We Philologists, Volume 8 | Page 4

even then they learn from books, and not through travels, &c. They get some training, of course.
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Most men are obviously in the world accidentally; no necessity of a higher kind is seen in them. They work at this and that, their talents are average. How strange! The manner in which they live shows that they think very little of themselves: they merely esteem themselves in so far as they waste their energy on trifles (whether these be mean or frivolous desires, or the trashy concerns of their everyday calling). In the so-called life's calling, which everyone must choose, we may perceive a touching modesty on the part of mankind. They practically admit in choosing thus. "We are called upon to serve and to be of advantage to our equals--the same remark applies to our neighbour and to his neighbour, so everyone serves somebody else; no one is carrying out the duties of his calling for his own sake, but always for the sake of others and thus we are like geese which support one another by the one leaning against the other. _When the aim of each one of us is centred in another, then we have all no object in existing;_ and this 'existing for others' is the most comical of comedies."
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Vanity is the involuntary inclination to set one's self up for an individual while not really being one; that is to say, trying to appear independent when one is dependent. The case of wisdom is the exact contrary: it appears to be dependent while in reality it is independent.
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The Hades of Homer--From what type of existence is it really copied? I think it is the description of the philologist: it is better to be a day-labourer than to have such an an?mic recollection of the past.--[1]
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The attitude of the philologist towards antiquity is apologetic, or else dictated by the view that what our own age values can likewise be found in antiquity. The right attitude to take up, however, is the reverse one, viz., to start with an insight into our modern topsyturviness, and to look back from antiquity to it--and many things about antiquity which have hitherto displeased us will then be seen to have been most profound necessities.
We must make it clear to ourselves that we are acting in an absurd manner when we try to defend or to beautify antiquity: who are we!
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We are under a false impression when we say that there is always some caste which governs a nation's culture, and that therefore savants are necessary; for savants only possess knowledge concerning culture (and even this only in exceptional cases). Among learned men themselves there might be a few, certainly not a caste, but even these would indeed be rare.
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One very great value of antiquity consists in the fact that its writings are the only ones which modern men still read carefully.
Overstraining of the memory--very common among philologists, together with a poor development of the judgment.
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Busying ourselves with the culture-epochs of the past: is this gratitude? We should look backwards in order to explain to ourselves the present conditions of culture: we do not become too laudatory in regard to our own circumstances, but perhaps we should do so in order that we may not be too severe on ourselves.
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He who has no sense for the symbolical has none for antiquity: let pedantic philologists bear this in mind.
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My aim is to bring about a state of complete enmity between our present "culture" and antiquity. Whoever wishes to serve the former must hate the latter.
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Careful meditation upon the past leads to the impression that we are a multiplication of many pasts · so how can we be a final aim? But why not? In most instances, however, we do not wish to be this. We take up our positions again in the ranks, work in our own little corner, and hope that what we do may be of some small profit to our successors. But that is exactly the case of the cask of the Dan? · and this is useless, we must again set about doing everything for ourselves, and only for ourselves--measuring science by ourselves, for example with the question · What is science to us? not . what are we to science? People really make life too easy for themselves when they look upon themselves from such a simple historical point of view, and make humble servants of themselves. "Your own salvation above everything"--that is what you should say; and there are no institutions which you should prize more highly than your own soul.--Now, however, man learns to know himself: he finds himself miserable, despises himself, and is pleased to find something worthy of respect outside himself. Therefore he gets rid of himself, so to speak, makes himself subservient to a