* In itself the confusion is quite amusing, and since it is not so dialectically [XIII
* In itself the confusion is quite amusing, and since it is not so dialectically [XIII 423] difficult that it cannot easily and entertainingly be portrayed on one page, I shall do it here. An imaginative constructor [Experimentator] says: In order to become properly aware of what is decisive in the religious existence-categories, since religiousness is very often confused with all sorts of things and with apathy, I shall imaginatively construct [experimentere] a character who lives in a final and extreme approximation of madness but tends toward the religious. The imaginative constructor himself says that the point of view of the imaginatively constructed character [Experimenterede] is a deviation but adds that he is doing the whole imaginary construction [Experiment] in order to study normality by means of the passion of deviation (p. 309).97 He himself declares that it is a very strenuous task to hold the imaginatively constructed character [Experimenterede] at this extremity while he himself supervises imaginatively constructively. The difficulty is to keep the imaginatively constructed character at the terminal point where it never becomes madness [XIII 424] but is constantly on the brink. Now comes Mr. P. L. Møller’s charge: “It is almost insanity, it is the preliminary stage of madness.”98 Reply: Absolutely right, that is precisely the difficulty of the task. Consequently, the charge is an acknowledgment, which I do not deny is slight, for, after all, it is Mr. P. L. Møller’s, but on the other hand it perhaps is Mr. P.L.M.’s maximum. Presumably he will be capable of appreciating a dialectical work that is as crucial and decisive as my imaginary construction only when he himself is unaware that he is doing it, when after dinner he blissfully imagines that he is attacking it. After dinner—for I certainly assume that the same will happen to him after reading it, but nevertheless I hold to the given fact that it was after dinner; this stipulation is less indefinite and completely reliable. After dinner he attacks the imaginary construction, he charges it with bordering on insanity, but that was just exactly what the imaginary construction intended. Consequently, his attack is the defense, which I do not deny is insignificant, for, after all, it comes from Mr. P. L. Møller, but for him the precarious maximum of the vehemence of an attack is always that it becomes a defense. He has finished the imaginary construction; in fact, he judges it, and what is his judgment? That it borders on insanity. But that was precisely the task; so he is back at the beginning. And what does his judgment signify? Well, at most it means: It is a very difficult task. Reply: Without a doubt, Mr. P. L. Møller, and since it is after dinner and you no doubt already have thanked Professor Hauch for the food, I shall wish you: velbekomme.101
[XIII 426] * Only the person who carelessly confuses him with the quidam [someone]106 of the imaginary construction or has turned the page where he begins, without a new title page, to be sure, and with a totally different style, can think anything else, which is like confusing physician and patient, Jean Paul and Schmelzle,107 Cervantes and the licentiate.108 Only a completely worldly person utterly devoid of a concept of religiousness, virtually admiring Johannes the Seducer,109 and with an arrogant notion of what it is to be healthy, can suppose that even quidam’s suffering is a blasé state of mind. And only a person who carelessly pages through a book can think that the quædam110 of the imaginary construction is being used to be spun into a dialectical web, since the whole imaginary construction revolves around spinning her out and ends with her complete restitutio in integrum [restitution to the original state]111 under absolutely the most favorable conditions. All this is in my interest, the imaginative constructor’s, who therefore points out again and again that if the relation is regarded for one single moment from the standpoint of egotism, it vanishes, and the imaginary construction is impossible.