We Philologists: Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche, Volume 8Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm
PhilosophyPhilosophy
We Philologists: Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche, Volume 8
Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm
Classical philology; Education
There is something disrespectful about the way in which we make our
young students known to the ancients: what is worse, it is
unpedagogical; or what can result from a mere acquaintance with things
which a youth cannot consciously esteem! Perhaps he must learn to
"_believe_" and this is why I object to it.
76
There are matters regarding which antiquity instructs us, and about
which I should hardly care to express myself publicly.
77
All the difficulties of historical study to be elucidated by great
examples.
Why our young students are not suited to the Greeks.
The consequences of philology.
Arrogant expectation.
Culture-philistinism.
Superficiality.
Too high an esteem for reading and writing.
Estrangement from the nation and its needs.
The philologists themselves, the historians, philosophers, and jurists
all end in smoke.
Our young students should be brought into contact with real sciences.
Likewise with real art.
In consequence, when they grew older, a desire for _real_ history would
be shown.
78
Inhumanity: even in the "Antigone," even in Goethe's "Iphigenia."
The want of "rationalism" in the Greeks.
Young people cannot understand the political affairs of antiquity.
The poetic element: a bad expectation.
79
Do the philologists know the present time? Their judgments on it as
Periclean, their mistaken judgments when they speak of Freytag's[7]
genius as resembling that of Homer, and so on; their following in the
lead of the litterateurs, their abandonment of the pagan sense, which
was exactly the classical element that Goethe discovered in Winckelmann.
80
The condition of the philologists may be seen by their indifference at
the appearance of Wagner. They should have learnt even more through him
than through Goethe, and they did not even glance in his direction. That
shows that they are not actuated by any strong need, or else they would
have an instinct to tell them where their food was to be found.
81
Wagner prizes his art too highly to go and sit in a corner with it, like
Schumann. He either surrenders himself to the public ("Rienzi") or he
makes the public surrender itself to him. He educates it up to his
music. Minor artists, too, want their public, but they try to get it by
inartistic means, such as through the Press, Hanslick,[8] &c.
82
Wagner perfected the inner fancy of man . later generations will see a
renaissance in sculpture. Poetry must precede the plastic art.
83
I observe in philologists .
1. Want of respect for antiquity.
2. Tenderness and flowery oratory; even an apologetic tone.
3. Simplicity in their historical comments.
4. Self-conceit.
5. Under-estimation of the talented philologists.
84
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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