"] With what glee he raids through his
domains, and what signs of destruction and massacre mark the path of the
sportsman! His hand is infallible like his glance. The spirit of sarcasm
lives and thrives in the midst of universal wreck; its balls are
enchanted and itself invulnerable, and it braves retaliations and
reprisals because itself is a mere flash, a bodiless and magical
nothing.
Clever men will recognize and tolerate nothing but cleverness; every
authority rouses their ridicule, every superstition amuses them, every
convention moves them to contradiction. Only force finds favor in their
eyes, and they have no toleration for anything that is not purely
natural and spontaneous. And yet ten clever men are not worth one man of
talent, nor ten men of talent worth one man of genius. And in the
individual, feeling is more than cleverness, reason is worth as much as
feeling, and conscience has it over reason. If, then, the clever man is
not _mockable_, he may at least be neither loved, nor considered, nor
esteemed. He may make himself feared, it is true, and force others to
respect his independence; but this negative advantage, which is the
result of a negative superiority, brings no happiness with it.
Cleverness is serviceable for everything, sufficient for nothing.
Pages:
322
323
324
325
326
327
328
329
330
331
332
333
334
335
336
337
338
339
340
341
342
343
344
345
346