After he had handed his book over to the publisher he set out for Italy, without awaiting its publication, with the proud faith that he had given a revelation to the world. His _délire des grandeurs_ at this period increased, and the mental disturbance he underwent revealed itself later. He wrote: “In enchanting Venice, Love’s arms held me long enfettered, until an inner voice bade me break free and lead my steps elsewhere.” And again: “If I could only satisfy my desire to look upon this race of toads and vipers as my equals, it would be a consolation to me.” While oscillating between mental exaltation and depression he heard of the collapse of his banking-house. It is easy to understand the grief which this news caused him; he was reduced to the necessity of living by philosophy, instead of for philosophy, as he had desired to do. He twice sought to become a _Privatdozent_ in Berlin, but he was unsuccessful in these attempts. His violent attacks on his contemporaries displeased his hearers, and his passionate disputations, and his tenacity in holding strange opinions, which he gave forth as oracles, rendered precarious his relations with friends and men of learning. The invasion of cholera, at the beginning of 1831, completed his troubles. On the last night of 1830 he had already had a dream, which he looked upon as a prophecy, foretelling his death in the new year. “This dream,” he wrote in his _Cogitata_, “influenced me in my departure from Berlin immediately the cholera began in 1831. I had scarcely reached Frankfort-on-the-Main, when I had a very distinct vision of spirits. They were, as I think, my ancestors, and they announced to me that I should survive my mother, at that time still living. My father, who was dead, carried a light in his hand.” That this hallucination was accompanied by real brain affection is proved by the fact that at that time he “fell into deep melancholy, not speaking to any one for weeks together.” The doctors were alarmed, and induced him to go to Mannheim for change of scene. More than a year later he returned to Frankfort, when the acute period of his illness had apparently passed. Signs of it remained, however, in his peculiar bearing, his habit of gesticulating and talking aloud to himself as he walked through the streets of the city, or sat at table in the restaurant, and in his fury against “such philosophasters as Hegel, Schleiermacher, and similar charlatans, who shine like so many stars in the firmament of philosophy, and rule the philosophic market.” He accused them of depriving him of the praise and fame he deserved, by deliberately keeping silence concerning his work. This was a fixed idea with him, like the idea of his own infallibility, even after he seemed to return to a relatively normal condition, thanks to the fame which, after a delay of thirty years, at length crowned his name and his works.