Ecclesiastes is eternal because it has verified that there are no new vices, nor new hopes, that what has been done will be done again, and there will never be anything that has not already been done: in short, circumstances are different, but man is always the same, and always falls into the weaknesses of the past. The impression of change with time is illusory, since it is limited to external aspects of a permanent reality. Man is always man, and we can only expect him to be what he is.
The Revenge of the Common Man
What best characterizes modernity is the revenge of the common man on the man of genius. In all spheres, it is his interests that predominate; wherever one turns one’s eyes, it is his face that stands out. The victory is complete. And precisely from this stems the suffocation of culture and high aspirations, which now find an almost invincible hostility to germinate. The common man does not tolerate them, and knocks on doors as a missionary in order to indoctrinate. Perhaps never has it been so difficult and so necessary an effort to ignore him and not allow oneself to be contaminated.
The Pontiffs of Human Lucidity
Few works elicit such hearty laughter as those of these “men of science” like Max Nordau and Cesare Lombroso, who arrogate to themselves the role of pontiffs of human lucidity and supreme judges of mental sanity. Finally, one should admire them for their audacity in packing the greatest geniuses of human history, from Mozart to Shakespeare, and calling them all degenerate lunatics. They are the real fathers of modern psychiatry, which has in the jester the perfect model of mental sanity. An ordinary man can easily identify the original as sick, but it takes a visionary to see in creativity itself a mental disorder. Like talented clowns, these men deserve from us nothing but effusive applause and enormous gratitude.
The Philosopher Who Cannot Teach…
The philosopher who cannot teach something valuable in a simple way to an ordinary man should retire. Perhaps in no other field is clarity a more necessary quality, and a more evident manifestation of mastery over the subject matter. There are many forgivable sins, and many defects that even scratch the thought of a philosopher; but from the moment that discourse, through him, makes the subject more confusing, the best he would do is to return quietly to his studies, if not abandon them forever and seek a new occupation.