Overbeck, Gersdorff and Rohde wretchedly watched the failure of this book which they admired. "It is another thunderbolt," wrote Rohde; "it will have no more effect than fireworks in a cellar. But one day people will recognise it and will admire the courage and precision with which he has put his finger on our worst wound. How strong he is, our friend." And Overbeck: "The sensation of isolation that our friend experiences is growing in a painful manner. Ever and ever to sap the branch of the tree on which one supports oneself cannot be done without grievous consequences." And Gersdorff: "The best thing for our friend would be for him to imitate the Pythagoreans: five years without reading or writing. When I am free, which will be in two or three years, I shall return to my property: that asylum will be at his disposal." These men, with their touching solicitude concerning their friend's lot, did not suspect either the true cause or the intensity of his distress. They pitied his solitude, they did not know how profound it was, or how lonely he was even with them. What mattered to him the failure of a book from which he was separated by a revolution of thought? "As to my book," he wrote to Rohde, "I can hardly think that I wrote it." He had discovered his error and his fault. Hence his sorrow, hence the agony which he dared not confess. "At the present moment," he announced to Gersdorff, "many things ferment within me, many extreme and daring things. I do not know in what measure I may communicate them to my best friends, but in any case I cannot write them." One evening, however, passion carried him away. He was alone with Overbeck; the conversation happened to turn on _Lohengrin,_ and, with a sudden fury, Nietzsche pulled to pieces this false and romantic work. Overbeck listened to him in amazement. Nietzsche became silent, and from that moment was more careful to practise the pretence which shamed him and disgusted him with himself. "Dear, true friend," he wrote to Gersdorff in April, 1874 "if only you could have a far lower opinion of me! I am almost sure you will lose those illusions that you have about me, and I would wish to be the first to open your eyes, by explaining fully and conscientiously that I _deserve nothing._ If you could understand how radically I am discouraged, and from what melancholy I suffer on my own account. I do not know if I shall ever be capable of production. Henceforward I seek only a little liberty, a little of the real atmosphere of life, and I am arming myself against the numerous, the unspeakably numerous, revolting slaveries that encompass me. Shall I ever succeed? Doubt upon doubt. The aim is too distant, and if I ever succeed in reaching it, then I shall have consumed the better part of myself in long and trying struggles. I shall be free and languishing like an ephemeron at dusk. I express my lively fear! It is a misfortune to be so conscious of one's struggles, so clairvoyant...."