degenerated into something evil and dangerous. The Jews differed from is in their notions of wrath and pronounced it holy. Accordingly they have seen in their midst the gloomy majesty of man, with which it showed itself associated, at an elevation such as no European could imagine. They moulded their wrathful, holy Jehovah after their wrathful, holy prophets.Compared with these, the great avengers amongEuropeans are, so to speak, only second-hand creatures.
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‘’The prejudice of the pure intellect’’--Wherever the doctrine of pure intellectuality prevailed, it has destroyed the nervous force by means of its extravagances, it preached that the body should be despised, neglected, tormented, and that man himself, on account of his cravings, should be tortured and despised. It produced gloomy, strained, depressed souls--which, moreover, professed to know the reason of their wretchedness in the means of possibly relieving it. "It must centre in the body which still thrives too well." Thus they argued, while, in fact, the body by its sufferings again and again protested against this constant mockery. At last a general, chronic over-nervousness fell to the lot of those virtuous representatives of the pure intellect. They experience pleasure in the form only of ecstasy and other indications of insanity, and their system reached its acme when it mistook ecstasy for the highest goal
