Another try with my Goethe post...

?Hmm. Great man though Goethe undoubtedly was, he was very much up his own bottom when it came to his pronouncements on what he regarded as philosophical matters. There are hundreds of millions of people who not only understand the gritty reality of life but who also have to live it day after day. Sitting in your ivory tower musing about the higher flights of what you regard as reality is, well, just a bit unreal, ironically. A contemporary of Goethe who suffered the privations of chronic ill-health and unrequited love, and who died at a much younger age, produced far greater art than Goethe and never bothered to make high-flown pronouncements about the deficits of his fellow humans. His name was Ludwig van Beethoven. He and Goethe knew each other and didn't get on. I'm not surprised.