Friedrich_Nietzsche - Untimely_Meditations_(Cambridge_Texts_in_the_History_of_Philosophy__1997)

Untimely Meditationsunfruitful - a consequence of how he comes into exi'stence! - and thathe harbours · a certain natural hatred for the fruitful man; which iswhy geniuses and scholars have at all times been at odds with oneanother. For the latter want to kill, dissect and understand nature,while the former want to augment nature with new living nature; andso there exists a conflict of activities and intentions. Wholly fortunateages did not need the scholar and did not know him, wholly morbidand listless ages have valued him as the highest and most venerableof men and accorded him the highest rank.How it stands with our own age in regard to health and sickness ­who is sufficient of a physician to know that! Certainly the scholar isin very many ways still too highly valued, which has a harmful effectespecially in all that concerns the evolving genius. The scholar hasno heart for the latter's distress; he speaks past him in a sharp, coldvoice, and all too soon he shrugs his shoulders as though over somethingqueer and strange for which he has neither time nor inclination.Knowledge of the goal of culture cannot be found in himeither. -tBut what have we gained at all from these reflections? Theknowledge that where today culture seems to be most vigorouslypursued nothing is known of this goal. However loudly the state mayproclaim its service to culture, it furthers culture in order to furtheritself and cannot conceive of a goal higher than its own welfare andcontinued existence. What the money-makers really want when theyceaselessly demand instruction and education is in the last resortprecisely money. When those who require form ascribe to themselvesthe actual labour on behalf of culture and opine, for instance, that allart belongs to them and must stand in the service of their requirements,what is quite clear is that by affirming culture they are merelyaffirming themselves: that they too are therefore still involved in amisunderstanding. Enough has been said of the scholarly man oflearning. And so we see that, however zealous all four powers .together may be in promoting their own interests with the aid of cul..lture, they are dull and without inspiration when these interests arenot involved. And that is why the conditions for the production ofthe genius have not improved in modern times, and why antipathy fororiginal men has increased to such an extent that Socrates could nothave lived among us and would in any event not have attainedseventy.N ow I recall the theme I developed in the third section: that ourwhole modern world has so little the appearance of permanence and174