The essay did not always exist. Nor was the idea of recording one's personal introspections, whether in private diary or public form, always valued. It took centuries of evolution, from Seneca's philosophical epistles to the Christian confessional and beyond, before twentieth-century students would b

Contemplative, Essays, Repetitive, Self-reflection, Tranquil, Witty

"Nothing is worse," Nietzsche once said, "than the smell of an ill-constituted soul." For this professor of Classics and son of a Protestant minister, things were not hidden, there were no secrets: the world revealed itself. From this base of materialism and realism, Nietzsche assaulted Christianity,

Bombast, Clever, Discourse as event, Dramatic, Epic, Euphoric, Flux, Joyful, Melancholy, Overflowing, Philosophy, Poststructuralism, Profane, Surface, Witty