from them too often, and the Master's expression is never more sour
and his movements never stiffer than when he has just attempted to
take the leap, or to glance with the fiery eye, of a genius. Precisely
owing to the fact that he is too lightly equipped for our zone, he
runs the risk of catching cold more often and more severely than
another. It may seem a terrible hardship to him that every one should
notice this; but if he wishes to be cured, the following diagnosis of
his case ought to be publicly presented to him:-- Once upon a time
there lived a Strauss, a brave, severe, and stoutly equipped scholar,
with whom we sympathised as wholly as with all those in Germany who
seek to serve truth with earnestness and energy, and to rule within
the limits of their powers. He, however, who is now publicly famous as
David Strauss, is another person. The theologians may be to blame for
this metamorphosis; but, at any rate, his present toying with the mask
of genius inspires us with as much hatred and scorn as his former
earnestness commanded respect and sympathy. When, for instance, he
tells us, "it would also argue ingratitude towards my genius if I were
not to rejoice that to the faculty of an incisive, analytical
criticism was added the innocent pleasure in artistic production," it
may astonish him to hear that, in spite of this self-praise, there are
still men who maintain exactly the reverse, and who say, not only that
he has never possessed the gift of artistic production, but that the
"innocent" pleasure he mentions is of all things the least innocent,
seeing that it succeeded in gradually undermining and ultimately
destroying a nature as strongly and deeply scholarly and critical as
Strauss's--in fact, the real Straussian Genius. In a moment of
unlimited frankness, Strauss himself indeed adds: "Merck was always in
my thoughts, calling out, 'Don't produce such child's play again;
others can do that too!'" That was the voice of the real Straussian
genius, which also asked him what the worth of his newest, innocent,