Page:Popular Works of Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1889) Vol 2.djvu/111

 something new, no one listens to another, but each goes his own way, and promulgates his own conceptions. Not the Reader: for he, glad to be done with the old, flies to the newest comers, in choosing among whom he is for the most part guided by mere chance. In these circumstances no one who commits his lucubrations to the press, can be sure that any one, except himself and his printer, shall know anything of the matter. Hence it becomes indispensably necessary to set on foot and establish some public and general record or memorial of Literature. Such are the literary Journals and Magazines, which once more make known what it is which the Author has made known, and by means of which an Author is enabled to repeat, even after the lapse of half a year, what he has said already; and a similar opportunity is afforded to the reading public to learn what he has said, if they read the Journals. But it would not accord with the dignity of the authors of these publications, and would place them too far below other writers, if they only conveyed this intelligence of the thoughts of others; they must therefore, while reporting their information, also assert their own independence by discussing these thoughts and announcing their own opinion thereon;—the leading maxims in this business being the following:—that the Reviewer shall always find something to censure; and that he knows everything better than the original Author.

With such writings as commonly appear this is of little moment; for it is no great misfortune that something which is bad at first should be made worse by the new treatment of the Reviewer. Writings which really deserve to see the light, whether in the department of Science or that of Literature, are ever the expression of a Life wholly devoted to the Idea in some new and original form; and until such writings have seized upon the Age, and penetrated it, and fashioned it after their own thought, no judgment of them is