Page:The World as Will and Idea - Schopenhauer, tr. Haldane and Kemp - Volume 2.djvu/351

Rh such a juggle of words destitute of thoughts, quite sincerely, under the delusion that they are really thoughts, and in front of him the students, who just as bonâ fide, i.e., under the same delusion, listen attentively and take notes, while yet in reality neither the one nor the other goes beyond the words, but rather these words themselves, together with the audible scratching of pens, are the only realities in the whole matter. This peculiar satisfaction in words has more than anything else to do with the perpetuation of errors. For, relying on the words and phrases received from his predecessors, each one confidently passes over obscurities and problems, and thus these are propagated through centuries from book to book; and the thinking man, especially in youth, is in doubt whether it may be that he is incapable of understanding it, or that there is really nothing here to understand; and similarly, whether for others the problem which they all slink past with such comical seriousness by the same path is no problem at all, or whether it is only that they will not see it. Many truths remain undiscovered simply on this account, that no one has the courage to look the problem in the face and grapple with it. On the contrary, the distinctness of thought and clearness of conceptions peculiar to eminent minds produces the effect that even known truths when brought forward by them gain new light, or at least a new stimulus. If we hear them or read them, it is as if we exchanged a bad telescope for a good one. Let one only read, for example, in Euler's "Letters to the Princess," his exposition of the fundamental truths of mechanics and optics. Upon this rests the remark of Diderot in the Neveu de Rameau, that only the perfect masters are capable of teaching really well the elements of a science; just because it is only they who really understand the questions, and for them words never take the place of thoughts.

But we ought to know that inferior minds are the rule, good minds the exception, eminent minds very rare,