Homer and ClassicalPhilology

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At the present day no clear and consistent opin-ion seems to be held regarding Classical Philol-ogy. We are conscious of this in the circles ofthe learned just as much as among the follow-ers of that science itself. The cause of this lies inits many-sided character, in the lack of an ab-stract unity, and in the inorganic aggregation ofheterogeneous scientific activities which areconnected with one another only by the name"Philology." It must be freely admitted that phi-lology is to some extent borrowed from severalother sciences, and is mixed together like amagic potion from the most outlandish liquors,ores, and bones. It may even be added that itlikewise conceals within itself an artistic ele-ment, one which, on æsthetic and ethicalgrounds, may be called imperatival—an ele-ment that acts in opposition to its purely scien-tific behaviour. Philology is composed of his-tory just as much as of natural science oræsthetics: history, in so far as it endeavours tocomprehend the manifestations of the indi-

vidualities of peoples in ever new images, andthe prevailing law in the disappearance of phe-nomena; natural science, in so far as it strives tofathom the deepest instinct of man, that ofspeech; æsthetics, finally, because from variousantiquities at our disposal it endeavours to pickout the so-called "classical" antiquity, with theview and pretension of excavating the idealworld buried under it, and to hold up to thepresent the mirror of the classical and everlast-ing standards. That these wholly different sci-entific and æsthetico-ethical impulses havebeen associated under a common name, a kindof sham monarchy, is shown especially by thefact that philology at every period from its ori-gin onwards was at the same time pedagogical.From the standpoint of the pedagogue, a choicewas offered of those elements which were ofthe greatest educational value; and thus thatscience, or at least that scientific aim, which wecall philology, gradually developed out of the

practical calling originated by the exigencies ofthat science itself.

These philological aims were pursued some-times with greater ardour and sometimes withless, in accordance with the degree of cultureand the development of the taste of a particularperiod; but, on the other hand, the followers ofthis science are in the habit of regarding theaims which correspond to their several abilitiesas the aims of philology; whence it comes aboutthat the estimation of philology in public opin-ion depends upon the weight of the personali-ties of the philologists!

At the present time—that is to say, in a periodwhich has seen men distinguished in almostevery department of philology—a general un-certainty of judgment has increased more andmore, and likewise a general relaxation of in-terest and participation in philological prob-lems. Such an undecided and imperfect state ofpublic opinion is damaging to a science in that

its hidden and open enemies can work withmuch better prospects of success. And philol-ogy has a great many such enemies. Where dowe not meet with them, these mockers, alwaysready to aim a blow at the philological "moles,"the animals that practise dust-eating ex professo,and that grub up and eat for the eleventh timewhat they have already eaten ten times before.For opponents of this sort, however, philologyis merely a useless, harmless, and inoffensivepastime, an object of laughter and not of hate.But, on the other hand, there is a boundless andinfuriated hatred of philology wherever anideal, as such, is feared, where the modern manfalls down to worship himself, and where Hel-lenism is looked upon as a superseded andhence very insignificant point of view. Againstthese enemies, we philologists must alwayscount upon the assistance of artists and men ofartistic minds; for they alone can judge how thesword of barbarism sweeps over the head ofevery one who loses sight of the unutterable

simplicity and noble dignity of the Hellene; andhow no progress in commerce or technical in-dustries, however brilliant, no school regula-tions, no political education of the masses,however widespread and complete, can protectus from the curse of ridiculous and barbaricoffences against good taste, or from annihila-tion by the Gorgon head of the classicist.

Whilst philology as a whole is looked on withjealous eyes by these two classes of opponents,there are numerous and varied hostilities inother directions of philology; philologists them-selves are quarrelling with one another; inter-nal dissensions are caused by useless disputesabout precedence and mutual jealousies, butespecially by the differences—even enmities—comprised in the name of philology, which arenot, however, by any means naturally harmo-nised instincts.

Science has this in common with art, that themost ordinary, everyday thing appears to it as

something entirely new and attractive, as ifmetamorphosed by witchcraft and now seenfor the first time. Life is worth living, says art,the beautiful temptress; life is worth knowing,says science. With this contrast the so heart-rending and dogmatic tradition follows in atheory, and consequently in the practice of clas-sical philology derived from this theory. Wemay consider antiquity from a scientific pointof view; we may try to look at what has hap-pened with the eye of a historian, or to arrangeand compare the linguistic forms of ancientmasterpieces, to bring them at all events undera morphological law; but we always lose thewonderful creative force, the real fragrance, ofthe atmosphere of antiquity; we forget that pas-sionate emotion which instinctively drove ourmeditation and enjoyment back to the Greeks.From this point onwards we must take noticeof a clearly determined and very surprisingantagonism which philology has great cause toregret. From the circles upon whose help we

must place the most implicit reliance—the artis-tic friends of antiquity, the warm supporters ofHellenic beauty and noble simplicity—we hearharsh voices crying out that it is precisely thephilologists themselves who are the real oppo-nents and destroyers of the ideals of antiquity.Schiller upbraided the philologists with havingscattered Homer's laurel crown to the winds. Itwas none other than Goethe who, in early life asupporter of Wolf's theories regarding Homer,recanted in the verses—

With subtle wit you took awayOur former adoration:The Iliad, you may us say,Was mere conglomeration.Think it not crime in any way:Youth's fervent adorationLeads us to know the verity,And feel the poet's unity.

The reason of this want of piety and reverencemust lie deeper; and many are in doubt as to

whether philologists are lacking in artistic ca-pacity and impressions, so that they are unableto do justice to the ideal, or whether the spiritof negation has become a destructive andiconoclastic principle of theirs. When, however,even the friends of antiquity, possessed of suchdoubts and hesitations, point to our presentclassical philology as something questionable,what influence may we not ascribe to the out-bursts of the "realists" and the claptrap of theheroes of the passing hour? To answer the lat-ter on this occasion, especially when we con-sider the nature of the present assembly, wouldbe highly injudicious; at any rate, if I do notwish to meet with the fate of that sophist who,when in Sparta, publicly undertook to praiseand defend Herakles, when he was interruptedwith the query: "But who then has found faultwith him?" I cannot help thinking, however,that some of these scruples are still sounding inthe ears of not a few in this gathering; for theymay still be frequently heard from the lips of

noble and artistically gifted men—as even anupright philologist must feel them, and feelthem most painfully, at moments when hisspirits are downcast. For the single individualthere is no deliverance from the dissensionsreferred to; but what we contend and inscribeon our banner is the fact that classical philol-ogy, as a whole, has nothing whatsoever to dowith the quarrels and bickerings of its individ-ual disciples. The entire scientific and artisticmovement of this peculiar centaur is bent,though with cyclopic slowness, upon bridgingover the gulf between the ideal antiquity—which is perhaps only the magnificent blossom-ing of the Teutonic longing for the south—andthe real antiquity; and thus classical philologypursues only the final end of its own being,which is the fusing together of primarily hostileimpulses that have only forcibly been broughttogether. Let us talk as we will about the unat-tainability of this goal, and even designate thegoal itself as an illogical pretension—the aspira-

tion for it is very real; and I should like to try tomake it clear by an example that the most sig-nificant steps of classical philology never leadaway from the ideal antiquity, but to it; andthat, just when people are speaking unwarrant-ably of the overthrow of sacred shrines, newand more worthy altars are being erected. Letus then examine the so-called Homeric questionfrom this standpoint, a question the most im-portant problem of which Schiller called a scho-lastic barbarism.

The important problem referred to is the ques-tion of the personality of Homer.

We now meet everywhere with the firm opin-ion that the question of Homer's personality isno longer timely, and that it is quite a differentthing from the real "Homeric question." It maybe added that, for a given period—such as ourpresent philological period, for example—thecentre of discussion may be removed from theproblem of the poet's personality; for even now

a painstaking experiment is being made to re-construct the Homeric poems without the aidof personality, treating them as the work ofseveral different persons. But if the centre of ascientific question is rightly seen to be wherethe swelling tide of new views has risen up, i.e.where individual scientific investigation comesinto contact with the whole life of science andculture—if any one, in other words, indicates ahistorico-cultural valuation as the central pointof the question, he must also, in the province ofHomeric criticism, take his stand upon thequestion of personality as being the really fruit-ful oasis in the desert of the whole argument.For in Homer the modern world, I will not sayhas learnt, but has examined, a great historicalpoint of view; and, even without now puttingforward my own opinion as to whether thisexamination has been or can be happily carriedout, it was at all events the first example of theapplication of that productive point of view. Byit scholars learnt to recognise condensed beliefs

in the apparently firm, immobile figures of thelife of ancient peoples; by it they for the firsttime perceived the wonderful capability of thesoul of a people to represent the conditions ofits morals and beliefs in the form of a personal-ity. When historical criticism has confidentlyseized upon this method of evaporating appar-ently concrete personalities, it is permissible topoint to the first experiment as an importantevent in the history of sciences, without consid-ering whether it was successful in this instanceor not.

It is a common occurrence for a series of strik-ing signs and wonderful emotions to precedean epoch-making discovery. Even the experi-ment I have just referred to has its own attrac-tive history; but it goes back to a surprisinglyancient era. Friedrich August Wolf has exactlyindicated the spot where Greek antiquity drop-ped the question. The zenith of the historico-literary studies of the Greeks, and hence also of

their point of greatest importance—the Ho-meric question—was reached in the age of theAlexandrian grammarians. Up to this time theHomeric question had run through the longchain of a uniform process of development, ofwhich the standpoint of those grammariansseemed to be the last link, the last, indeed,which was attainable by antiquity. They con-ceived the Iliad and the Odyssey as the creationsof one single Homer; they declared it to be psy-chologically possible for two such differentworks to have sprung from the brain of onegenius, in contradiction to the Chorizontes,who represented the extreme limit of the scep-ticism of a few detached individuals of antiq-uity rather than antiquity itself considered as awhole. To explain the different general impres-sion of the two books on the assumption thatone poet composed them both, scholars soughtassistance by referring to the seasons of thepoet's life, and compared the poet of the Odys-sey to the setting sun. The eyes of those critics

were tirelessly on the lookout for discrepanciesin the language and thoughts of the two poems;but at this time also a history of the Homericpoem and its tradition was prepared, accordingto which these discrepancies were not due toHomer, but to those who committed his wordsto writing and those who sang them. It wasbelieved that Homer's poem was passed fromone generation to another viva voce, and faultswere attributed to the improvising and at timesforgetful bards. At a certain given date, aboutthe time of Pisistratus, the poems which hadbeen repeated orally were said to have beencollected in manuscript form; but the scribes, itis added, allowed themselves to take some lib-erties with the text by transposing some linesand adding extraneous matter here and there.This entire hypothesis is the most important inthe domain of literary studies that antiquity hasexhibited; and the acknowledgment of the dis-semination of the Homeric poems by word ofmouth, as opposed to the habits of a book-

learned age, shows in particular a depth of an-cient sagacity worthy of our admiration. Fromthose times until the generation that producedFriedrich August Wolf we must take a jumpover a long historical vacuum; but in our ownage we find the argument left just as it was atthe time when the power of controversy de-parted from antiquity, and it is a matter of in-difference to us that Wolf accepted as certaintradition what antiquity itself had set up onlyas a hypothesis. It may be remarked as mostcharacteristic of this hypothesis that, in thestrictest sense, the personality of Homer is trea-ted seriously; that a certain standard of innerharmony is everywhere presupposed in themanifestations of the personality; and that,with these two excellent auxiliary hypotheses,whatever is seen to be below this standard andopposed to this inner harmony is at once sweptaside as un-Homeric. But even this distinguish-ing characteristic, in place of wishing to recog-nise the supernatural existence of a tangible

personality, ascends likewise through all thestages that lead to that zenith, with ever-increasing energy and clearness. Individualityis ever more strongly felt and accentuated; thepsychological possibility of a single Homer isever more forcibly demanded. If we descendbackwards from this zenith, step by step, wefind a guide to the understanding of the Ho-meric problem in the person of Aristotle.Homer was for him the flawless and untiringartist who knew his end and the means to at-tain it; but there is still a trace of infantile criti-cism to be found in Aristotle—i.e., in the naiveconcession he made to the public opinion thatconsidered Homer as the author of the originalof all comic epics, the Margites. If we go stillfurther backwards from Aristotle, the inabilityto create a personality is seen to increase; moreand more poems are attributed to Homer; andevery period lets us see its degree of criticismby how much and what it considers as Ho-meric. In this backward examination, we in-

stinctively feel that away beyond Herodotusthere lies a period in which an immense floodof great epics has been identified with the nameof Homer.

Let us imagine ourselves as living in the time ofPisistratus: the word "Homer" then compre-hended an abundance of dissimilarities. Whatwas meant by "Homer" at that time? It is evi-dent that that generation found itself unable tograsp a personality and the limits of its mani-festations. Homer had now become of smallconsequence. And then we meet with theweighty question: What lies before this period?Has Homer's personality, because it cannot begrasped, gradually faded away into an emptyname? Or had all the Homeric poems beengathered together in a body, the nation naivelyrepresenting itself by the figure of Homer? Wasthe person created out of a conception, or the concep-tion out of a person? This is the real "Homeric

question," the central problem of the personal-ity.

The difficulty of answering this question, how-ever, is increased when we seek a reply in an-other direction, from the standpoint of the po-ems themselves which have come down to us.As it is difficult for us at the present day, andnecessitates a serious effort on our part, to un-derstand the law of gravitation clearly—thatthe earth alters its form of motion when an-other heavenly body changes its position inspace, although no material connection unitesone to the other—it likewise costs us sometrouble to obtain a clear impression of thatwonderful problem which, like a coin longpassed from hand to hand, has lost its originaland highly conspicuous stamp. Poetical works,which cause the hearts of even the greatest gen-iuses to fail when they endeavour to vie withthem, and in which unsurpassable images areheld up for the admiration of posterity—and

yet the poet who wrote them with only a hol-low, shaky name, whenever we do lay hold onhim; nowhere the solid kernel of a powerfulpersonality. "For who would wage war withthe gods: who, even with the one god?" asksGoethe even, who, though a genius, strove invain to solve that mysterious problem of theHomeric inaccessibility.

The conception of popular poetry seemed tolead like a bridge over this problem—a deeperand more original power than that of everysingle creative individual was said to have be-come active; the happiest people, in the happi-est period of its existence, in the highest activityof fantasy and formative power, was said tohave created those immeasurable poems. Inthis universality there is something almost in-toxicating in the thought of a popular poem: wefeel, with artistic pleasure, the broad, overpow-ering liberation of a popular gift, and we de-light in this natural phenomenon as we do in

an uncontrollable cataract. But as soon as weexamine this thought at close quarters, we in-voluntarily put a poetic mass of people in theplace of the poetising soul of the people: a longrow of popular poets in whom individualityhas no meaning, and in whom the tumultuousmovement of a people's soul, the intuitivestrength of a people's eye, and the unabatedprofusion of a people's fantasy, were oncepowerful: a row of original geniuses, attachedto a time, to a poetic genus, to a subject-matter.

Such a conception justly made people suspi-cious. Could it be possible that that same Na-ture who so sparingly distributed her rarestand most precious production—genius—should suddenly take the notion of lavishingher gifts in one sole direction? And here thethorny question again made its appearance:Could we not get along with one genius only,and explain the present existence of that unat-tainable excellence? And now eyes were keenly

on the lookout for whatever that excellence andsingularity might consist of. Impossible for it tobe in the construction of the complete works,said one party, for this is far from faultless; butdoubtless to be found in single songs: in thesingle pieces above all; not in the whole. A sec-ond party, on the other hand, sheltered them-selves beneath the authority of Aristotle, whoespecially admired Homer's "divine" nature inthe choice of his entire subject, and the mannerin which he planned and carried it out. If, how-ever, this construction was not clearly seen, thisfault was due to the way the poems werehanded down to posterity and not to the poethimself—it was the result of retouchings andinterpolations, owing to which the original set-ting of the work gradually became obscured.The more the first school looked for inequali-ties, contradictions, perplexities, the more ener-getically did the other school brush aside whatin their opinion obscured the original plan, inorder, if possible, that nothing might be left

remaining but the actual words of the originalepic itself. The second school of thought ofcourse held fast by the conception of an epoch-making genius as the composer of the greatworks. The first school, on the other hand, wa-vered between the supposition of one geniusplus a number of minor poets, and another hy-pothesis which assumed only a number of su-perior and even mediocre individual bards, butalso postulated a mysterious discharging, adeep, national, artistic impulse, which showsitself in individual minstrels as an almost indif-ferent medium. It is to this latter school that wemust attribute the representation of the Ho-meric poems as the expression of that mysteri-ous impulse.

All these schools of thought start from the as-sumption that the problem of the present formof these epics can be solved from the stand-point of an æsthetic judgment—but we mustawait the decision as to the authorised line of

demarcation between the man of genius andthe poetical soul of the people. Are there char-acteristic differences between the utterances ofthe man of genius and the poetical soul of the peo-ple?

This whole contrast, however, is unjust andmisleading. There is no more dangerous as-sumption in modern æsthetics than that ofpopular poetry and individual poetry, or, as it isusually called, artistic poetry. This is the reac-tion, or, if you will, the superstition, which fol-lowed upon the most momentous discovery ofhistorico-philological science, the discoveryand appreciation of the soul of the people. Forthis discovery prepared the way for a comingscientific view of history, which was until then,and in many respects is even now, a mere col-lection of materials, with the prospect that newmaterials would continue to be added, and thatthe huge, overflowing pile would never be sys-tematically arranged. The people now under-

stood for the first time that the long-felt powerof greater individualities and wills was largerthan the pitifully small will of an individualman;[1] they now saw that everything trulygreat in the kingdom of the will could not haveits deepest root in the inefficacious and ephem-eral individual will; and, finally, they now dis-covered the powerful instincts of the masses,and diagnosed those unconscious impulses tobe the foundations and supports of the so-called universal history. But the newly-lightedflame also cast its shadow: and this shadowwas none other than that superstition alreadyreferred to, which popular poetry set up in op-position to individual poetry, and thusenlarged the comprehension of the people'ssoul to that of the people's mind. By the misap-plication of a tempting analogical inference,people had reached the point of applying in thedomain of the intellect and artistic ideas thatprinciple of greater individuality which is trulyapplicable only in the domain of the will. The

masses have never experienced more flatteringtreatment than in thus having the laurel of gen-ius set upon their empty heads. It was imag-ined that new shells were forming round asmall kernel, so to speak, and that those piecesof popular poetry originated like avalanches, inthe drift and flow of tradition. They were, how-ever, ready to consider that kernel as being ofthe smallest possible dimensions, so that theymight occasionally get rid of it altogether with-out losing anything of the mass of the ava-lanche. According to this view, the text itselfand the stories built round it are one and thesame thing.

[1] Of course Nietzsche saw afterwards thatthis was not so.—TR.

Now, however, such a contrast between popu-lar poetry and individual poetry does not existat all; on the contrary, all poetry, and of coursepopular poetry also, requires an intermediaryindividuality. This much-abused contrast,

therefore, is necessary only when the term indi-vidual poem is understood to mean a poemwhich has not grown out of the soil of popularfeeling, but which has been composed by anon-popular poet in a non-popular atmos-phere—something which has come to maturityin the study of a learned man, for example.

With the superstition which presupposes poet-ising masses is connected another: that popularpoetry is limited to one particular period of apeople's history and afterwards dies out—which indeed follows as a consequence of thefirst superstition I have mentioned. Accordingto this school, in the place of the gradually de-caying popular poetry we have artistic poetry,the work of individual minds, not of masses ofpeople. But the same powers which were onceactive are still so; and the form in which theyact has remained exactly the same. The greatpoet of a literary period is still a popular poetin no narrower sense than the popular poet of

an illiterate age. The difference between them isnot in the way they originate, but it is their dif-fusion and propagation, in short, tradition. Thistradition is exposed to eternal danger withoutthe help of handwriting, and runs the risk ofincluding in the poems the remains of thoseindividualities through whose oral traditionthey were handed down.

If we apply all these principles to the Homericpoems, it follows that we gain nothing with ourtheory of the poetising soul of the people, andthat we are always referred back to the poeticalindividual. We are thus confronted with thetask of distinguishing that which can haveoriginated only in a single poetical mind fromthat which is, so to speak, swept up by the tideof oral tradition, and which is a highly impor-tant constituent part of the Homeric poems.

Since literary history first ceased to be a merecollection of names, people have attempted tograsp and formulate the individualities of the

poets. A certain mechanism forms part of themethod: it must be explained—i.e., it must bededuced from principles—why this or that in-dividuality appears in this way and not in that.People now study biographical details, envi-ronment, acquaintances, contemporary events,and believe that by mixing all these ingredientstogether they will be able to manufacture thewished-for individuality. But they forget thatthe punctum saliens, the indefinable individualcharacteristics, can never be obtained from acompound of this nature. The less there isknown about the life and times of the poet, theless applicable is this mechanism. When, how-ever, we have merely the works and the nameof the writer, it is almost impossible to detectthe individuality, at all events, for those whoput their faith in the mechanism in question;and particularly when the works are perfect,when they are pieces of popular poetry. For thebest way for these mechanicians to grasp indi-vidual characteristics is by perceiving devia-

tions from the genius of the people; the aberra-tions and hidden allusions: and the fewer dis-crepancies to be found in a poem the fainterwill be the traces of the individual poet whocomposed it.

All those deviations, everything dull and belowthe ordinary standard which scholars thinkthey perceive in the Homeric poems, were at-tributed to tradition, which thus became thescapegoat. What was left of Homer's own indi-vidual work? Nothing but a series of beautifuland prominent passages chosen in accordancewith subjective taste. The sum total of æstheticsingularity which every individual scholar per-ceived with his own artistic gifts, he now calledHomer.

This is the central point of the Homeric errors.The name of Homer, from the very beginning,has no connection either with the conception ofæsthetic perfection or yet with the Iliad and theOdyssey. Homer as the composer of the Iliad

and the Odyssey is not a historical tradition, butan æsthetic judgment.

The only path which leads back beyond thetime of Pisistratus and helps us to elucidate themeaning of the name Homer, takes its way onthe one hand through the reports which havereached us concerning Homer's birthplace:from which we see that, although his name isalways associated with heroic epic poems, he ison the other hand no more referred to as thecomposer of the Iliad and the Odyssey than asthe author of the Thebais or any other cyclicalepic. On the other hand, again, an old traditiontells of the contest between Homer and Hesiod,which proves that when these two names werementioned people instinctively thought of twoepic tendencies, the heroic and the didactic; andthat the signification of the name "Homer" wasincluded in the material category and not in theformal. This imaginary contest with Hesiod didnot even yet show the faintest presentiment of

individuality. From the time of Pisistratus on-wards, however, with the surprisingly rapiddevelopment of the Greek feeling for beauty,the differences in the æsthetic value of thoseepics continued to be felt more and more: theIliad and the Odyssey arose from the depths ofthe flood and have remained on the surfaceever since. With this process of æsthetic separa-tion, the conception of Homer gradually be-came narrower: the old material meaning of thename "Homer" as the father of the heroic epicpoem, was changed into the æsthetic meaningof Homer, the father of poetry in general, andlikewise its original prototype. This transforma-tion was contemporary with the rationalisticcriticism which made Homer the magician outto be a possible poet, which vindicated the ma-terial and formal traditions of those numerousepics as against the unity of the poet, and gra-dually removed that heavy load of cyclical ep-ics from Homer's shoulders.

So Homer, the poet of the Iliad and the Odyssey,is an æsthetic judgment. It is, however, by nomeans affirmed against the poet of these epicsthat he was merely the imaginary being of anæsthetic impossibility, which can be the opin-ion of only very few philologists indeed. Themajority contend that a single individual wasresponsible for the general design of a poemsuch as the Iliad, and further that this individ-ual was Homer. The first part of this contentionmay be admitted; but, in accordance with whatI have said, the latter part must be denied. AndI very much doubt whether the majority ofthose who adopt the first part of the contentionhave taken the following considerations intoaccount.

The design of an epic such as the Iliad is not anentire whole, not an organism; but a number ofpieces strung together, a collection of reflec-tions arranged in accordance with æsthetic ru-les. It is certainly the standard of an artist's

greatness to note what he can take in with asingle glance and set out in rhythmical form.The infinite profusion of images and incidentsin the Homeric epic must force us to admit thatsuch a wide range of vision is next to impossi-ble. Where, however, a poet is unable to ob-serve artistically with a single glance, he usu-ally piles conception on conception, and en-deavours to adjust his characters according to acomprehensive scheme.

He will succeed in this all the better the morehe is familiar with the fundamental principlesof æsthetics: he will even make some believethat he made himself master of the entire sub-ject by a single powerful glance.

The Iliad is not a garland, but a bunch of flow-ers. As many pictures as possible are crowdedon one canvas; but the man who placed themthere was indifferent as to whether the group-ing of the collected pictures was invariablysuitable and rhythmically beautiful. He well

knew that no one would ever consider the col-lection as a whole; but would merely look atthe individual parts. But that stringing togetherof some pieces as the manifestations of a graspof art which was not yet highly developed, stillless thoroughly comprehended and generallyesteemed, cannot have been the real Homericdeed, the real Homeric epoch-making event.On the contrary, this design is a later product,far later than Homer's celebrity. Those, there-fore, who look for the "original and perfect de-sign" are looking for a mere phantom; for thedangerous path of oral tradition had reached itsend just as the systematic arrangement ap-peared on the scene; the disfigurements whichwere caused on the way could not have af-fected the design, for this did not form part ofthe material handed down from generation togeneration.

The relative imperfection of the design mustnot, however, prevent us from seeing in the

designer a different personality from the realpoet. It is not only probable that everythingwhich was created in those times with con-scious æsthetic insight, was infinitely inferior tothe songs that sprang up naturally in the poet'smind and were written down with instinctivepower: we can even take a step further. If weinclude the so-called cyclic poems in this com-parison, there remains for the designer of theIliad and the Odyssey the indisputable merit ofhaving done something relatively great in thisconscious technical composing: a merit whichwe might have been prepared to recognisefrom the beginning, and which is in my opinionof the very first order in the domain of instinc-tive creation. We may even be ready to pro-nounce this synthetisation of great importance.All those dull passages and discrepancies—deemed of such importance, but really onlysubjective, which we usually look upon as thepetrified remains of the period of tradition—arenot these perhaps merely the almost necessary

evils which must fall to the lot of the poet ofgenius who undertakes a composition virtuallywithout a parallel, and, further, one whichproves to be of incalculable difficulty?

Let it be noted that the insight into the mostdiverse operations of the instinctive and theconscious changes the position of the Homericproblem; and in my opinion throws light uponit.

We believe in a great poet as the author of theIliad and the Odyssey—but not that Homer wasthis poet.

The decision on this point has already beengiven. The generation that invented those nu-merous Homeric fables, that poetised the mythof the contest between Homer and Hesiod, andlooked upon all the poems of the epic cycle asHomeric, did not feel an æsthetic but a materialsingularity when it pronounced the name"Homer." This period regards Homer as be-

longing to the ranks of artists like Orpheus,Eumolpus, Dædalus, and Olympus, the mythi-cal discoverers of a new branch of art, to whom,therefore, all the later fruits which grew fromthe new branch were thankfully dedicated.

And that wonderful genius to whom we owethe Iliad and the Odyssey belongs to this thank-ful posterity: he, too, sacrificed his name on thealtar of the primeval father of the Homeric epic,Homeros.

Up to this point, gentlemen, I think I have beenable to put before you the fundamental phi-losophical and æsthetic characteristics of theproblem of the personality of Homer, keepingall minor details rigorously at a distance, on thesupposition that the primary form of this wide-spread and honeycombed mountain known asthe Homeric question can be most clearly ob-served by looking down at it from a far-offheight. But I have also, I imagine, recalled twofacts to those friends of antiquity who take such

delight in accusing us philologists of lack ofpiety for great conceptions and an unproduc-tive zeal for destruction. In the first place, those"great" conceptions—such, for example, as thatof the indivisible and inviolable poetic genius,Homer—were during the pre-Wolfian periodonly too great, and hence inwardly altogetherempty and elusive when we now try to graspthem. If classical philology goes back again tothe same conceptions, and once more tries topour new wine into old bottles, it is only on thesurface that the conceptions are the same: eve-rything has really become new; bottle andmind, wine and word. We everywhere findtraces of the fact that philology has lived incompany with poets, thinkers, and artists forthe last hundred years: whence it has nowcome about that the heap of ashes formerlypointed to as classical philology is now turnedinto fruitful and even rich soil.[2]

[2] Nietzsche perceived later on that this state-ment was, unfortunately, not justified.—TR.

And there is a second fact which I should liketo recall to the memory of those friends of an-tiquity who turn their dissatisfied backs onclassical philology. You honour the immortalmasterpieces of the Hellenic mind in poetryand sculpture, and think yourselves so muchmore fortunate than preceding generations,which had to do without them; but you mustnot forget that this whole fairyland once layburied under mountains of prejudice, and thatthe blood and sweat and arduous labour ofinnumerable followers of our science were allnecessary to lift up that world from the chasminto which it had sunk. We grant that philologyis not the creator of this world, not the com-poser of that immortal music; but is it not amerit, and a great merit, to be a mere virtuoso,and let the world for the first time hear thatmusic which lay so long in obscurity, despised

and undecipherable? Who was Homer previ-ously to Wolf's brilliant investigations? A goodold man, known at best as a "natural genius," atall events the child of a barbaric age, repletewith faults against good taste and good morals.Let us hear how a learned man of the first rankwrites about Homer even so late as 1783:"Where does the good man live? Why did heremain so long incognito? Apropos, can't youget me a silhouette of him?"

We demand thanks—not in our own name, forwe are but atoms—but in the name of philologyitself, which is indeed neither a Muse nor aGrace, but a messenger of the gods: and just asthe Muses descended upon the dull and tor-mented Bœotian peasants, so Philology comesinto a world full of gloomy colours and pic-tures, full of the deepest, most incurable woes;and speaks to men comfortingly of the beauti-ful and godlike figure of a distant, rosy, andhappy fairyland.

It is time to close; yet before I do so a fewwords of a personal character must be added,justified, I hope, by the occasion of this lecture.

It is but right that a philologist should describehis end and the means to it in the short formulaof a confession of faith; and let this be done inthe saying of Seneca which I thus reverse—

"Philosophia facta est quæ philologia fuit."

By this I wish to signify that all philologicalactivities should be enclosed and surroundedby a philosophical view of things, in whicheverything individual and isolated is evapo-rated as something detestable, and in whichgreat homogeneous views alone remain. Now,therefore, that I have enunciated my philologi-cal creed, I trust you will give me cause to hopethat I shall no longer be a stranger among you:give me the assurance that in working with youtowards this end I am worthily fulfilling the

confidence with which the highest authoritiesof this community have honoured me.