necessarily in individual and
exceptional cases, become stronger and richer than he has perhaps ever
been before--owing to the unprejudicedness of his schooling, owing to
the immense variety of practice, art, and disguise. I meant to say
that the democratising of Europe is at the same time an involuntary
arrangement for the rearing of TYRANTS--taking the word in all its
meanings, even in its most spiritual sense.

243. I hear with pleasure that our sun is moving rapidly towards the
constellation Hercules: and I hope that the men on this earth will do
like the sun. And we foremost, we good Europeans!

244. There was a time when it was customary to call Germans "deep"
by way of distinction; but now that the most successful type of new
Germanism is covetous of quite other honours, and perhaps misses
"smartness" in all that has depth, it is almost opportune and patriotic
to doubt whether we did not formerly deceive ourselves with that
commendation: in short, whether German depth is not at bottom something
different and worse--and something from which, thank God, we are on the
point of successfully ridding ourselves. Let us try, then, to relearn
with regard to German depth; the only thing necessary for the purpose is
a little vivisection of the German soul.--The German soul is above all
manifold, varied in its source, aggregated and super-imposed, rather
than actually built: this is owing to its origin. A German who would
embolden himself to assert: "Two souls, alas, dwell in my breast," would
make a bad guess at the truth, or, more correctly, he would come far
short of the truth about the number of souls. As a people made up of
the most extraordinary mixing and mingling of races, perhaps even with a
preponderance of the pre-Aryan element as the "people of the centre" in
every sense of the term, the Germans are more intangible, more ample,
more contradictory, more unknown, more incalculable, more surprising,
and even more terrifying than other peoples are to themselves:--they
escape DEFINITION, and are thereby alone the despair of the French. It
IS characteristic of the Germans that the question: "What is German?"
never dies out among them. Kotzebue certainly knew his Germans well
enough: "We are known," they cried jubilantly to him--but Sand also
thought he knew them. Jean Paul knew what he was doing when he declared
himself incensed at Fichte's lying but patriotic flatteries and
exaggerations,--but it is probable that Go