Friedrich_Nietzsche - Untimely_Meditations_(Cambridge_Texts_in_the_History_of_Philosophy__1997)

David Strauss, the confessor and the writerand that it holds up to them the reflection of a life such as they themselveslive. For this is the trick of the thing: the Master affects to beoudining the ideal of a new philosophy of life, and now he hearshimself praised on every side, since everyone is in a position to thinkthat this is precisely how he thinks and that Strauss would see alreadyfulfilled in him that which he has demanded only of the future. Thisis part of the explanation of the extraordinary success of this book:'as is here written so do we live and go our way rejoicing!' the scholarcries to him, and is glad when he finds that others feel the same.Whether he happens to differ from the Master on individual points ­over DaIWin, for example, or capital punishment - is to him of litdemoment, since he is on the whole so certain of breathing his own airand hearing the echo of his voice and his needs. The painfulness ofthis unanimity for any true friend of German culture must not deterhim from acknowledging it to himself or from making the factpublic.We all know how our age is typified by its pursuit of science; weknow it because it is part of our life: and that precisely is the reasonalmost no one asks himself what the consequences of such aninvolvement with the sciences could be for culture, even supposingthat the will and the capacity to promote culture were everywhere tohand. For the nature of scientific man (quite apart from the form heassumes at present) contains a real paradox: he behaves like theproudest idler of fortune, as though existence were not a dreadfuland questionable thing but a firm possession guaranteed to last forever. He seems to be permitted to squander his life on questionswhose answer could at bottom be of consequence only to someoneassured of an eternity. The heir of but a few hours, he is ringedaround with frightful abysses, and every step he takes ought to makehim ask: Whither? Whence? To what end? But his soul is warmedwith the task of counting the stamens of a flower or breaking up thestones of the pathway, and all the interest,joy, strength and desire hepossesses is absorbed in this work. Now, this paradox, the scientificman, has in recent years got into a frantic hurry in Germany, asthough science were a factory and every minute's slacking incurredpunishment. Nowadays he works as hard as the fourth estate, theslaves; his study is no longer an occupation but a necessity, he looksneither to right nor left and goes through all the business of life, andits more questionable aspects, with the half-consciousness or therepellent need for entertainment characteristic of the exhaustedworker.35