Lecture II

Much of what was at one time far more intensely established in the social order of humanity, we have today merely in our language, and since our language has in many respects become phrases we have it in the phrase. Just recollect in how many cases and to what an extent people are accustomed to use the little word “one”—“one” thinks so, “one” does this, “one” says this, and so on, although in most cases it is merely a phrase and means nothing at all. The little pronoun “one” really has meaning only in the speech which still belongs to a people in which the separate member has not become such a strong individuality as in our time, in which the words of a single person express with a certain right a common judgment.