Their tongues are all paralyzed. It is the _silentium
livoris_ described by Seneca. This malicious silence, which is
technically known as _ignoring_, may for a long time interfere with
the growth of reputation; if, as happens in the higher walks of
learning, where a man's immediate audience is wholly composed of rival
workers and professed students, who then form the channel of his fame,
the greater public is obliged to use its suffrage without being able
to examine the matter for itself. And if, in the end, that malicious
silence is broken in upon by the voice of praise, it will be but
seldom that this happens entirely apart from some ulterior aim,
pursued by those who thus manipulate justice. For, as Goethe says in
the _West-oestlicher Divan_, a man can get no recognition, either from
many persons or from only one, unless it is to publish abroad the
critic's own discernment:
_Denn es ist kein Anerkenen,
Weder Vieler, noch des Einen,
Wenn es nicht am Tage foerdert,
Wo man selbst was moechte scheinen_.
The credit you allow to another man engaged in work similar to your
own or akin to it, must at bottom be withdrawn from yourself; and you
can praise him only at the expense of your own claims.
Accordingly, mankind is in itself not at all inclined to award praise
and reputation; it is more disposed to blame and find fault, whereby
it indirectly praises itself.
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