It was in this State, and with its assistance, that Plato thought he could do for the Greeks what Mohammed did for the Arabs several centuries later: viz. establishing both minor and more important customs, and especially regulating the daily life of every man. His ideas were quite practicable just as certainly as those of Mohammed were practicable; for even much more incredible ideas, those of Christianity, proved themselves to be practicable! a few hazards less and a few hazards more—and then the world would have witnessed the Platonisation of Southern Europe; and, if we suppose that this state of things had continued to our own days, we should probably be worshipping Plato now as the “good principle.” But he was unsuccessful, and so his traditional character remains that of a dreamer and a Utopian—stronger epithets than these passed away with ancient Athens. 497. THE PURIFYING EYE.—We have the best reason for speaking of “genius” in men—for example, Plato, Spinoza, and Goethe—whose minds appear to be but loosely linked to their character and temperament, like winged beings which easily separate themselves from them, and then rise far above them. On the other hand, those who never succeeded in cutting themselves loose from their temperament, and who knew how to give to it the most intellectual, lofty, and at times even cosmic expression (Schopenhauer, for instance) have always been very fond of speaking about their genius. These geniuses could not rise above themselves, but they believed that, fly where they would, they would always find and recover themselves—this is their “greatness,” and this can be greatness!—The others who are entitled to this name possess the pure and purifying eye which does not seem to have sprung out of their temperament and character, but separately from them, and generally in contradiction to them, and looks out upon the world as on a God whom it loves. But even people like these do not come into possession of such an eye all at once: they require practice and a preliminary school of sight, and he who is really fortunate will at the right moment also fall in with a teacher of pure sight. 498. NEVER DEMAND!—You do not know him! it is true that he easily and readily submits both to men and things, and that he is kind to both—his only wish is to be left in peace—but only in so far as men and things do not _demand_ his submission. Any demand makes him proud, bashful, and warlike. 499.