30 September 2008

Well Styled and Profound

From H.L. Menken, his introduction to his translations of Nietzche's Der Antichrist (which can be translated either "The Antichrist" or "The Antichristian"; both are probably intended) the second-to-last book Nietzsche ever wrote.
Because the average philosophical writer, when he essays to expose his ideas, makes such inordinate drafts upon the parts of speech that the dictionary is almost emptied, these defective observers jump to the conclusion that his intrinsic notions are of corresponding weight. This is not unseldom quite untrue. What makes philosophy so garrulous is not the profundity of philosophers, but their lack of art.
The book itself is equally stunning in its eloquence. As expected from Nietzsche.

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