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 A Preface to Politics

(American writer upon public questions, born 1889)

We have almost no spiritual weapons against classicalism: universities, churches, newspapers are by-products of a commercial success; we have no tradition of intellectual revolt. The American college student has the gravity and mental habits of a Supreme Court judge; his "wild oats" are rarely spiritual; the critical, analytical habit of mind is distrusted. We say that "knocking" is a sign of the "sorehead" and we sublimate criticism by saying that "every knock is a boost." America does not play with ideas; generous speculation is regarded as insincere, and shunned as if it might endanger the optimism which underlies success. All this becomes such an insulation against new ideas that when the Yankee goes abroad he takes his environment with him.

Learning

(From "Thus Spake Zarathustra")

(German philosopher, 1844-1900, whose lofty utterance has suffered from materialistic interpreters)

As I lay in sleep a sheep ate up the ivy crown of my head—ate and then said: "Zarathustra is no more a scholar."

Said it and went strutting away, and proud. A child told it to me