...No German can pronounce the name of Lessing without a responsive echo in his breast. Since Luther, Germany has produced no greater and better man than Gotthold Ephraim Lessing. These two are our pride and joy. In the troubles of the present we look back at their consoling figures, and they answer with a look full of bright promise. The third man will come who will perfect what Luther began and what Lessing carried on--the third Liberator. Like Luther, Lessing's achievements consisted not only in effecting something definite, but in agitating the German people to its depths, and in awakening through his criticism and polemics a wholesome intellectual activity. He was the vivifying critic of his time, and his whole life was a polemic. His critical insight made itself felt throughout the widest range of thought and feeling--in religion, in science, and in art. His polemics vanquished every opponent, and grew stronger with every victory. Lessing, as he himself confessed, needed conflict for the full development of his powers. He resembled that fabulous Norman who inherited the skill, knowledge, and strength of those whom he slew in single combat, and in this manner became finally endowed with all possible excellencies and perfections. It is easily conceivable that such a contentious champion should stir up not a little commotion in Germany,--in that quiet Germany which was then even more sabbatically quiet than now. The majority were stupefied at his literary audacity. But this was of the greatest assistance to him, for _oser_! is the secret of success in literature, as it is in revolutions,--and in love. All trembled before the sword of Lessing. No head was safe from him. Yes, many heads he struck off from mere wantonness, and was moreover so spiteful as to lift them up from the ground and show to the public that they were hollow inside. Those whom his sword could not reach he slew with the arrows of his wit. His friends admired the pretty feathers of those arrows; his enemies felt their barbs in their hearts. Lessing's wit does not resemble that _enjouement_, that _gaîté_, those lively _saillies_, which are so well known here in France. His wit was no petty French greyhound, chasing its own shadow: it was rather a great German tom-cat, who plays with the mouse before he throttles it.