Even the bravest of us rarely has the courage for what he knows…

Nietzsche

In his small, strange little book, Twilight of the Idols, Nietzsche discussed the “problem of Socrates,” starting from the premise that “the great sages are declining types.” He suggested that Socrates and Plato were “symptoms of decay” and “agents of the dissolution of Greece.” In fact, he claimed they were “pseudo-Greek [and] anti-Greek.”[1] Of course, Nietzsche saw a parallel with modernity. He saw that modern thinkers have also proven to be declining types. In fact, our thinkers, our intellectuals, have busied themselves with destroying civilization through the “organization of political hatreds.”