we are not quite sure of our own selves. That, betimes, we surrounded ourselves with the thorny hedges of the most pointed contempt, lest, at the critical moment, when age makes us work and forgetful, we might be inclined to climb across our own contempt?Frankly, this conjecture is an erroneous one, and he who forms it knows nothing of what agitates anddetermines the independent thinker: how little do his changes of opinion appear to him contemptible in themselves! How highly, on the contrary, does he honour in the faculty of changing his opinion, a rare and high distinction, especially if it extends far into old age.His ambition (and not his pusillanimity) reaches up even to the forbidden fruits of the ‘’speruere se sperui’’ (contempt for his despisers) and the ‘’speruere se ipsum’’ (contempt for self): not to mention theadditional anxieties of a rain and easy-going man.Besides he esteems the doctrine of the innocence of all opinions to be as safe as the doctrine of the innocence of all actions : how could he pose as judge and executioner before the apostate from intellectual freedom? His sight would more probably repel him, as the sight of any one who has somedisease repels the physician. The physical disgust of the spongy, mollified, rank, suppurating, for a moment conquers reason and the desire to assist. Hence our readiness is overcome by the notion of the gigantic dishonesty which must have prevailed in the apostate
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