building. And, so saying, the Philistine raises his hand to his brow.

But, in order to be able thus to misjudge, and thus to grant
left-handed veneration to our classics, people must have ceased to
know them. This, generally speaking, is precisely what has happened.
For, otherwise, one ought to know that there is only one way of
honouring them, and that is to continue seeking with the same spirit
and with the same courage, and not to weary of the search. But to
foist the doubtful title of "classics" upon them, and to "edify"
oneself from time to time by reading their works, means to yield to
those feeble and selfish emotions which all the paying public may
purchase at concert-halls and theatres. Even the raising of monuments
to their memory, and the christening of feasts and societies with
their names--all these things are but so many ringing cash payments by
means of which the Culture-Philistine discharges his indebtedness to
them, so that in all other respects he may be rid of them, and, above
all, not bound to follow in their wake and prosecute his search
further. For henceforth inquiry is to cease: that is the Philistine
watchword.

This watchword once had some meaning. In Germany, during the first
decade of the nineteenth century, for instance, when the heyday and
confusion of seeking, experimenting, destroying, promising, surmising,
and hoping was sweeping in currents and cross-currents over the land,
the thinking middle-classes were right in their concern for their own
security. It was then quite right of them to dismiss from their minds
with a shrug of their shoulders the omnium gatherum of fantastic and
language-maiming philosophies, and of rabid special-pleading
historical studies, the carnival of all gods and myths, and the
poetical affectations and fooleries which a drunken spirit may be