The Case of Wagner Complete Works, Volume 8 · Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
30
The peculiarly significant situation of philologists: a class of people to whom we entrust our youth, and who have to investigate quite a special antiquity. The highest value is obviously attached to this antiquity. But if this antiquity has been wrongly valued, then the whole foundation upon which the high position of the philologist is based suddenly collapses. In any case this antiquity has been very differently valued; and our appreciation of the philologists has constantly been guided by it. These people have borrowed their power from the strong prejudices in favour of antiquity,--this must be made clear. Philologists now feel that when these prejudices are at last refuted, and antiquity depicted in its true colours, the favourable prejudices towards them will diminish considerably. _It is thus to the interest of their profession not to let a clear impression of antiquity come to light: in particular the impression that antiquity in its highest sense renders one "out of season"_ i.e., _an enemy to one's own time._ It is also to the interest of philologists as a class not to let their calling as teachers be regarded from a higher standpoint than that to which they themselves can correspond.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.