GOETHE TO ZELTER.
Weimar, 6th June, 1825
"Railways, quick mails, steamships, and every possible kind of facility in the way of communication are what the educated world has in view, that it may over-educate itself, and thereby continue in a state of mediocrity.
And it is, moreover, the result of universality, that a mediocre culture should become common... Properly speaking, this is the century for men with heads on their shoulders, for practical men of quick perceptions, who, because they possess a certain adroitness, feel their superiority to the multitude, even though they themselves may not be gifted in the highest degree. Let us, as far as possible, keep that mind with which we came hither; we, and perhaps a few others, shall be the last of an epoch which will not so soon return again."
