So long as Christ signified God, one could take a certain amount of comfort; for God's ways are marvellous, and if he actually wanted to go through the ultimate in terms of human suffering and humiliation, it was understandable that he descended to the level of the most despised and despicable people, the Jews, who, after all, had also been made by him. (For at that time people failed to notice that it was the Jews, too, who had made this God; because of their own belief in God, people were not able to hold the Jews guilty here. They only begin to become aware of it as a result of the tremendous progress of the Enlightenment, which brings the full malice toward Jews to light for the first time). Now, however, the more Christ stands recognized in general terms as a man, the more ill-starred the Jew Christ becomes. Christ a Jew?! In that case—given the undoubtedly true racial theory—how could the Jewish race be inferior? Then we, who have not produced such a genius, would be the inferior race! This is nonsense, since we are the highest race, as the scientific truth of the racial theory proves, and this in turn demonstrates the indubitable scientific integrity and truth of the theory itself. This Christ is ruining the whole racial theory!

The greater the genius, the less effect he will have directly on his age, the less attention he will attract from those who would be in a position to record interesting details about his life. The genius is invisible to those who surround him; those who are closest to him will have forgotten the little they (poorly enough) observed, or else they will have died, before the age begins to take casual notice of him. And even when it does, it will be for its own purposes, which are not those of the genius. For instance, we can see how rapidly practically everything of a personal nature, concerning a man of some signficance, is forgotten, in the almost entirely inconsequential attempt by J.H. Mackay to produce a life of Max Stirner. Max Stirner died in Berlin in 1856. No critic has ever had doubts about the fact that he lived, nor did any critic concern himself with his life. And now, in spite of the most industrious research which began immediately after Stirner's death, there is almost nothing left to discover and describe. This is how things are in modern times, which, in that respect as in all essentials, are as like former times as two peas. Thus, in our case too, the argumentum e silentio must be seen as evidence that, at that time, criticism in Galilee and Judaea failed to take the proper interest in Christ that it ought to have done. Now, therefore, it should hold its tongue.

The greater the genius, the less effect he will have directly on his age, the less attention he will attract from those who would be in a position to record interesting details about his life. The genius is invisible to those who surround him; those who are closest to him will have forgotten the little they (poorly enough) observed, or else they will have died, before the age begins to take casual notice of him. And even when it does, it will be for its own purposes, which are not those of the genius. For instance, we can see how rapidly practically everything of a personal nature, concerning a man of some signficance, is forgotten, in the almost entirely inconsequential attempt by J.H. Mackay to produce a life of Max Stirner. Max Stirner died in Berlin in 1856. No critic has ever had doubts about the fact that he lived, nor did any critic concern himself with his life. And now, in spite of the most industrious research which began immediately after Stirner's death, there is almost nothing left to discover and describe. This is how things are in modern times, which, in that respect as in all essentials, are as like former times as two peas. Thus, in our case too, the argumentum e silentio must be seen as evidence that, at that time, criticism in Galilee and Judaea failed to take the proper interest in Christ that it ought to have done. Now, therefore, it should hold its tongue.