s, and that
is why I blamed you, because I regret that by a premature expression of
your secret thoughts, you render your own work difficult, if not
impossible. Dear me, the field of philosophy is so terribly barren,
people would be glad to foster and cherish a new power; but if it deals
such blows to the right and left, loosens with its roots the soil on
which tame kitchen vegetables have hitherto peacefully slept their
nourishing plant-sleep--you have too clear a head, dear Herr Doctor,
not to understand that the time has not yet come when we can need you
among us."

"Not yet _come_, certainly, but it is near, nearer perhaps than those
in high places suppose. Or how long do you think it will be, before
shame at the incompleteness and artificially fostered self-deception,
which is palliated by pedagogical considerations, will flush the faces
of the leaders of the public, and compel them to openly acknowledge
what has long since been secretly perceived and recognized? It is true
that hitherto we have had other tasks to solve, questions of existence,
of defence in peril, and then of our power and honor. But after we have
advanced tolerably far in these, do you suppose that we, who have to
support our moral dignity before other nations, will continue in this
traditional track, and thereby allow the noblest intellectual
possessions to be endangered? For all the canonized myths and
metaphysical legends have also produced an ethical effect, not
according to the measure of their truth, but by the degree of veracity
in the author and hearer of the composition. And must the degree of
veracity no longer be the standard of the allowableness and moral power
of a lesson? Or is it not a great immorality, out of mere external
considerations relating to the political education of children, to give
us for the corner stone of our happiness, fairy tales and legends,
which all cultivated minds believe as little, as the Greeks of
Aristotle's time credited the fables of Homer and Hesiod. Of course we
must not pour away the dirty water before we have fresh; but who will
answer for it that we shall ever draw from the deepest, purest
fountain? And who would not quench his thirst with the wild fruit that
grows by the way side, rather than drink the water, which in spite of
all filtering, has constantly become darker and more slimy? Oh! my dear
friend, I see in your face the reply you wish to make, that the great
masses are not so particular, a