The difference between maxims such as those of Wilde and those Nietzsche is this: one offers his remarks to a divided audience, the mockers and the mocked; those present, those absent; those up with us, thos far behind. Because of this divisive policy such remarks fail to be truly public. Nietzsche, in contrast, speaks to one listener, or, we could say, to none. The imagined reader is so little characterised that anyone may imagine themselves addressed. This is a triumph of manners beyond anything that Wilde imagined, and yet it is a weakness, and a temptation to misuse.