No More Learning

Habitual Shake. —Why do we feel shame
when some virtue or merit is attributed to us which,
as the saying goes, "we have not deserved"?
Because we appear to have intruded upon a territory
to which we do not belong, from which we should
be excluded, as from a holy place or holy of holies,
which ought not to be trodden by our foot . Through
the errors of others we have, nevertheless, penetrated
to it, and we are now swayed partly by fear, partly
by reverence, partly by surprise; we do net know
whether we ought to fly or to enjoy the blissful
moment with all its gracious advantages. In all
shame there is a mystery, which seems dese;rated or
in danger of desecration through us. All favour
begets shame. —But if it be remembered that we
have never really "deserved " anything, this feeling
of shame, provided that we surrender ourselves to
this point of view in a spirit of Christian contem-
plation, becomes habitual, because upon such a
one God seems continually to be conferring his
blessing and his favours. Apart from this Christian
interpretation, the state of habitual shame will be
possible even to the entirely godless sage, who
clings firmly to the basic non-responsibility and non-
meritoriousness of all action and being. If he be
treated as if he had deserved this or that, he will
seem to have won his way into a higher order of
beings, who do actually deserve something, who are
free and can really bear the burden of responsibility
for their own volition and capacity. Whoever says
to him, "You have deserved it," appears to cry


## p. 233 (#269) ############################################

THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW. 233
out to him, "You are not a human being, but a
God. "
70.
The Most Unskilful Teacher. —In one man
all his real virtues are implanted on the soil of his
spirit of contradiction, in another on his incapacity
to say "no "—in other words, on his spirit of ac-
quiescence. A third has made all his morality grow
out of his pride as a solitary, a fourth from his
strong social instinct. Now,supposing that theseeds
of the virtues in these four cases, owing to mischance
or unskilful teachers, were not sown on the soil of
their nature, which provides them with the richest
and most abundant mould, they would become
weak, unsatisfactory men (devoid of morality).
And who would have been the most unskilful of
teachers, the evil genius of these men? The moral
fanatic, who thinks that the good can only grow
out of the good and on the soil of the good.
7i-
The Cautious Style. —A. But if this were
known to all, it would be injurious to the majority.
You yourself call your opinions dangerous to those
in danger, and yet you make them public?
B. I write so that neither the mob, nor the
populi, nor the parties of all kinds can read me. So
my opinions will never be "public opinions. "
A. How do you write, then?
B. Neither usefully nor pleasantly—for the three
classes I have mentioned.


## p. 233 (#270) ############################################

232
HUMAN, ALL-TOO-HUMAN.
69.
HABITUAL SHAME. – Why do we feel shame
when some virtue or merit is attributed to us which,
as the saying goes, “we have not deserved "?
Because we appear to have intruded upon a territory
to which we do not belong, from which we should
be excluded, as from a holy place or holy of holies,
which ought not to be trodden by our foot. Through
the errors of others we have, nevertheless, penetrated
to it, and we are now swayed partly by fear, partly
by reverence, partly by surprise; we do nct know
whether we ought to fly or to enjoy the blissful
moment with all its gracious advantages. In all
shame there is a mystery, which seems desecrated or
in danger of desecration through us. All favour
begets shame. —But if it be remembered that we
have never really “deserved” anything, this feeling
of shame, provided that we surrender ourselves to
this point of view in a spirit of Christian contem-
plation, becomes habitual, because upon such a
one God seems continually to be conferring his
blessing and his favours. Apart from this Christian
interpretation, the state of habitual shame will be
possible even to the entirely godless sage, who
clings firmly to the basic non-responsibility and non-
meritoriousness of all action and being. If he be
treated as if he had deserved this or that, he will
seem to have won his way into a higher order of
beings, who do actually deserve something, who are
free and can really bear the burden of responsibility
for their own volition and capacity. Whoever says
to him, “You have deserved it," appears to cry



## p. 233 (#271) ############################################

THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW. 233
out to him, “You are not a human being, but a
God. ”
70.
The MOST UNSKILFUL TEACHER. -In one man
all his real virtues are implanted on the soil of his
spirit of contradiction, in another on his incapacity
to say "no"—in other words, on his spirit of ac-
quiescence. A third has made all his morality grow
out of his pride as a solitary, a fourth from his
strong social instinct. Now,supposing that theseeds
of the virtues in these four cases, owing to mischance
or unskilful teachers, were not sown on the soil of
their nature, which provides them with the richest
and most abundant mould, they would become
weak, unsatisfactory men (devoid of morality).
And who would have been the most unskilful of
teachers, the evil genius of these men? The moral
fanatic, who thinks that the good can only grow
out of the good and on the soil of the good.
71.
THE CAUTIOUS STYLE. -A. But if this were
known to all, it would be injurious to the majority.
You yourself call your opinions dangerous to those
in danger, and yet you make them public?
B. I write so that neither the mob, nor the
populi, nor the parties of all kinds can read me. So
my opinions will never be "public opinions. ”
• A. How do you write, then?
B. Neither usefully nor pleasantly—for the three
classes I have mentioned.


## p. 234 (#272) ############################################

234
HUMAN, ALL-TOO-HUMAN.
72.
DIVINE MISSIONARIES. — Even Socrates feels
himself to be a divine missionary, but I am not sure
whether we should not here detect a tincture of that
Attic irony and fondness for jesting whereby this
odious, arrogant conception would be toned down.
He talks of the fact without unction_his images of
the gadily and the horse are simple and not sacer-
dotal. The real religious task which he has set
himself—to test God in a hundred ways and see
whether he spoke the truth-betrays a bold and free
attitude, in which the missionary walked by the side
of his God. This testing of God is one of the most
subtle compromises between piety and free-thinking
that has ever been devised. —Nowadays we do not
even need this compromise any longer.
73.
HONESTY IN PAINTING. –Raphael, who cared a
great deal for the Church (so far as she could pay
him), but, like the best men of his time, cared little
for the objects of the Church's belief, did not advance
one step to meet the exacting, ecstatic piety of many
of his patrons. He remained honest even in that
exceptional picture which was originally intended
for a banner in a procession—the Sistine Madonna.
Here for once he wished to paint a vision, but such
a vision as even noble youths without “faith” may
and will have—the vision of the future wife, a wise,
high-souled, silent, and very beautiful woman, carry-
ing her first-born in her arms. Let men of an older
generation, accustomed to prayer and devotion, find


## p. 235 (#273) ############################################

THE WANDERER AND- HIS SHADOW. 235
here, like the worthy elder on the left, something
superhuman to revere. We younger men (so
Raphael seems to call to us) are occupied with the
beautiful maiden on the right, who says to the
spectator of the picture, with her challenging and
by no means devout look, "The mother and her
child—is not that a pleasant, inviting sight? " The
face and the look are reflected in the joy in the faces
of the beholders. The artist who devised all this
enjoys himself in this way, and adds his own delight
to the delight of the art-lover. As regards the
"messianic" expression in the face of the child,
Raphael, honest man, who would not paint any
state of soul in which he did not believe, has
amiably cheated his religious admirers. He painted
that freak of nature which is very often found, the
man's eye in the child's face, and that, too, the eye
of a brave, helpful man who sees distress. This eye
should be accompanied by a beard. The fact that a
beard is wanting, and that two different ages are seen
in one countenance, is the pleasing paradox which
believers have interpreted in accordance with their
faith in miracles. The artist could only expect as
much from their art of exposition and interpretation.
74-
Prayer. —On two hypotheses alone is there any
sense in prayer, that not quite extinct custom of
olden times. It would have to be possible either
to fix or alter the will of the godhead, and the
devotee would have to know best himself what he
needs and should really desire. Both hypotheses,


## p. 235 (#274) ############################################

234
HUMAN, ALL-TOO-HUMAN.
72.
DIVINE MISSIONARIES. — Even Socrates feels
himself to be a divine missionary, but I am not sure
whether we should not here detect a tincture of that
Attic irony and fondness for jesting whereby this
odious, arrogant conception would be toned down.
He talks of the fact without unction_his images of
the gadily and the horse are simple and not sacer-
dotal. The real religious task which he has set
himself—to test God in a hundred ways and see
whether he spoke the truth—betrays a bold and free
attitude, in which the missionary walked by the side
of his God. This testing of God is one of the most
subtle compromises between piety and free-thinking
that has ever been devised. Nowadays we do not
even need this compromise any longer.
73.
HONESTY IN PAINTING. —Raphael, who cared a
great deal for the Church (so far as she could pay
him), but, like the best men of his time, cared little
for the objects of the Church's belief, did not advance
one step to meet the exacting, ecstatic piety of many
of his patrons. He remained honest even in that
exceptional picture which was originally intended
for a banner in a procession—the Sistine Madonna.
Here for once he wished to paint a vision, but such
a vision as even noble youths without "faith” may
and will have—the vision of the future wife, a wise,
high-souled, silent, and very beautiful woman, carry-
ing her first-born in her arms. Let men of an older
generation, accustomed to prayer and devotion, find


## p. 235 (#275) ############################################

THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW.
235
here, like the worthy elder on the left, something
superhuman to revere. We younger men (so
Raphael seems to call to us) are occupied with the
beautiful maiden on the right, who says to the
spectator of the picture, with her challenging and
by no means devout look, "The mother and her
child—is not that a pleasant, inviting sight? ” The
face and the look are reflected in the joy in the faces
of the beholders. The artist who devised all this
enjoys himself in this way, and adds his own delight
to the delight of the art-lover. As regards the
“messianic” expression in the face of the child,
Raphael, honest man, who would not paint any
state of soul in which he did not believe, has
amiably cheated his religious admirers. He painted
that freak of nature which is very often found, the
man's eye in the child's face, and that, too, the eye
of a brave, helpful man who sees distress. This eye
should be accompanied by a beard. The fact that a
beard is wanting, and that two different ages are seen
in one countenance, is the pleasing paradox which
believers have interpreted in accordance with their
faith in miracles. The artist could only expect as
much from their art of exposition and interpretation.
74.
PRAYER. —On two hypotheses alone is there any
sense in prayer, that not quite extinct custom of
olden times. It would have to be possible either
to fix or alter the will of the godhead, and the
devotee would have to know best himself what he
needs and should really desire. Both hypotheses,


## p. 236 (#276) ############################################

236 HUMAN, ALL-TOO-HUMAN.
axiomatic and traditional in all other religions, are
denied by Christianity. If Christianity neverthe-
less maintained prayer side by side with its belief
in the all-wise and all-provident divine reason (a
belief that makes prayer really senseless and even
blasphemous), it showed here once more its admir-
able "wisdom of the serpent. " For an outspoken
command, "Thou shalt not pray," would have led
Christians by way of boredom to the denial of
Christianity. In the Christian ora et labora ora
plays the r61e of pleasure. Without ora what could
those unlucky saints who renounced labora have
done? But to have a chat with God, to ask him
for all kinds of pleasant things, to feel a slight
amusement at one's own folly in still having any
wishes at all, in spite of so excellent a father—all
that was an admirable invention for saints.
75-
A Holy Lie. —The lie that was on Arria's lips
when she died (Paete, non dolet *) obscures all the
truths that have ever been uttered by the dying.
It is the only holy lie that has become famous,
whereas elsewhere the odour of sanctity has clung
only to errors.
76.
The Most Necessary Apostle. — Among
twelve apostles one must always be hard as stone, in
order that upon him the new church may be built.
* The wife of the Stoic Thrasea Paetus, when their com-
plicity in the great conspiracy of 65 a. d. against Nero was
discovered, is reported to have said as she committed suicide,
"It doesn't hurt, Paetus. "—Tr.


## p. 237 (#277) ############################################

THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW. 237
77-
Which is more Transitory, the Body or
THE Spirit ? —In legal, moral, and religious institu-
tions the external and concrete elements—in other
words, rites, gestures, and ceremonies—are the most
permanent. They are the body to which a new
spirit is constantly being superadded. The cult,
like an unchangeable text, is ever interpreted anew.
Concepts and emotions are fluid, customs are solid.
78.
The Belief in Disease qua Disease. —
Christianity first painted the devil on the wall of
the world. Christianity first brought the idea of sin
into the world. The belief in the remedies, which
is offered as an antidote, has gradually been shaken
to its very foundations. But the belief in the
disease, which Christianity has taught and propa-
gated, still exists.
79-
Speech and Writings of Religious Men. —
If the priest's style and general expression, both in
speaking and writing, do not clearly betray the
religious man, we need no longer take his views
upon religion and his pleading for religion seriously.
These opinions have become powerless for him if,
judging by his style, he has at command irony,
arrogance, malice, hatred, and all the changing
eddies of mood, just like the most irreligious of
men—how far more powerless will they be for his


## p. 238 (#278) ############################################

238 HUMAN, ALL-TOO-HUMAN.
hearers and readers! In short, he will serve to
make the latter still more irreligious.
So.
The Danger in Personality. — The more
God has been regarded as a personality in himself,
the less loyal have we been to him. Men are far
more attached to their thought-images than to their
best beloved. That is why they sacrifice themselves
for State, Church, and even for God—so far as he
remains their creation, their thought, and is not too
much looked upon as a personality. In the latter
case they almost always quarrel with him. After
all, it was the most pious of men who let slip that
bitter cry: " My God, why hast thou forsaken me? "
81.
Worldly Justice. —It is possible to unhinge
worldly justice with the doctrine |of the complete
non - responsibility and innocence of every man.
An attempt has been made in the same direction
on the basis of the opposite doctrine of the full
responsibility and guilt of every man. It was the
founder of Christianity who wished to abolish
worldly justice and banish judgment and punish-
ment from the world. For he understood all guilt
as "sin "—that is, an outrage against God and not
against the world. On the other hand, he con-
sidered every man in a broad sense, and almost
in every sense, a sinner. The guilty, however, are
not to be the judges of their peers—so his rules


## p. 239 (#279) ############################################

THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW. 239
of equity decided. Thus all dispensers of worldly
justice were in his eyes as culpable as those they
condemned, and their air of guiltlessness appeared
to him hypocritical and pharisaical. Moreover, he
looked to the motives and not to the results of
actions, and thought that only one was keen-sighted
enough to give a verdict on motives—himself or, as
he expressed it, God.
82.
An Affectation in Parting. —He who wishes
to sever his connection with a party or a creed thinks
it necessary for him to refute it. This is a most
arrogant notion. The only thing necessary is that
he should clearly see what tentacles hitherto held
him to this party or creed and no longer hold him,
what views impelled him to it and now impel him
in some other directions. We have not joined the
party or creed on strict grounds of knowledge. We
should not affect this attitude on parting from it
either.
83.
Saviour and Physician. —In his knowledge of
the human soul the founder of Christianity was, as
is natural, not without many great deficiencies and
prejudices, and, as physician of the soul, was ad-
dicted to that disreputable, laical belief in a universal
medicine. In his methods he sometimes resembles
that dentist who wishes to heal all pain by extract-
ing the tooth. Thus, for example, he assails sensu-
ality with the advice: "If thine eye offend thee,
pluck it out. "—Yet there still remains the distinction


## p. 240 (#280) ############################################

240 HUMAN, ALL-TOO-HUMAN.
that the dentist at least attains his object—painless-
ness for the patient—although in so clumsy a fashion
that he becomes ridiculous; whereas the Christian
who follows that advice and thinks he has killed
his sensuality, is wrong, for his sensuality still lives
in an uncanny, vampire form, and torments him in
hideous disguises.
84.
PRISONERS. —One morning the prisoners entered
the yard for work, but the warder was not there.
Some, as their manner was, set to work at once;
others stood idle and gazed defiantly around.
Then one of them strode forward and cried," Work
as much as you will or do nothing, it all comes to
the same. Your secret machinations have come to
light; the warder has been keeping his eye on you
of late, and will cause a terrible judgment to be
passed upon you in a few days' time. You know
him—he is of a cruel and resentful disposition.
But now, listen: you have mistaken me hitherto.
I am not what I seem, but far more—I am the son
of the warder, and can get anything I like out of
him. I can save you—nay, I will save you. But
remember this: I will only save those of you who
believe that I am the son of the prison warder.
The rest may reap the fruits of their unbelief. "
"Well," said an old prisoner after an interval of
silence, "what can it matter to you whether we
believe you or not? If you are really the son, and
can do what you say, then put in a good word for
us all. That would be a real kindness on your
part. But have done with all talk of belief and


## p. 241 (#281) ############################################

THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW. 241
unbelief! " "What is more," cried a younger man,
"I don't believe him: he has only got a bee in his
bonnet. I'll wager that in a week's time we shall
find ourselves in the same place as we are to-day,
and the warder will know nothing. " "And if the
warder ever knew anything, he knows it no longer,"
said the last of the prisoners, coming down into
the yard at that moment, "for he has just died
suddenly. " "Ah ha! " cried several in confusion,
"ah ha! Sir Son, Sir Son, how stands it now with
your title? Are we by any chance your prisoners
now? " "I told you," answered the man gently,
■' I will set free all who believe in me, as surely as
my father still lives. "—The prisoners did not laugh,
but shrugged their shoulders and left him to himself.
85-
The Persecutors of God. —Paul conceived
and Calvin followed up the idea that countless
creatures have been predestined to damnation from
time immemorial, and that this fair world was
made in order that the glory of God might be
manifested therein. So heaven and hell and man-
kind merely exist to satisfy the vanity of God!
What acruel, insatiable vanity must have smouldered
in the soul of the first or second thinker of such a
thought! —Paul, then, after all, remained Saul—the
persecutor of God.
86.
Socrates. —If all goes well, the time will come
when, in order to advance themselves on the path


## p. 242 (#282) ############################################

242 HUMAN, ALL-TOO-HUMAN.
of moral reason, men will rather take up the
Memorabilia of Socrates than the Bible, and when
Montaigne and Horace will be used as pioneers and
guides for the understanding of Socrates, the simplest
and most enduring of interpretative sages. In him
converge the roads of the most different philo-
sophic modes of life, which are in truth the modes of
the different temperaments, crystallised by reason
and habit and all ultimately directed towards the
delight in life and in self. The apparent conclu-
sion is that the most peculiar thing about Socrates
was his share in all the temperaments. Socrates
excels the founder of Christianity by virtue of his
merry style of seriousness and by that wisdom of
sheer roguish pranks which constitutes the best state
of soul in a man. Moreover, he had a superior in-
telligence.
87.
Learning to Write Well. —The age of good
speaking is over, because the age of city-state culture
is over. The limit allowed by Aristotle to the
great city—in which the town-crier must be able
to make himself heard by the whole assembled
community—troubles us as little as do any city-
communities, us who even wish to be understood
beyond the boundaries of nations. Therefore
every one who is of a good European turn of mind
must learn to write well, and to write better and
better. He cannot help himself, he must learn
that: even if he was born in Germany, where bad
writing is looked upon as a national privilege.
Better writing means better thinking; always to


## p. 243 (#283) ############################################

THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW. 243
discover matter more worthy of communication; to
be able to communicate it properly; to be translate-
able into the tongues of neighbouring nations; to
make oneself comprehensible to foreigners who
learn our language; to work with the view of
making all that is good common property, and of
giving free access everywhere to the free; finally,
to pave the way for that still remote state of things,
when the great task shall come for good Europeans—
guidance and guardianship of the universal world-
culture. —Whoever preaches the opposite doctrine
of not troubling about good writing and good
reading (both virtues grow together and decline
together) is really showing the peoples a way of
becoming more and more national. He is intensi-
fying the malady of this century, and is a foe to
good Europeans, a foe to free spirits.
88.
The Theory of the Best Style. —The theory
of the best style may at one time be the theory of
finding the expression by which we transfer every
mood of ours to the reader and the listener. At
another, it may be the theory of finding expressions
for the more desirable human moods, the communi-
cation and transference of which one desires most
—for the mood of a man moved from the depth of
his heart, intellectually cheerful, bright, and sincere,
who has conquered his passions. This will be the
theory of the best style, a theory that corresponds
to the good man.


## p. 244 (#284) ############################################

244 HUMAN, ALL-TOO-HUMAN.
89.
Paving Attention to Movement. — The
movement of the sentences shows whether the
author be tired. Individual expressions may never-
theless be still strong and good, because they were
invented earlier and for their own sake, when the
thought first flashed across the author's mind. This
is frequently the case with Goethe, who too often
dictated when he was tired.
90.
"Already" and "Still. "—A. German prose
is still very young. Goethe declares that Wieland
is its father.
B. So young and already so ugly!
C. But, so far as I am aware, Bishop Ulfilas al-
ready wrote German prose, which must therefore
be fifteen hundred years old.
B. So old and still so ugly!
91.
Original German. —German prose, which is
really not fashioned on any pattern and must be
considered an original creation of German taste,
should give the eager advocate of a future original
German culture an indication of how real German
dress, German society, German furniture, German
meals would look without the imitation of models.
—Some one who had long reflected on these vistas
finally cried in great horror, " But, Heaven help us,
perhaps we already have that original culture—
only we don't like to talk about it! "


## p. 245 (#285) ############################################

THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW. 245
92.
Forbidden Books. —One should never read
anything written by those arrogant wiseacres and
puzzle-brains who have the detestable vice of
logical paradox. They apply logical formulae just
where everything is really improvised at random
and built in the air. ("Therefore" with them
means, "You idiot of a reader, this 'therefore'
does not exist for you, but only for me. " The
answer to this is: "You idiot of a writer, then why
do you write ? ")
93-
Displaying One's Wit. —Every one who wishes
to display his wit thereby proclaims that he has
also a plentiful lack of wit. That vice which clever
Frenchmen have of adding a touch olde'dain to their
best ideas arises from a desire to be considered
richer than they really are. They wish to be care-
lessly generous, as if weary of continual spending
from overfull treasuries.
94-
French and German Literature. —The mis-
fortune of the French and German literature of the
last hundred years is that the Germans ran away too
early from the French school, and the French, later
on, went too early to the German school.
95-
Our Prose. —None of the present-day cultured
nations has so bad a prose as the German. When


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246 HUMAN, ALL-TOO-HUMAN.
clever, blast Frenchmen say, "There is no German
prose," we ought really not to be angry, for this
criticism is more polite than we deserve. If we look
for reasons, we come at last to the strange pheno-
menon that the German knows only improvised
prose and has no conception of any other. He
simply cannot understand the Italian, who says that
prose is as much harder than poetry as the repre-
sentation of naked beauty is harder to the sculptor
than that of draped beauty. Verse, images, rhythm,
and rhyme need honest effort—that even the German
realises, and he is not inclined to set a very high
value on extempore poetry. But the notion of work-
ing at a page of prose as at a statue sounds to him
like a tale from fairyland.
96.
The Grand Style. —The grand style comes into
being when the beautiful wins a victory over the
monstrous.
97-
DODgINg. —We do not realise, in the case of dis-
tinguished minds, wherein lies the excellence of their
expression, their turn of phrase, until we can say
what Word every mediocre writer would inevitably
have hit upon in expressing the same idea. All great
artists, in steering their car, show themselves prone
to dodge and leave the track, but never to fall over.
98.
Something like Bread. —Bread neutralises
and takes out the taste of other food, and is there-


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THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW.
247
fore necessary to every long meal. In all works of
art there must be something like bread, in order that
they may produce divers effects. If these effects
followed one another without occasional pauses and
intervals, they would soon make us weary and pro-
voke disgust—in fact, a long meal of art would then
be impossible.
99.
JEAN PAUL. — Jean Paul knew a great deal, but
had no science; understood all manner of tricks of
art, but had no art; found almost everything enjoy-
able, but had no taste; possessed feeling and serious-
ness, but in dispensing them poured over them a
nauseous sauce of tears; had even wit, but, unfor-
tunately for his ardent desire for it, far too little-
whence he drives the reader to despair by his very
lack of wit. In short, he was the bright, rank-
smelling weed that shot up overnight in the fair
pleasaunces of Schiller and Goethe. He was a good,
comfortable man, and yet a destiny, a destiny in a
dressing-gown. "
100.
PALATE FOR OPPOSITES. —In order to enjoy a
work of the past as its contemporaries enjoyed it,
one must have a palate for the prevailing taste of
the age which it attacked.
* It is interesting to compare this judgment with Carlyle's
praise of Jean Paul. The dressing-gown is an allusion to
Jean Paul's favourite costume. -TR.


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248 HUMAN, ALL-TOO-HUMAN.
IOI.
Spirits-OF-Wine Authors. —Many writers are
neither spirit nor wine, but spirits of wine. They
can flare up, and then they give warmth.
102.
The Interpretative Sense. —The sense of
taste, as the true interpretative sense, often talks the
other senses over to its point of view and imposes
upon them its laws and customs. At table one can
receive disclosures about the most subtle secrets of
the arts; it suffices to observe what tastes good and
when and after what and how long it tastes good.
103.
Lessing. —Lessing had a genuine French talent,
and, as writer, went most assiduously to the French
school. He knows well how to arrange and display
his wares in his shop-window. Without this true
art his thoughts, like the objects of them, would have
remained rather in the dark, nor would the general
loss be great. His art, however, has taught many
(especially the last generation of German scholars)
and has given enjoyment to a countless number.
It is true his disciples had no need to learn from
him, as they often did, his unpleasant tone with its
mingling of petulance and candour. —Opinion is now
unanimous on Lessing as " lyric poet," and will some
day be unanimous on Lessing as "dramatic poet. "
104.
Undesirable Readers. —How an author is
vexed by those stolid, awkward readers who always


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THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW. 249
fall at every place where they stumble, and always
hurt themselves when they fall!
105.
Poets' Thoughts. —Real thoughts of real poets
always go about with a veil on, like Egyptian women;
only the deep eye of thought looks out freely through
the veil. —Poets' thoughts are as a rule not of such
value as is supposed. We have to pay for the veil
and for our own curiosity into the bargain.
106.
Write Simply and Usefully. —Transitions,
details, colour in depicting the passions—we make
a present of all these to the author because we bring
them with us and set them down to the credit of his
book, provided he makes us some compensation.
107.
WlELAND. —Wieland wrote German better than
any one else, and had the genuine adequacies and
inadequacies of the master. His translations of
the letters of Cicero and Lucian are the best in
the language. His ideas, however, add nothing to
our store of thought. We can endure his cheerful
moralities as little as his cheerful immoralities, for
both are very closely connected. The men who en-
joyed them were at bottom better men than we are,
but also a good deal heavier. They needed'an author
of this sort. The Germans did not need Goethe, and
therefore cannot make proper use of him. We have


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250 HUMAN, ALL-TOO-HUMAX.
only to consider the best of our statesmen and
artists in this light . None of them had or could
have had Goethe as their teacher.
108.
Rare Festivals. —Pithyconciseness, repose, and
maturity—where you find these qualities in an
author, cry halt and celebrate a great festival in the
desert . It will be long before you have such a treat
again.
109.
The Treasure of German Prose. —Apart
from Goethe's writings and especially Goethe's con-
versations with Eckermann (the best German book
in existence), what German prose literature remains
that is worth reading over and over again? Lichten-
berg's Aphorisms, the first book of Jung-Stilling's
Story of My Life, Adalbert Stifter's St. Martin's
Summer and Gottfried Keller's People of Seldwyla
—and there, for the time being, it comes to an end.
no.
Literary and Colloquial Style. —The art
of writing demands, first and foremost, substitutions
for the means of expression which speech alone
possesses—in other words, for gestures, accent, in-
tonation, and look. Hence literary style is quite
different from colloquial style, and far more difficult,
because it has to make itself as intelligible as the
latter with fewer accessaries. Demosthenes delivered
his speeches differently from what we read; he


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THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW. 251
worked them up for reading purposes. —Cicero's
speeches ought to be "demosthenised" with the
same object, for at present they contain more of the
Roman Forum than we can endure.
in.
Caution in Quotation. —Young authors do
not know that a good expression or idea only looks
well among its peers; that an excellent quotation
may spoil whole pages, nay the whole book; for it
seems to cry warningly to the reader, " Mark you, I
am the precious stone, and round about me is lead
—pale, worthless lead! " Every word, every idea
only desires to live in its own company—that is the
moral of a choice style.
112.
How should Errors be Enunciated? —We
may dispute whether it be more injurious for errors
to be enunciated badly or as well as the best truths.
It is certain that in the former case they are doubly
harmful to the brain and are less easily removed
from it. But, on the other hand, they are not so
certain of effect as in the latter case. They are, in
fact, less contagious.
"3-
Limiting and Widening. —Homer limited and
diminished the horizon of his subject, but allowed
individual scenes to expand and blossom out.
Later, the tragedians are constantly renewing this
process. Each takes his material in ever smaller
and smaller fragments than his predecessor did, but


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252 HUMAN', ALL-TOO-HUMAN.
each attains a greater wealth of blooms within the
narrow hedges of these sequestered garden en-
closures.
114.
Literature and Morality Mutually Ex-
planatory. —We can show from Greek literature
by what forces the Greek spirit developed, how it
entered upon different channels, and where it be-
came enfeebled. All this also depicts to us how
Greek morality proceeded, and how all morality will
proceed: how it was at first a constraint and dis-
played cruelty, then became gradually milder; how
a pleasure in certain actions, in certain forms and
conventions arose, and from this again a propensity
for solitary exercise, for solitary possession; how the
track becomes crowded and overcrowded with com-
petitors ; how satiety enters in, newobjects of struggle
and ambition are sought, and forgotten aims are
awakened to life; how the drama is repeated, and the
spectators become altogether weary of looking on,
because the whole gamut seems to have been run
through—and then comes a stoppage, an expira-
tion, and the rivulets are lost in the sand. The end,
or at any rate an end, has come.
115.