painted of them. His love for them was un-
usual; perhaps it can only be fully understood
emotionally by us: like all men who are capable
of very great love, Nietzsche lent the objects of his
affection anything they might happen to lack in
the way of greatness, and when at last his eyes
were opened, genuine pain, not malice, was the
motive of even the most bitter of his diatribes.


## p. xxxviii (#76) #########################################

xxxviii translator's preface.
Finally, we should, just like to give one more
passage from Ecce Homo bearing upon the subject
under discussion. It is particularly interesting
from an autobiographical standpoint, and will
perhaps afford the best possible conclusion to this
preface.
Nietzsche is writing about Wagner's music, and
he says: "The world must indeed be empty for
him who has never been unhealthy enough for this
'infernal voluptuousness'; it is allowable and yet
almost forbidden to use a mystical expression in
this behalf. I suppose I know better than any one
the prodigies Wagner was capable of, the fifty
worlds of strange raptures to which no one save
him could soar; and as I stand to-day—strong
enough to convert even the most suspicious and
dangerous phenomenon to my own use and be the
stronger for it—I declare Wagner to be the great
benefactor of my life. Something will always keep
our names associated in the minds of men, and
that is, that we are two who have suffered more
excruciatingly—even at each other's hands—than
most men are able to suffer nowadays. And just
as Wagner is merely a misunderstanding among
Germans, so am I and ever will be. You lack two
centuries of psychological and artistic discipline,
my dear countrymen! . . . But it will be im-
possible for you ever to recover the time now
lost" (p. 43).
ANTHONY M. LUDOVICI.


## p. 1 (#77) ###############################################

DAVID STRAUSS,
THE CONFESSOR AND THE WRITER.


## p. 2 (#78) ###############################################



## p. 3 (#79) ###############################################

DAVID STRAUSS.
i.
Public opinion in Germany seems strictly to
forbid any allusion to the evil and dangerous con-
sequences of a war, more particularly when the
war in question has been a victorious one. Those
writers, therefore, command a more ready atten-
tion who, regarding this public opinion as final,
proceed to vie with each other in their jubilant
praise of the war, and of the powerful influences
it has brought to bear upon morality, culture, and
art. Yet it must be confessed that a great victory
is a great danger. Human nature bears a triumph
less easily than a defeat; indeed, it might even
be urged that it is simpler to gain a victory of
this sort than to turn it to such account that it
may not ultimately prove a serious rout.
But of all evil results due to the last contest
with France, the most deplorable, perhaps, is that
widespread and even universal error of public
opinion and of all who think publicly, that
German culture was also victorious in the struggle,
and that it should now, therefore, be decked with
garlands, as a fit recognition of such extra-


## p. 4 (#80) ###############################################

4 THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
ordinary events and successes. This error is in
the highest degree pernicious: not because it is
an error,—for there are illusions which are both
salutary and blessed,—but because it threatens to
convert our victory into a signal defeat. A defeat?
—I should say rather, into the uprooting of the
"German Mind" for the benefit of the "German
Empire. "
Even supposing that the fight had been between
the two cultures, the standard for the value of the
victor would still be a very relative one, and, in
any case, would certainly not justify such ex-
aggerated triumph or self-glorification. For, in the
first place, it would be necessary to ascertain the
worth of the conquered culture. This might be
very little; in which case, even if the victory had
involved the most glorious display of arms, it
would still offer no warrant for inordinate rapture.
Even so, however, there can be no question, in
our case, of the victory of German culture; and
for the simple reason, that French culture remains
as heretofore, and that we depend upon it as
heretofore. It did not even help towards the
success of our arms. Severe military discipline,
natural bravery and sustaining power, the superior
generalship, unity and obedience in the rank and
file—in short, factors which have nothing to do
with culture, were instrumental in making us
conquer an opponent in whom the most essential
of these factors were absent. The only wonder
is, that precisely what is now called "culture" in
Germany did not prove an obstacle to the military
operations which seemed vitally necessary to a


## p. 5 (#81) ###############################################

DAVID STRAUSS. 5
great victory. Perhaps, though, this was only
owing to the fact that this "thing" which dubs
itself "culture" saw its advantage, for once, in
keeping in the background.
If, however, it be permitted to grow and to
spread, if it be spoilt by the flattering and non-
sensical assurance that ? Vhas been victorious,—then,
as I have said, it will have the power to extirpate
German mind, and, when that is done, who knows
whether there will still be anything to be made
out of the surviving German body!
Provided it were possible to direct that calm and
tenacious bravery which the German opposed to
the pathetic and spontaneous fury of the French-
man, against the inward enemy, against the highly
suspicious and, at all events, unnative "cultivation"
which, owing to a dangerous misunderstanding,
is called "culture" in Germany, then all hope of
a really genuine German "culture " — the reverse
of that "cultivation "—would not be entirely lost.
For the Germans have never known any lack of
clear-sighted and heroic leaders, though these,
often enough, probably, have lacked Germans.
But whether it be possible to turn German bravery
into a new direction seems to me to become ever
more and more doubtful; for I realise how fully
convinced every one is that such a struggle and
such bravery are no longer requisite; on the con-
trary, that most things are regulated as satis-
factorily as they possibly can be—or, at all events,
that everything of moment has long ago been
discovered and accomplished: in a word, that the
best seed of culture is already sown everywhere,


## p. 6 (#82) ###############################################

6 THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
and is now either shooting up its fresh green
blades, or, here and there, even bursting forth into
luxuriant blossom. In this sphere, not only
happiness but ecstasy reigns supreme. I am con-
scious of this ecstasy and happiness, in the in-
effable, truculent assurance of German journalists
and manufacturers of novels, tragedies, poems,
and histories (for it must be clear that these
people belong to one category), who seem to have
conspired to improve the leisure and ruminative
hours—that is to say, " the intellectual lapses "—of
the modern man, by bewildering him with their
printed paper. Since the war, all is gladness,
dignity, and self-consciousness in this merry
throng. After the startling successes of German
culture, it regards itself, not only as approved and
sanctioned, but almost as sanctified. It therefore
speaks with gravity, affects to apostrophise the
German People, and issues complete works, after
the manner of the classics; nor does it shrink
from proclaiming in those journals which are open
to it some few of its adherents as new German
classical writers and model authors. It might be
supposed that the dangers of such an abuse of
success would be recognised by the more thought-
ful and enlightened among cultivated Germans;
or, at least, that these would feel how painful is
the comedy that is being enacted around them:
for what in truth could more readily inspire pity
than the sight of a cripple strutting like a cock
before a mirror, and exchanging complacent glances
with his reflection! But the "scholar" caste
willingly allow things to remain as they are, and


## p. 7 (#83) ###############################################

DAVID STRAUSS.
7
are too much concerned with their own affairs
to busy themselves with the care of the German
mind. Moreover, the units of this caste are too
thoroughly convinced that their own scholarship
is the ripest and most perfect fruit of the age—in
fact, of all ages—to see any necessity for a care
of German culture in general; since, in so far
as they and the legion of their brethren are con-
cerned, preoccupations of this order have every-
where been, so to speak, surpassed. The more
conscientious observer, more particularly if he be
a foreigner, cannot help noticing withal that no
great disparity exists between that which the
German scholar regards as his culture and that
other triumphant culture of the new German
classics, save in respect of the quantum of know-
ledge. Everywhere, where knowledge and not
ability, where information and not art, hold the
first rank,—everywhere, therefore, where life bears
testimony to the kind of culture extant, there is now
only one specific German culture—and this is the
culture that is supposed to have conquered France?
The contention appears to be altogether too
preposterous. It was solely to the more extensive
knowledge of German officers, to the superior
training of their soldiers, and to their more
scientific military strategy, that all impartial
judges, and even the French nation, in the end,
ascribed the victory. Hence, if it be intended
to regard German erudition as a thing apart,
in what sense can German culture be said to
have conquered? In none whatsoever; for the
moral qualities of severe discipline, of more placid


## p. 8 (#84) ###############################################

8 THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
obedience, have nothing in common with culture:
these were characteristic of the Macedonian army,
for instance, despite the fact that the Greek
soldiers were infinitely more cultivated. To speak
of German scholarship and culture as having con-
quered, therefore, can only be the outcome of a
misapprehension, probably resulting from the cir-
cumstance that every precise notion of culture has
now vanished from Germany.
Culture is, before all things, the unity of
artistic style, in every expression of the life of a
people. Abundant knowledge and learning, how-
ever, are not essential to it, nor are they a sign of
its existence; and, at a pinch, they might coexist
much more harmoniously with the very opposite
of culture—with barbarity: that is to say, with a
complete lack of style, or with a riotous jumble
of all styles. But it is precisely amid this riotous
jumble that the German of to-day subsists; and
the serious problem to be solved is: how, with
all his learning, he can possibly avoid noticing
it; how, into the bargain, he can rejoice with all
his heart in his present "culture"? For every-
thing conduces to open his eyes for him—every
glance he casts at his clothes, his room, his house;
every walk he takes through the streets of his
town; every visit he pays to his art-dealers and
to his trader in the articles of fashion. In his social
intercourse he ought to realise the origin of his
manners and movements; in the heart of our art-
institutions, the pleasures of our concerts, theatres,
and museums, he ought to become apprised of the
super- and juxta-position of all imaginable styles.


## p. 9 (#85) ###############################################


DAVID STRAUSS.
The German heaps up around him the forms,
colours, products, and curiosities of all ages and
zones, and thereby succeeds in producing that
garish newness, as of a country fair, which his
scholars then proceed to contemplate and to
define as "Modernism per se"; and there he re-
mains, squatting peacefully, in the midst of this
conflict of styles. But with this kind of culture,
which is, at bottom, nothing more nor less than
a phlegmatic insensibility to real culture, men
cannot vanquish an enemy, least of all an enemy
like the French, who, whatever their worth may
be, do actually possess a genuine and productive
culture, and whom, up to the present, we have
systematically copied, though in the majority of
cases without skill.
Even supposing we had really ceased copying
them, it would still not mean that we had overcome
them, but merely that we had lifted their yoke from
our necks. Not before we have succeeded in forcing
an original German culture upon them can there
be any question of the triumph of German culture.
Meanwhile, let us not forget that in all matters
of form we are, and must be, just as dependent
upon Paris now as we were before the war; for
up to the present there has been no such thing as
an original German culture.
We all ought to have become aware of this, of
our own accord. Besides, one of the few who had
the right to speak to Germans in terms of reproach
publicly drew attention to the fact. “We Germans
are of yesterday," Goethe once said to Eckermann.
“True, for the last hundred years we have diligently


## p. 10 (#86) ##############################################

THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
obedience, have nothing in common with culture:
these were characteristic of the Macedonian army,
for instance, despite the fact that the Greek
soldiers were infinitely more cultivated. To speak
of German scholarship and culture as having con-
quered, therefore, can only be the outcome of a
misapprehension, probably resulting from the cir-
cumstance that every precise notion of culture has
now vanished from Germany.
Culture is, before all things, the unity of
artistic style, in every expression of the life of a
people. Abundant knowledge and learning, how-
ever, are not essential to it, nor are they a sign of
its existence; and, at a pinch, they might coexist
much more harmoniously with the very opposite
of culture—with barbarity: that is to say, with a
complete lack of style, or with a riotous jumble
of all styles. But it is precisely amid this riotous
jumble that the German of to-day subsists; and
the serious problem to be solved is: how, with
all his learning, he can possibly avoid noticing
it; how, into the bargain, he can rejoice with all
his heart in his present “culture”? For every-
thing conduces to open his eyes for him-every
glance he casts at his clothes, his room, his house;
every walk he takes through the streets of his
town; every visit he pays to his art-dealers and
to his trader in the articles of fashion. In his social
intercourse he ought to realise the origin of his
manners and movements; in the heart of our art-
institutions, the pleasures of our concerts, theatres,
and museums, he ought to become apprised of the
super- and juxta-position of all imaginable styles.


## p. 11 (#87) ##############################################

DAVID STRAUSS.
The German heaps up around him the forms,
colours, products, and curiosities of all ages and
zones, and thereby succeeds in producing that
garish newness, as of a country fair, which his
scholars then proceed to contemplate and to
define as “Modernism per se”; and there he re-
mains, squatting peacefully, in the midst of this
conflict of styles. But with this kind of culture,
which is, at bottom, nothing more nor less than
a phlegmatic insensibility to real culture, men
cannot vanquish an enemy, least of all an enemy
like the French, who, whatever their worth may
be, do actually possess a genuine and productive
culture, and whom, up to the present, we have
systematically copied, though in the majority of
cases without skill.
Even supposing we had really ceased copying
them, it would still not mean that we had overcome
them, but merely that we had lifted their yoke from
our necks. Not before we have succeeded in forcing
an original German culture upon them can there
be any question of the triumph of German culture.
Meanwhile, let us not forget that in all matters
of form we are, and must be, just as dependent
upon Paris now as we were before the war; for
up to the present there has been no such thing as
an original German culture.
We all ought to have become aware of this, of
our own accord. Besides, one of the few who had
the right to speak to Germans in terms of reproach
publicly drew attention to the fact. “We Germans
are of yesterday,” Goethe once said to Eckermann.
“True, for the last hundred years we have diligently


## p. 11 (#88) ##############################################

THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
obedience, have nothing in common with culture :
these were characteristic of the Macedonian army,
for instance, despite the fact that the Greek
soldiers were infinitely more cultivated. To speak
of German scholarship and culture as having con-
quered, therefore, can only be the outcome of a
misapprehension, probably resulting from the cir-
cumstance that every precise notion of culture has
now vanished from Germany.
Culture is, before all things, the unity of
artistic style, in every expression of the life of a
people. Abundant knowledge and learning, how-
ever, are not essential to it, nor are they a sign of
its existence; and, at a pinch, they might coexist
much more harmoniously with the very opposite
of culture—with barbarity: that is to say, with a
complete lack of style, or with a riotous jumble
of all styles. But it is precisely amid this riotous
jumble that the German of to-day subsists; and
the serious problem to be solved is: how, with
all his learning, he can possibly avoid noticing
it; how, into the bargain, he can rejoice with all
his heart in his present “culture"? For every-
thing conduces to open his eyes for him-every
glance he casts at his clothes, his room, his house ;
every walk he takes through the streets of his
town; every visit he pays to his art-dealers and
to his trader in the articles of fashion. In his social
intercourse he ought to realise the origin of his
manners and movements; in the heart of our art-
institutions, the pleasures of our concerts, theatres,
and museums, he ought to become apprised of the
super- and juxta-position of all imaginable styles.



## p. 11 (#89) ##############################################

DAVID STRAUSS.
midst of this
which is at yes. But with thie
The German heaps up around him the forms,
colours, products, and curiosities of all ages and
zones, and thereby succeeds in producing that
garish newness, as of a country fair, which his
scholars then proceed to contemplate and to
define as “Modernism per se"; and there he re-
mains, squatting peacefully, in the midst of this
conflict of styles. But with this kind of culture,
which is, at bottom, nothing more nor less than
a phlegmatic insensibility to real culture, men
cannot vanquish an enemy, least of all an enemy
like the French, who, whatever their worth may
be, do actually possess a genuine and productive
culture, and whom, up to the present, we have
systematically copied, though in the majority of
cases without skill.
Even supposing we had really ceased copying
them, it would still not mean that we had overcome
them, but merely that we had lifted their yoke from
our necks. Not before we have succeeded in forcing
an original German culture upon them can there
be any question of the triumph of German culture.
Meanwhile, let us not forget that in all matters
of form we are, and must be, just as dependent
upon Paris now as we were before the war; for
up to the present there has been no such thing as
an original German culture.
We all ought to have become aware of this, of
our own accord. Besides, one of the few who had
the right to speak to Germans in terms of reproach
publicly drew attention to the fact. “We Germans
are of yesterday,” Goethe once said to Eckermann.
“True, for the last hundred years we have diligently


## p. 11 (#90) ##############################################

THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
obedience, have nothing in common with culture:
these were characteristic of the Macedonian army,
for instance, despite the fact that the Greek
soldiers were infinitely more cultivated. To speak
of German scholarship and culture as having con-
quered, therefore, can only be the outcome of a
misapprehension, probably resulting from the cir-
cumstance that every precise notion of culture has
now vanished from Germany.
Culture is, before all things, the unity of
artistic style, in every expression of the life of a
people. Abundant knowledge and learning, how-
ever, are not essential to it, nor are they a sign of
its existence; and, at a pinch, they might coexist
much more harmoniously with the very opposite
of culture—with barbarity: that is to say, with a
complete lack of style, or with a riotous jumble
of all styles. But it is precisely amid this riotous
jumble that the German of to-day subsists; and
the serious problem to be solved is: how, with
all his learning, he can possibly avoid noticing
it; how, into the bargain, he can rejoice with all
his heart in his present “culture"? For every-
thing conduces to open his eyes for him-every
glance he casts at his clothes, his room, his house;
every walk he takes through the streets of his
town; every visit he pays to his art-dealers and
to his trader in the articles of fashion. In his social
intercourse he ought to realise the origin of his
manners and movements; in the heart of our art-
institutions, the pleasures of our concerts, theatres,
and museums, he ought to become apprised of the
super- and juxta-position of all imaginable styles.
Or with
that thout it is



## p. 11 (#91) ##############################################

DAVID STRAUSS.
The German heaps up around him the forms,
colours, products, and curiosities of all ages and
zones, and thereby succeeds in producing that
garish newness, as of a country fair, which his
scholars then proceed to contemplate and to
define as “Modernism per se”; and there he re-
mains, squatting peacefully, in the midst of this
conflict of styles. But with this kind of culture,
which is, at bottom, nothing more nor less than
a phlegmatic insensibility to real culture, men
cannot vanquish an enemy, least of all an enemy
like the French, who, whatever their worth may
be, do actually possess a genuine and productive
culture, and whom, up to the present, we have
systematically copied, though in the majority of
cases without skill.
Even supposing we had really ceased copying
them, it would still not mean that we had overcome
them, but merely that we had lifted their yoke from
our necks. Not before we have succeeded in forcing
an original German culture upon them can there
be any question of the triumph of German culture.
Meanwhile, let us not forget that in all matters
of form we are, and must be, just as dependent
upon Paris now as we were before the war; for
up to the present there has been no such thing as
an original German culture.
We all ought to have become aware of this, of
our own accord. Besides, one of the few who had
the right to speak to Germans in terms of reproach
publicly drew attention to the fact. “We Germans
are of yesterday,” Goethe once said to Eckermann.
“True, for the last hundred years we have diligently


## p. 11 (#92) ##############################################

THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
obedience, have nothing in common with culture:
these were characteristic of the Macedonian army,
for instance, despite the fact that the Greek
soldiers were infinitely more cultivated. To speak
of German scholarship and culture as having con-
quered, therefore, can only be the outcome of a
misapprehension, probably resulting from the cir-
cumstance that every precise notion of culture has
now vanished from Germany.
Culture is, before all things, the unity of
artistic style, in every expression of the life of a
people. Abundant knowledge and learning, how-
ever, are not essential to it, nor are they a sign of
its existence; and, at a pinch, they might coexist
much more harmoniously with the very opposite
of culture—with barbarity: that is to say, with a
complete lack of style, or with a riotous jumble
of all styles. But it is precisely amid this riotous
jumble that the German of to-day subsists; and
the serious problem to be solved is: how, with
all his learning, he can possibly avoid noticing
it; how, into the bargain, he can rejoice with all
his heart in his present “culture”? For every-
thing conduces to open his eyes for him-every
glance he casts at his clothes, his room, his house;
every walk he takes through the streets of his
town; every visit he pays to his art-dealers and
to his trader in the articles of fashion. In his social
intercourse he ought to realise the origin of his
manners and movements; in the heart of our art-
institutions, the pleasures of our concerts, theatres,
and museums, he ought to become apprised of the
super- and juxta-position of all imaginable styles.



## p. 11 (#93) ##############################################

DAVID STRAUSS. 9
The German heaps up around him the forms,
colours, products, and curiosities of all ages and
zones, and thereby succeeds in producing that
garish newness, as of a country fair, which his
scholars then proceed to contemplate and to
define as "Modernism per se"; and there he re-
mains, squatting peacefully, in the midst of this
conflict of styles. But with this kind of culture,
which is, at bottom, nothing more nor less than
a phlegmatic insensibility to real culture, men
cannot vanquish an eneniy, least of all an enemy
like the French, who, whatever their worth may
be, do actually possess a genuine and productive
culture, and whom, up to the present, we have
systematically copied, though in the majority of
cases without skill.
Even supposing we had really ceased copying
them, it would still not mean that we had overcome
them, but merely that we had lifted their yoke from
our necks. Not before we have succeeded in forcing
an original German culture upon them can there
be any question of the triumph of German culture.
Meanwhile, let us not forget that in all matters
of form we are, and must be, just as dependent
upon Paris now as we were before the war; for
up to the present there has been no such thing as
an original German culture.
We all ought to have become aware of this, of
our own accord. Besides, one of the few who had
the right to speak to Germans in terms of reproach
publicly drew attention to the fact. "We Germans
are of yesterday," Goethe once said to Eckermann.
"True, for the last hundred years we have diligently


## p. 11 (#94) ##############################################

THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
obedience, have nothing in common with culture:
these were characteristic of the Macedonian army,
for instance, despite the fact that the Greek
soldiers were infinitely more cultivated. To speak
of German scholarship and culture as having con-
quered, therefore, can only be the outcome of a
misapprehension, probably resulting from the cir-
cumstance that every precise notion of culture has
now vanished from Germany.
Culture is, before all things, the unity of
artistic style, in every expression of the life of a
people. Abundant knowledge and learning, how-
ever, are not essential to it, nor are they a sign of
its existence; and, at a pinch, they might coexist
much more harmoniously with the very opposite
of culture—with barbarity: that is to say, with a
complete lack of style, or with a riotous jumble
of all styles. But it is precisely amid this riotous
jumble that the German of to-day subsists; and
the serious problem to be solved is: how, with
all his learning, he can possibly avoid noticing
it; how, into the bargain, he can rejoice with all
his heart in his present “culture"? For every-
thing conduces to open his eyes for him-every
glance he casts at his clothes, his room, his house ;
every walk he takes through the streets of his
town; every visit he pays to his art-dealers and
to his trader in the articles of fashion. In his social
intercourse he ought to realise the origin of his
manners and movements; in the heart of our art-
institutions, the pleasures of our concerts, theatres,
and museums, he ought to become apprised of the
super- and juxta-position of all imaginable styles.



## p. 11 (#95) ##############################################

DAVID STRAUSS.
The German heaps up around him the forms,
colours, products, and curiosities of all ages and
zones, and thereby succeeds in producing that
garish newness, as of a country fair, which his
scholars then proceed to contemplate and to
define as “Modernism per se”; and there he re-
mains, squatting peacefully, in the midst of this
conflict of styles. But with this kind of culture,
which is, at bottom, nothing more nor less than
a phlegmatic insensibility to real culture, men
cannot vanquish an enemy, least of all an enemy
like the French, who, whatever their worth may
be, do actually possess a genuine and productive
culture, and whom, up to the present, we have
systematically copied, though in the majority of
cases without skill.
Even supposing we had really ceased copying
them, it would still not mean that we had overcome
them, but merely that we had lifted their yoke from
our necks. Not before we have succeeded in forcing
an original German culture upon them can there
be any question of the triumph of German culture.
Meanwhile, let us not forget that in all matters
of form we are, and must be, just as dependent
upon Paris now as we were before the war; for
up to the present there has been no such thing as
an original German culture.
We all ought to have become aware of this, of
our own accord. Besides, one of the few who had
the right to speak to Germans in terms of reproach
publicly drew attention to the fact. “We Germans
are of yesterday," Goethe once said to Eckermann.
“True, for the last hundred years we have diligently


## p. 11 (#96) ##############################################

THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
obedience, have nothing in common with culture:
these were characteristic of the Macedonian army,
for instance, despite the fact that the Greek
soldiers were infinitely more cultivated. To speak
of German scholarship and culture as having con-
quered, therefore, can only be the outcome of a
misapprehension, probably resulting from the cir-
cumstance that every precise notion of culture has
now vanished from Germany.
Culture is, before all things, the unity of
artistic style, in every expression of the life of a
people. Abundant knowledge and learning, how-
ever, are not essential to it, nor are they a sign of
its existence; and, at a pinch, they might coexist
much more harmoniously with the very opposite
of culture—with barbarity: that is to say, with a
complete lack of style, or with a riotous jumble
of all styles. But it is precisely amid this riotous
jumble that the German of to-day subsists; and
the serious problem to be solved is: how, with
all his learning, he can possibly avoid noticing
it; how, into the bargain, he can rejoice with all
his heart in his present “culture”? For every-
thing conduces to open his eyes for him-every
glance he casts at his clothes, his room, his house ;
every walk he takes through the streets of his
town; every visit he pays to his art-dealers and
to his trader in the articles of fashion. In his social
intercourse he ought to realise the origin of his
manners and movements; in the heart of our art-
institutions, the pleasures of our concerts, theatres,
and museums, he ought to become apprised of the
super- and juxta-position of all imaginable styles.



## p. 11 (#97) ##############################################

DAVID STRAUSS.
9
The German heaps up around him the forms,
colours, products, and curiosities of all ages and
zones, and thereby succeeds in producing that
garish newness, as of a country fair, which his
scholars then proceed to contemplate and to
define as “Modernism per se”; and there he re-
mains, squatting peacefully, in the midst of this
conflict of styles. But with this kind of culture,
which is, at bottom, nothing more nor less than
a phlegmatic insensibility to real culture, men
cannot vanquish an enemy, least of all an enemy
like the French, who, whatever their worth may
be, do actually possess a genuine and productive
culture, and whom, up to the present, we have
systematically copied, though in the majority of
cases without skill.
Even supposing we had really ceased copying
them, it would still not mean that we had overcome
them, but merely that we had lifted their yoke from
our necks. Not before we have succeeded in forcing
an original German culture upon them can there
be any question of the triumph of German culture.
Meanwhile, let us not forget that in all matters
of form we are, and must be, just as dependent
upon Paris now as we were before the war; for
up to the present there has been no such thing as
an original German culture.
We all ought to have become aware of this, of
our own accord. Besides, one of the few who had
the right to speak to Germans in terms of reproach
publicly drew attention to the fact. “We Germans
up to the predow as we werbe, just as the matters
are of yesterday," Goethe once said to Eckermann.
“True, for the last hundred years we have diligently


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THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
obedience, have nothing in common with culture:
these were characteristic of the Macedonian army,
for instance, despite the fact that the Greek
soldiers were infinitely more cultivated. To speak
of German scholarship and culture as having con-
quered, therefore, can only be the outcome of a
misapprehension, probably resulting from the cir-
cumstance that every precise notion of culture has
now vanished from Germany.
Culture is, before all things, the unity of
artistic style, in every expression of the life of a
people. Abundant knowledge and learning, how-
ever, are not essential to it, nor are they a sign of
its existence; and, at a pinch, they might coexist
much more harmoniously with the very opposite
of culture—with barbarity: that is to say, with a
complete lack of style, or with a riotous jumble
of all styles. But it is precisely amid this riotous
jumble that the German of to-day subsists; and
the serious problem to be solved is: how, with
all his learning, he can possibly avoid noticing
it; how, into the bargain, he can rejoice with all
his heart in his present “culture”? For every-
thing conduces to open his eyes for him-every
glance he casts at his clothes, his room, his house;
every walk he takes through the streets of his
town; every visit he pays to his art-dealers and
to his trader in the articles of fashion. In his social
intercourse he ought to realise the origin of his
manners and movements; in the heart of our art-
institutions, the pleasures of our concerts, theatres,
and museums, he ought to become apprised of the
super- and juxta-position of all imaginable styles.



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DAVID STRAUSS.
The German heaps up around him the forms,
colours, products, and curiosities of all ages and
zones, and thereby succeeds in producing that
garish newness, as of a country fair, which his
scholars then proceed to contemplate and to
define as “Modernism per se"; and there he re-
mains, squatting peacefully, in the midst of this
conflict of styles. But with this kind of culture,
which is, at bottom, nothing more nor less than
a phlegmatic insensibility to real culture, men
cannot vanquish an enemy, least of all an enemy
like the French, who, whatever their worth may
be, do actually possess a genuine and productive
culture, and whom, up to the present, we have
systematically copied, though in the majority of
cases without skill.
Even supposing we had really ceased copying
them, it would still not mean that we had overcome
them, but merely that we had lifted their yoke from
our necks. Not before we have succeeded in forcing
an original German culture upon them can there
be any question of the triumph of German culture.
Meanwhile, let us not forget that in all matters
of form we are, and must be, just as dependent
upon Paris now as we were before the war; for
up to the present there has been no such thing as
an original German culture.
We all ought to have become aware of this, of
our own accord. Besides, one of the few who had
the right to speak to Germans in terms of reproach
publicly drew attention to the fact. “We Germans
are of yesterday,” Goethe once said to Eckermann.
“True, for the last hundred years we have diligently


## p. 11 (#100) #############################################

IO THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
cultivated ourselves, but a few centuries may yet
have to run their course before our fellow-country-
men become permeated with sufficient intellectu-
ality and higher culture to have it said of them,
it is a long time since they were barbarians"
II.
If, however, our public and private life is so
manifestly devoid of all signs of a productive
and characteristic culture; if, moreover, our great
artists, with that earnest vehemence and honesty
which is peculiar to greatness admit, and have
admitted, this monstrous fact—so very humiliating
to a gifted nation; how can it still be possible for
contentment to reign to such an astonishing extent
among German scholars? And since the last war
this complacent spirit has seemed ever more and
more ready to break forth into exultant cries and
demonstrations of triumph. At all events, the
belief seems to be rife that we are in possession of
a genuine culture, and the enormous incongruity
of this triumphant satisfaction in the face of the
inferiority which should be patent to all, seems only
to be noticed by the few and the select. For all
those who think with the public mind have blind-
folded their eyes and closed their ears. The in-
congruity is not even acknowledged to exist. How
is this possible? What power is sufficiently in-
fluential to deny this existence? What species of
men must have attained to supremacy in Germany
that feelings which are so strong and simple should


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DAVID STRAUSS. II
be denied or prevented from obtaining expression?
This power, this species of men, I will name—they
are the Philistines of Culture.
As every one knows, the word "Philistine" is
borrowed from the vernacular of student-life, and,
in its widest and most popular sense, it signifies
the reverse of a son of the Muses, of an artist, and
of the genuine man of culture. The Philistine of
culture, however, the study of whose type and the
hearing of whose confessions (when he makes them)
have now become tiresome duties, distinguishes
himself from the general notion of the order
"Philistine" by means of a superstition: he fancies
that he is himself a son of the Muses and a man of
culture. This incomprehensible error clearly shows
that he does not even know the difference between
a Philistine and his opposite. We must not be
surprised, therefore, if we find him, for the most
part, solemnly protesting that he is no Philistine.
Owing to this lack of self-knowledge, he is con-
vinced that his "culture" is the consummate mani-
festation of real German culture; and, since he
everywhere meets with scholars of his own type,
since all public institutions, whether schools, uni-
versities, or academies, are so organised as to be in
complete harmony with his education and needs,
wherever he goes he bears with him the triumphant
feeling that he is the worthy champion of prevailing
German culture, and he frames his pretensions and
claims accordingly.
If, however, real culture takes unity of style for
granted (and even an inferior and degenerate
culture cannot be imagined in which a certain


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12 THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
coalescence of the profusion of forms has not taken
place), it is just possible that the confusion under-
lying the Culture-Philistine's error may arise from
the fact that, since he comes into contact every-
where with creatures cast in the same mould as
himself, he concludes that this uniformity among
all " scholars " must point to a certain uniformity
in German education—hence to culture. All round
him, he sees only needs and views similar to his
own; wherever he goes, he finds himself embraced
by a ring of tacit conventions concerning almost
everything, but more especially matters of religion
and art. This imposing sameness, this tutti unisono
which, though it responds to no word of command,
is yet ever ready to burst forth, cozens him
into the belief that here a culture must be estab-
lished and flourishing. But Philistinism, despite its
systematic organisation and power, does not
constitute a culture by virtue of its system alone;
it does not even constitute an inferior culture, but
invariably the reverse—namely, firmly established
barbarity. For the uniformity of character which is
so apparent in the German scholars of to-day is only
the result of a conscious or unconscious exclusion and
negation of all the artistically productive forms and
requirements of a genuine style. The mind of the
cultured Philistine must have become sadly un-
hinged; for precisely what culture repudiates he
regards as culture itself; and, since he proceeds
logically, he succeeds in creating a connected
group of these repudiations—a system of non-
culture, to which one might at a pinch grant a
certain "unity of style," provided of course it were


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DAVID STRAUSS. 13
not nonsense to attribute style to barbarity.
If he have to choose between a stylish act and
its opposite, he will invariably adopt the latter,
and, since this rule holds good throughout, every
one of his acts bears the same negative stamp.
Now, it is by means of this stamp that he is able
to identify the character of the " German culture,"
which is his own patent; and all things that do not
bear it are so many enemies and obstacles drawn
up against him. In the presence of these arrayed
forces the Culture-Philistine either does no more
than ward off the blows, or else he denies, holds his
tongue, stops his ears, and refuses to face facts.
He is a negative creature—even in his hatred and
animosity. Nobody, however, is more disliked by
him than the man who regards him as a Philistine,
and tells him what he is — namely, the barrier
in the way of all powerful men and creators,
the labyrinth for all who doubt and go astray,
the swamp for all the weak and the weary, the
fetters of those who would run towards lofty goals,
the poisonous mist that chokes all germinating
hopes, the scorching sand to all those German
thinkers who seek for, and thirst after, a new life.
For the mind of Germany is seeking; and ye hate
it because it is seeking, and because it will not
accept your word, when ye declare that ye have
found what it is seeking. How could it have
been possible for a type like that of the Culture-
Philistine to develop? and even granting its de-
velopment, how was it able to rise to the powerful
position of supreme judge concerning all questions
of German culture? How could this have been


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14 THOUGHTS OUT OF SEASON.
possible, seeing that a whole procession of grand
and heroic figures has already filed past us, whose
every movement, the expression of whose every
feature, whose questioning voice and burning eye
betrayed the one fact, that tfiey were seekers, and
that they sought that which the Culture-Philistine
had long fancied he had found—to wit, a genuine
original German culture? Is there a soil—thus
they seemed to ask—a soil that is pure enough,
unhandselled enough, of sufficient virgin sanctity, to
allow the mind of Germany to build its house
upon it?