The Vulgar

Friedrich von Schiller, from his Preface to the first edition of The Robbers, 1781:

The vulgar—among whom I would not be understood to mean merely the rabble—the vulgar, I say (between ourselves), extend their influence far around, and unfortunately—set the fashion. . . . Let as many friends of truth as you will, instruct their fellow-citizens in the pulpit and on the stage, the vulgar will never cease to be vulgar, though the sun and the moon may change their course, and «heaven and earth wax old as a garment».