Naphta vs. Settembrini - Part 1 (MM12) (2024) Painting by Noël Van Hoof

Thomas Mann – The Magic Mountain – Part 12

“Aha,” Hans Castorp said to himself, “you improper Jesuit with your permutations and interpretations of the crucifixion. It's clear enough why you did not became a priest, a handsome Jesuit with a little moist spot! Well, lion, roar,” he thought, turning toward Herr Settembrini. And “roar” he did, declaring everything Naphta had said to be chicanery, humbug, confusion. “Admit it,” he shouted at his adversary, “admit it, by your responsibility as a pedagogue, confess it before the ears of impressionable youth, say it straight out: your Spirit is illness. No doubt of it, that will rouse them for your Spirit, that will win them to the taith. Go ahead and explain how illness and death are noble, but health and life are sordid – that's the surest method for engaging these pupils in the service of humanity. Davvero, è criminoso!” And like a knight entering the lists, he championed the nobility of health and life, the nobility that had been granted by nature and did not need to fear Spirit. “Form!” he said. And Naphta grandiloquently responded, “Logos!” But he who would not hear of the logos, said, “Reason!” And the man of the logos defended “Passion!” Confusion reigned. “Objective reality,”shouted one; “The self!” cried the other. Finally one side was talking about “Art!” and the other about “Criticism!” And both constantly returned to “Nature!” and “Spirit!” and to which of them was more noble, and to the issue of “true aristocracy.” But there was no clarity, no order not even of a dualistic and militant sort; for it was all not only contradictory, but also topsy-turvy, and the disputants not only contradicted one another, but also themselves.

(English translation by John E. Woods)

Related themes

Thomas MannThe Magic MountainDer ZauberbergNaphtaSettembrini