Page:Addresses to the German nation.djvu/282

 enveloped everyone in the same twilight—surely they have vanished now! That twilight no longer binds our eyes; moreover, it can no longer serve us as an excuse. Here we stand now, bare and empty, with all external coverings and hangings taken away, just as we are ourselves. Now there must be revealed what that self is or is not.

217. Perhaps someone may come forward from among you and ask me: “What gives you alone of all German men and writers the special task, the vocation, and the right to assemble us and press your views upon us? Would not each one of the thousands of Germany’s men of letters have just as much right to it as you? Not one of them does it, but you alone thrust yourself forward.” I answer that, of course, everyone would have the same right as I have, that I am doing it solely because not one of them has done it before me, and that I would be silent if another had already done it. This was the first step to the goal of a thorough reformation; someone or other had to take it. I was the first one to see it vividly; therefore it fell to me to take the first step. After this some other step will be the second; all have now the same right to take this step; but once again it will in fact be one man, and one man only, who does take it. There must always be one who is first; then let him be first who can!

218. Without troubling yourselves about this objection, let your gaze rest for a little while upon the view to which we have already conducted you, viz., in what an enviable condition Germany would be, and the world as well, if the former had known how to make use of the good fortune due to its position and to recognize its advantages. Let your eye dwell upon what both are now, and make yourselves feel to the quick the pain and indignation which must seize every noble-minded man when he