Seize at once the opportunity here
offered you; reflect clearly upon the theme presented for your
deliberation; and the clarity which has dawned for you in one point
will gradually spread over all others as well.
These addresses adjure you, old men! You are regarded as you have just
heard, and you are told so to your faces; and for his own past the
speaker frankly adds that--excluding the exceptions which, it must
be admitted, not infrequently occur, and which are all the more
admirable--the world is perfectly right with regard to the great
majority among you. Go through the history of the last two or three
decades; everything except yourselves agrees--and even you yourselves
agree, each one in the specialty that does not immediately concern
him--that (always excluding the exceptions, and regarding only the
majority) the greatest uselessness and selfishness are found in
advanced years in all branches, in science as well as in practical
occupations. The whole world has witnessed that every one who desired
the better and the more perfect still had to wage the bitterest battle
with you in addition to the battle with his own uncertainty and with
his other surroundings; that you were firmly resolved that nothing
must thrive which you had not done and known in the same way; that you
regarded every impulse of thought as an insult to your intelligence;
and that you left no power unutilized to conquer in this battle
against improvement--and in fact you generally did prevail.
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