A real writer _disdains_ to repeat from hearsay events which he has not witnessed. It seems to him tedious and humiliating to tell "in his own words," like a schoolboy, things which he has fished out of another man's books. But there--how can we expect him to stoop to such insignificance! 61 Whilst conscience stands between the educated and the lower classes, as the only possible mediator, there can be no hope for mutual understanding. Conscience demands sacrifices, nothing but sacrifices. It says to the educated man: "You are happy, well-off, learned--the people are poor, unhappy, ignorant; renounce therefore your well-being, or else soothe your conscience with suave speeches." Only he who has nothing to sacrifice, nothing to lose, having lost everything, can hope to approach the people as an equal. This is why Dostoevsky and Nietzsche were not afraid to speak in their own name, and did not feel compelled either to stretch up or to stoop down in order to be on a level with men. 62 Not to know what you want is considered a shameful weakness. To confess it is to lose for ever not only the reputation of a writer, but even of a man. None the less, "conscience" demands such a confession. True, in this case as in most others the demands of conscience are satisfied only when they incur no very dire consequences. Leaving aside the fact that people are no longer terrified of the once-so-terrible public opinion (the public has been tamed, it listens with reverence to what is told to it, and never dares judge)--the admission "I do not know myself what I want" seems to offer a guarantee of something important. Those who know what they want generally want trifles, and attain to inglorious ends: riches, fame, or at the best, progress or a philosophy of their own. Even now it is sometimes not a sin to laugh at such wonders, and may-be the time is coming when a rehabilitated Hamlet will announce, not with shame but with pride: "I don't in the least know what I want." And the crowd will applaud him, for the crowd always applauds heroes and proud men. 63 Fear of death is explained conclusively by the desire for self-preservation. But at that rate the fear should disappear in old and sick people, who ought by nature to look with indifference on death. Whereas the horror of death is present in all living things. Does not this suggest that there is still some other reason for the dread, and that even where the pangs of horror cannot save a man from his end, still it is a necessary and purposeful anguish? The natural-scientific explanation here, as usual, stops halfway, and fails to lead the human mind to the promised goal. 64