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Last of all, the Germans have upon their conscience their attitude to himself, their indifference, their lack of recognition, the silence in which they buried his life's work. The Germans are bad company. And although his autobiography ends with a poem in which he affects a scorn of fame, "that coin in which the whole world pays, but which he receives with gloved hands and tramples underfoot with loathing "—yet his failure to win renown in Germany during his lifetime contributed powerfully to foster his antipathy.

The exaltation that marks the whole tone of the work, the unrestrained self-esteem which animates it and is ominous of the near approach of madness, have not deprived Ecce Homo of its character of surpassing greatness.