Human, All-Too-Human: A Book For Free Spirits; Part II

383

Greatness as a Mask. – By greatness in our comportment we embitter our foes; by envy that we do not conceal we almost reconcile them to us. For envy levels and makes equal; it is an unconscious, plaintive variety of modesty. – It may be indeed that here and there, for the sake of the above-named advantage, envy has been assumed as a mask by those who are not envious. Certainly, however, greatness in comportment is often used as the mask of envy by ambitious men who would rather suffer drawbacks and embitter their foes than let it be seen that they place them on an equal footing with themselves.

384

Unpardonable. – You gave him an opportunity of displaying the greatness of his character, and he did not make use of the opportunity. He will never forgive you for that.

385

Contrasts. – The most senile thought ever conceived about men lies in the famous saying, “The ego is always hateful,” the most childish in the still more famous saying, “Love thy neighbour as thyself.” – With the one knowledge of men has ceased, with the other it has not yet begun.

386

A Defective Ear. – “We still belong to the mob so long as we always shift the blame on to others; we are on the track of wisdom when we always make ourselves alone responsible; but the wise man finds no one to blame, neither himself nor others.” – Who said that? Epictetus, eighteen hundred years ago. – The world has heard but forgotten the saying. – No, the world has not heard and not forgotten it: everything is not forgotten. But we had not the necessary ear, the ear of Epictetus. – So he whispered it into his own ear? – Even so: wisdom is the whispering of the sage to himself in the crowded market-place.

387

A Defect of Standpoint, not of Vision. – We always stand a few paces too near ourselves and a few paces too far from our neighbour. Hence we judge him too much in the lump, and ourselves too much by individual, occasional, insignificant features and circumstances.

388

Ignorance about Weapons. – How little we care whether another knows a subject or not! – whereas he perhaps sweats blood at the bare idea that he may be considered ignorant on the point. Yes, there are exquisite fools, who always go about with a quiverful of mighty, excommunicatory utterances, ready to shoot down any one who shows freely that there are matters in which their judgment is not taken into account.

389

At the Drinking-Table of Experience. – People whose innate moderation leads them to drink but the half of every glass, will not admit that everything in the world has its lees and sediment.

390

Singing-Birds. – The followers of a great man often put their own eyes out, so that they may be the better able to sing his praise.

391

Beyond our Ken. – The good generally displeases us when it is beyond our ken.

392

Rule as Mother or as Child. – There is one condition that gives birth to rules, another to which rules give birth.

393

Comedy. – We sometimes earn honour or love for actions and achievements which we have long since sloughed as the snake sloughs his skin. We are hereby easily seduced into becoming the comic actors of our own past, and into throwing the old skin once more about our shoulders – and that not merely from vanity, but from good-will towards our admirers.

394

A Mistake of Biographers. – The small force that is required to launch a boat into the stream must not be confounded with the force of the stream that carries the boat along. Yet this mistake is made in nearly all biographies.

395

Not Buying too Dear. – The things that we buy too dear we generally turn to bad use, because we have no love for them but only a painful recollection. Thus they involve a twofold drawback.

396

The Philosophy that Society always Needs. – The pillars of the social structure rest upon the fundamental fact that every one cheerfully contemplates all that he is, does, and attempts, his sickness or health, his poverty or affluence, his honour or insignificance, and says to himself, “After all, I would not change places with any one!” – Whoever wishes to add a stone to the social structure should always try to implant in mankind this cheerful philosophy of contentment and refusal to change places.

397

The Mark of a Noble Soul. – A noble soul is not that which is capable of the highest flights, but that which rises little and falls little, living always in a free and bright atmosphere and altitude.

398

Greatness and its Contemplator. – The noblest effect of greatness is that it gives the contemplator a power of vision that magnifies and embellishes.

399

Being Satisfied. – We show that we have attained maturity of understanding when we no longer go where rare flowers lurk under the thorniest hedges of knowledge, but are satisfied with gardens, forests, meadows, and ploughlands, remembering that life is too short for the rare and uncommon.

400

Advantage in Privation. – He who always lives in the warmth and fulness of the heart, and, as it were, in the summer air of the soul, cannot form an idea of that fearful delight which seizes more wintry natures, who for once in a way are kissed by the rays of love and the milder breath of a sunny February day.

401

Recipe for the Sufferer. – You find the burden of life too heavy? Then you must increase the burden of your life. When the sufferer finally thirsts after and seeks the river of Lethe, then he must become a hero to be certain of finding it.

402

The Judge. – He who has seen another's ideal becomes his inexorable judge, and as it were his evil conscience.

403

The Utility of Great Renunciation. – The useful thing about great renunciation is that it invests us with that youthful pride through which we can thenceforth easily demand of ourselves small renunciations.

404

How Duty Acquires a Glamour. – You can change a brazen duty into gold in the eyes of all by always performing something more than you have promised.

405

Prayer to Mankind. – “Forgive us our virtues” – so should we pray to mankind.

406

They that Create and They that Enjoy. – Every one who enjoys thinks that the principal thing to the tree is the fruit, but in point of fact the principal thing to it is the seed. – Herein lies the difference between them that create and them that enjoy.

407

The Glory of all Great Men. – What is the use of genius if it does not invest him who contemplates and reveres it with such freedom and loftiness of feeling that he no longer has need of genius? – To make themselves superfluous is the glory of all great men.