_The Happiness of Renunciation._--He who has absolutely dispensed with something for a long time will almost imagine, when he accidentally meets with it again, that he has discovered it,--and what happiness every discoverer has! Let us be wiser than the serpents that lie too long in the same sunshine. 166. _Always in our own Society._--All that is akin to me in nature and history speaks to me, praises me, urges me forward and comforts me--: other things are unheard by me, or immediately forgotten. We are only in our own society always. 167. _Misanthropy and Philanthropy._--We only speak about being sick of men when we can no longer digest them, and yet have the stomach full of them. Misanthropy is the result of a far too eager philanthropy and "cannibalism,"--but who ever bade you swallow men like oysters, my Prince Hamlet? 168. _Concerning an Invalid._--"Things go badly with him!"--What is wrong?--" He suffers from the longing to be praised, and finds no sustenance for it."--Inconceivable! All the world does honour to him, and he is reverenced not only in deed but in word!--"Certainly, but he is dull of hearing for the praise. When a friend praises him it sounds to him as if the friend praised himself; when an enemy praises him, it sounds to him as if the enemy wanted to be praised for it; when, finally, some one else praises him--there are by no means so many of these, he is so famous!--he is offended because they neither want him for a friend nor for an enemy; he is accustomed to say: 'What do I care for those who can still pose as the all-righteous towards me!'" 169. _Avowed Enemies._--Bravery in presence of an enemy is a thing by itself: a person may possess it and still be a coward and an irresolute num-skull. That was Napoleon's opinion concerning the "bravest man" he knew, Murat:--whence it follows that avowed enemies are indispensable to some men, if they are to attain to _their_ virtue, to their manliness, to their cheerfulness. 170. _With, the Multitude._--He has hitherto gone with the multitude and is its panegyrist; but one day he will be its opponent! For he follows it in the belief that his laziness will find its advantage thereby: he has not yet learned that the multitude is not lazy enough for him! that it always presses forward! that it does not allow any one to stand still!--And he likes so well to stand still! 171. _Fame._--When the gratitude of many to one casts aside all shame, then fame originates. 172. _The Perverter of Taste._--A: "You are a perverter of taste--they say so everywhere!" B: "Certainly! I pervert every one's taste for his party:--no party forgives me for that." 173. _To be Profound and to Appear Profound._--He who knows that he is profound strives for clearness; he who would like to appear profound to the multitude strives for obscurity. The multitude thinks everything profound of which it cannot see the bottom; it is so timid and goes so unwillingly into the water. 174.