Silencing the children

More from Shestov: He finds an allegory of metaphysics in Anderson’s tale of the emperor’s new clothes and the child who declares the king naked. Children are always the obstacle in keeping up the charade about the emperor’s clothes. What’s to be done about the children?

Shestov says, “With them the only remedy is the Pythagorean system of upbringing, so glorified by Hegel. Children must keep silent and not raise their voice until they realise that some things may not be talked about. This is our method. With us pupils remain silent, not only for five years, as the Pythagoreans recommended, but for ten or more – until they have learned to speak like their masters. And then they are granted a freedom which is no longer any good to them” (35).