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 +-----------------------------------------------------------+ | Transcriber's Note: | | | | Inconsistent hyphenation in the original document has | | been preserved. | | | | Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. For | | a complete list, please see the end of this document. | | | +-----------------------------------------------------------+

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 THE COMPLETE WORKS

 OF

 FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE

 _The First Complete and Authorised English Translation_

 EDITED BY

 Dr. OSCAR LEVY

 [Illustration]

 VOLUME THREE

 ON THE FUTURE OF OUR EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS

 * * * * *

 _FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE_

 ON THE FUTURE OF OUR EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS

 TRANSLATED, WITH INTRODUCTION, BY

 J. M. KENNEDY

 T. N. FOULIS 13 & 15 FREDERICK STREET EDINBURGH: and LONDON 1910

 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

 _Printed by_ MORRISON & GIBB LIMITED, _Edinburgh_. 

PREFACE. 

(_To be read before the lectures, although it in no way relates tothem. _)

The reader from whom I expect something must possess three qualities:he must be calm and must read without haste; he must not be everinterposing his own personality and his own special "culture"; and hemust not expect as the ultimate results of his study of these pagesthat he will be presented with a set of new formulæ. I do not proposeto furnish formulæ or new plans of study for _Gymnasia_ or otherschools; and I am much more inclined to admire the extraordinary powerof those who are able to cover the whole distance between the depthsof empiricism and the heights of special culture-problems, and whoagain descend to the level of the driest rules and the most neatlyexpressed formulæ. I shall be content if only I can ascend a tolerablylofty mountain, from the summit of which, after having recovered mybreath, I may obtain a general survey of the ground; for I shall neverbe able, in this book, to satisfy the votaries of tabulated rules. Indeed, I see a time coming when serious men, working together in theservice of a completely rejuvenated and purified culture, may againbecome the directors of a system of everyday instruction, calculatedto promote that culture; and they will probably be compelled once moreto draw up sets of rules: but how remote this time now seems! And whatmay not happen meanwhile! It is just possible that between now andthen all _Gymnasia_--yea, and perhaps all universities, may bedestroyed, or have become so utterly transformed that their veryregulations may, in the eyes of future generations, seem to be but therelics of the cave-dwellers' age. 

This book is intended for calm readers, --for men who have not yet beendrawn into the mad headlong rush of our hurry-skurrying age, and whodo not experience any idolatrous delight in throwing themselvesbeneath its chariot-wheels. It is for men, therefore, who are notaccustomed to estimate the value of everything according to the amountof time it either saves or wastes. In short, it is for the few. These, we believe, "still have time. " Without any qualms of conscience theymay improve the most fruitful and vigorous hours of their day inmeditating on the future of our education; they may even believe whenthe evening has come that they have used their day in the mostdignified and useful way, namely, in the _meditatio generis futuri_. No one among them has yet forgotten to think while reading a book; hestill understands the secret of reading between the lines, and isindeed so generous in what he himself brings to his study, that hecontinues to reflect upon what he has read, perhaps long after he haslaid the book aside. And he does this, not because he wishes to writea criticism about it or even another book; but simply becausereflection is a pleasant pastime to him. Frivolous spendthrift! Thouart a reader after my own heart; for thou wilt be patient enough toaccompany an author any distance, even though he himself cannot yetsee the goal at which he is aiming, --even though he himself feels onlythat he must at all events honestly believe in a goal, in order that afuture and possibly very remote generation may come face to face withthat towards which we are now blindly and instinctively groping. Should any reader demur and suggest that all that is required isprompt and bold reform; should he imagine that a new "organisation"introduced by the State, were all that is necessary, then we fear hewould have misunderstood not only the author but the very nature ofthe problem under consideration. 

The third and most important stipulation is, that he should in no casebe constantly bringing himself and his own "culture" forward, afterthe style of most modern men, as the correct standard and measure ofall things. We would have him so highly educated that he could eventhink meanly of his education or despise it altogether. Only thuswould he be able to trust entirely to the author's guidance; for it isonly by virtue of ignorance and his consciousness of ignorance, thatthe latter can dare to make himself heard. Finally, the author wouldwish his reader to be fully alive to the specific character of ourpresent barbarism and of that which distinguishes us, as thebarbarians of the nineteenth century, from other barbarians. 

Now, with this book in his hand, the writer seeks all those who mayhappen to be wandering, hither and thither, impelled by feelingssimilar to his own. Allow yourselves to be discovered--ye lonely onesin whose existence I believe! Ye unselfish ones, suffering inyourselves from the corruption of the German spirit! Ye contemplativeones who cannot, with hasty glances, turn your eyes swiftly from onesurface to another! Ye lofty thinkers, of whom Aristotle said that yewander through life vacillating and inactive so long as no greathonour or glorious Cause calleth you to deeds! It is you I summon!Refrain this once from seeking refuge in your lairs of solitude anddark misgivings. Bethink you that this book was framed to be yourherald. When ye shall go forth to battle in your full panoply, whoamong you will not rejoice in looking back upon the herald who ralliedyou?

INTRODUCTION. 

The title I gave to these lectures ought, like all titles, to havebeen as definite, as plain, and as significant as possible; now, however, I observe that owing to a certain excess of precision, in itspresent form it is too short and consequently misleading. My firstduty therefore will be to explain the title, together with the objectof these lectures, to you, and to apologise for being obliged to dothis. When I promised to speak to you concerning the future of oureducational institutions, I was not thinking especially of theevolution of our particular institutions in Bâle. However frequentlymy general observations may seem to bear particular application to ourown conditions here, I personally have no desire to draw theseinferences, and do not wish to be held responsible if they should bedrawn, for the simple reason that I consider myself still far too muchan inexperienced stranger among you, and much too superficiallyacquainted with your methods, to pretend to pass judgment upon anysuch special order of scholastic establishments, or to predict theprobable course their development will follow. On the other hand, Iknow full well under what distinguished auspices I have to deliverthese lectures--namely, in a city which is striving to educate andenlighten its inhabitants on a scale so magnificently out ofproportion to its size, that it must put all larger cities to shame. This being so, I presume I am justified in assuming that in a quarterwhere so much is _done_ for the things of which I wish to speak, people must also _think_ a good deal about them. My desire--yea, myvery first condition, therefore, would be to become united in spiritwith those who have not only thought very deeply upon educationalproblems, but have also the will to promote what they think to beright by all the means in their power. And, in view of thedifficulties of my task and the limited time at my disposal, to suchlisteners, alone, in my audience, shall I be able to make myselfunderstood--and even then, it will be on condition that they shallguess what I can do no more than suggest, that they shall supply whatI am compelled to omit; in brief, that they shall need but to bereminded and not to be taught. Thus, while I disclaim all desire ofbeing taken for an uninvited adviser on questions relating to theschools and the University of Bâle, I repudiate even more emphaticallystill the rôle of a prophet standing on the horizon of civilisationand pretending to predict the future of education and of scholasticorganisation. I can no more project my vision through such vastperiods of time than I can rely upon its accuracy when it is broughttoo close to an object under examination. With my title: _Our_Educational Institutions, I wish to refer neither to theestablishments in Bâle nor to the incalculably vast number of otherscholastic institutions which exist throughout the nations of theworld to-day; but I wish to refer to _German institutions_ of the kindwhich we rejoice in here. It is their future that will now engage ourattention, _i. E. _ the future of German elementary, secondary, andpublic schools (Gymnasien) and universities. While pursuing ourdiscussion, however, we shall for once avoid all comparisons andvaluations, and guard more especially against that flattering illusionthat our conditions should be regarded as the standard for all othersand as surpassing them. Let it suffice that they are our institutions, that they have not become a part of ourselves by mere accident, andwere not laid upon us like a garment; but that they are livingmonuments of important steps in the progress of civilisation, in somerespects even the furniture of a bygone age, and as such link us withthe past of our people, and are such a sacred and venerable legacythat I can only undertake to speak of the future of our educationalinstitutions in the sense of their being a most probable approximationto the ideal spirit which gave them birth. I am, moreover, convincedthat the numerous alterations which have been introduced into theseinstitutions within recent years, with the view of bringing themup-to-date, are for the most part but distortions and aberrations ofthe originally sublime tendencies given to them at their foundation. And what we dare to hope from the future, in this behalf, partakes somuch of the nature of a rejuvenation, a reviviscence, and a refiningof the spirit of Germany that, as a result of this very process, oureducational institutions may also be indirectly remoulded and bornagain, so as to appear at once old and new, whereas now they onlyprofess to be "modern" or "up-to-date. "

Now it is only in the spirit of the hope above mentioned that I wishto speak of the future of our educational institutions: and this isthe second point in regard to which I must tender an apology from theoutset. The "prophet" pose is such a presumptuous one that it seemsalmost ridiculous to deny that I have the intention of adopting it. No one should attempt to describe the future of our education, andthe means and methods of instruction relating thereto, in a propheticspirit, unless he can prove that the picture he draws already existsin germ to-day, and that all that is required is the extension anddevelopment of this embryo if the necessary modifications are to beproduced in schools and other educational institutions. All I ask, is, like a Roman haruspex, to be allowed to steal glimpses of thefuture out of the very entrails of existing conditions, which, inthis case, means no more than to hand the laurels of victory to anyone of the many forces tending to make itself felt in our presenteducational system, despite the fact that the force in question maybe neither a favourite, an esteemed, nor a very extensive one. Iconfidently assert that it will be victorious, however, because ithas the strongest and mightiest of all allies in nature herself; andin this respect it were well did we not forget that scores of thevery first principles of our modern educational methods arethoroughly artificial, and that the most fatal weaknesses of thepresent day are to be ascribed to this artificiality. He who feels incomplete harmony with the present state of affairs and who acquiescesin it _as something_ "_selbstverständliches_, "[1] excites our envyneither in regard to his faith nor in regard to that egregious word"_selbstverständlich_, " so frequently heard in fashionable circles. 

He, however, who holds the opposite view and is therefore in despair, does not need to fight any longer: all he requires is to give himselfup to solitude in order soon to be alone. Albeit, between those whotake everything for granted and these anchorites, there stand the_fighters_--that is to say, those who still have hope, and as thenoblest and sublimest example of this class, we recognise Schiller ashe is described by Goethe in his "Epilogue to the Bell. "

 "Brighter now glow'd his cheek, and still more bright With that unchanging, ever youthful glow:-- That courage which o'ercomes, in hard-fought fight, Sooner or later ev'ry earthly foe, -- That faith which soaring to the realms of light, Now boldly presseth on, now bendeth low, So that the good may work, wax, thrive amain, So that the day the noble may attain. "[2]

I should like you to regard all I have just said as a kind of preface, the object of which is to illustrate the title of my lectures and toguard me against any possible misunderstanding and unjustifiedcriticisms. And now, in order to give you a rough outline of the rangeof ideas from which I shall attempt to form a judgment concerning oureducational institutions, before proceeding to disclose my views andturning from the title to the main theme, I shall lay a scheme beforeyou which, like a coat of arms, will serve to warn all strangers whocome to my door, as to the nature of the house they are about toenter, in case they may feel inclined, after having examined thedevice, to turn their backs on the premises that bear it. My scheme isas follows:--

Two seemingly antagonistic forces, equally deleterious in theiractions and ultimately combining to produce their results, are atpresent ruling over our educational institutions, although these werebased originally upon very different principles. These forces are: astriving to achieve the greatest possible _extension of education_ onthe one hand, and a tendency _to minimise and to weaken it_ on theother. The first-named would fain spread learning among the greatestpossible number of people, the second would compel education torenounce its highest and most independent claims in order tosubordinate itself to the service of the State. In the face of thesetwo antagonistic tendencies, we could but give ourselves up todespair, did we not see the possibility of promoting the cause of twoother contending factors which are fortunately as completely German asthey are rich in promises for the future; I refer to the presentmovement towards _limiting and concentrating_ education as theantithesis of the first of the forces above mentioned, and that othermovement towards the _strengthening and the independence_ of educationas the antithesis of the second force. If we should seek a warrant forour belief in the ultimate victory of the two last-named movements, wecould find it in the fact that both of the forces which we hold to bedeleterious are so opposed to the eternal purpose of nature as theconcentration of education for the few is in harmony with it, and istrue, whereas the first two forces could succeed only in founding aculture false to the root. 

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Selbstverständlich = "granted or self-understood. "

[2] _The Poems of Goethe. _ Edgar Alfred Bowring's Translation. (Ed. 1853. )

THE FUTURE OF OUR EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS. 

FIRST LECTURE. 

(_Delivered on the 16th of January 1872. _)

Ladies and Gentlemen, --The subject I now propose to consider with youis such a serious and important one, and is in a sense so disquieting, that, like you, I would gladly turn to any one who could proffer someinformation concerning it, --were he ever so young, were his ideas everso improbable--provided that he were able, by the exercise of his ownfaculties, to furnish some satisfactory and sufficient explanation. Itis just possible that he may have had the opportunity of _hearing_sound views expressed in reference to the vexed question of the futureof our educational institutions, and that he may wish to repeat themto you; he may even have had distinguished teachers, fully qualifiedto foretell what is to come, and, like the _haruspices_ of Rome, ableto do so after an inspection of the entrails of the Present. 

Indeed, you yourselves may expect something of this kind from me. Ihappened once, in strange but perfectly harmless circumstances, tooverhear a conversation on this subject between two remarkable men, and the more striking points of the discussion, together with theirmanner of handling the theme, are so indelibly imprinted on my memorythat, whenever I reflect on these matters, I invariably find myselffalling into their grooves of thought. I cannot, however, profess tohave the same courageous confidence which they displayed, both intheir daring utterance of forbidden truths, and in the still moredaring conception of the hopes with which they astonished me. Ittherefore seemed to me to be in the highest degree important that arecord of this conversation should be made, so that others might beincited to form a judgment concerning the striking views andconclusions it contains: and, to this end, I had special grounds forbelieving that I should do well to avail myself of the opportunityafforded by this course of lectures. 

I am well aware of the nature of the community to whose seriousconsideration I now wish to commend that conversation--I know it to bea community which is striving to educate and enlighten its members ona scale so magnificently out of proportion to its size that it mustput all larger cities to shame. This being so, I presume I may take itfor granted that in a quarter where so much is _done_ for the thingsof which I wish to speak, people must also _think_ a good deal aboutthem. In my account of the conversation already mentioned, I shall beable to make myself completely understood only to those among myaudience who will be able to guess what I can do no more than suggest, who will supply what I am compelled to omit, and who, above all, needbut to be reminded and not taught. 

Listen, therefore, ladies and gentlemen, while I recount my harmlessexperience and the less harmless conversation between the twogentlemen whom, so far, I have not named. 

Let us now imagine ourselves in the position of a young student--thatis to say, in a position which, in our present age of bewilderingmovement and feverish excitability, has become an almost impossibleone. It is necessary to have lived through it in order to believe thatsuch careless self-lulling and comfortable indifference to the moment, or to time in general, are possible. In this condition I, and a friendabout my own age, spent a year at the University of Bonn on theRhine, --it was a year which, in its complete lack of plans andprojects for the future, seems almost like a dream to me now--a dreamframed, as it were, by two periods of growth. We two remained quietand peaceful, although we were surrounded by fellows who in the mainwere very differently disposed, and from time to time we experiencedconsiderable difficulty in meeting and resisting the somewhat toopressing advances of the young men of our own age. Now, however, thatI can look upon the stand we had to take against these opposingforces, I cannot help associating them in my mind with those checks weare wont to receive in our dreams, as, for instance, when we imaginewe are able to fly and yet feel ourselves held back by someincomprehensible power. 

I and my friend had many reminiscences in common, and these dated fromthe period of our boyhood upwards. One of these I must relate to you, since it forms a sort of prelude to the harmless experience alreadymentioned. On the occasion of a certain journey up the Rhine, which wehad made together one summer, it happened that he and I independentlyconceived the very same plan at the same hour and on the same spot, and we were so struck by this unwonted coincidence that we determinedto carry the plan out forthwith. We resolved to found a kind of smallclub which would consist of ourselves and a few friends, and theobject of which would be to provide us with a stable and bindingorganisation directing and adding interest to our creative impulses inart and literature; or, to put it more plainly: each of us would bepledged to present an original piece of work to the club once amonth, --either a poem, a treatise, an architectural design, or amusical composition, upon which each of the others, in a friendlyspirit, would have to pass free and unrestrained criticism. 

We thus hoped, by means of mutual correction, to be able both tostimulate and to chasten our creative impulses and, as a matter offact, the success of the scheme was such that we have both always felta sort of respectful attachment for the hour and the place at which itfirst took shape in our minds. 

This attachment was very soon transformed into a rite; for we allagreed to go, whenever it was possible to do so, once a year to thatlonely spot near Rolandseck, where on that summer's day, while sittingtogether, lost in meditation, we were suddenly inspired by the samethought. Frankly speaking, the rules which were drawn up on theformation of the club were never very strictly observed; but owing tothe very fact that we had many sins of omission on our conscienceduring our student-year in Bonn, when we were once more on the banksof the Rhine, we firmly resolved not only to observe our rule, butalso to gratify our feelings and our sense of gratitude by reverentlyvisiting that spot near Rolandseck on the day appointed. 

It was, however, with some difficulty that we were able to carry ourplans into execution; for, on the very day we had selected for ourexcursion, the large and lively students' association, which alwayshindered us in our flights, did their utmost to put obstacles in ourway and to hold us back. Our association had organised a generalholiday excursion to Rolandseck on the very day my friend and I hadfixed upon, the object of the outing being to assemble all its membersfor the last time at the close of the half-year and to send them homewith pleasant recollections of their last hours together. 

The day was a glorious one; the weather was of the kind which, in ourclimate at least, only falls to our lot in late summer: heaven andearth merged harmoniously with one another, and, glowing wondrously inthe sunshine, autumn freshness blended with the blue expanse above. Arrayed in the bright fantastic garb in which, amid the gloomyfashions now reigning, students alone may indulge, we boarded asteamer which was gaily decorated in our honour, and hoisted our flagon its mast. From both banks of the river there came at intervals thesound of signal-guns, fired according to our orders, with the view ofacquainting both our host in Rolandseck and the inhabitants in theneighbourhood with our approach. I shall not speak of the noisyjourney from the landing-stage, through the excited and expectantlittle place, nor shall I refer to the esoteric jokes exchangedbetween ourselves; I also make no mention of a feast which became bothwild and noisy, or of an extraordinary musical production in theexecution of which, whether as soloists or as chorus, we allultimately had to share, and which I, as musical adviser of our club, had not only had to rehearse, but was then forced to conduct. Towardsthe end of this piece, which grew ever wilder and which was sung toever quicker time, I made a sign to my friend, and just as the lastchord rang like a yell through the building, he and I vanished, leaving behind us a raging pandemonium. 

In a moment we were in the refreshing and breathless stillness ofnature. The shadows were already lengthening, the sun still shonesteadily, though it had sunk a good deal in the heavens, and from thegreen and glittering waves of the Rhine a cool breeze was wafted overour hot faces. Our solemn rite bound us only in so far as the latesthours of the day were concerned, and we therefore determined to employthe last moments of clear daylight by giving ourselves up to one ofour many hobbies. 

At that time we were passionately fond of pistol-shooting, and both ofus in later years found the skill we had acquired as amateurs of greatuse in our military career. Our club servant happened to know thesomewhat distant and elevated spot which we used as a range, and hadcarried our pistols there in advance. The spot lay near the upperborder of the wood which covered the lesser heights behind Rolandseck:it was a small uneven plateau, close to the place we had consecratedin memory of its associations. On a wooded slope alongside of ourshooting-range there was a small piece of ground which had beencleared of wood, and which made an ideal halting-place; from it onecould get a view of the Rhine over the tops of the trees and thebrushwood, so that the beautiful, undulating lines of the SevenMountains and above all of the Drachenfels bounded the horizon againstthe group of trees, while in the centre of the bow formed by theglistening Rhine itself the island of Nonnenwörth stood out as ifsuspended in the river's arms. This was the place which had becomesacred to us through the dreams and plans we had had in common, and towhich we intended to withdraw, later in the evening, --nay, to which weshould be obliged to withdraw, if we wished to close the day inaccordance with the law we had imposed on ourselves. 

At one end of the little uneven plateau, and not very far away, therestood the mighty trunk of an oak-tree, prominently visible against abackground quite bare of trees and consisting merely of low undulatinghills in the distance. Working together, we had once carved apentagram in the side of this tree-trunk. Years of exposure to rainand storm had slightly deepened the channels we had cut, and thefigure seemed a welcome target for our pistol-practice. It was alreadylate in the afternoon when we reached our improvised range, and ouroak-stump cast a long and attenuated shadow across the barren heath. All was still: thanks to the lofty trees at our feet, we were unableto catch a glimpse of the valley of the Rhine below. The peacefulnessof the spot seemed only to intensify the loudness of ourpistol-shots--and I had scarcely fired my second barrel at thepentagram when I felt some one lay hold of my arm and noticed that myfriend had also some one beside him who had interrupted his loading. 

Turning sharply on my heels I found myself face to face with anastonished old gentleman, and felt what must have been a very powerfuldog make a lunge at my back. My friend had been approached by asomewhat younger man than I had; but before we could give expressionto our surprise the older of the two interlopers burst forth in thefollowing threatening and heated strain: "No! no!" he called to us, "no duels must be fought here, but least of all must you youngstudents fight one. Away with these pistols and compose yourselves. Bereconciled, shake hands! What?--and are you the salt of the earth, the intelligence of the future, the seed of our hopes--and are younot even able to emancipate yourselves from the insane code of honourand its violent regulations? I will not cast any aspersions on yourhearts, but your heads certainly do you no credit. You, whose youth iswatched over by the wisdom of Greece and Rome, and whose youthfulspirits, at the cost of enormous pains, have been flooded with thelight of the sages and heroes of antiquity, --can you not refrain frommaking the code of knightly honour--that is to say, the code of follyand brutality--the guiding principle of your conduct?--Examine itrationally once and for all, and reduce it to plain terms; lay itspitiable narrowness bare, and let it be the touchstone, not of yourhearts but of your minds. If you do not regret it then, it will merelyshow that your head is not fitted for work in a sphere where greatgifts of discrimination are needful in order to burst the bonds ofprejudice, and where a well-balanced understanding is necessary forthe purpose of distinguishing right from wrong, even when thedifference between them lies deeply hidden and is not, as in thiscase, so ridiculously obvious. In that case, therefore, my lads, tryto go through life in some other honourable manner; join the army orlearn a handicraft that pays its way. "

To this rough, though admittedly just, flood of eloquence, we repliedwith some irritation, interrupting each other continually in so doing:"In the first place, you are mistaken concerning the main point; forwe are not here to fight a duel at all; but rather to practisepistol-shooting. Secondly, you do not appear to know how a real duelis conducted;--do you suppose that we should have faced each other inthis lonely spot, like two highwaymen, without seconds or doctors, etc. Etc. ? Thirdly, with regard to the question of duelling, we eachhave our own opinions, and do not require to be waylaid and surprisedby the sort of instruction you may feel disposed to give us. "

This reply, which was certainly not polite, made a bad impression uponthe old man. At first, when he heard that we were not about to fight aduel, he surveyed us more kindly: but when we reached the last passageof our speech, he seemed so vexed that he growled. When, however, webegan to speak of our point of view, he quickly caught hold of hiscompanion, turned sharply round, and cried to us in bitter tones:"People should not have points of view, but thoughts!" And then hiscompanion added: "Be respectful when a man such as this even makesmistakes!"

Meanwhile, my friend, who had reloaded, fired a shot at the pentagram, after having cried: "Look out!" This sudden report behind his backmade the old man savage; once more he turned round and looked sourlyat my friend, after which he said to his companion in a feeble voice:"What shall we do? These young men will be the death of me with theirfiring. "--"You should know, " said the younger man, turning to us, "that your noisy pastimes amount, as it happens on this occasion, toan attempt upon the life of philosophy. You observe this venerableman, --he is in a position to beg you to desist from firing here. Andwhen such a man begs----" "Well, his request is generally granted, "the old man interjected, surveying us sternly. 

As a matter of fact, we did not know what to make of the whole matter;we could not understand what our noisy pastimes could have in commonwith philosophy; nor could we see why, out of regard for politescruples, we should abandon our shooting-range, and at this moment wemay have appeared somewhat undecided and perturbed. The companionnoticing our momentary discomfiture, proceeded to explain the matterto us. 

"We are compelled, " he said, "to linger in this immediateneighbourhood for an hour or so; we have a rendezvous here. An eminentfriend of this eminent man is to meet us here this evening; and we hadactually selected this peaceful spot, with its few benches in themidst of the wood, for the meeting. It would really be most unpleasantif, owing to your continual pistol-practice, we were to be subjectedto an unending series of shocks; surely your own feelings will tellyou that it is impossible for you to continue your firing when youhear that he who has selected this quiet and isolated place for ameeting with a friend is one of our most eminent philosophers. "

This explanation only succeeded in perturbing us the more; for we sawa danger threatening us which was even greater than the loss of ourshooting-range, and we asked eagerly, "Where is this quiet spot?Surely not to the left here, in the wood?"

"That is the very place. "

"But this evening that place belongs to us, " my friend interposed. "Wemust have it, " we cried together. 

Our long-projected celebration seemed at that moment more importantthan all the philosophies of the world, and we gave such vehement andanimated utterance to our sentiments that in view of theincomprehensible nature of our claims we must have cut a somewhatridiculous figure. At any rate, our philosophical interlopers regardedus with expressions of amused inquiry, as if they expected us toproffer some sort of apology. But we were silent, for we wished aboveall to keep our secret. 

Thus we stood facing one another in silence, while the sunset dyed thetree-tops a ruddy gold. The philosopher contemplated the sun, hiscompanion contemplated him, and we turned our eyes towards our nook inthe woods which to-day we seemed in such great danger of losing. Afeeling of sullen anger took possession of us. What is philosophy, weasked ourselves, if it prevents a man from being by himself or fromenjoying the select company of a friend, --in sooth, if it prevents himfrom becoming a philosopher? For we regarded the celebration of ourrite as a thoroughly philosophical performance. In celebrating it wewished to form plans and resolutions for the future, by means of quietreflections we hoped to light upon an idea which would once again helpus to form and gratify our spirit in the future, just as that formeridea had done during our boyhood. The solemn act derived its verysignificance from this resolution, that nothing definite was to bedone, we were only to be alone, and to sit still and meditate, as wehad done five years before when we had each been inspired with thesame thought. It was to be a silent solemnisation, all reminiscenceand all future; the present was to be as a hyphen between the two. Andfate, now unfriendly, had just stepped into our magic circle--and weknew not how to dismiss her;--the very unusual character of thecircumstances filled us with mysterious excitement. 

Whilst we stood thus in silence for some time, divided into twohostile groups, the clouds above waxed ever redder and the eveningseemed to grow more peaceful and mild; we could almost fancy we heardthe regular breathing of nature as she put the final touches to herwork of art--the glorious day we had just enjoyed; when, suddenly, thecalm evening air was rent by a confused and boisterous cry of joywhich seemed to come from the Rhine. A number of voices could be heardin the distance--they were those of our fellow-students who by thattime must have taken to the Rhine in small boats. It occurred to usthat we should be missed and that we should also miss something:almost simultaneously my friend and I raised our pistols: our shotswere echoed back to us, and with their echo there came from the valleythe sound of a well-known cry intended as a signal of identification. For our passion for shooting had brought us both repute and ill-reputein our club. At the same time we were conscious that our behaviourtowards the silent philosophical couple had been exceptionallyungentlemanly; they had been quietly contemplating us for some time, and when we fired the shock made them draw close up to each other. Wehurried up to them, and each in our turn cried out: "Forgive us. Thatwas our last shot, and it was intended for our friends on the Rhine. They have understood us, do you hear? If you insist upon having thatplace among the trees, grant us at least the permission to reclinethere also. You will find a number of benches on the spot: we shallnot disturb you; we shall sit quite still and shall not utter a word:but it is now past seven o'clock and we _must_ go there at once. 

"That sounds more mysterious than it is, " I added after a pause; "wehave made a solemn vow to spend this coming hour on that ground, andthere were reasons for the vow. The spot is sacred to us, owing tosome pleasant associations, it must also inaugurate a good future forus. We shall therefore endeavour to leave you with no disagreeablerecollections of our meeting--even though we have done much to perturband frighten you. "

The philosopher was silent; his companion, however, said: "Ourpromises and plans unfortunately compel us not only to remain, butalso to spend the same hour on the spot you have selected. It is leftfor us to decide whether fate or perhaps a spirit has been responsiblefor this extraordinary coincidence. "

"Besides, my friend, " said the philosopher, "I am not half sodispleased with these warlike youngsters as I was. Did you observehow quiet they were a moment ago, when we were contemplating the sun?They neither spoke nor smoked, they stood stone still, I even believethey meditated. "

Turning suddenly in our direction, he said: "_Were_ you meditating?Just tell me about it as we proceed in the direction of our commontrysting-place. " We took a few steps together and went down the slopeinto the warm balmy air of the woods where it was already much darker. On the way my friend openly revealed his thoughts to the philosopher, he confessed how much he had feared that perhaps to-day for the firsttime a philosopher was about to stand in the way of hisphilosophising. 

The sage laughed. "What? You were afraid a philosopher would preventyour philosophising? This might easily happen: and you have not yetexperienced such a thing? Has your university life been free fromexperience? You surely attend lectures on philosophy?"

This question discomfited us; for, as a matter of fact, there had beenno element of philosophy in our education up to that time. In thosedays, moreover, we fondly imagined that everybody who held the postand possessed the dignity of a philosopher must perforce be one: wewere inexperienced and badly informed. We frankly admitted that we hadnot yet belonged to any philosophical college, but that we wouldcertainly make up for lost time. 

"Then what, " he asked, "did you mean when you spoke ofphilosophising?" Said I, "We are at a loss for a definition. But toall intents and purposes we meant this, that we wished to make earnestendeavours to consider the best possible means of becoming men ofculture. " "That is a good deal and at the same time very little, "growled the philosopher; "just you think the matter over. Here are ourbenches, let us discuss the question exhaustively: I shall not disturbyour meditations with regard to how you are to become men of culture. I wish you success and--points of view, as in your duelling questions;brand-new, original, and enlightened points of view. The philosopherdoes not wish to prevent your philosophising: but refrain at leastfrom disconcerting him with your pistol-shots. Try to imitate thePythagoreans to-day: they, as servants of a true philosophy, had toremain silent for five years--possibly you may also be able to remainsilent for five times fifteen minutes, as servants of your own futureculture, about which you seem so concerned. "

We had reached our destination: the solemnisation of our rite began. As on the previous occasion, five years ago, the Rhine was once moreflowing beneath a light mist, the sky seemed bright and the woodsexhaled the same fragrance. We took our places on the farthest cornerof the most distant bench; sitting there we were almost concealed, andneither the philosopher nor his companion could see our faces. We werealone: when the sound of the philosopher's voice reached us, it hadbecome so blended with the rustling leaves and with the buzzingmurmur of the myriads of living things inhabiting the wooded height, that it almost seemed like the music of nature; as a sound itresembled nothing more than a distant monotonous plaint. We wereindeed undisturbed. 

Some time elapsed in this way, and while the glow of sunset grewsteadily paler the recollection of our youthful undertaking in thecause of culture waxed ever more vivid. It seemed to us as if we owedthe greatest debt of gratitude to that little society we had founded;for it had done more than merely supplement our public schooltraining; it had actually been the only fruitful society we had had, and within its frame we even placed our public school life, as apurely isolated factor helping us in our general efforts to attain toculture. 

We knew this, that, thanks to our little society, no thought ofembracing any particular career had ever entered our minds in thosedays. The all too frequent exploitation of youth by the State, for itsown purposes--that is to say, so that it may rear useful officials asquickly as possible and guarantee their unconditional obedience to itby means of excessively severe examinations--had remained quiteforeign to our education. And to show how little we had been actuatedby thoughts of utility or by the prospect of speedy advancement andrapid success, on that day we were struck by the comfortingconsideration that, even then, we had not yet decided what we shouldbe--we had not even troubled ourselves at all on this head. Our littlesociety had sown the seeds of this happy indifference in our souls andfor it alone we were prepared to celebrate the anniversary of itsfoundation with hearty gratitude. I have already pointed out, I think, that in the eyes of the present age, which is so intolerant ofanything that is not useful, such purposeless enjoyment of the moment, such a lulling of one's self in the cradle of the present, must seemalmost incredible and at all events blameworthy. How useless we were!And how proud we were of being useless! We used even to quarrel witheach other as to which of us should have the glory of being the moreuseless. We wished to attach no importance to anything, to have strongviews about nothing, to aim at nothing; we wanted to take no thoughtfor the morrow, and desired no more than to recline comfortably likegood-for-nothings on the threshold of the present; and we did--blessus!

--That, ladies and gentlemen, was our standpoint then!--

Absorbed in these reflections, I was just about to give an answer tothe question of the future of _our_ Educational Institutions in thesame self-sufficient way, when it gradually dawned upon me that the"natural music, " coming from the philosopher's bench had lost itsoriginal character and travelled to us in much more piercing anddistinct tones than before. Suddenly I became aware that I waslistening, that I was eavesdropping, and was passionately interested, with both ears keenly alive to every sound. I nudged my friend who wasevidently somewhat tired, and I whispered: "Don't fall asleep! Thereis something for us to learn over there. It applies to us, eventhough it be not meant for us. "

For instance, I heard the younger of the two men defending himselfwith great animation while the philosopher rebuked him with everincreasing vehemence. "You are unchanged, " he cried to him, "unfortunately unchanged. It is quite incomprehensible to me how youcan still be the same as you were seven years ago, when I saw you forthe last time and left you with so much misgiving. I fear I must onceagain divest you, however reluctantly, of the skin of modern culturewhich you have donned meanwhile;--and what do I find beneath it? Thesame immutable 'intelligible' character forsooth, according to Kant;but unfortunately the same unchanged 'intellectual' character, too--which may also be a necessity, though not a comforting one. I askmyself to what purpose have I lived as a philosopher, if, possessed asyou are of no mean intelligence and a genuine thirst for knowledge, all the years you have spent in my company have left no deeperimpression upon you. At present you are behaving as if you had noteven heard the cardinal principle of all culture, which I went to suchpains to inculcate upon you during our former intimacy. Tell me, --whatwas that principle?"

"I remember, " replied the scolded pupil, "you used to say no one wouldstrive to attain to culture if he knew how incredibly small the numberof really cultured people actually is, and can ever be. And even thisnumber of really cultured people would not be possible if a prodigiousmultitude, from reasons opposed to their nature and only led on by analluring delusion, did not devote themselves to education. It weretherefore a mistake publicly to reveal the ridiculous disproportionbetween the number of really cultured people and the enormousmagnitude of the educational apparatus. Here lies the whole secret ofculture--namely, that an innumerable host of men struggle to achieveit and work hard to that end, ostensibly in their own interests, whereas at bottom it is only in order that it may be possible for thefew to attain to it. "

"That is the principle, " said the philosopher, --"and yet you could sofar forget yourself as to believe that you are one of the few? Thisthought has occurred to you--I can see. That, however, is the resultof the worthless character of modern education. The rights of geniusare being democratised in order that people may be relieved of thelabour of acquiring culture, and their need of it. Every one wants ifpossible to recline in the shade of the tree planted by genius, and toescape the dreadful necessity of working for him, so that hisprocreation may be made possible. What? Are you too proud to be ateacher? Do you despise the thronging multitude of learners? Do youspeak contemptuously of the teacher's calling? And, aping my mode oflife, would you fain live in solitary seclusion, hostilely isolatedfrom that multitude? Do you suppose that you can reach at one boundwhat I ultimately had to win for myself only after long and determinedstruggles, in order even to be able to live like a philosopher? And doyou not fear that solitude will wreak its vengeance upon you? Justtry living the life of a hermit of culture. One must be blessed withoverflowing wealth in order to live for the good of all on one's ownresources! Extraordinary youngsters! They felt it incumbent upon themto imitate what is precisely most difficult and most high, --what ispossible only to the master, when they, above all, should know howdifficult and dangerous this is, and how many excellent gifts may beruined by attempting it!"

"I will conceal nothing from you, sir, " the companion replied. "I haveheard too much from your lips at odd times and have been too long inyour company to be able to surrender myself entirely to our presentsystem of education and instruction. I am too painfully conscious ofthe disastrous errors and abuses to which you used to call myattention--though I very well know that I am not strong enough to hopefor any success were I to struggle ever so valiantly against them. Iwas overcome by a feeling of general discouragement; my recourse tosolitude was the result neither of pride nor arrogance. I would faindescribe to you what I take to be the nature of the educationalquestions now attracting such enormous and pressing attention. Itseemed to me that I must recognise two main directions in the forcesat work--two seemingly antagonistic tendencies, equally deleterious intheir action, and ultimately combining to produce their results: astriving to achieve the greatest possible _expansion_ of education onthe one hand, and a tendency to _minimise and weaken_ it on theother. The first-named would, for various reasons, spread learningamong the greatest number of people; the second would compel educationto renounce its highest, noblest and sublimest claims in order tosubordinate itself to some other department of life--such as theservice of the State. 

"I believe I have already hinted at the quarter in which the cry forthe greatest possible expansion of education is most loudly raised. This expansion belongs to the most beloved of the dogmas of modernpolitical economy. As much knowledge and education as possible;therefore the greatest possible supply and demand--hence as muchhappiness as possible:--that is the formula. In this case utility ismade the object and goal of education, --utility in the sense ofgain--the greatest possible pecuniary gain. In the quarter now underconsideration culture would be defined as that point of vantage whichenables one to 'keep in the van of one's age, ' from which one can seeall the easiest and best roads to wealth, and with which one controlsall the means of communication between men and nations. The purpose ofeducation, according to this scheme, would be to rear the most'current' men possible, --'current' being used here in the sense inwhich it is applied to the coins of the realm. The greater the numberof such men, the happier a nation will be; and this precisely is thepurpose of our modern educational institutions: to help every one, asfar as his nature will allow, to become 'current'; to develop him sothat his particular degree of knowledge and science may yield him thegreatest possible amount of happiness and pecuniary gain. Every onemust be able to form some sort of estimate of himself; he must knowhow much he may reasonably expect from life. The 'bond betweenintelligence and property' which this point of view postulates hasalmost the force of a moral principle. In this quarter all culture isloathed which isolates, which sets goals beyond gold and gain, andwhich requires time: it is customary to dispose of such eccentrictendencies in education as systems of 'Higher Egotism, ' or of 'ImmoralCulture--Epicureanism. ' According to the morality reigning here, thedemands are quite different; what is required above all is 'rapideducation, ' so that a money-earning creature may be produced with allspeed; there is even a desire to make this education so thorough thata creature may be reared that will be able to earn a _great deal_ ofmoney. Men are allowed only the precise amount of culture which iscompatible with the interests of gain; but that amount, at least, isexpected from them. In short: mankind has a necessary right tohappiness on earth--that is why culture is necessary--but on thataccount alone!"

"I must just say something here, " said the philosopher. "In the caseof the view you have described so clearly, there arises the great andawful danger that at some time or other the great masses may overleapthe middle classes and spring headlong into this earthly bliss. Thatis what is now called 'the social question. ' It might seem to thesemasses that education for the greatest number of men was only a meansto the earthly bliss of the few: the 'greatest possible expansion ofeducation' so enfeebles education that it can no longer conferprivileges or inspire respect. The most general form of culture issimply barbarism. But I do not wish to interrupt your discussion. "

The companion continued: "There are yet other reasons, besides thisbeloved economical dogma, for the expansion of education that is beingstriven after so valiantly everywhere. In some countries the fear ofreligious oppression is so general, and the dread of its results somarked, that people in all classes of society long for culture andeagerly absorb those elements of it which are supposed to scatter thereligious instincts. Elsewhere the State, in its turn, strives hereand there for its own preservation, after the greatest possibleexpansion of education, because it always feels strong enough to bringthe most determined emancipation, resulting from culture, under itsyoke, and readily approves of everything which tends to extendculture, provided that it be of service to its officials or soldiers, but in the main to itself, in its competition with other nations. Inthis case, the foundations of a State must be sufficiently broad andfirm to constitute a fitting counterpart to the complicated arches ofculture which it supports, just as in the first case the traces ofsome former religious tyranny must still be felt for a people to bedriven to such desperate remedies. Thus, wherever I hear the massesraise the cry for an expansion of education, I am wont to ask myselfwhether it is stimulated by a greedy lust of gain and property, bythe memory of a former religious persecution, or by the prudentegotism of the State itself. 

"On the other hand, it seemed to me that there was yet anothertendency, not so clamorous, perhaps, but quite as forcible, which, hailing from various quarters, was animated by a differentdesire, --the desire to minimise and weaken education. 

"In all cultivated circles people are in the habit of whispering toone another words something after this style: that it is a generalfact that, owing to the present frantic exploitation of the scholar inthe service of his science, his _education_ becomes every day moreaccidental and more uncertain. For the study of science has beenextended to such interminable lengths that he who, though notexceptionally gifted, yet possesses fair abilities, will need todevote himself exclusively to one branch and ignore all others if heever wish to achieve anything in his work. Should he then elevatehimself above the herd by means of his speciality, he still remainsone of them in regard to all else, --that is to say, in regard to allthe most important things in life. Thus, a specialist in science getsto resemble nothing so much as a factory workman who spends his wholelife in turning one particular screw or handle on a certain instrumentor machine, at which occupation he acquires the most consummate skill. In Germany, where we know how to drape such painful facts with theglorious garments of fancy, this narrow specialisation on the part ofour learned men is even admired, and their ever greater deviationfrom the path of true culture is regarded as a moral phenomenon. 'Fidelity in small things, ' 'dogged faithfulness, ' become expressionsof highest eulogy, and the lack of culture outside the speciality isflaunted abroad as a sign of noble sufficiency. 

"For centuries it has been an understood thing that one alluded toscholars alone when one spoke of cultured men; but experience tells usthat it would be difficult to find any necessary relation between thetwo classes to-day. For at present the exploitation of a man for thepurpose of science is accepted everywhere without the slightestscruple. Who still ventures to ask, What may be the value of a sciencewhich consumes its minions in this vampire fashion? The division oflabour in science is practically struggling towards the same goalwhich religions in certain parts of the world are consciously strivingafter, --that is to say, towards the decrease and even the destructionof learning. That, however, which, in the case of certain religions, is a perfectly justifiable aim, both in regard to their origin andtheir history, can only amount to self-immolation when transferred tothe realm of science. In all matters of a general and serious nature, and above all, in regard to the highest philosophical problems, wehave now already reached a point at which the scientific man, as such, is no longer allowed to speak. On the other hand, that adhesive andtenacious stratum which has now filled up the interstices between thesciences--Journalism--believes it has a mission to fulfil here, andthis it does, according to its own particular lights--that is to say, as its name implies, after the fashion of a day-labourer. 

"It is precisely in journalism that the two tendencies combine andbecome one. The expansion and the diminution of education here joinhands. The newspaper actually steps into the place of culture, and hewho, even as a scholar, wishes to voice any claim for education, mustavail himself of this viscous stratum of communication which cementsthe seams between all forms of life, all classes, all arts, and allsciences, and which is as firm and reliable as news paper is, as arule. In the newspaper the peculiar educational aims of the presentculminate, just as the journalist, the servant of the moment, hasstepped into the place of the genius, of the leader for all time, ofthe deliverer from the tyranny of the moment. Now, tell me, distinguished master, what hopes could I still have in a struggleagainst the general topsy-turvification of all genuine aims foreducation; with what courage can I, a single teacher, step forward, when I know that the moment any seeds of real culture are sown, theywill be mercilessly crushed by the roller of this pseudo-culture?Imagine how useless the most energetic work on the part of theindividual teacher must be, who would fain lead a pupil back into thedistant and evasive Hellenic world and to the real home of culture, when in less than an hour, that same pupil will have recourse to anewspaper, the latest novel, or one of those learned books, the verystyle of which already bears the revolting impress of modern barbaricculture----"

"Now, silence a minute!" interjected the philosopher in a strong andsympathetic voice. "I understand you now, and ought never to havespoken so crossly to you. You are altogether right, save in yourdespair. I shall now proceed to say a few words of consolation. "

SECOND LECTURE. 

(_Delivered on the 6th of February 1872. _)

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, --Those among you whom I now have the pleasure ofaddressing for the first time and whose only knowledge of my firstlecture has been derived from reports will, I hope, not mind beingintroduced here into the middle of a dialogue which I had begun torecount on the last occasion, and the last points of which I must nowrecall. The philosopher's young companion was just pleading openly andconfidentially with his distinguished tutor, and apologising forhaving so far renounced his calling as a teacher in order to spend hisdays in comfortless solitude. No suspicion of superciliousness orarrogance had induced him to form this resolve. 

"I have heard too much from your lips at various times, " thestraightforward pupil said, "and have been too long in your company, to surrender myself blindly to our present systems of education andinstruction. I am too painfully conscious of the disastrous errors andabuses to which you were wont to call my attention; and yet I knowthat I am far from possessing the requisite strength to meet withsuccess, however valiantly I might struggle to shatter the bulwarksof this would-be culture. I was overcome by a general feeling ofdepression: my recourse to solitude was not arrogance orsuperciliousness. " Whereupon, to account for his behaviour, hedescribed the general character of modern educational methods sovividly that the philosopher could not help interrupting him in avoice full of sympathy, and crying words of comfort to him. 

"Now, silence for a minute, my poor friend, " he cried; "I can moreeasily understand you now, and should not have lost my patience withyou. You are altogether right, save in your despair. I shall nowproceed to say a few words of comfort to you. How long do you supposethe state of education in the schools of our time, which seems toweigh so heavily upon you, will last? I shall not conceal my views onthis point from you: its time is over; its days are counted. The firstwho will dare to be quite straightforward in this respect will hearhis honesty re-echoed back to him by thousands of courageous souls. For, at bottom, there is a tacit understanding between the more noblygifted and more warmly disposed men of the present day. Every one ofthem knows what he has had to suffer from the condition of culture inschools; every one of them would fain protect his offspring from theneed of enduring similar drawbacks, even though he himself wascompelled to submit to them. If these feelings are never quitehonestly expressed, however, it is owing to a sad want of spirit amongmodern pedagogues. These lack real initiative; there are too fewpractical men among them--that is to say, too few who happen to havegood and new ideas, and who know that real genius and the realpractical mind must necessarily come together in the same individuals, whilst the sober practical men have no ideas and therefore fall shortin practice. 

"Let any one examine the pedagogic literature of the present; he whois not shocked at its utter poverty of spirit and its ridiculouslyawkward antics is beyond being spoiled. Here our philosophy must notbegin with wonder but with dread; he who feels no dread at this pointmust be asked not to meddle with pedagogic questions. The reverse, ofcourse, has been the rule up to the present; those who were terrifiedran away filled with embarrassment as you did, my poor friend, whilethe sober and fearless ones spread their heavy hands over the mostdelicate technique that has ever existed in art--over the technique ofeducation. This, however, will not be possible much longer; at sometime or other the upright man will appear, who will not only have thegood ideas I speak of, but who in order to work at their realisation, will dare to break with all that exists at present: he may by means ofa wonderful example achieve what the broad hands, hitherto active, could not even imitate--then people will everywhere begin to drawcomparisons; then men will at least be able to perceive a contrast andwill be in a position to reflect upon its causes, whereas, at present, so many still believe, in perfect good faith, that heavy hands are anecessary factor in pedagogic work. "

"My dear master, " said the younger man, "I wish you could point toone single example which would assist me in seeing the soundness ofthe hopes which you so heartily raise in me. We are both acquaintedwith public schools; do you think, for instance, that in respect ofthese institutions anything may be done by means of honesty and goodand new ideas to abolish the tenacious and antiquated customs nowextant? In this quarter, it seems to me, the battering-rams of anattacking party will have to meet with no solid wall, but with themost fatal of stolid and slippery principles. The leader of theassault has no visible and tangible opponent to crush, but rather acreature in disguise that can transform itself into a hundreddifferent shapes and, in each of these, slip out of his grasp, only inorder to reappear and to confound its enemy by cowardly surrenders andfeigned retreats. It was precisely the public schools which drove meinto despair and solitude, simply because I feel that if the strugglehere leads to victory all other educational institutions must give in;but that, if the reformer be forced to abandon his cause here, he mayas well give up all hope in regard to every other scholastic question. Therefore, dear master, enlighten me concerning the public schools;what can we hope for in the way of their abolition or reform?"

"I also hold the question of public schools to be as important as youdo, " the philosopher replied. "All other educational institutions mustfix their aims in accordance with those of the public school system;whatever errors of judgment it may suffer from, they suffer from also, and if it were ever purified and rejuvenated, they would be purifiedand rejuvenated too. The universities can no longer lay claim to thisimportance as centres of influence, seeing that, as they now stand, they are at least, in one important aspect, only a kind of annex tothe public school system, as I shall shortly point out to you. For themoment, let us consider, together, what to my mind constitutes thevery hopeful struggle of the two possibilities: _either_ that themotley and evasive spirit of public schools which has hitherto beenfostered, will completely vanish, or that it will have to becompletely purified and rejuvenated. And in order that I may not shockyou with general propositions, let us first try to recall one of thosepublic school experiences which we have all had, and from which wehave all suffered. Under severe examination what, as a matter of fact, is the present _system of teaching German_ in public schools?

"I shall first of all tell you what it should be. Everybody speaks andwrites German as thoroughly badly as it is just possible to do so inan age of newspaper German: that is why the growing youth who happensto be both noble and gifted has to be taken by force and put under theglass shade of good taste and of severe linguistic discipline. If thisis not possible, I would prefer in future that Latin be spoken; for Iam ashamed of a language so bungled and vitiated. 

"What would be the duty of a higher educational institution, in thisrespect, if not this--namely, with authority and dignified severity toput youths, neglected, as far as their own language is concerned, onthe right path, and to cry to them: 'Take your own language seriously!He who does not regard this matter as a sacred duty does not possesseven the germ of a higher culture. From your attitude in this matter, from your treatment of your mother-tongue, we can judge how highly orhow lowly you esteem art, and to what extent you are related to it. Ifyou notice no physical loathing in yourselves when you meet withcertain words and tricks of speech in our journalistic jargon, ceasefrom striving after culture; for here in your immediate vicinity, atevery moment of your life, while you are either speaking or writing, you have a touchstone for testing how difficult, how stupendous, thetask of the cultured man is, and how very improbable it must be thatmany of you will ever attain to culture. '

"In accordance with the spirit of this address, the teacher of Germanat a public school would be forced to call his pupil's attention tothousands of details, and with the absolute certainty of good taste, to forbid their using such words and expressions, for instance, as:'_beanspruchen_, ' '_vereinnahmen_, ' '_einer Sache Rechnung tragen_, ''_die Initiative ergreifen_, ' '_selbstverständlich_, '[3] etc. , _cumtædio in infinitum_. The same teacher would also have to take ourclassical authors and show, line for line, how carefully and with whatprecision every expression has to be chosen when a writer has thecorrect feeling in his heart and has before his eyes a perfectconception of all he is writing. He would necessarily urge his pupils, time and again, to express the same thought ever more happily; norwould he have to abate in rigour until the less gifted in his classhad contracted an unholy fear of their language, and the others haddeveloped great enthusiasm for it. 

"Here then is a task for so-called 'formal' education[4] [theeducation tending to develop the mental faculties, as opposed to'material' education, [5] which is intended to deal only with theacquisition of facts, _e. G. _ history, mathematics, etc. ], and one ofthe utmost value: but what do we find in the public school--that is tosay, in the head-quarters of formal education? He who understands howto apply what he has heard here will also know what to think of themodern public school as a so-called educational institution. He willdiscover, for instance, that the public school, according to itsfundamental principles, does not educate for the purposes of culture, but for the purposes of scholarship; and, further, that of late itseems to have adopted a course which indicates rather that it has evendiscarded scholarship in favour of journalism as the object of itsexertions. This can be clearly seen from the way in which German istaught. 

"Instead of that purely practical method of instruction by which theteacher accustoms his pupils to severe self-discipline in their ownlanguage, we find everywhere the rudiments of a historico-scholasticmethod of teaching the mother-tongue: that is to say, people deal withit as if it were a dead language and as if the present and future wereunder no obligations to it whatsoever. The historical method hasbecome so universal in our time, that even the living body of thelanguage is sacrificed for the sake of anatomical study. But this isprecisely where culture begins--namely, in understanding how to treatthe quick as something vital, and it is here too that the mission ofthe cultured teacher begins: in suppressing the urgent claims of'historical interests' wherever it is above all necessary to _do_properly and not merely to _know_ properly. Our mother-tongue, however, is a domain in which the pupil must learn how to _do_properly, and to this practical end, alone, the teaching of German isessential in our scholastic establishments. The historical method maycertainly be a considerably easier and more comfortable one for theteacher; it also seems to be compatible with a much lower grade ofability and, in general, with a smaller display of energy and will onhis part. But we shall find that this observation holds good in everydepartment of pedagogic life: the simpler and more comfortable methodalways masquerades in the disguise of grand pretensions and statelytitles; the really practical side, the _doing_, which should belong toculture and which, at bottom, is the more difficult side, meets onlywith disfavour and contempt. That is why the honest man must makehimself and others quite clear concerning this _quid pro quo_. 

"Now, apart from these learned incentives to a study of the language, what is there besides which the German teacher is wont to offer? Howdoes he reconcile the spirit of his school with the spirit of the_few_ that Germany can claim who are really cultured, --_i. E. _ with thespirit of its classical poets and artists? This is a dark and thornysphere, into which one cannot even bear a light without dread; buteven here we shall conceal nothing from ourselves; for sooner or laterthe whole of it will have to be reformed. In the public school, therepulsive impress of our æsthetic journalism is stamped upon the stillunformed minds of youths. Here, too, the teacher sows the seeds ofthat crude and wilful misinterpretation of the classics, which lateron disports itself as art-criticism, and which is nothing butbumptious barbarity. Here the pupils learn to speak of our unique_Schiller_ with the superciliousness of prigs; here they are taught tosmile at the noblest and most German of his works--at the Marquis ofPosa, at Max and Thekla--at these smiles German genius becomesincensed and a worthier posterity will blush. 

"The last department in which the German teacher in a public school isat all active, which is often regarded as his sphere of highestactivity, and is here and there even considered the pinnacle of publicschool education, is the so-called _German composition_. Owing to thevery fact that in this department it is almost always the most giftedpupils who display the greatest eagerness, it ought to have been madeclear how dangerously stimulating, precisely here, the task of theteacher must be. _German composition_ makes an appeal to theindividual, and the more strongly a pupil is conscious of his variousqualities, the more personally will he do his _German composition_. This 'personal doing' is urged on with yet an additional fillip insome public schools by the choice of the subject, the strongest proofof which is, in my opinion, that even in the lower classes thenon-pedagogic subject is set, by means of which the pupil is led togive a description of his life and of his development. Now, one hasonly to read the titles of the compositions set in a large number ofpublic schools to be convinced that probably the large majority ofpupils have to suffer their whole lives, through no fault of theirown, owing to this premature demand for personal work--for the unripeprocreation of thoughts. And how often are not all a man's subsequentliterary performances but a sad result of this pedagogic original sinagainst the intellect!

"Let us only think of what takes place at such an age in theproduction of such work. It is the first individual creation; thestill undeveloped powers tend for the first time to crystallise; thestaggering sensation produced by the demand for self-reliance impartsa seductive charm to these early performances, which is not only quitenew, but which never returns. All the daring of nature is hauled outof its depths; all vanities--no longer constrained by mightybarriers--are allowed for the first time to assume a literary form:the young man, from that time forward, feels as if he had reached hisconsummation as a being not only able, but actually invited, to speakand to converse. The subject he selects obliges him either to expresshis judgment upon certain poetical works, to class historical personstogether in a description of character, to discuss serious ethicalproblems quite independently, or even to turn the searchlight inwards, to throw its rays upon his own development and to make a criticalreport of himself: in short, a whole world of reflection is spread outbefore the astonished young man who, until then, had been almostunconscious, and is delivered up to him to be judged. 

"Now let us try to picture the teacher's usual attitude towards thesefirst highly influential examples of original composition. What doeshe hold to be most reprehensible in this class of work? What does hecall his pupil's attention to?--To all excess in form or thought--thatis to say, to all that which, at their age, is essentiallycharacteristic and individual. Their really independent traits which, in response to this very premature excitation, can manifest themselvesonly in awkwardness, crudeness, and grotesque features, --in short, their individuality is reproved and rejected by the teacher in favourof an unoriginal decent average. On the other hand, uniform mediocritygets peevish praise; for, as a rule, it is just the class of worklikely to bore the teacher thoroughly. 

"There may still be men who recognise a most absurd and most dangerouselement of the public school curriculum in the whole farce of thisGerman composition. Originality is demanded here: but the only shapein which it can manifest itself is rejected, and the 'formal'education that the system takes for granted is attained to only by avery limited number of men who complete it at a ripe age. Hereeverybody without exception is regarded as gifted for literature andconsidered as capable of holding opinions concerning the mostimportant questions and people, whereas the one aim which propereducation should most zealously strive to achieve would be thesuppression of all ridiculous claims to independent judgment, and theinculcation upon young men of obedience to the sceptre of genius. Herea pompous form of diction is taught in an age when every spoken orwritten word is a piece of barbarism. Now let us consider, besides, the danger of arousing the self-complacency which is so easilyawakened in youths; let us think how their vanity must be flatteredwhen they see their literary reflection for the first time in themirror. Who, having seen all these effects at _one_ glance, could anylonger doubt whether all the faults of our public, literary, andartistic life were not stamped upon every fresh generation by thesystem we are examining: hasty and vain production, the disgracefulmanufacture of books; complete want of style; the crude, characterless, or sadly swaggering method of expression; the loss ofevery æsthetic canon; the voluptuousness of anarchy and chaos--inshort, the literary peculiarities of both our journalism and ourscholarship. 

"None but the very fewest are aware that, among many thousands, perhaps only _one_ is justified in describing himself as literary, andthat all others who at their own risk try to be so deserve to be metwith Homeric laughter by all competent men as a reward for everysentence they have ever had printed;--for it is truly a spectacle meetfor the gods to see a literary Hephaistos limping forward who wouldpretend to help us to something. To educate men to earnest andinexorable habits and views, in this respect, should be the highestaim of all mental training, whereas the general _laisser aller_ of the'fine personality' can be nothing else than the hall-mark ofbarbarism. From what I have said, however, it must be clear that, atleast in the teaching of German, no thought is given to culture;something quite different is in view, --namely, the production of theafore-mentioned 'free personality. ' And so long as German publicschools prepare the road for outrageous and irresponsible scribbling, so long as they do not regard the immediate and practical disciplineof speaking and writing as their most holy duty, so long as they treatthe mother-tongue as if it were only a necessary evil or a dead body, I shall not regard these institutions as belonging to real culture. 

"In regard to the language, what is surely least noticeable is anytrace of the influence of _classical examples_: that is why, on thestrength of this consideration alone, the so-called 'classicaleducation' which is supposed to be provided by our public school, strikes me as something exceedingly doubtful and confused. For howcould anybody, after having cast one glance at those examples, fail tosee the great earnestness with which the Greek and the Roman regardedand treated his language, from his youth onwards--how is it possibleto mistake one's example on a point like this one?--provided, ofcourse, that the classical Hellenic and Roman world really did hoverbefore the educational plan of our public schools as the highest andmost instructive of all morals--a fact I feel very much inclined todoubt. The claim put forward by public schools concerning the'classical education' they provide seems to be more an awkward evasionthan anything else; it is used whenever there is any question raisedas to the competency of the public schools to impart culture and toeducate. Classical education, indeed! It sounds so dignified! Itconfounds the aggressor and staves off the assault--for who could seeto the bottom of this bewildering formula all at once? And this haslong been the customary strategy of the public school: from whicheverside the war-cry may come, it writes upon its shield--not overloadedwith honours--one of those confusing catchwords, such as: 'classicaleducation, ' 'formal education, ' 'scientific education':--threeglorious things which are, however, unhappily at loggerheads, not onlywith themselves but among themselves, and are such that, if they werecompulsorily brought together, would perforce bring forth aculture-monster. For a 'classical education' is something so unheardof, difficult and rare, and exacts such complicated talent, that onlyingenuousness or impudence could put it forward as an attainable goalin our public schools. The words: 'formal education' belong to thatcrude kind of unphilosophical phraseology which one should do one'sutmost to get rid of; for there is no such thing as 'the opposite offormal education. ' And he who regards 'scientific education' as theobject of a public school thereby sacrifices 'classical education' andthe so-called 'formal education, ' at one stroke, as the scientific manand the cultured man belong to two different spheres which, thoughcoming together at times in the same individual, are never reconciled. 

"If we compare all three of these would-be aims of the public schoolwith the actual facts to be observed in the present method of teachingGerman, we see immediately what they really amount to inpractice, --that is to say, only to subterfuges for use in the fightand struggle for existence and, often enough, mere means wherewith tobewilder an opponent. For we are unable to detect any single featurein this teaching of German which in any way recalls the example ofclassical antiquity and its glorious methods of training in languages. 'Formal education, ' however, which is supposed to be achieved by thismethod of teaching German, has been shown to be wholly at the pleasureof the 'free personality, ' which is as good as saying that it isbarbarism and anarchy. And as for the preparation in science, which isone of the consequences of this teaching, our Germanists will have todetermine, in all justice, how little these learned beginnings inpublic schools have contributed to the splendour of their sciences, and how much the personality of individual university professors hasdone so. --Put briefly: the public school has hitherto neglected itsmost important and most urgent duty towards the very beginning of allreal culture, which is the mother-tongue; but in so doing it haslacked the natural, fertile soil for all further efforts at culture. For only by means of stern, artistic, and careful discipline andhabit, in a language, can the correct feeling for the greatness of ourclassical writers be strengthened. Up to the present their recognitionby the public schools has been owing almost solely to the doubtfulæsthetic hobbies of a few teachers or to the massive effects ofcertain of their tragedies and novels. But everybody should, himself, be aware of the difficulties of the language: he should have learntthem from experience: after long seeking and struggling he must reachthe path our great poets trod in order to be able to realise howlightly and beautifully they trod it, and how stiffly and swaggeringlythe others follow at their heels. 

"Only by means of such discipline can the young man acquire thatphysical loathing for the beloved and much-admired 'elegance' of styleof our newspaper manufacturers and novelists, and for the 'ornatestyle' of our literary men; by it alone is he irrevocably elevated ata stroke above a whole host of absurd questions and scruples, such, for instance, as whether Auerbach and Gutzkow are really poets, forhis disgust at both will be so great that he will be unable to readthem any longer, and thus the problem will be solved for him. Let noone imagine that it is an easy matter to develop this feeling to theextent necessary in order to have this physical loathing; but let noone hope to reach sound æsthetic judgments along any other road thanthe thorny one of language, and by this I do not mean philologicalresearch, but self-discipline in one's mother-tongue. 

"Everybody who is in earnest in this matter will have the same sort ofexperience as the recruit in the army who is compelled to learnwalking after having walked almost all his life as a dilettante orempiricist. It is a hard time: one almost fears that the tendons aregoing to snap and one ceases to hope that the artificial andconsciously acquired movements and positions of the feet will ever becarried out with ease and comfort. It is painful to see how awkwardlyand heavily one foot is set before the other, and one dreads that onemay not only be unable to learn the new way of walking, but that onewill forget how to walk at all. Then it suddenly become noticeablethat a new habit and a second nature have been born of the practisedmovements, and that the assurance and strength of the old manner ofwalking returns with a little more grace: at this point one begins torealise how difficult walking is, and one feels in a position to laughat the untrained empiricist or the elegant dilettante. Our 'elegant'writers, as their style shows, have never learnt 'walking' in thissense, and in our public schools, as our other writers show, no onelearns walking either. Culture begins, however, with the correctmovement of the language: and once it has properly begun, it begetsthat physical sensation in the presence of 'elegant' writers which isknown by the name of 'loathing. '

"We recognise the fatal consequences of our present public schools, inthat they are unable to inculcate severe and genuine culture, whichshould consist above all in obedience and habituation; and that, attheir best, they much more often achieve a result by stimulating andkindling scientific tendencies, is shown by the hand which is sofrequently seen uniting scholarship and barbarous taste, science andjournalism. In a very large majority of cases to-day we can observehow sadly our scholars fall short of the standard of culture which theefforts of Goethe, Schiller, Lessing, and Winckelmann established; andthis falling short shows itself precisely in the egregious errorswhich the men we speak of are exposed to, equally among literaryhistorians--whether Gervinus or Julian Schmidt--as in any othercompany; everywhere, indeed, where men and women converse. It showsitself most frequently and painfully, however, in pedagogic spheres, in the literature of public schools. It can be proved that the onlyvalue that these men have in a real educational establishment has notbeen mentioned, much less generally recognised for half a century:their value as preparatory leaders and mystogogues of classicalculture, guided by whose hands alone can the correct road leading toantiquity be found. 

"Every so-called classical education can have but one naturalstarting-point--an artistic, earnest, and exact familiarity with theuse of the mother-tongue: this, together with the secret of form, however, one can seldom attain to of one's own accord, almosteverybody requires those great leaders and tutors and must placehimself in their hands. There is, however, no such thing as aclassical education that could grow without this inferred love ofform. Here, where the power of discerning form and barbarity graduallyawakens, there appear the pinions which bear one to the only real homeof culture--ancient Greece. If with the solitary help of those pinionswe sought to reach those far-distant and diamond-studded wallsencircling the stronghold of Hellenism, we should certainly not getvery far; once more, therefore, we need the same leaders and tutors, our German classical writers, that we may be borne up, too, by thewing-strokes of their past endeavours--to the land of yearning, toGreece. 

"Not a suspicion of this possible relationship between our classicsand classical education seems to have pierced the antique walls ofpublic schools. Philologists seem much more eagerly engaged inintroducing Homer and Sophocles to the young souls of their pupils, intheir own style, calling the result simply by the unchallengedeuphemism: 'classical education. ' Let every one's own experience tellhim what he had of Homer and Sophocles at the hands of such eagerteachers. It is in this department that the greatest number of deepestdeceptions occur, and whence misunderstandings are inadvertentlyspread. In German public schools I have never yet found a trace ofwhat might really be called 'classical education, ' and there isnothing surprising in this when one thinks of the way in which theseinstitutions have emancipated themselves from German classical writersand the discipline of the German language. Nobody reaches antiquity bymeans of a leap into the dark, and yet the whole method of treatingancient writers in schools, the plain commentating and paraphrasing ofour philological teachers, amounts to nothing more than a leap intothe dark. 

"The feeling for classical Hellenism is, as a matter of fact, such anexceptional outcome of the most energetic fight for culture andartistic talent that the public school could only have professed toawaken this feeling owing to a very crude misunderstanding. In whatage? In an age which is led about blindly by the most sensationaldesires of the day, and which is not aware of the fact that, once thatfeeling for Hellenism is roused, it immediately becomes aggressive andmust express itself by indulging in an incessant war with theso-called culture of the present. For the public school boy of to-day, the Hellenes as Hellenes are dead: yes, he gets some enjoyment out ofHomer, but a novel by Spielhagen interests him much more: yes, heswallows Greek tragedy and comedy with a certain relish, but athoroughly modern drama, like Freitag's 'Journalists, ' moves him inquite another fashion. In regard to all ancient authors he is ratherinclined to speak after the manner of the æsthete, Hermann Grimm, who, on one occasion, at the end of a tortuous essay on the Venus of Milo, asks himself: 'What does this goddess's form mean to me? Of what useare the thoughts she suggests to me? Orestes and Œdipus, Iphigeniaand Antigone, what have they in common with my heart?'--No, my dearpublic school boy, the Venus of Milo does not concern you in any way, and concerns your teacher just as little--and that is the misfortune, that is the secret of the modern public school. Who will conduct youto the land of culture, if your leaders are blind and assume theposition of seers notwithstanding? Which of you will ever attain to atrue feeling for the sacred seriousness of art, if you aresystematically spoiled, and taught to stutter independently instead ofbeing taught to speak; to æstheticise on your own account, when youought to be taught to approach works of art almost piously; tophilosophise without assistance, while you ought to be compelled to_listen_ to great thinkers. All this with the result that you remaineternally at a distance from antiquity and become the servants of theday. 

"At all events, the most wholesome feature of our modern institutionsis to be found in the earnestness with which the Latin and Greeklanguages are studied over a long course of years. In this way boyslearn to respect a grammar, lexicons, and a language that conforms tofixed rules; in this department of public school work there is anexact knowledge of what constitutes a fault, and no one is troubledwith any thought of justifying himself every minute by appealing (asin the case of modern German) to various grammatical andorthographical vagaries and vicious forms. If only this respect forlanguage did not hang in the air so, like a theoretical burden whichone is pleased to throw off the moment one turns to one'smother-tongue! More often than not, the classical master makes prettyshort work of the mother-tongue; from the outset he treats it as adepartment of knowledge in which one is allowed that indolent easewith which the German treats everything that belongs to his nativesoil. The splendid practice afforded by translating from one languageinto another, which so improves and fertilises one's artistic feelingfor one's own tongue, is, in the case of German, never conducted withthat fitting categorical strictness and dignity which would be aboveall necessary in dealing with an undisciplined language. Of late, exercises of this kind have tended to decrease ever more and more:people are satisfied to _know_ the foreign classical tongues, theywould scorn being able to _apply_ them. 

"Here one gets another glimpse of the scholarly tendency of publicschools: a phenomenon which throws much light upon the object whichonce animated them, --that is to say, the serious desire to cultivatethe pupil. This belonged to the time of our great poets, those fewreally cultured Germans, --the time when the magnificent FriedrichAugust Wolf directed the new stream of classical thought, introducedfrom Greece and Rome by those men, into the heart of the publicschools. Thanks to his bold start, a new order of public schools wasestablished, which thenceforward was not to be merely a nursery forscience, but, above all, the actual consecrated home of all higher andnobler culture. 

"Of the many necessary measures which this change called into being, some of the most important have been transferred with lasting successto the modern regulations of public schools: the most important ofall, however, did not succeed--the one demanding that the teacher, also, should be consecrated to the new spirit, so that the aim of thepublic school has meanwhile considerably departed from the originalplan laid down by Wolf, which was the cultivation of the pupil. Theold estimate of scholarship and scholarly culture, as an absolute, which Wolf overcame, seems after a slow and spiritless struggle ratherto have taken the place of the culture-principle of more recentintroduction, and now claims its former exclusive rights, though notwith the same frankness, but disguised and with features veiled. Andthe reason why it was impossible to make public schools fall in withthe magnificent plan of classical culture lay in the un-German, almostforeign or cosmopolitan nature of these efforts in the cause ofeducation: in the belief that it was possible to remove the nativesoil from under a man's feet and that he should still remain standing;in the illusion that people can spring direct, without bridges, intothe strange Hellenic world, by abjuring German and the German mind ingeneral. 

"Of course one must know how to trace this Germanic spirit to its lairbeneath its many modern dressings, or even beneath heaps of ruins; onemust love it so that one is not ashamed of it in its stunted form, andone must above all be on one's guard against confounding it with whatnow disports itself proudly as 'Up-to-date German culture. ' The Germanspirit is very far from being on friendly times with this up-to-dateculture: and precisely in those spheres where the latter complains ofa lack of culture the real German spirit has survived, though perhapsnot always with a graceful, but more often an ungraceful, exterior. Onthe other hand, that which now grandiloquently assumes the title of'German culture' is a sort of cosmopolitan aggregate, which bears thesame relation to the German spirit as Journalism does to Schiller orMeyerbeer to Beethoven: here the strongest influence at work is thefundamentally and thoroughly un-German civilisation of France, whichis aped neither with talent nor with taste, and the imitation of whichgives the society, the press, the art, and the literary style ofGermany their pharisaical character. Naturally the copy nowhereproduces the really artistic effect which the original, grown out ofthe heart of Roman civilisation, is able to produce almost to this dayin France. Let any one who wishes to see the full force of thiscontrast compare our most noted novelists with the less noted ones ofFrance or Italy: he will recognise in both the same doubtfultendencies and aims, as also the same still more doubtful means, butin France he will find them coupled with artistic earnestness, atleast with grammatical purity, and often with beauty, while in theirevery feature he will recognise the echo of a corresponding socialculture. In Germany, on the other hand, they will strike him asunoriginal, flabby, filled with dressing-gown thoughts andexpressions, unpleasantly spread out, and therewithal possessing nobackground of social form. At the most, owing to their scholarlymannerisms and display of knowledge, he will be reminded of the factthat in Latin countries it is the artistically-trained man, and thatin Germany it is the abortive scholar, who becomes a journalist. Withthis would-be German and thoroughly unoriginal culture, the German cannowhere reckon upon victory: the Frenchman and the Italian will alwaysget the better of him in this respect, while, in regard to the cleverimitation of a foreign culture, the Russian, above all, will always behis superior. 

"We are therefore all the more anxious to hold fast to that Germanspirit which revealed itself in the German Reformation, and in Germanmusic, and which has shown its enduring and genuine strength in theenormous courage and severity of German philosophy and in the loyaltyof the German soldier, which has been tested quite recently. From itwe expect a victory over that 'up-to-date' pseudo-culture which is nowthe fashion. What we should hope for the future is that schools maydraw the real school of culture into this struggle, and kindle theflame of enthusiasm in the younger generation, more particularly inpublic schools, for that which is truly German; and in this wayso-called classical education will resume its natural place andrecover its one possible starting-point. 

"A thorough reformation and purification of the public school can onlybe the outcome of a profound and powerful reformation and purificationof the German spirit. It is a very complex and difficult task to findthe border-line which joins the heart of the Germanic spirit with thegenius of Greece. Not, however, before the noblest needs of genuineGerman genius snatch at the hand of this genius of Greece as at a firmpost in the torrent of barbarity, not before a devouring yearning forthis genius of Greece takes possession of German genius, and notbefore that view of the Greek home, on which Schiller and Goethe, after enormous exertions, were able to feast their eyes, has becomethe Mecca of the best and most gifted men, will the aim of classicaleducation in public schools acquire any definition; and they at leastwill not be to blame who teach ever so little science and learning inpublic schools, in order to keep a definite and at the same time idealaim in their eyes, and to rescue their pupils from that glisteningphantom which now allows itself to be called 'culture' and'education. ' This is the sad plight of the public school of to-day:the narrowest views remain in a certain measure right, because no oneseems able to reach or, at least, to indicate the spot where all theseviews culminate in error. "

"No one?" the philosopher's pupil inquired with a slight quaver in hisvoice; and both men were silent. 

FOOTNOTES:

[3] It is not practicable to translate these German solecisms by similarinstances of English solecisms. The reader who is interested in thesubject will find plenty of material in a book like the Oxford _King'sEnglish_. 

[4] German: _Formelle Bildung. _

[5] German: _Materielle Bildung. _

THIRD LECTURE. 

(_Delivered on the 27th of February 1872. _)

Ladies and Gentlemen, --At the close of my last lecture, theconversation to which I was a listener, and the outlines of which, asI clearly recollect them, I am now trying to lay before you, wasinterrupted by a long and solemn pause. Both the philosopher and hiscompanion sat silent, sunk in deep dejection: the peculiarly criticalstate of that important educational institution, the German publicschool, lay upon their souls like a heavy burden, which one single, well-meaning individual is not strong enough to remove, and themultitude, though strong, not well meaning enough. 

Our solitary thinkers were perturbed by two facts: by clearlyperceiving on the one hand that what might rightly be called"classical education" was now only a far-off ideal, a castle in theair, which could not possibly be built as a reality on the foundationsof our present educational system, and that, on the other hand, whatwas now, with customary and unopposed euphemism, pointed to as"classical education" could only claim the value of a pretentiousillusion, the best effect of which was that the expression "classicaleducation" still lived on and had not yet lost its pathetic sound. These two worthy men saw clearly, by the system of instruction invogue, that the time was not yet ripe for a higher culture, a culturefounded upon that of the ancients: the neglected state of linguisticinstruction; the forcing of students into learned historical paths, instead of giving them a practical training; the connection of certainpractices, encouraged in the public schools, with the objectionablespirit of our journalistic publicity--all these easily perceptiblephenomena of the teaching of German led to the painful certainty thatthe most beneficial of those forces which have come down to us fromclassical antiquity are not yet known in our public schools: forceswhich would train students for the struggle against the barbarism ofthe present age, and which will perhaps once more transform the publicschools into the arsenals and workshops of this struggle. 

On the other hand, it would seem in the meantime as if the spirit ofantiquity, in its fundamental principles, had already been driven awayfrom the portals of the public schools, and as if here also the gateswere thrown open as widely as possible to the be-flattered andpampered type of our present self-styled "German culture. " And if thesolitary talkers caught a glimpse of a single ray of hope, it was thatthings would have to become still worse, that what was as yet divinedonly by the few would soon be clearly perceived by the many, and thatthen the time for honest and resolute men for the earnestconsideration of the scope of the education of the masses would not befar distant. 

After a few minutes' silent reflection, the philosopher's companionturned to him and said: "You used to hold out hopes to me, but now youhave done more: you have widened my intelligence, and with it mystrength and courage: now indeed can I look on the field of battlewith more hardihood, now indeed do I repent of my too hasty flight. Wewant nothing for ourselves, and it should be nothing to us how manyindividuals may fall in this battle, or whether we ourselves may beamong the first. Just because we take this matter so seriously, weshould not take our own poor selves so seriously: at the very momentwe are falling some one else will grasp the banner of our faith. Iwill not even consider whether I am strong enough for such a fight, whether I can offer sufficient resistance; it may even be anhonourable death to fall to the accompaniment of the mocking laughterof such enemies, whose seriousness has frequently seemed to us to besomething ridiculous. When I think how my contemporaries preparedthemselves for the highest posts in the scholastic profession, as Imyself have done, then I know how we often laughed at the exactcontrary, and grew serious over something quite different----"

"Now, my friend, " interrupted the philosopher, laughingly, "you speakas one who would fain dive into the water without being able to swim, and who fears something even more than the mere drowning; _not_ beingdrowned, but laughed at. But being laughed at should be the very lastthing for us to dread; for we are in a sphere where there are too manytruths to tell, too many formidable, painful, unpardonable truths, forus to escape hatred, and only fury here and there will give rise tosome sort of embarrassed laughter. Just think of the innumerable crowdof teachers, who, in all good faith, have assimilated the system ofeducation which has prevailed up to the present, that they maycheerfully and without over-much deliberation carry it further on. What do you think it will seem like to these men when they hear ofprojects from which they are excluded _beneficio naturæ_; of commandswhich their mediocre abilities are totally unable to carry out; ofhopes which find no echo in them; of battles the war-cries of whichthey do not understand, and in the fighting of which they can takepart only as dull and obtuse rank and file? But, without exaggeration, that must necessarily be the position of practically all the teachersin our higher educational establishments: and indeed we cannot wonderat this when we consider how such a teacher originates, how he_becomes_ a teacher of such high status. Such a large number of highereducational establishments are now to be found everywhere that farmore teachers will continue to be required for them than the nature ofeven a highly-gifted people can produce; and thus an inordinate streamof undesirables flows into these institutions, who, however, by theirpreponderating numbers and their instinct of 'similis simile gaudet'gradually come to determine the nature of these institutions. Theremay be a few people, hopelessly unfamiliar with pedagogical matters, who believe that our present profusion of public schools and teachers, which is manifestly out of all proportion, can be changed into a realprofusion, an _ubertas ingenii_, merely by a few rules andregulations, and without any reduction in the number of theseinstitutions. But we may surely be unanimous in recognising that bythe very nature of things only an exceedingly small number of peopleare destined for a true course of education, and that a much smallernumber of higher educational establishments would suffice for theirfurther development, but that, in view of the present large numbers ofeducational institutions, those for whom in general such institutionsought only to be established must feel themselves to be the leastfacilitated in their progress. 

"The same holds good in regard to teachers. It is precisely the bestteachers--those who, generally speaking, judged by a high standard, are worthy of this honourable name--who are now perhaps the leastfitted, in view of the present standing of our public schools, for theeducation of these unselected youths, huddled together in a confusedheap; but who must rather, to a certain extent, keep hidden from themthe best they could give: and, on the other hand, by far the largernumber of these teachers feel themselves quite at home in theseinstitutions, as their moderate abilities stand in a kind ofharmonious relationship to the dullness of their pupils. It is fromthis majority that we hear the ever-resounding call for theestablishment of new public schools and higher educationalinstitutions: we are living in an age which, by ringing the changes onits deafening and continual cry, would certainly give one theimpression that there was an unprecedented thirst for culture whicheagerly sought to be quenched. But it is just at this point that oneshould learn to hear aright: it is here, without being disconcerted bythe thundering noise of the education-mongers, that we must confrontthose who talk so tirelessly about the educational necessities oftheir time. Then we should meet with a strange disillusionment, onewhich we, my good friend, have often met with: those blatant heraldsof educational needs, when examined at close quarters, are suddenlyseen to be transformed into zealous, yea, fanatical opponents of trueculture, _i. E. _ all those who hold fast to the aristocratic nature ofthe mind; for, at bottom, they regard as their goal the emancipationof the masses from the mastery of the great few; they seek tooverthrow the most sacred hierarchy in the kingdom of theintellect--the servitude of the masses, their submissive obedience, their instinct of loyalty to the rule of genius. 

"I have long accustomed myself to look with caution upon those who areardent in the cause of the so-called 'education of the people' in thecommon meaning of the phrase; since for the most part they desire forthemselves, consciously or unconsciously, absolutely unlimitedfreedom, which must inevitably degenerate into something resemblingthe saturnalia of barbaric times, and which the sacred hierarchy ofnature will never grant them. They were born to serve and to obey; andevery moment in which their limping or crawling or broken-windedthoughts are at work shows us clearly out of which clay nature mouldedthem, and what trade mark she branded thereon. The education of themasses cannot, therefore, be our aim; but rather the education of afew picked men for great and lasting works. We well know that a justposterity judges the collective intellectual state of a time only bythose few great and lonely figures of the period, and gives itsdecision in accordance with the manner in which they are recognised, encouraged, and honoured, or, on the other hand, in which they aresnubbed, elbowed aside, and kept down. What is called the 'educationof the masses' cannot be accomplished except with difficulty; and evenif a system of universal compulsory education be applied, they canonly be reached outwardly: those individual lower levels where, generally speaking, the masses come into contact with culture, wherethe people nourishes its religious instinct, where it poetises itsmythological images, where it keeps up its faith in its customs, privileges, native soil, and language--all these levels can scarcelybe reached by direct means, and in any case only by violentdemolition. And, in serious matters of this kind, to hasten forwardthe progress of the education of the people means simply thepostponement of this violent demolition, and the maintenance of thatwholesome unconsciousness, that sound sleep, of the people, withoutwhich counter-action and remedy no culture, with the exhausting strainand excitement of its own actions, can make any headway. 

"We know, however, what the aspiration is of those who would disturbthe healthy slumber of the people, and continually call out to them:'Keep your eyes open! Be sensible! Be wise!' we know the aim of thosewho profess to satisfy excessive educational requirements by means ofan extraordinary increase in the number of educational institutionsand the conceited tribe of teachers originated thereby. These verypeople, using these very means, are fighting against the naturalhierarchy in the realm of the intellect, and destroying the roots ofall those noble and sublime plastic forces which have their materialorigin in the unconsciousness of the people, and which fittinglyterminate in the procreation of genius and its due guidance and propertraining. It is only in the simile of the mother that we can grasp themeaning and the responsibility of the true education of the people inrespect to genius: its real origin is not to be found in sucheducation; it has, so to speak, only a metaphysical source, ametaphysical home. But for the genius to make his appearance; for himto emerge from among the people; to portray the reflected picture, asit were, the dazzling brilliancy of the peculiar colours of thispeople; to depict the noble destiny of a people in the similitude ofan individual in a work which will last for all time, thereby makinghis nation itself eternal, and redeeming it from the ever-shiftingelement of transient things: all this is possible for the genius onlywhen he has been brought up and come to maturity in the tender care ofthe culture of a people; whilst, on the other hand, without thissheltering home, the genius will not, generally speaking, be able torise to the height of his eternal flight, but will at an early moment, like a stranger weather-driven upon a bleak, snow-covered desert, slink away from the inhospitable land. "

"You astonish me with such a metaphysics of genius, " said theteacher's companion, "and I have only a hazy conception of theaccuracy of your similitude. On the other hand, I fully understandwhat you have said about the surplus of public schools and thecorresponding surplus of higher grade teachers; and in this regard Imyself have collected some information which assures me that theeducational tendency of the public school _must_ right itself by thisvery surplus of teachers who have really nothing at all to do witheducation, and who are called into existence and pursue this pathsolely because there is a demand for them. Every man who, in anunexpected moment of enlightenment, has convinced himself of thesingularity and inaccessibility of Hellenic antiquity, and has wardedoff this conviction after an exhausting struggle--every such man knowsthat the door leading to this enlightenment will never remain open toall comers; and he deems it absurd, yea disgraceful, to use the Greeksas he would any other tool he employs when following his profession orearning his living, shamelessly fumbling with coarse hands amidst therelics of these holy men. This brazen and vulgar feeling is, however, most common in the profession from which the largest numbers ofteachers for the public schools are drawn, the philologicalprofession, wherefore the reproduction and continuation of such afeeling in the public school will not surprise us. 

"Just look at the younger generation of philologists: how seldom wesee in them that humble feeling that we, when compared with such aworld as it was, have no right to exist at all: how coolly andfearlessly, as compared with us, did that young brood build itsmiserable nests in the midst of the magnificent temples! A powerfulvoice from every nook and cranny should ring in the ears of those who, from the day they begin their connection with the university, roam atwill with such self-complacency and shamelessness among theawe-inspiring relics of that noble civilisation: 'Hence, yeuninitiated, who will never be initiated; fly away in silence andshame from these sacred chambers!' But this voice speaks in vain; forone must to some extent be a Greek to understand a Greek curse ofexcommunication. But these people I am speaking of are so barbaricthat they dispose of these relics to suit themselves: all their modernconveniences and fancies are brought with them and concealed amongthose ancient pillars and tombstones, and it gives rise to greatrejoicing when somebody finds, among the dust and cobwebs ofantiquity, something that he himself had slyly hidden there not sovery long before. One of them makes verses and takes care to consultHesychius' Lexicon. Something there immediately assures him that he isdestined to be an imitator of Æschylus, and leads him to believe, indeed, that he 'has something in common with' Æschylus: the miserablepoetaster! Yet another peers with the suspicious eye of a policemaninto every contradiction, even into the shadow of everycontradiction, of which Homer was guilty: he fritters away his life intearing Homeric rags to tatters and sewing them together again, ragsthat he himself was the first to filch from the poet's kingly robe. Athird feels ill at ease when examining all the mysterious andorgiastic sides of antiquity: he makes up his mind once and for all tolet the enlightened Apollo alone pass without dispute, and to see inthe Athenian a gay and intelligent but nevertheless somewhat immoralApollonian. What a deep breath he draws when he succeeds in raisingyet another dark corner of antiquity to the level of his ownintelligence!--when, for example, he discovers in Pythagoras acolleague who is as enthusiastic as himself in arguing about politics. Another racks his brains as to why Œdipus was condemned by fate toperform such abominable deeds--killing his father, marrying hismother. Where lies the blame! Where the poetic justice! Suddenly itoccurs to him: Œdipus was a passionate fellow, lacking all Christiangentleness--he even fell into an unbecoming rage when Tiresias calledhim a monster and the curse of the whole country. Be humble and meek!was what Sophocles tried to teach, otherwise you will have to marryyour mothers and kill your fathers! Others, again, pass their lives incounting the number of verses written by Greek and Roman poets, andare delighted with the proportions 7:13 = 14:26. Finally, one of thembrings forward his solution of a question, such as the Homeric poemsconsidered from the standpoint of prepositions, and thinks he hasdrawn the truth from the bottom of the well with ἀνά and κατά. All of them, however, with the most widely separated aims in view, digand burrow in Greek soil with a restlessness and a blundering awkwardnessthat must surely be painful to a true friend of antiquity: and thus itcomes to pass that I should like to take by the hand every talented ortalentless man who feels a certain professional inclination urging himon to the study of antiquity, and harangue him as follows: 'Young sir, do you know what perils threaten you, with your little stock of schoollearning, before you become a man in the full sense of the word? Haveyou heard that, according to Aristotle, it is by no means a tragicdeath to be slain by a statue? Does that surprise you? Know, then, that for centuries philologists have been trying, with ever-failingstrength, to re-erect the fallen statue of Greek antiquity, butwithout success; for it is a colossus around which single individualmen crawl like pygmies. The leverage of the united representatives ofmodern culture is utilised for the purpose; but it invariably happensthat the huge column is scarcely more than lifted from the ground whenit falls down again, crushing beneath its weight the luckless wightsunder it. That, however, may be tolerated, for every being must perishby some means or other; but who is there to guarantee that during allthese attempts the statue itself will not break in pieces! Thephilologists are being crushed by the Greeks--perhaps we can put upwith this--but antiquity itself threatens to be crushed by thesephilologists! Think that over, you easy-going young man; and turnback, lest you too should not be an iconoclast!'"

"Indeed, " said the philosopher, laughing, "there are many philologistswho have turned back as you so much desire, and I notice a greatcontrast with my own youthful experience. Consciously orunconsciously, large numbers of them have concluded that it ishopeless and useless for them to come into direct contact withclassical antiquity, hence they are inclined to look upon this studyas barren, superseded, out-of-date. This herd has turned with muchgreater zest to the science of language: here in this wide expanse ofvirgin soil, where even the most mediocre gifts can be turned toaccount, and where a kind of insipidity and dullness is even lookedupon as decided talent, with the novelty and uncertainty of methodsand the constant danger of making fantastic mistakes--here, where dullregimental routine and discipline are desiderata--here the newcomer isno longer frightened by the majestic and warning voice that rises fromthe ruins of antiquity: here every one is welcomed with open arms, including even him who never arrived at any uncommon impression ornoteworthy thought after a perusal of Sophocles and Aristophanes, withthe result that they end in an etymological tangle, or are seducedinto collecting the fragments of out-of-the-way dialects--and theirtime is spent in associating and dissociating, collecting andscattering, and running hither and thither consulting books. And sucha usefully employed philologist would now fain be a teacher! He nowundertakes to teach the youth of the public schools something aboutthe ancient writers, although he himself has read them without anyparticular impression, much less with insight! What a dilemma!Antiquity has said nothing to him, consequently he has nothing to sayabout antiquity. A sudden thought strikes him: why is he a skilledphilologist at all! Why did these authors write Latin and Greek! Andwith a light heart he immediately begins to etymologise with Homer, calling Lithuanian or Ecclesiastical Slavonic, or, above all, thesacred Sanskrit, to his assistance: as if Greek lessons were merelythe excuse for a general introduction to the study of languages, andas if Homer were lacking in only one respect, namely, not beingwritten in pre-Indogermanic. Whoever is acquainted with our presentpublic schools well knows what a wide gulf separates their teachersfrom classicism, and how, from a feeling of this want, comparativephilology and allied professions have increased their numbers to suchan unheard-of degree. "

"What I mean is, " said the other, "it would depend upon whether ateacher of classical culture did _not_ confuse his Greeks and Romanswith the other peoples, the barbarians, whether he could _never_ putGreek and Latin _on a level with_ other languages: so far as hisclassicalism is concerned, it is a matter of indifference whether theframework of these languages concurs with or is in any way related tothe other languages: such a concurrence does not interest him at all;his real concern is with _what is not common to both_, with what showshim that those two peoples were not barbarians as compared with theothers--in so far, of course, as he is a true teacher of culture andmodels himself after the majestic patterns of the classics. "

"I may be wrong, " said the philosopher, "but I suspect that, owing tothe way in which Latin and Greek are now taught in schools, theaccurate grasp of these languages, the ability to speak and write themwith ease, is lost, and that is something in which my own generationdistinguished itself--a generation, indeed, whose few survivers haveby this time grown old; whilst, on the other hand, the presentteachers seem to impress their pupils with the genetic and historicalimportance of the subject to such an extent that, at best, theirscholars ultimately turn into little Sanskritists, etymologicalspitfires, or reckless conjecturers; but not one of them can read hisPlato or Tacitus with pleasure, as we old folk can. The public schoolsmay still be seats of learning: not, however of _the_ learning which, as it were, is only the natural and involuntary auxiliary of a culturethat is directed towards the noblest ends; but rather of that culturewhich might be compared to the hypertrophical swelling of an unhealthybody. The public schools are certainly the seats of this obesity, if, indeed, they have not degenerated into the abodes of that elegantbarbarism which is boasted of as being 'German culture of thepresent!'"

"But, " asked the other, "what is to become of that large body ofteachers who have not been endowed with a true gift for culture, andwho set up as teachers merely to gain a livelihood from theprofession, because there is a demand for them, because a superfluityof schools brings with it a superfluity of teachers? Where shall theygo when antiquity peremptorily orders them to withdraw? Must they notbe sacrificed to those powers of the present who, day after day, callout to them from the never-ending columns of the press 'We areculture! We are education! We are at the zenith! We are the apexes ofthe pyramids! We are the aims of universal history!'--when they hearthe seductive promises, when the shameful signs of non-culture, theplebeian publicity of the so-called 'interests of culture' areextolled for their benefit in magazines and newspapers as an entirelynew and the best possible, full-grown form of culture! Whither shallthe poor fellows fly when they feel the presentiment that thesepromises are not true--where but to the most obtuse, sterilescientificality, that here the shriek of culture may no longer beaudible to them? Pursued in this way, must they not end, like theostrich, by burying their heads in the sand? Is it not a realhappiness for them, buried as they are among dialects, etymologies, and conjectures, to lead a life like that of the ants, even thoughthey are miles removed from true culture, if only they can close theirears tightly and be deaf to the voice of the 'elegant' culture of thetime. "

"You are right, my friend, " said the philosopher, "but whence comes theurgent necessity for a surplus of schools for culture, which furthergives rise to the necessity for a surplus of teachers?--when we soclearly see that the demand for a surplus springs from a sphere which ishostile to culture, and that the consequences of this surplus only leadto non-culture. Indeed, we can discuss this dire necessity only in sofar as the modern State is willing to discuss these things with us, andis prepared to follow up its demands by force: which phenomenoncertainly makes the same impression upon most people as if they wereaddressed by the eternal law of things. For the rest, a 'Culture-State, 'to use the current expression, which makes such demands, is rather anovelty, and has only come to a 'self-understanding' within the lasthalf century, _i. E. _ in a period when (to use the favourite popularword) so many 'self-understood' things came into being, but which are inthemselves not 'self-understood' at all. This right to higher educationhas been taken so seriously by the most powerful of modernStates--Prussia--that the objectionable principle it has adopted, takenin connection with the well-known daring and hardihood of this State, isseen to have a menacing and dangerous consequence for the true Germanspirit; for we see endeavours being made in this quarter to raise thepublic school, formally systematised, up to the so-called 'level of thetime. ' Here is to be found all that mechanism by means of which as manyscholars as possible are urged on to take up courses of public schooltraining: here, indeed, the State has its most powerful inducement--theconcession of certain privileges respecting military service, with thenatural consequence that, according to the unprejudiced evidence ofstatistical officials, by this, and by this only, can we explain theuniversal congestion of all Prussian public schools, and the urgent andcontinual need for new ones. What more can the State do for a surplus ofeducational institutions than bring all the higher and the majority ofthe lower civil service appointments, the right of entry to theuniversities, and even the most influential military posts into closeconnection with the public school: and all this in a country where bothuniversal military service and the highest offices of the Stateunconsciously attract all gifted natures to them. The public school ishere looked upon as an honourable aim, and every one who feels himselfurged on to the sphere of government will be found on his way to it. This is a new and quite original occurrence: the State assumes theattitude of a mystogogue of culture, and, whilst it promotes its ownends, it obliges every one of its servants not to appear in its presencewithout the torch of universal State education in their hands, by theflickering light of which they may again recognise the State as thehighest goal, as the reward of all their strivings after education. 

"Now this last phenomenon should indeed surprise them; it shouldremind them of that allied, slowly understood tendency of a philosophywhich was formerly promoted for reasons of State, namely, thetendency of the Hegelian philosophy: yea, it would perhaps be noexaggeration to say that, in the subordination of all strivings aftereducation to reasons of State, Prussia has appropriated, with success, the principle and the useful heirloom of the Hegelian philosophy, whose apotheosis of the State in _this_ subordination certainlyreaches its height. "

"But, " said the philosopher's companion, "what purposes can the Statehave in view with such a strange aim? For that it has some Stateobjects in view is seen in the manner in which the conditions ofPrussian schools are admired by, meditated upon, and occasionallyimitated by other States. These other States obviously presupposesomething here that, if adopted, would tend towards the maintenanceand power of the State, like our well-known and popular conscription. Where everyone proudly wears his soldier's uniform at regularintervals, where almost every one has absorbed a uniform type ofnational culture through the public schools, enthusiastic hyperbolesmay well be uttered concerning the systems employed in former times, and a form of State omnipotence which was attained only in antiquity, and which almost every young man, by both instinct and training, thinks it is the crowning glory and highest aim of human beings toreach. "

"Such a comparison, " said the philosopher, "would be quitehyperbolical, and would not hobble along on one leg only. For, indeed, the ancient State emphatically did not share the utilitarian point ofview of recognising as culture only what was directly useful to theState itself, and was far from wishing to destroy those impulses whichdid not seem to be immediately applicable. For this very reason theprofound Greek had for the State that strong feeling of admiration andthankfulness which is so distasteful to modern men; because he clearlyrecognised not only that without such State protection the germs ofhis culture could not develop, but also that all his inimitable andperennial culture had flourished so luxuriantly under the wise andcareful guardianship of the protection afforded by the State. TheState was for his culture not a supervisor, regulator, and watchman, but a vigorous and muscular companion and friend, ready for war, whoaccompanied his noble, admired, and, as it were, ethereal friendthrough disagreeable reality, earning his thanks therefor. This, however, does not happen when a modern State lays claim to such heartygratitude because it renders such chivalrous service to German cultureand art: for in this regard its past is as ignominious as its present, as a proof of which we have but to think of the manner in which thememory of our great poets and artists is celebrated in German cities, and how the highest objects of these German masters are supported onthe part of the State. 

"There must therefore be peculiar circumstances surrounding both thispurpose towards which the State is tending, and which always promoteswhat is here called 'education'; and surrounding likewise the culturethus promoted, which subordinates itself to this purpose of the State. With the real German spirit and the education derived therefrom, suchas I have slowly outlined for you, this purpose of the State is atwar, hiddenly or openly: _the_ spirit of education, which is welcomedand encouraged with such interest by the State, and owing to which theschools of this country are so much admired abroad, must accordinglyoriginate in a sphere that never comes into contact with this trueGerman spirit: with that spirit which speaks to us so wondrously fromthe inner heart of the German Reformation, German music, and Germanphilosophy, and which, like a noble exile, is regarded with suchindifference and scorn by the luxurious education afforded by theState. This spirit is a stranger: it passes by in solitary sadness, and far away from it the censer of pseudo-culture is swung backwardsand forwards, which, amidst the acclamations of 'educated' teachersand journalists, arrogates to itself its name and privileges, andmetes out insulting treatment to the word 'German. ' Why does the Staterequire that surplus of educational institutions, of teachers? Whythis education of the masses on such an extended scale? Because thetrue German spirit is hated, because the aristocratic nature of trueculture is feared, because the people endeavour in this way to drivesingle great individuals into self-exile, so that the claims of themasses to education may be, so to speak, planted down and carefullytended, in order that the many may in this way endeavour to escape therigid and strict discipline of the few great leaders, so that themasses may be persuaded that they can easily find the path forthemselves--following the guiding star of the State!

"A new phenomenon! The State as the guiding star of culture! In themeantime one thing consoles me: this German spirit, which people arecombating so much, and for which they have substituted a gaudilyattired _locum tenens_, this spirit is brave: it will fight and redeemitself into a purer age; noble, as it is now, and victorious, as itone day will be, it will always preserve in its mind a certain pitifultoleration of the State, if the latter, hard-pressed in the hour ofextremity, secures such a pseudo-culture as its associate. For what, after all, do we know about the difficult task of governing men, _i. E. _ to keep law, order, quietness, and peace among millions ofboundlessly egoistical, unjust, unreasonable, dishonourable, envious, malignant, and hence very narrow-minded and perverse human beings; andthus to protect the few things that the State has conquered for itselfagainst covetous neighbours and jealous robbers? Such a hard-pressedState holds out its arms to any associate, grasps at any straw; andwhen such an associate does introduce himself with flowery eloquence, when he adjudges the State, as Hegel did, to be an 'absolutelycomplete ethical organism, ' the be-all and end-all of every one'seducation, and goes on to indicate how he himself can best promote theinterests of the State--who will be surprised if, without furtherparley, the State falls upon his neck and cries aloud in a barbaricvoice of full conviction: 'Yes! Thou art education! Thou art indeedculture!'"

FOURTH LECTURE. 

(_Delivered on the 5th of March 1872. _)

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, --Now that you have followed my tale up to thispoint, and that we have made ourselves joint masters of the solitary, remote, and at times abusive duologue of the philosopher and hiscompanion, I sincerely hope that you, like strong swimmers, are readyto proceed on the second half of our journey, especially as I canpromise you that a few other marionettes will appear in thepuppet-play of my adventure, and that if up to the present you haveonly been able to do little more than endure what I have been tellingyou, the waves of my story will now bear you more quickly and easilytowards the end. In other words we have now come to a turning, and itwould be advisable for us to take a short glance backwards to see whatwe think we have gained from such a varied conversation. 

"Remain in your present position, " the philosopher seemed to say tohis companion, "for you may cherish hopes. It is more and more clearlyevident that we have no educational institutions at all; but that weought to have them. Our public schools--established, it would seem, for this high object--have either become the nurseries of areprehensible culture which repels the true culture with profoundhatred--_i. E. _ a true, aristocratic culture, founded upon a fewcarefully chosen minds; or they foster a micrological and sterilelearning which, while it is far removed from culture, has at leastthis merit, that it avoids that reprehensible culture as well as thetrue culture. " The philosopher had particularly drawn his companion'sattention to the strange corruption which must have entered into theheart of culture when the State thought itself capable of tyrannisingover it and of attaining its ends through it; and further when theState, in conjunction with this culture, struggled against otherhostile forces as well as against _the_ spirit which the philosopherventured to call the "true German spirit. " This spirit, linked to theGreeks by the noblest ties, and shown by its past history to have beensteadfast and courageous, pure and lofty in its aims, its facultiesqualifying it for the high task of freeing modern man from the curseof modernity--this spirit is condemned to live apart, banished fromits inheritance. But when its slow, painful tones of woe resoundthrough the desert of the present, then the overladen and gaily-deckedcaravan of culture is pulled up short, horror-stricken. We must notonly astonish, but terrify--such was the philosopher's opinion: not tofly shamefully away, but to take the offensive, was his advice; but heespecially counselled his companion not to ponder too anxiously overthe individual from whom, through a higher instinct, this aversion forthe present barbarism proceeded, "Let it perish: the Pythian god hadno difficulty in finding a new tripod, a second Pythia, so long, atleast, as the mystic cold vapours rose from the earth. "

The philosopher once more began to speak: "Be careful to remember, myfriend, " said he, "there are two things you must not confuse. A manmust learn a great deal that he may live and take part in the strugglefor existence; but everything that he as an individual learns and doeswith this end in view has nothing whatever to do with culture. Thislatter only takes its beginning in a sphere that lies far above theworld of necessity, indigence, and struggle for existence. Thequestion now is to what extent a man values his ego in comparison withother egos, how much of his strength he uses up in the endeavour toearn his living. Many a one, by stoically confining his needs within anarrow compass, will shortly and easily reach the sphere in which hemay forget, and, as it were, shake off his ego, so that he can enjoyperpetual youth in a solar system of timeless and impersonal things. Another widens the scope and needs of his ego as much as possible, andbuilds the mausoleum of this ego in vast proportions, as if he wereprepared to fight and conquer that terrible adversary, Time. In thisinstinct also we may see a longing for immortality: wealth and power, wisdom, presence of mind, eloquence, a flourishing outward aspect, arenowned name--all these are merely turned into the means by which aninsatiable, personal will to live craves for new life, with which, again, it hankers after an eternity that is at last seen to beillusory. 

"But even in this highest form of the ego, in the enhanced needs ofsuch a distended and, as it were, collective individual, true cultureis never touched upon; and if, for example, art is sought after, onlyits disseminating and stimulating actions come into prominence, _i. E. _those which least give rise to pure and noble art, and most of all tolow and degraded forms of it. For in all his efforts, however greatand exceptional they seem to the onlooker, he never succeeds infreeing himself from his own hankering and restless personality: thatilluminated, ethereal sphere where one may contemplate without theobstruction of one's own personality continually recedes from him--andthus, let him learn, travel, and collect as he may, he must alwayslive an exiled life at a remote distance from a higher life and fromtrue culture. For true culture would scorn to contaminate itself withthe needy and covetous individual; it well knows how to give the slipto the man who would fain employ it as a means of attaining toegoistic ends; and if any one cherishes the belief that he has firmlysecured it as a means of livelihood, and that he can procure thenecessities of life by its sedulous cultivation, then it suddenlysteals away with noiseless steps and an air of derisive mockery. [6]

"I will thus ask you, my friend, not to confound this culture, thissensitive, fastidious, ethereal goddess, with that usefulmaid-of-all-work which is also called 'culture, ' but which is onlythe intellectual servant and counsellor of one's practicalnecessities, wants, and means of livelihood Every kind of training, however, which holds out the prospect of bread-winning as its end andaim, is not a training for culture as we understand the word; butmerely a collection of precepts and directions to show how, in thestruggle for existence, a man may preserve and protect his own person. It may be freely admitted that for the great majority of men such acourse of instruction is of the highest importance; and the morearduous the struggle is the more intensely must the young man strainevery nerve to utilise his strength to the best advantage. 

"But--let no one think for a moment that the schools which urge him onto this struggle and prepare him for it are in any way seriously to beconsidered as establishments of culture. They are institutions whichteach one how to take part in the battle of life; whether they promiseto turn out civil servants, or merchants, or officers, or wholesaledealers, or farmers, or physicians, or men with a technical training. The regulations and standards prevailing at such institutions differfrom those in a true educational institution; and what in the latteris permitted, and even freely held out as often as possible, ought tobe considered as a criminal offence in the former. 

"Let me give you an example. If you wish to guide a young man on thepath of true culture, beware of interrupting his naive, confident, and, as it were, immediate and personal relationship with nature. Thewoods, the rocks, the winds, the vulture, the flowers, the butterfly, the meads, the mountain slopes, must all speak to him in their ownlanguage; in them he must, as it were, come to know himself again incountless reflections and images, in a variegated round of changingvisions; and in this way he will unconsciously and gradually feel themetaphysical unity of all things in the great image of nature, and atthe same time tranquillise his soul in the contemplation of hereternal endurance and necessity. But how many young men should bepermitted to grow up in such close and almost personal proximity tonature! The others must learn another truth betimes: how to subduenature to themselves. Here is an end of this naive metaphysics; andthe physiology of plants and animals, geology, inorganic chemistry, force their devotees to view nature from an altogether differentstandpoint. What is lost by this new point of view is not only apoetical phantasmagoria, but the instinctive, true, and unique pointof view, instead of which we have shrewd and clever calculations, and, so to speak, overreachings of nature. Thus to the truly cultured manis vouchsafed the inestimable benefit of being able to remainfaithful, without a break, to the contemplative instincts of hischildhood, and so to attain to a calmness, unity, consistency, andharmony which can never be even thought of by a man who is compelledto fight in the struggle for existence. 

"You must not think, however, that I wish to withhold all praise fromour primary and secondary schools: I honour the seminaries where boyslearn arithmetic and master modern languages, and study geography andthe marvellous discoveries made in natural science. I am quiteprepared to say further that those youths who pass through the betterclass of secondary schools are well entitled to make the claims putforward by the fully-fledged public school boy; and the time iscertainly not far distant when such pupils will be everywhere freelyadmitted to the universities and positions under the government, whichhas hitherto been the case only with scholars from the publicschools--of our present public schools, be it noted![7] I cannot, however, refrain from adding the melancholy reflection: if it be truethat secondary and public schools are, on the whole, working soheartily in common towards the same ends, and differ from each otheronly in such a slight degree, that they may take equal rank before thetribunal of the State, then we completely lack another kind ofeducational institutions: those for the development of culture! To saythe least, the secondary schools cannot be reproached with this; forthey have up to the present propitiously and honourably followed uptendencies of a lower order, but one nevertheless highly necessary. Inthe public schools, however, there is very much less honesty and verymuch less ability too; for in them we find an instinctive feeling ofshame, the unconscious perception of the fact that the wholeinstitution has been ignominiously degraded, and that the sonorouswords of wise and apathetic teachers are contradictory to the dreary, barbaric, and sterile reality. So there are no true culturalinstitutions! And in those very places where a pretence to culture isstill kept up, we find the people more hopeless, atrophied, anddiscontented than in the secondary schools, where the so-called'realistic' subjects are taught! Besides this, only think how immatureand uninformed one must be in the company of such teachers when oneactually misunderstands the rigorously defined philosophicalexpressions 'real' and 'realism' to such a degree as to think them thecontraries of mind and matter, and to interpret 'realism' as 'the roadto knowledge, formation, and mastery of reality. '

"I for my own part know of only two exact contraries: _institutionsfor teaching culture and institutions for teaching how to succeed inlife_. All our present institutions belong to the second class; but Iam speaking only of the first. "

About two hours went by while the philosophically-minded couplechatted about such startling questions. Night slowly fell in themeantime; and when in the twilight the philosopher's voice had soundedlike natural music through the woods, it now rang out in the profounddarkness of the night when he was speaking with excitement or evenpassionately; his tones hissing and thundering far down the valley, and reverberating among the trees and rocks. Suddenly he was silent:he had just repeated, almost pathetically, the words, "we have no trueeducational institutions; we have no true educational institutions!"when something fell down just in front of him--it might have been afir-cone--and his dog barked and ran towards it. Thus interrupted, thephilosopher raised his head, and suddenly became aware of thedarkness, the cool air, and the lonely situation of himself and hiscompanion. "Well! What are we about!" he ejaculated, "it's dark. Youknow whom we were expecting here; but he hasn't come. We have waitedin vain; let us go. "

 * * * * *

I must now, ladies and gentlemen, convey to you the impressionsexperienced by my friend and myself as we eagerly listened to thisconversation, which we heard distinctly in our hiding-place. I havealready told you that at that place and at that hour we had intendedto hold a festival in commemoration of something: and this somethinghad to do with nothing else than matters concerning educationaltraining, of which we, in our own youthful opinions, had garnered aplentiful harvest during our past life. We were thus disposed toremember with gratitude the institution which we had at one timethought out for ourselves at that very spot in order, as I havealready mentioned, that we might reciprocally encourage and watch overone another's educational impulses. But a sudden and unexpected lightwas thrown on all that past life as we silently gave ourselves up tothe vehement words of the philosopher. As when a traveller, walkingheedlessly across unknown ground, suddenly puts his foot over the edgeof a cliff, so it now seemed to us that we had hastened to meet thegreat danger rather than run away from it. Here at this spot, somemorable to us, we heard the warning: "Back! Not another step! Knowyou not whither your footsteps tend, whither this deceitful path isluring you?"

It seemed to us that we now knew, and our feeling of overflowingthankfulness impelled us so irresistibly towards our earnestcounsellor and trusty Eckart, that both of us sprang up at the samemoment and rushed towards the philosopher to embrace him. He was justabout to move off, and had already turned sideways when we rushed upto him. The dog turned sharply round and barked, thinking doubtless, like the philosopher's companion, of an attempt at robbery rather thanan enraptured embrace. It was plain that he had forgotten us. In aword, he ran away. Our embrace was a miserable failure when we didovertake him; for my friend gave a loud yell as the dog bit him, andthe philosopher himself sprang away from me with such force that weboth fell. What with the dog and the men there was a scramble thatlasted a few minutes, until my friend began to call out loudly, parodying the philosopher's own words: "In the name of all culture andpseudo-culture, what does the silly dog want with us? Hence, youconfounded dog; you uninitiated, never to be initiated; hasten awayfrom us, silent and ashamed!" After this outburst matters were clearedup to some extent, at any rate so far as they could be cleared up inthe darkness of the wood. "Oh, it's you!" ejaculated the philosopher, "our duellists! How you startled us! What on earth drives you to jumpout upon us like this at such a time of the night?"

"Joy, thankfulness, and reverence, " said we, shaking the old man bythe hand, whilst the dog barked as if he understood, "we can't let yougo without telling you this. And if you are to understand everythingyou must not go away just yet; we want to ask you about so many thingsthat lie heavily on our hearts. Stay yet awhile; we know every foot ofthe way and can accompany you afterwards. The gentleman you expect mayyet turn up. Look over yonder on the Rhine: what is that we see soclearly floating on the surface of the water as if surrounded by thelight of many torches? It is there that we may look for your friend, Iwould even venture to say that it is he who is coming towards you withall those lights. "

And so much did we assail the surprised old man with our entreaties, promises, and fantastic delusions, that we persuaded the philosopherto walk to and fro with us on the little plateau, "by learned lumberundisturbed, " as my friend added. 

"Shame on you!" said the philosopher, "if you really want to quotesomething, why choose Faust? However, I will give in to you, quotationor no quotation, if only our young companions will keep still and notrun away as suddenly as they made their appearance, for they are likewill-o'-the-wisps; we are amazed when they are there and again whenthey are not there. "

My friend immediately recited--

 Respect, I hope, will teach us how we may Our lighter disposition keep at bay. Our course is only zig-zag as a rule. 

The philosopher was surprised, and stood still. "You astonish me, youwill-o'-the-wisps, " he said; "this is no quagmire we are on now. Ofwhat use is this ground to you? What does the proximity of aphilosopher mean to you? For around him the air is sharp and clear, the ground dry and hard. You must find out a more fantastic region foryour zig-zagging inclinations. "

"I think, " interrupted the philosopher's companion at this point, "thegentlemen have already told us that they promised to meet some onehere at this hour; but it seems to me that they listened to our comedyof education like a chorus, and truly 'idealistic spectators'--forthey did not disturb us; we thought we were alone with each other. "

"Yes, that is true, " said the philosopher, "that praise must not bewithheld from them, but it seems to me that they deserve still higherpraise----"

Here I seized the philosopher's hand and said: "That man must be asobtuse as a reptile, with his stomach on the ground and his headburied in mud, who can listen to such a discourse as yours withoutbecoming earnest and thoughtful, or even excited and indignant. Self-accusation and annoyance might perhaps cause a few to get angry;but our impression was quite different: the only thing I do not knowis how exactly to describe it. This hour was so well-timed for us, andour minds were so well prepared, that we sat there like empty vessels, and now it seems as if we were filled to overflowing with this newwisdom: for I no longer know how to help myself, and if some one askedme what I am thinking of doing to-morrow, or what I have made up mymind to do with myself from now on, I should not know what to answer. For it is easy to see that we have up to the present been living andeducating ourselves in the wrong way--but what can we do to cross overthe chasm between to-day and to-morrow?"

"Yes, " acknowledged my friend, "I have a similar feeling, and I askthe same question: but besides that I feel as if I were frightenedaway from German culture by entertaining such high and ideal views ofits task; yea, as if I were unworthy to co-operate with it in carryingout its aims. I only see a resplendent file of the highest naturesmoving towards this goal; I can imagine over what abysses and throughwhat temptations this procession travels. Who would dare to be so boldas to join in it?"

At this point the philosopher's companion again turned to him andsaid: "Don't be angry with me when I tell you that I too have asomewhat similar feeling, which I have not mentioned to you before. When talking to you I often felt drawn out of myself, as it were, andinspired with your ardour and hopes till I almost forgot myself. Thena calmer moment arrives; a piercing wind of reality brings me back toearth--and then I see the wide gulf between us, over which youyourself, as in a dream, draw me back again. Then what you call'culture' merely totters meaninglessly around me or lies heavily on mybreast: it is like a shirt of mail that weighs me down, or a swordthat I cannot wield. "

Our minds, as we thus argued with the philosopher, were unanimous, and, mutually encouraging and stimulating one another, we slowlywalked with him backwards and forwards along the unencumbered spacewhich had earlier in the day served us as a shooting range. And then, in the still night, under the peaceful light of hundreds of stars, weall broke out into a tirade which ran somewhat as follows:--

"You have told us so much about the genius, " we began, "about hislonely and wearisome journey through the world, as if nature neverexhibited anything but the most diametrical contraries: in one placethe stupid, dull masses, acting by instinct, and then, on a far higherand more remote plane, the great contemplating few, destined for theproduction of immortal works. But now you call these the apexes of theintellectual pyramid: it would, however, seem that between the broad, heavily burdened foundation up to the highest of the free andunencumbered peaks there must be countless intermediate degrees, andthat here we must apply the saying _natura non facit saltus_. Wherethen are we to look for the beginning of what you call culture; whereis the line of demarcation to be drawn between the spheres which areruled from below upwards and those which are ruled from abovedownwards? And if it be only in connection with these exalted beingsthat true culture may be spoken of, how are institutions to be foundedfor the uncertain existence of such natures, how can we deviseeducational establishments which shall be of benefit only to theseselect few? It rather seems to us that such persons know how to findtheir own way, and that their full strength is shown in their beingable to walk without the educational crutches necessary for otherpeople, and thus undisturbed to make their way through the storm andstress of this rough world just like a phantom. "

We kept on arguing in this fashion, speaking without any great abilityand not putting our thoughts in any special form: but thephilosopher's companion went even further, and said to him: "Justthink of all these great geniuses of whom we are wont to be so proud, looking upon them as tried and true leaders and guides of this realGerman spirit, whose names we commemorate by statues and festivals, and whose works we hold up with feelings of pride for the admirationof foreign lands--how did they obtain the education you demand forthem, to what degree do they show that they have been nourished andmatured by basking in the sun of national education? And yet they areseen to be possible, they have nevertheless become men whom we musthonour: yea, their works themselves justify the form of thedevelopment of these noble spirits; they justify even a certain wantof education for which we must make allowance owing to their countryand the age in which they lived. How could Lessing and Winckelmannbenefit by the German culture of their time? Even less than, or at allevents just as little as Beethoven, Schiller, Goethe, or every one ofour great poets and artists. It may perhaps be a law of nature thatonly the later generations are destined to know by what divine giftsan earlier generation was favoured. "

At this point the old philosopher could not control his anger, andshouted to his companion: "Oh, you innocent lamb of knowledge! Yougentle sucking doves, all of you! And would you give the name ofarguments to those distorted, clumsy, narrow-minded, ungainly, crippled things? Yes, I have just now been listening to the fruits ofsome of this present-day culture, and my ears are still ringing withthe sound of historical 'self-understood' things, of over-wise andpitiless historical reasonings! Mark this, thou unprofaned Nature:thou hast grown old, and for thousands of years this starry sky hasspanned the space above thee--but thou hast never yet heard suchconceited and, at bottom, mischievous chatter as the talk of thepresent day! So you are proud of your poets and artists, my goodTeutons? You point to them and brag about them to foreign countries, do you? And because it has given you no trouble to have them amongstyou, you have formed the pleasant theory that you need not concernyourselves further with them? Isn't that so, my inexperiencedchildren: they come of their own free will, the stork brings them toyou! Who would dare to mention a midwife! You deserve an earnestteaching, eh? You should be proud of the fact that all the noble andbrilliant men we have mentioned were prematurely suffocated, worn out, and crushed through you, through your barbarism? You think withoutshame of Lessing, who, on account of your stupidity, perished inbattle against your ludicrous gods and idols, the evils of yourtheatres, your learned men, and your theologians, without once daringto lift himself to the height of that immortal flight for which hewas brought into the world. And what are your impressions when youthink of Winckelmann, who, that he might rid his eyes of yourgrotesque fatuousness, went to beg help from the Jesuits, and whosedisgraceful religious conversion recoils upon you and will alwaysremain an ineffaceable blemish upon you? You can even name Schillerwithout blushing! Just look at his picture! The fiery, sparkling eyes, looking at you with disdain, those flushed, death-like cheeks: can youlearn nothing from all that? In him you had a beautiful and divineplaything, and through it was destroyed. And if it had been possiblefor you to take Goethe's friendship away from this melancholy, hastylife, hunted to premature death, then you would have crushed him evensooner than you did. You have not rendered assistance to a single oneof our great geniuses--and now upon that fact you wish to build up thetheory that none of them shall ever be helped in future? For each ofthem, however, up to this very moment, you have always been the'resistance of the stupid world' that Goethe speaks of in his"Epilogue to the Bell"; towards each of them you acted the part ofapathetic dullards or jealous narrow-hearts or malignant egotists. Inspite of you they created their immortal works, against you theydirected their attacks, and thanks to you they died so prematurely, their tasks only half accomplished, blunted and dulled and shatteredin the battle. Who can tell to what these heroic men were destined toattain if only that true German spirit had gathered them togetherwithin the protecting walls of a powerful institution?--that spiritwhich, without the help of some such institution, drags out anisolated, debased, and degraded existence. All those great men wereutterly ruined; and it is only an insane belief in the Hegelian'reasonableness of all happenings' which would absolve you of anyresponsibility in the matter. And not those men alone! Indictments arepouring forth against you from every intellectual province: whether Ilook at the talents of our poets, philosophers, painters, orsculptors--and not only in the case of gifts of the highest order--Ieverywhere see immaturity, overstrained nerves, or prematurelyexhausted energies, abilities wasted and nipped in the bud; Ieverywhere feel that 'resistance of the stupid world, ' in other words, _your_ guiltiness. That is what I am talking about when I speak oflacking educational establishments, and why I think those which atpresent claim the name in such a pitiful condition. Whoever is pleasedto call this an 'ideal desire, ' and refers to it as 'ideal' as if hewere trying to get rid of it by praising me, deserves the answer thatthe present system is a scandal and a disgrace, and that the man whoasks for warmth in the midst of ice and snow must indeed get angry ifhe hears this referred to as an 'ideal desire. ' The matter we are nowdiscussing is concerned with clear, urgent, and palpably evidentrealities: a man who knows anything of the question feels that thereis a need which must be seen to, just like cold and hunger. But theman who is not affected at all by this matter most certainly has astandard by which to measure the extent of his own culture, and thusto know what I call 'culture, ' and where the line should be drawnbetween that which is ruled from below upwards and that which is ruledfrom above downwards. "

The philosopher seemed to be speaking very heatedly. We begged him towalk round with us again, since he had uttered the latter part of hisdiscourse standing near the tree-stump which had served us as atarget. For a few minutes not a word more was spoken. Slowly andthoughtfully we walked to and fro. We did not so much feel ashamed ofhaving brought forward such foolish arguments as we felt a kind ofrestitution of our personality. After the heated and, so far as wewere concerned, very unflattering utterance of the philosopher, weseemed to feel ourselves nearer to him--that we even stood in apersonal relationship to him. For so wretched is man that he neverfeels himself brought into such close contact with a stranger as whenthe latter shows some sign of weakness, some defect. That ourphilosopher had lost his temper and made use of abusive languagehelped to bridge over the gulf created between us by our timid respectfor him: and for the sake of the reader who feels his indignationrising at this suggestion let it be added that this bridge often leadsfrom distant hero-worship to personal love and pity. And, after thefeeling that our personality had been restored to us, this pitygradually became stronger and stronger. Why were we making this oldman walk up and down with us between the rocks and trees at that timeof the night? And, since he had yielded to our entreaties, why couldwe not have thought of a more modest and unassuming manner of havingourselves instructed, why should the three of us have contradicted himin such clumsy terms?

For now we saw how thoughtless, unprepared, and baseless were all theobjections we had made, and how greatly the echo of _the_ present washeard in them, the voice of which, in the province of culture, the oldman would fain not have heard. Our objections, however, were notpurely intellectual ones: our reasons for protesting against thephilosopher's statements seemed to lie elsewhere. They arose perhapsfrom the instinctive anxiety to know whether, if the philosopher'sviews were carried into effect, our own personalities would find aplace in the higher or lower division; and this made it necessary forus to find some arguments against the mode of thinking which robbed usof our self-styled claims to culture. People, however, should notargue with companions who feel the weight of an argument sopersonally; or, as the moral in our case would have been: suchcompanions should not argue, should not contradict at all. 

So we walked on beside the philosopher, ashamed, compassionate, dissatisfied with ourselves, and more than ever convinced that the oldman was right and that we had done him wrong. How remote now seemedthe youthful dream of our educational institution; how clearly we sawthe danger which we had hitherto escaped merely by good luck, namely, giving ourselves up body and soul to the educational system whichforced itself upon our notice so enticingly, from the time when weentered the public schools up to that moment. How then had it comeabout that we had not taken our places in the chorus of its admirers?Perhaps merely because we were real students, and could still drawback from the rough-and-tumble, the pushing and struggling, therestless, ever-breaking waves of publicity, to seek refuge in our ownlittle educational establishment; which, however, time would have soonswallowed up also. 

Overcome by such reflections, we were about to address the philosopheragain, when he suddenly turned towards us, and said in a softer tone--

"I cannot be surprised if you young men behave rashly andthoughtlessly; for it is hardly likely that you have ever seriouslyconsidered what I have just said to you. Don't be in a hurry; carrythis question about with you, but do at any rate consider it day andnight. For you are now at the parting of the ways, and now you knowwhere each path leads. If you take the one, your age will receive youwith open arms, you will not find it wanting in honours anddecorations: you will form units of an enormous rank and file; andthere will be as many people like-minded standing behind you as infront of you. And when the leader gives the word it will be re-echoedfrom rank to rank. For here your first duty is this: to fight in rankand file; and your second: to annihilate all those who refuse to formpart of the rank and file. On the other path you will have but fewfellow-travellers: it is more arduous, winding and precipitous; andthose who take the first path will mock you, for your progress is morewearisome, and they will try to lure you over into their own ranks. When the two paths happen to cross, however, you will be roughlyhandled and thrust aside, or else shunned and isolated. 

"Now, take these two parties, so different from each other in everyrespect, and tell me what meaning an educational establishment wouldhave for them. That enormous horde, crowding onwards on the first pathtowards its goal, would take the term to mean an institution by whicheach of its members would become duly qualified to take his place inthe rank and file, and would be purged of everything which might tendto make him strive after higher and more remote aims. I don't deny, ofcourse, that they can find pompous words with which to describe theiraims: for example, they speak of the 'universal development of freepersonality upon a firm social, national, and human basis, ' or theyannounce as their goal: 'The founding of the peaceful sovereignty ofthe people upon reason, education, and justice. '

"An educational establishment for the other and smaller company, however, would be something vastly different. They would employ it toprevent themselves from being separated from one another andoverwhelmed by the first huge crowd, to prevent their few selectspirits from losing sight of their splendid and noble task throughpremature weariness, or from being turned aside from the true path, corrupted, or subverted. These select spirits must complete theirwork: that is the _raison d'être_ of their common institution--a work, indeed, which, as it were, must be free from subjective traces, andmust further rise above the transient events of future times as thepure reflection of the eternal and immutable essence of things. Andall those who occupy places in that institution must co-operate in theendeavour to engender men of genius by this purification fromsubjectiveness and the creation of the works of genius. Not a few, even of those whose talents may be of the second or third order, aresuited to such co-operation, and only when serving in such aneducational establishment as this do they feel that they are trulycarrying out their life's task. But now it is just these talents Ispeak of which are drawn away from the true path, and their instinctsestranged, by the continual seductions of that modern 'culture. '

"The egotistic emotions, weaknesses, and vanities of these few selectminds are continually assailed by the temptations unceasingly murmuredinto their ears by the spirit of the age: 'Come with me! There you areservants, retainers, tools, eclipsed by higher natures; your ownpeculiar characteristics never have free play; you are tied down, chained down, like slaves; yea, like automata: here, with me, you willenjoy the freedom of your own personalities, as masters should, yourtalents will cast their lustre on yourselves alone, with their aid youmay come to the very front rank; an innumerable train of followerswill accompany you, and the applause of public opinion will yield youmore pleasure than a nobly-bestowed commendation from the height ofgenius. ' Even the very best of men now yield to these temptations: andit cannot be said that the deciding factor here is the degree oftalent, or whether a man is accessible to these voices or not; butrather the degree and the height of a certain moral sublimity, theinstinct towards heroism, towards sacrifice--and finally a positive, habitual need of culture, prepared by a proper kind of education, which education, as I have previously said, is first and foremostobedience and submission to the discipline of genius. Of thisdiscipline and submission, however, the present institutions called bycourtesy 'educational establishments' know nothing whatever, althoughI have no doubt that the public school was originally intended to bean institution for sowing the seeds of true culture, or at least as apreparation for it. I have no doubt, either, that they took the firstbold steps in the wonderful and stirring times of the Reformation, andthat afterwards, in the era which gave birth to Schiller and Goethe, there was again a growing demand for culture, like the firstprotuberance of that wing spoken of by Plato in the _Phaedrus_, which, at every contact with the beautiful, bears the soul aloft into theupper regions, the habitations of the gods. "

"Ah, " began the philosopher's companion, "when you quote the divinePlato and the world of ideas, I do not think you are angry with me, however much my previous utterance may have merited your disapprovaland wrath. As soon as you speak of it, I feel that Platonic wingrising within me; and it is only at intervals, when I act as thecharioteer of my soul, that I have any difficulty with the resistingand unwilling horse that Plato has also described to us, the'crooked, lumbering animal, put together anyhow, with a short, thickneck; flat-faced, and of a dark colour, with grey eyes and blood-redcomplexion; the mate of insolence and pride, shag-eared and deaf, hardly yielding to whip or spur. '[8] Just think how long I have livedat a distance from you, and how all those temptations you speak ofhave endeavoured to lure me away, not perhaps without some success, even though I myself may not have observed it. I now see more clearlythan ever the necessity for an institution which will enable us tolive and mix freely with the few men of true culture, so that we mayhave them as our leaders and guiding stars. How greatly I feel thedanger of travelling alone! And when it occurred to me that I couldsave myself by flight from all contact with the spirit of the time, Ifound that this flight itself was a mere delusion. Continuously, withevery breath we take, some amount of that atmosphere circulatesthrough every vein and artery, and no solitude is lonesome or distantenough for us to be out of reach of its fogs and clouds. Whether inthe guise of hope, doubt, profit, or virtue, the shades of thatculture hover about us; and we have been deceived by that juggleryeven here in the presence of a true hermit of culture. How steadfastlyand faithfully must the few followers of that culture--which mightalmost be called sectarian--be ever on the alert! How they muststrengthen and uphold one another! How adversely would any errors becriticised here, and how sympathetically excused! And thus, teacher, Iask you to pardon me, after you have laboured so earnestly to set mein the right path!"

"You use a language which I do not care for, my friend, " said thephilosopher, "and one which reminds me of a diocesan conference. Withthat I have nothing to do. But your Platonic horse pleases me, and onits account you shall be forgiven. I am willing to exchange my ownanimal for yours. But it is getting chilly, and I don't feel inclinedto walk about any more just now. The friend I was waiting for isindeed foolish enough to come up here even at midnight if he promisedto do so. But I have waited in vain for the signal agreed upon; and Icannot guess what has delayed him. For as a rule he is punctual, as weold men are wont, to be, something that you young men nowadays lookupon as old-fashioned. But he has left me in the lurch for once: howannoying it is! Come away with me! It's time to go!"

At this moment something happened. 

FOOTNOTES:

[6] It will be apparent from these words that Nietzsche is still underthe influence of Schopenhauer. --TR. 

[7] This prophecy has come true. --TR. 

[8] _Phaedrus_; Jowett's translation. 

FIFTH LECTURE. 

(_Delivered on the 23rd of March 1872. _)

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, --If you have lent a sympathetic ear to what Ihave told you about the heated argument of our philosopher in thestillness of that memorable night, you must have felt as disappointedas we did when he announced his peevish intention. You will rememberthat he had suddenly told us he wished to go; for, having been left inthe lurch by his friend in the first place, and, in the second, havingbeen bored rather than animated by the remarks addressed to him by hiscompanion and ourselves when walking backwards and forwards on thehillside, he now apparently wanted to put an end to what appeared tohim to be a useless discussion. It must have seemed to him that hisday had been lost, and he would have liked to blot it out of hismemory, together with the recollection of ever having made ouracquaintance. And we were thus rather unwillingly preparing to departwhen something else suddenly brought him to a standstill, and the foothe had just raised sank hesitatingly to the ground again. 

A coloured flame, making a crackling noise for a few seconds, attracted our attention from the direction of the Rhine; andimmediately following upon this we heard a slow, harmonious call, quite in tune, although plainly the cry of numerous youthful voices. "That's his signal, " exclaimed the philosopher, "so my friend isreally coming, and I haven't waited for nothing, after all. It will bea midnight meeting indeed--but how am I to let him know that I amstill here? Come! Your pistols; let us see your talent once again! Didyou hear the severe rhythm of that melody saluting us? Mark it well, and answer it in the same rhythm by a series of shots. "

This was a task well suited to our tastes and abilities; so we loadedup as quickly as we could and pointed our weapons at the brilliantstars in the heavens, whilst the echo of that piercing cry died awayin the distance. The reports of the first, second, and third shotssounded sharply in the stillness; and then the philosopher cried"False time!" as our rhythm was suddenly interrupted: for, like alightning flash, a shooting star tore its way across the clouds afterthe third report, and almost involuntarily our fourth and fifth shotswere sent after it in the direction it had taken. 

"False time!" said the philosopher again, "who told you to shootstars! They can fall well enough without you! People should know whatthey want before they begin to handle weapons. "

And then we once more heard that loud melody from the waters of theRhine, intoned by numerous and strong voices. "They understand us, "said the philosopher, laughing, "and who indeed could resist whensuch a dazzling phantom comes within range?" "Hush!" interrupted hisfriend, "what sort of a company can it be that returns the signal tous in such a way? I should say they were between twenty and fortystrong, manly voices in that crowd--and where would such a number comefrom to greet us? They don't appear to have left the opposite bank ofthe Rhine yet; but at any rate we must have a look at them from ourown side of the river. Come along, quickly!"

We were then standing near the top of the hill, you may remember, andour view of the river was interrupted by a dark, thick wood. On theother hand, as I have told you, from the quiet little spot which wehad left we could have a better view than from the little plateau onthe hillside; and the Rhine, with the island of Nonnenwörth in themiddle, was just visible to the beholder who peered over thetree-tops. We therefore set off hastily towards this little spot, taking care, however, not to go too quickly for the philosopher'scomfort. The night was pitch dark, and we seemed to find our way byinstinct rather than by clearly distinguishing the path, as we walkeddown with the philosopher in the middle. 

We had scarcely reached our side of the river when a broad and fiery, yet dull and uncertain light shot up, which plainly came from theopposite side of the Rhine. "Those are torches, " I cried, "there isnothing surer than that my comrades from Bonn are over yonder, andthat your friend must be with them. It is they who sang that peculiarsong, and they have doubtless accompanied your friend here. See!Listen! They are putting off in little boats. The whole torchlightprocession will have arrived here in less than half an hour. "

The philosopher jumped back. "What do you say?" he ejaculated, "yourcomrades from Bonn--students--can my friend have come here with_students_?"

This question, uttered almost wrathfully, provoked us. "What's yourobjection to students?" we demanded; but there was no answer. It wasonly after a pause that the philosopher slowly began to speak, notaddressing us directly, as it were, but rather some one in thedistance: "So, my friend, even at midnight, even on the top of alonely mountain, we shall not be alone; and you yourself are bringinga pack of mischief-making students along with you, although you wellknow that I am only too glad to get out of the way of _hoc genusomne_. I don't quite understand you, my friend: it must mean somethingwhen we arrange to meet after a long separation at such anout-of-the-way place and at such an unusual hour. Why should we want acrowd of witnesses--and such witnesses! What calls us together to-dayis least of all a sentimental, soft-hearted necessity; for both of uslearnt early in life to live alone in dignified isolation. It was notfor our own sakes, not to show our tender feelings towards each other, or to perform an unrehearsed act of friendship, that we decided tomeet here; but that here, where I once came suddenly upon you as yousat in majestic solitude, we might earnestly deliberate with eachother like knights of a new order. Let them listen to us who canunderstand us; but why should you bring with you a throng of peoplewho don't understand us! I don't know what you mean by such a thing, my friend!"

We did not think it proper to interrupt the dissatisfied old grumbler;and as he came to a melancholy close we did not dare to tell him howgreatly this distrustful repudiation of students vexed us. 

At last the philosopher's companion turned to him and said: "I amreminded of the fact that even you at one time, before I made youracquaintance, occupied posts in several universities, and that reportsconcerning your intercourse with the students and your methods ofinstruction at the time are still in circulation. From the tone ofresignation in which you have just referred to students many would beinclined to think that you had some peculiar experiences which werenot at all to your liking; but personally I rather believe that yousaw and experienced in such places just what every one else saw andexperienced in them, but that you judged what you saw and felt morejustly and severely than any one else. For, during the time I haveknown you, I have learnt that the most noteworthy, instructive, anddecisive experiences and events in one's life are those which are ofdaily occurrence; that the greatest riddle, displayed in full view ofall, is seen by the fewest to be the greatest riddle, and that theseproblems are spread about in every direction, under the very feet ofthe passers-by, for the few real philosophers to lift up carefully, thenceforth to shine as diamonds of wisdom. Perhaps, in the short timenow left us before the arrival of your friend, you will be good enoughto tell us something of your experiences of university life, so as toclose the circle of observations, to which we were involuntarilyurged, respecting our educational institutions. We may also be allowedto remind you that you, at an earlier stage of your remarks, gave methe promise that you would do so. Starting with the public school, youclaimed for it an extraordinary importance: all other institutionsmust be judged by its standard, according as its aim has beenproposed; and, if its aim happens to be wrong, all the others have tosuffer. Such an importance cannot now be adopted by the universitiesas a standard; for, by their present system of grouping, they would benothing more than institutions where public school students might gothrough finishing courses. You promised me that you would explain thisin greater detail later on: perhaps our student friends can bearwitness to that, if they chanced to overhear that part of ourconversation. "

"We can testify to that, " I put in. The philosopher then turned to usand said: "Well, if you really did listen attentively, perhaps you cannow tell me what you understand by the expression 'the present aim ofour public schools. ' Besides, you are still near enough to this sphereto judge my opinions by the standard of your own impressions andexperiences. "

My friend instantly answered, quickly and smartly, as was his habit, in the following words: "Until now we had always thought that the soleobject of the public school was to prepare students for theuniversities. This preparation, however, should tend to make usindependent enough for the extraordinarily free position of auniversity student;[9] for it seems to me that a student, to a greaterextent than any other individual, has more to decide and settle forhimself. He must guide himself on a wide, utterly unknown path formany years, so the public school must do its best to render himindependent. "

I continued the argument where my friend left off. "It even seems tome, " I said, "that everything for which you have justly blamed thepublic school is only a necessary means employed to imbue the youthfulstudent with some kind of independence, or at all events with thebelief that there is such a thing. The teaching of German compositionmust be at the service of this independence: the individual must enjoyhis opinions and carry out his designs early, so that he may be ableto travel alone and without crutches. In this way he will soon beencouraged to produce original work, and still sooner to take upcriticism and analysis. If Latin and Greek studies prove insufficientto make a student an enthusiastic admirer of antiquity, the methodswith which such studies are pursued are at all events sufficient toawaken the scientific sense, the desire for a more strict causality ofknowledge, the passion for finding out and inventing. Only think howmany young men may be lured away for ever to the attractions ofscience by a new reading of some sort which they have snatched up withyouthful hands at the public school! The public school boy must learnand collect a great deal of varied information: hence an impulse willgradually be created, accompanied with which he will continue to learnand collect independently at the university. We believe, in short, that the aim of the public school is to prepare and accustom thestudent always to live and learn independently afterwards, just asbeforehand he must live and learn dependently at the public school. "

The philosopher laughed, not altogether good-naturedly, and said: "Youhave just given me a fine example of that independence. And it is thisvery independence that shocks me so much, and makes any place in theneighbourhood of present-day students so disagreeable to me. Yes, mygood friends, you are perfect, you are mature; nature has cast you andbroken up the moulds, and your teachers must surely gloat over you. What liberty, certitude, and independence of judgment; what noveltyand freshness of insight! You sit in judgment--and the cultures of allages run away. The scientific sense is kindled, and rises out of youlike a flame--let people be careful, lest you set them alight! If I gofurther into the question and look at your professors, I again findthe same independence in a greater and even more charming degree:never was there a time so full of the most sublime independent folk, never was slavery more detested, the slavery of education and cultureincluded. 

"Permit me, however, to measure this independence of yours by thestandard of this culture, and to consider your university as aneducational institution and nothing else. If a foreigner desires toknow something of the methods of our universities, he asks first ofall with emphasis: 'How is the student connected with the university?'We answer: 'By the ear, as a hearer. ' The foreigner is astonished. 'Only by the ear?' he repeats. 'Only by the ear, ' we again reply. Thestudent hears. When he speaks, when he sees, when he is in the companyof his companions when he takes up some branch of art: in short, whenhe _lives_ he is independent, _i. E. _ not dependent upon theeducational institution. The student very often writes down somethingwhile he hears; and it is only at these rare moments that he hangs tothe umbilical cord of his alma mater. He himself may choose what he isto listen to; he is not bound to believe what is said; he may closehis ears if he does not care to hear. This is the 'acroamatic' methodof teaching. 

"The teacher, however, speaks to these listening students. Whateverelse he may think and do is cut off from the student's perception byan immense gap. The professor often reads when he is speaking. As arule he wishes to have as many hearers as possible; he is not contentto have a few, and he is never satisfied with one only. One speakingmouth, with many ears, and half as many writing hands--there you haveto all appearances, the external academical apparatus; the universityengine of culture set in motion. Moreover, the proprietor of this onemouth is severed from and independent of the owners of the many ears;and this double independence is enthusiastically designated as'academical freedom. ' And again, that this freedom may be broadenedstill more, the one may speak what he likes and the other may hearwhat he likes; except that, behind both of them, at a modest distance, stands the State, with all the intentness of a supervisor, to remindthe professors and students from time to time that _it_ is the aim, the goal, the be-all and end-all, of this curious speaking and hearingprocedure. 

"We, who must be permitted to regard this phenomenon merely as aneducational institution, will then inform the inquiring foreigner thatwhat is called 'culture' in our universities merely proceeds from themouth to the ear, and that every kind of training for culture is, as Isaid before, merely 'acroamatic. ' Since, however, not only thehearing, but also the choice of what to hear is left to theindependent decision of the liberal-minded and unprejudiced student, and since, again, he can withhold all belief and authority from whathe hears, all training for culture, in the true sense of the term, reverts to himself; and the independence it was thought desirable toaim at in the public school now presents itself with the highestpossible pride as 'academical self-training for culture, ' and strutsabout in its brilliant plumage. 

"Happy times, when youths are clever and cultured enough to teachthemselves how to walk! Unsurpassable public schools, which succeed inimplanting independence in the place of the dependence, discipline, subordination, and obedience implanted by former generations thatthought it their duty to drive away all the bumptiousness ofindependence! Do you clearly see, my good friends, why I, from thestandpoint of culture, regard the present type of university as a mereappendage to the public school? The culture instilled by the publicschool passes through the gates of the university as something readyand entire, and with its own particular claims: _it_ demands, it giveslaws, it sits in judgment. Do not, then, let yourselves be deceived inregard to the cultured student; for he, in so far as he thinks he hasabsorbed the blessings of education, is merely the public school boyas moulded by the hands of his teacher: one who, since his academicalisolation, and after he has left the public school, has therefore beendeprived of all further guidance to culture, that from now on he maybegin to live by himself and be free. 

"Free! Examine this freedom, ye observers of human nature! Erectedupon the sandy, crumbling foundation of our present public schoolculture, its building slants to one side, trembling before thewhirlwind's blast. Look at the free student, the herald ofself-culture: guess what his instincts are; explain him from hisneeds! How does his culture appear to you when you measure it by threegraduated scales: first, by his need for philosophy; second, by hisinstinct for art; and third, by Greek and Roman antiquity as theincarnate categorical imperative of all culture?

"Man is so much encompassed about by the most serious and difficultproblems that, when they are brought to his attention in the rightway, he is impelled betimes towards a lasting kind of philosophicalwonder, from which alone, as a fruitful soil, a deep and noble culturecan grow forth. His own experiences lead him most frequently to theconsideration of these problems; and it is especially in thetempestuous period of youth that every personal event shines with adouble gleam, both as the exemplification of a triviality and, at thesame time, of an eternally surprising problem, deserving ofexplanation. At this age, which, as it were, sees his experiencesencircled with metaphysical rainbows, man is, in the highest degree, in need of a guiding hand, because he has suddenly and almostinstinctively convinced himself of the ambiguity of existence, and haslost the firm support of the beliefs he has hitherto held. 

"This natural state of great need must of course be looked upon as theworst enemy of that beloved independence for which the cultured youthof the present day should be trained. All these sons of the present, who have raised the banner of the 'self-understood, ' are thereforestraining every nerve to crush down these feelings of youth, tocripple them, to mislead them, or to stop their growth altogether;and the favourite means employed is to paralyse that naturalphilosophic impulse by the so-called "historical culture. " A stillrecent system, [10] which has won for itself a world-wide scandalousreputation, has discovered the formula for this self-destruction ofphilosophy; and now, wherever the historical view of things is found, we can see such a naive recklessness in bringing the irrational to'rationality' and 'reason' and making black look like white, that oneis even inclined to parody Hegel's phrase and ask: 'Is all thisirrationality real?' Ah, it is only the irrational that now seems tobe 'real, ' _i. E. _ really doing something; and to bring this kind ofreality forward for the elucidation of history is reckoned as true'historical culture. ' It is into this that the philosophical impulseof our time has pupated itself; and the peculiar philosophers of ouruniversities seem to have conspired to fortify and confirm the youngacademicians in it. 

"It has thus come to pass that, in place of a profound interpretationof the eternally recurring problems, a historical--yea, evenphilological--balancing and questioning has entered into theeducational arena: what this or that philosopher has or has notthought; whether this or that essay or dialogue is to be ascribed tohim or not; or even whether this particular reading of a classicaltext is to be preferred to that. It is to neutral preoccupations withphilosophy like these that our students in philosophical seminariesare stimulated; whence I have long accustomed myself to regard suchscience as a mere ramification of philology, and to value itsrepresentatives in proportion as they are good or bad philologists. Soit has come about that _philosophy itself_ is banished from theuniversities: wherewith our first question as to the value of ouruniversities from the standpoint of culture is answered. 

"In what relationship these universities stand to _art_ cannot beacknowledged without shame: in none at all. Of artistic thinking, learning, striving, and comparison, we do not find in them a singletrace; and no one would seriously think that the voice of theuniversities would ever be raised to help the advancement of thehigher national schemes of art. Whether an individual teacher feelshimself to be personally qualified for art, or whether a professorialchair has been established for the training of æstheticising literaryhistorians, does not enter into the question at all: the fact remainsthat the university is not in a position to control the youngacademician by severe artistic discipline, and that it must let happenwhat happens, willy-nilly--and this is the cutting answer to theimmodest pretensions of the universities to represent themselves asthe highest educational institutions. 

"We find our academical 'independents' growing up without philosophyand without art; and how can they then have any need to 'go in for'the Greeks and Romans?--for we need now no longer pretend, like ourforefathers, to have any great regard for Greece and Rome, which, besides, sit enthroned in almost inaccessible loneliness and majesticalienation. The universities of the present time consequently give noheed to almost extinct educational predilections like these, and foundtheir philological chairs for the training of new and exclusivegenerations of philologists, who on their part give similarphilological preparation in the public schools--a vicious circle whichis useful neither to philologists nor to public schools, but whichabove all accuses the university for the third time of not being whatit so pompously proclaims itself to be--a training ground for culture. Take away the Greeks, together with philosophy and art, and whatladder have you still remaining by which to ascend to culture? For, ifyou attempt to clamber up the ladder without these helps, you mustpermit me to inform you that all your learning will lie like a heavyburden on your shoulders rather than furnishing you with wings andbearing you aloft. 

"If you honest thinkers have honourably remained in these three stagesof intelligence, and have perceived that, in comparison with theGreeks, the modern student is unsuited to and unprepared forphilosophy, that he has no truly artistic instincts, and is merely abarbarian believing himself to be free, you will not on this accountturn away from him in disgust, although you will, of course, avoidcoming into too close proximity with him. For, as he now is, _he isnot to blame_: as you have perceived him he is the dumb but terribleaccuser of those who are to blame. 

"You should understand the secret language spoken by this guiltyinnocent, and then you, too, would learn to understand the inwardstate of that independence which is paraded outwardly with so muchostentation. Not one of these noble, well-qualified youths hasremained a stranger to that restless, tiring, perplexing, anddebilitating need of culture: during his university term, when he isapparently the only free man in a crowd of servants and officials, heatones for this huge illusion of freedom by ever-growing inner doubtsand convictions. He feels that he can neither lead nor help himself;and then he plunges hopelessly into the workaday world and endeavoursto ward off such feelings by study. The most trivial bustle fastensitself upon him; he sinks under his heavy burden. Then he suddenlypulls himself together; he still feels some of that power within himwhich would have enabled him to keep his head above water. Pride andnoble resolutions assert themselves and grow in him. He is afraid ofsinking at this early stage into the limits of a narrow profession;and now he grasps at pillars and railings alongside the stream that hemay not be swept away by the current. In vain! for these supports giveway, and he finds he has clutched at broken reeds. In low anddespondent spirits he sees his plans vanish away in smoke. Hiscondition is undignified, even dreadful: he keeps between the twoextremes of work at high pressure and a state of melancholyenervation. Then he becomes tired, lazy, afraid of work, fearful ofeverything great; and hating himself. He looks into his own breast, analyses his faculties, and finds he is only peering into hollow andchaotic vacuity. And then he once more falls from the heights of hiseagerly-desired self-knowledge into an ironical scepticism. He divestshis struggles of their real importance, and feels himself ready toundertake any class of useful work, however degrading. He now seeksconsolation in hasty and incessant action so as to hide himself fromhimself. And thus his helplessness and the want of a leader towardsculture drive him from one form of life into another: but doubt, elevation, worry, hope, despair--everything flings him hither andthither as a proof that all the stars above him by which he could haveguided his ship have set. 

"There you have the picture of this glorious independence of yours, ofthat academical freedom, reflected in the highest minds--those whichare truly in need of culture, compared with whom that other crowd ofindifferent natures does not count at all, natures that delight intheir freedom in a purely barbaric sense. For these latter show bytheir base smugness and their narrow professional limitations thatthis is the right element for them: against which there is nothing tobe said. Their comfort, however, does not counter-balance thesuffering of one single young man who has an inclination for cultureand feels the need of a guiding hand, and who at last, in a moment ofdiscontent, throws down the reins and begins to despise himself. Thisis the guiltless innocent; for who has saddled him with theunbearable burden of standing alone? Who has urged him on toindependence at an age when one of the most natural and peremptoryneeds of youth is, so to speak, a self-surrendering to great leadersand an enthusiastic following in the footsteps of the masters?

"It is repulsive to consider the effects to which the violentsuppression of such noble natures may lead. He who surveys thegreatest supporters and friends of that pseudo-culture of the presenttime, which I so greatly detest, will only too frequently find amongthem such degenerate and shipwrecked men of culture, driven by inwarddespair to violent enmity against culture, when, in a moment ofdesperation, there was no one at hand to show them how to attain it. It is not the worst and most insignificant people whom we afterwardsfind acting as journalists and writers for the press in themetamorphosis of despair: the spirit of some well-known men of lettersmight even be described, and justly, as degenerate studentdom. Howelse, for example, can we reconcile that once well-known 'youngGermany' with its present degenerate successors? Here we discover aneed of culture which, so to speak, has grown mutinous, and whichfinally breaks out into the passionate cry: I am culture! There, before the gates of the public schools and universities, we can seethe culture which has been driven like a fugitive away from theseinstitutions. True, this culture is without the erudition of thoseestablishments, but assumes nevertheless the mien of a sovereign; sothat, for example, Gutzkow the novelist might be pointed to as thebest example of a modern public school boy turned æsthete. Such adegenerate man of culture is a serious matter, and it is a horrifyingspectacle for us to see that all our scholarly and journalisticpublicity bears the stigma of this degeneracy upon it. How else can wedo justice to our learned men, who pay untiring attention to, and evenco-operate in the journalistic corruption of the people, how else thanby the acknowledgment that their learning must fill a want of theirown similar to that filled by novel-writing in the case of others:_i. E. _ a flight from one's self, an ascetic extirpation of theircultural impulses, a desperate attempt to annihilate their ownindividuality. From our degenerate literary art, as also from thatitch for scribbling of our learned men which has now reached suchalarming proportions, wells forth the same sigh: Oh that we couldforget ourselves! The attempt fails: memory, not yet suffocated by themountains of printed paper under which it is buried, keeps onrepeating from time to time: 'A degenerate man of culture! Born forculture and brought up to non-culture! Helpless barbarian, slave ofthe day, chained to the present moment, and thirsting forsomething--ever thirsting!'

"Oh, the miserable guilty innocents! For they lack something, a needthat every one of them must have felt: a real educational institution, which could give them goals, masters, methods, companions; and fromthe midst of which the invigorating and uplifting breath of the trueGerman spirit would inspire them. Thus they perish in the wilderness;thus they degenerate into enemies of that spirit which is at bottomclosely allied to their own; thus they pile fault upon fault higherthan any former generation ever did, soiling the clean, desecratingthe holy, canonising the false and spurious. It is by them that youcan judge the educational strength of our universities, askingyourselves, in all seriousness, the question: What cause did youpromote through them? The German power of invention, the noble Germandesire for knowledge, the qualifying of the German for diligence andself-sacrifice--splendid and beautiful things, which other nationsenvy you; yea, the finest and most magnificent things in the world, ifonly that true German spirit overspread them like a dark thundercloud, pregnant with the blessing of forthcoming rain. But you are afraid ofthis spirit, and it has therefore come to pass that a cloud of anothersort has thrown a heavy and oppressive atmosphere around youruniversities, in which your noble-minded scholars breathe wearily andwith difficulty. 

"A tragic, earnest, and instructive attempt was made in the presentcentury to destroy the cloud I have last referred to, and also to turnthe people's looks in the direction of the high welkin of the Germanspirit. In all the annals of our universities we cannot find any traceof a second attempt, and he who would impressively demonstrate what isnow necessary for us will never find a better example. I refer to theold, primitive _Burschenschaft_. [11]

"When the war of liberation was over, the young student brought backhome the unlooked-for and worthiest trophy of battle--the freedom ofhis fatherland. Crowned with this laurel he thought of something stillnobler. On returning to the university, and finding that he wasbreathing heavily, he became conscious of that oppressive andcontaminated air which overhung the culture of the university. Hesuddenly saw, with horror-struck, wide-open eyes, the non-Germanbarbarism, hiding itself in the guise of all kinds of scholasticism;he suddenly discovered that his own leaderless comrades were abandonedto a repulsive kind of youthful intoxication. And he was exasperated. He rose with the same aspect of proud indignation as Schiller may havehad when reciting the _Robbers_ to his companions: and if he hadprefaced his drama with the picture of a lion, and the motto, 'intyrannos, ' his follower himself was that very lion preparing tospring; and every 'tyrant' began to tremble. Yes, if these indignantyouths were looked at superficially and timorously, they would seem tobe little else than Schiller's robbers: their talk sounded so wild tothe anxious listener that Rome and Sparta seemed mere nunneriescompared with these new spirits. The consternation raised by theseyoung men was indeed far more general than had ever been caused bythose other 'robbers' in court circles, of which a German prince, according to Goethe, is said to have expressed the opinion: 'If he hadbeen God, and had foreseen the appearance of the _Robbers_, he wouldnot have created the world. '

"Whence came the incomprehensible intensity of this alarm? For thoseyoung men were the bravest, purest, and most talented of the band bothin dress and habits: they were distinguished by a magnanimousrecklessness and a noble simplicity. A divine command bound themtogether to seek harder and more pious superiority: what could befeared from them? To what extent this fear was merely deceptive orsimulated or really true is something that will probably never beexactly known; but a strong instinct spoke out of this fear and out ofits disgraceful and senseless persecution. This instinct hated theBurschenschaft with an intense hatred for two reasons: first of all onaccount of its organisation, as being the first attempt to construct atrue educational institution, and, secondly, on account of the spiritof this institution, that earnest, manly, stern, and daring Germanspirit; that spirit of the miner's son, Luther, which has come down tous unbroken from the time of the Reformation. 

"Think of the _fate_ of the Burschenschaft when I ask you, Did theGerman university then understand that spirit, as even the Germanprinces in their hatred appear to have understood it? Did the almamater boldly and resolutely throw her protecting arms round her noblesons and say: 'You must kill me first, before you touch my children?'I hear your answer--by it you may judge whether the German universityis an educational institution or not. 

"The student knew at that time at what depth a true educationalinstitution must take root, namely, in an inward renovation andinspiration of the purest moral faculties. And this must always berepeated to the student's credit. He may have learnt on the field ofbattle what he could learn least of all in the sphere of 'academicalfreedom': that great leaders are necessary, and that all culture beginswith obedience. And in the midst of victory, with his thoughts turned tohis liberated fatherland, he made the vow that he would remain German. German! Now he learnt to understand his Tacitus; now he grasped thesignification of Kant's categorical imperative; now he was enraptured byWeber's "Lyre and Sword" songs. [12] The gates of philosophy, of art, yea, even of antiquity, opened unto him; and in one of the mostmemorable of bloody acts, the murder of Kotzebue, he revenged--withpenetrating insight and enthusiastic short-sightedness--his one and onlySchiller, prematurely consumed by the opposition of the stupid world:Schiller, who could have been his leader, master, and organiser, andwhose loss he now bewailed with such heartfelt resentment. 

"For that was the doom of those promising students: they did not findthe leaders they wanted. They gradually became uncertain, discontented, and at variance among themselves; unlucky indiscretionsshowed only too soon that the one indispensability of powerful mindswas lacking in the midst of them: and, while that mysterious murdergave evidence of astonishing strength, it gave no less evidence of thegrave danger arising from the want of a leader. They wereleaderless--therefore they perished. 

"For I repeat it, my friends! All culture begins with the veryopposite of that which is now so highly esteemed as 'academicalfreedom': with obedience, with subordination, with discipline, withsubjection. And as leaders must have followers so also must thefollowers have a leader--here a certain reciprocal predispositionprevails in the hierarchy of spirits: yea, a kind of pre-establishedharmony. This eternal hierarchy, towards which all things naturallytend, is always threatened by that pseudo-culture which now sits onthe throne of the present. It endeavours either to bring the leadersdown to the level of its own servitude or else to cast them outaltogether. It seduces the followers when they are seeking theirpredestined leader, and overcomes them by the fumes of its narcotics. When, however, in spite of all this, leader and followers have at lastmet, wounded and sore, there is an impassioned feeling of rapture, like the echo of an ever-sounding lyre, a feeling which I can let youdivine only by means of a simile. 

"Have you ever, at a musical rehearsal, looked at the strange, shrivelled-up, good-natured species of men who usually form the Germanorchestra? What changes and fluctuations we see in that capriciousgoddess 'form'! What noses and ears, what clumsy, _danse macabre_movements! Just imagine for a moment that you were deaf, and had neverdreamed of the existence of sound or music, and that you were lookingupon the orchestra as a company of actors, and trying to enjoy theirperformance as a drama and nothing more. Undisturbed by the idealisingeffect of the sound, you could never see enough of the stern, medieval, wood-cutting movement of this comical spectacle, thisharmonious parody on the _homo sapiens_. 

"Now, on the other hand, assume that your musical sense has returned, and that your ears are opened. Look at the honest conductor at thehead of the orchestra performing his duties in a dull, spiritlessfashion: you no longer think of the comical aspect of the whole scene, you listen--but it seems to you that the spirit of tediousness spreadsout from the honest conductor over all his companions. Now you seeonly torpidity and flabbiness, you hear only the trivial, therhythmically inaccurate, and the melodiously trite. You see theorchestra only as an indifferent, ill-humoured, and even wearisomecrowd of players. 

"But set a genius--a real genius--in the midst of this crowd; and youinstantly perceive something almost incredible. It is as if thisgenius, in his lightning transmigration, had entered into thesemechanical, lifeless bodies, and as if only one demoniacal eye gleamedforth out of them all. Now look and listen--you can never listenenough! When you again observe the orchestra, now loftily storming, now fervently wailing, when you notice the quick tightening of everymuscle and the rhythmical necessity of every gesture, then you toowill feel what a pre-established harmony there is between leader andfollowers, and how in the hierarchy of spirits everything impels ustowards the establishment of a like organisation. You can divine frommy simile what I would understand by a true educational institution, and why I am very far from recognising one in the present type ofuniversity. "

 [From a few MS. Notes written down by Nietzsche in the spring and autumn of 1872, and still preserved in the Nietzsche Archives at Weimar, it is evident that he at one time intended to add a sixth and seventh lecture to the five just given. These notes, although included in the latest edition of Nietzsche's works, are utterly lacking in interest and continuity, being merely headings and sub-headings of sections in the proposed lectures. They do not, indeed, occupy more than two printed pages, and were deemed too fragmentary for translation in this edition. ]

FOOTNOTES:

[9] The reader may be reminded that a German university student issubject to very few restrictions, and that much greater liberty isallowed him than is permitted to English students. Nietzsche did notapprove of this extraordinary freedom, which, in his opinion, led tointellectual lawlessness. --TR. 

[10] Hegel's. --TR. 

[11] A German students' association, of liberal principles, founded forpatriotic purposes at Jena in 1813. 

[12] Weber set one or two of Körner's "Lyre and Sword" songs to music. The reader will remember that these lectures were delivered whenNietzsche was only in his twenty-eighth year. Like Goethe, he afterwardsfreed himself from all patriotic trammels and prejudices, and aimed at ageneral European culture. Luther, Schiller, Kant, Körner, and Weber didnot continue to be the objects of his veneration for long, indeed, theywere afterwards violently attacked by him, and the superficial studentwho speaks of inconsistency may be reminded of Nietzsche's phrase instanza 12 of the epilogue to _Beyond Good and Evil_: "Nur wer sichwandelt, bleibt mit mir verwandt"; _i. E. _ only the changing ones haveanything in common with me. --TR. 

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