It was a small cage, formerly inhabited by a panther who had regrettably died before his time. The enterprising owner had done his best to furnish it for the occasion, something of a problem, for this Steppenwolf was undoubtedly a rather unusual animal. Just as our friends and lawyers and industrialists allegedly have a wolf concealed beneath their shirts and frock coats, so in his hairy breast this wolf allegedly concealed a complex human soul, Mozart arias, and so on.
It’s horrible. It cannot be doubted that mankind, of whose life we have just heard a sampling, is mad. It is our descendants, the sons of our sons, the great-grandchildren of our great-grandchildren, that we have heard saying such dismal, distressing, confusing things, uttering such horrifying screams, and singing those incomprehensible, idiotic verses. Our descendants, friend Faust, will end in madness.