TOO GREAT AIMS.--Whoever aims publicly at great things and at length perceives secretly that he is too weak to achieve them, has usually also insufficient strength to renounce his aims publicly, and then inevitably becomes a hypocrite. 541. IN THE CURRENT.--Mighty waters sweep many stones and shrubs away with them; mighty spirits many foolish and confused minds. 542. THE DANGERS OF INTELLECTUAL EMANCIPATION.--In a seriously intended intellectual emancipation a person's mute passions and cravings also hope to find their advantage. 543. THE INCARNATION OF THE MIND.--When any one thinks much and to good purpose, not only his face but also his body acquires a sage look. 544. SEEING BADLY AND HEARING BADLY.--The man who sees little always sees less than there is to see; the man who hears badly always hears something more than there is to hear. 545. SELF-ENJOYMENT IN VANITY.--The vain man does not wish so much to be prominent as to feel himself prominent; he therefore disdains none of the expedients for self-deception and self-out-witting. It is not the opinion of others that he sets his heart on, but his opinion of their opinion 546. EXCEPTIONALLY VAIN.--He who is usually self-sufficient becomes exceptionally vain, and keenly alive to fame and praise when he is physically ill. The more he loses himself the more he has to endeavour to regain his position by means of the opinion of others. 547. THE "WITTY."--Those who seek wit do not possess it. 548. A HINT TO THE HEADS OF PARTIES.--When one can make people publicly support a cause they have also generally been brought to the point of inwardly declaring themselves in its favour, because they wish to be regarded as consistent. 549. CONTEMPT.--Man is more sensitive to the contempt of others than to self-contempt. 550. THE TIE OF GRATITUDE.--There are servile souls who carry so far their sense of obligation for benefits received that they strangle themselves with the tie of gratitude. 551. THE PROPHET'S KNACK.--In predicting beforehand the procedure of ordinary individuals, it must be taken for granted that they always make use of the smallest intellectual expenditure in freeing themselves from disagreeable situations. 552. MAN'S SOLE RIGHT.--He who swerves from the traditional is a victim of the unusual; he who keeps to the traditional is its slave. The man is ruined in either case. 553. BELOW THE BEAST.--When a man roars with laughter he surpasses all the animals by his vulgarity. 554. PARTIAL KNOWLEDGE.--He who speaks a foreign language imperfectly has more enjoyment therein than he who speaks it well. The enjoyment is with the partially initiated. 555. DANGEROUS HELPFULNESS.--There are people who wish to make human life harder for no other reason than to be able afterwards to offer men their life-alleviating recipes--their Christianity, for example. 556.