general, as a stemming, stultifying and therefore degenerate factor,
and regard David Strauss--as the author himself did, that is to say,
simply as a glass, focusing the whole light of our understanding upon
the main theme-- then the Strauss paper is seen to be one of such
enormous power, and its aim appears to us so lofty, that, whatever our
views may be concerning the nature of the person assailed, we are
forced to conclude that, to Nietzsche at least, he was but the
incarnation and concrete example of the evil and danger then
threatening to overtake his country, which it was the object of this
essay to expose.

When we read that at the time of Strauss's death (February 7th, 1874)
Nietzsche was greatly tormented by the fear that the old scholar might
have been hastened to his end by the use that had been made of his
personality in the first Unzeitgemässe Betrachtung; when we remember
that in the midst of this torment he ejaculated, "I was indeed not
made to hate and have enemies!"--we are then in a better position to
judge of the motives which, throughout his life, led him to engage
such formidable opponents and to undertake such relentless attacks. It
was merely his ruling principle that, all is true and good that tends
to elevate man; everything is bad and false that keeps man stationary
or sends him backwards.

Those who may think that his attacks were often unwarrantable and
ill-judged will do well, therefore, to bear this in mind, that
whatever his value or merits may have been as an iconoclast, at least
the aim he had was sufficiently lofty and honourable, and that he
never shirked the duties which he rightly or wrongly imagined would
help him to