Approaching the problem, then, as to how far such an emancipation would be serviceable today, one need scarcely say that one does not at all have in mind the institutions which, in a narrower sense, we now have come to call “schools.” As, for broad gauge philosophers, the concept priesthood is by no means identical with a definite office, the so-called clerical office, so what we understand by school and its masters, in Nietzsche’s sense, embraces a much wider circle than we are wont to think. There are schoolmasters in all vocations and callings and positions, not alone among scholars, but also among artists, politicians, laborers and merchants. We find them in the household and in the nursery; for schoolmaster-ism is a _certain kind of spirit_, and it is this kind of spirit which, under various names, Nietzsche pursues with his bitterest scorn and ridicule; which he stigmatizes as the most perilous hindrance in the path of the new culture. We modern men must concede that Nietzsche is right at this point; that mastery on the part of “school” signifies decay, stuntedness, of the very human essence itself. School gives _knowledge_. In all knowledge, man confronts nature. Man elaborates nature in his thoughts, and thus lifts himself _above_ nature. With his rules, he becomes master of nature. But, now, if a man abides in his school, a time comes, irremediably, when he is estranged from nature, estranged from life. His knowledge grows, indeed, his world of thought enlarges; but the “thoughts” which he calls his “knowledge” narrow and cramp him! The more he learns to work exclusively with his thoughts, the more he mislearns whence he derives his thoughts. He thinks about things, but he no longer finds his way into things, right into the innermost life of things. He thinks _after_, not _with_, not before. He thinks the alien, not his own. He knows names, not souls. Yes, life is so great, so infinite; and the school, our knowledge of life, is so paltry, so limited! Once man stood with his soul in this big wide world. Intimations of its abysses, unfathomable and awful, haunted him. Once man felt his hot cheeks fanned by the breezes of an eternal life of the world, by a divine breath that breathed and blew through the world. Once on some calm crest where mountain kissed sky, one of those blissful moments came over him when he felt himself so small, so great, so alone, so companioned,—inwardly seized by the miracle and mystery of life surrounding him, pervading him, at once bowing him down and lifting him up. Now all this is changed. Now he hears voices, loud, raucous, zealous, parading their wisdom as regards this august wealth of God. They speak, these voices, so wisely and cleverly, concerning that which no man’s wisdom and sagacity has ever plumbed. They out-trump each other with their oceanic learnedness. But once yet again let the soul take a deep breath, and cry, “I am a man, not a scholar. I dare to be a man,