nobody feels offended if his attention is drawn to somebody and it is hinted, "Some day he may be of use to you"; that we do not feel ashamed of paying a visit to ask for a person's intercession; that we do not even suspect that, by a spontaneous conformity lo such customs, we once for all stamp ourselves as nature's common pottery, which others may use and break without feeling compunctions about it; just as if we said, “There will never be a lack of such people as I am: take me, there, without ado!"
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Unconditional homage.—When I think of the beststudied German philosopher, the most popular German musician, the most distinguished German statesman, I admit that the Germans—this nation of unconditional feeling—are much imposed upon, and that, too, by their own great men. We see spread out before us a threefold splendid sight: in each case a stream, coursing along its own self-wrought bed, so mightily agitated that often it would seem to flow uphill. And yet, however highly we may cultivate this worship, who would not, in the main, like to differ from Schopenhauer? And who could now side in all greater and lesser matters with Richard Wagner, however true it may be that, as somebody has said, wherever he takes or gives offence, some problem lies buried—which he, however, does not unearth for us? And, last not least, how many would most
