m,
and as he has a strong repugnance to materialistic madness, his nature
must be stirred in its profoundest depths. If Richard succumbs, he will
act in his habitual consistent manner. All moral basis lost, morality
would be foolishness to him, since it is useless for beasts to curb the
passions by moral laws. As with immortality disappears man's eternal
destiny, it would be foolish to 'fight the giant fight of duty.' If he
is convinced that man is a beast, he will live like a beast--although
he might cloak his conduct with the varnish of decency--and thus
suddenly would the sensible Richard stand before his astonished father
a ruined man. This is one view; there is still another," said the
doctor hesitatingly. "I remember in the course of my practice a suicide
who wrote on a slip of paper, 'What do I here? Eat, drink, sleep,
worry, and fret; much suffering, little joy; therefore--' and the man
sent a bullet through his head. This suicide thought logically. This
earthly life is insupportable; it is foolishness to a man who thinks
and is at the same time a materialist."

"What prospects--horrible!" cried Herr Frank, wringing his hands.
"Accursed be those books; and I am the cause of this misfortune!"

"The involuntary cause," said Klingenberg consolingly. "You now have a
firm conviction of the devastating effects of those bad books. But how
many are there who consider every warning in this connection an
exhibition of prejudice or narrow-mindedness! How few readers are so
modest as to admit that they want the scientific culture to refute a
bad book, to separate the poison from the honey of sweet phrases and
winning style! How few can see that they cannot read those bad books
without detriment! No one would sit on a cask of powder and touch it
off for amusement; and yet those hellish books are more dangerous than
a cask full of powder. To me this is incomprehensible. Poisonous food
is always injurious; yet thousands and millions drink greedily from
this poisonous stream of bad reading which deluges all grades of
society."

"I will do immediately what must be done," said Herr Frank as he
hastily rose.

"What will you do?"

"Take from my son those execrable books."

"By no means," said Klingenberg. "This would be a psychological
mistake. Richard would buy the same books again at the book-shop, and
read them secretly. A man who has the resolution of your son must be
won by honorable combat. Authority would here be bad