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1Beyond Good and Evil
2Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm
3Published: 1886
4Categorie(s): Non-Fiction, Philosophy
5Source: http://en.wikisource.org
61
7About Nietzsche:
8Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (October 15, 1844 – August 25, 1900) was
9a German philosopher. His writing included critiques of religion, morality,
10contemporary culture, philosophy, and science, using a distinctive
11style and displaying a fondness for aphorism. Nietzsche's influence remains
12substantial within and beyond philosophy, notably in existentialism
13and postmodernism. Nietzsche began his career as a philologist before
14turning to philosophy. At the age of 24 he became Professor of Classical
15Philology at the University of Basel, but resigned in 1879 due to
16health problems, which would plague him for most of his life. In 1889 he
17exhibited symptoms of a serious mental illness, living out his remaining
18years in the care of his mother and sister until his death in 1900.
19Also available on Feedbooks for Nietzsche:
20• The Antichrist (1888)
21• Thus Spake Zarathustra (1885)
22Note: This book is brought to you by Feedbooks
23http://www.feedbooks.com
24Strictly for personal use, do not use this file for commercial purposes.
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26Preface
27SUPPOSING that Truth is a woman—what then? Is there not ground for
28suspecting that all philosophers, in so far as they have been dogmatists,
29have failed to understand women—that the terrible seriousness and
30clumsy importunity with which they have usually paid their addresses
31to Truth, have been unskilled and unseemly methods for winning a woman?
32Certainly she has never allowed herself to be won; and at present
33every kind of dogma stands with sad and discouraged mien—IF, indeed,
34it stands at all! For there are scoffers who maintain that it has fallen, that
35all dogma lies on the ground—nay more, that it is at its last gasp. But to
36speak seriously, there are good grounds for hoping that all dogmatizing
37in philosophy, whatever solemn, whatever conclusive and decided airs it
38has assumed, may have been only a noble puerilism and tyronism; and
39probably the time is at hand when it will be once and again understood
40WHAT has actually sufficed for the basis of such imposing and absolute
41philosophical edifices as the dogmatists have hitherto reared: perhaps
42some popular superstition of immemorial time (such as the soul-superstition,
43which, in the form of subject- and ego-superstition, has not yet
44ceased doing mischief): perhaps some play upon words, a deception on
45the part of grammar, or an audacious generalization of very restricted,
46very personal, very human—all-too-human facts. The philosophy of the
47dogmatists, it is to be hoped, was only a promise for thousands of years
48afterwards, as was astrology in still earlier times, in the service of which
49probably more labour, gold, acuteness, and patience have been spent
50than on any actual science hitherto: we owe to it, and to its "super- terrestrial"
51pretensions in Asia and Egypt, the grand style of architecture. It
52seems that in order to inscribe themselves upon the heart of humanity
53with everlasting claims, all great things have first to wander about the
54earth as enormous and awe- inspiring caricatures: dogmatic philosophy
55has been a caricature of this kind—for instance, the Vedanta doctrine in
56Asia, and Platonism in Europe. Let us not be ungrateful to it, although it
57must certainly be confessed that the worst, the most tiresome, and the
58most dangerous of errors hitherto has been a dogmatist error—namely,
59Plato's invention of Pure Spirit and the Good in Itself. But now when it
60has been surmounted, when Europe, rid of this nightmare, can again
61draw breath freely and at least enjoy a healthier—sleep, we, WHOSE
62DUTY IS WAKEFULNESS ITSELF, are the heirs of all the strength which
63the struggle against this error has fostered. It amounted to the very inversion
64of truth, and the denial of the PERSPECTIVE—the fundamental
653
66condition—of life, to speak of Spirit and the Good as Plato spoke of
67them; indeed one might ask, as a physician: "How did such a malady attack
68that finest product of antiquity, Plato? Had the wicked Socrates
69really corrupted him? Was Socrates after all a corrupter of youths, and
70deserved his hemlock?" But the struggle against Plato, or—to speak
71plainer, and for the "people"—the struggle against the ecclesiastical oppression
72of millenniums of Christianity (FOR CHRISITIANITY IS
73PLATONISM FOR THE "PEOPLE"), produced in Europe a magnificent
74tension of soul, such as had not existed anywhere previously; with such
75a tensely strained bow one can now aim at the furthest goals. As a matter
76of fact, the European feels this tension as a state of distress, and twice attempts
77have been made in grand style to unbend the bow: once by
78means of Jesuitism, and the second time by means of democratic enlightenment—
79which, with the aid of liberty of the press and newspaper-reading,
80might, in fact, bring it about that the spirit would not so easily find
81itself in "distress"! (The Germans invented gunpowder-all credit to them!
82but they again made things square—they invented printing.) But we,
83who are neither Jesuits, nor democrats, nor even sufficiently Germans,
84we GOOD EUROPEANS, and free, VERY free spirits—we have it still, all
85the distress of spirit and all the tension of its bow! And perhaps also the
86arrow, the duty, and, who knows? THE GOAL TO AIM AT… .
87Sils Maria Upper Engadine, JUNE, 1885.
884
89Chapter 1
90On the Prejudices of Philosophers
911. The Will to Truth, which is to tempt us to many a hazardous enterprise,
92the famous Truthfulness of which all philosophers have hitherto
93spoken with respect, what questions has this Will to Truth not laid before
94us! What strange, perplexing, questionable questions! It is already a
95long story; yet it seems as if it were hardly commenced. Is it any wonder
96if we at last grow distrustful, lose patience, and turn impatiently away?
97That this Sphinx teaches us at last to ask questions ourselves? WHO is it
98really that puts questions to us here? WHAT really is this "Will to Truth"
99in us? In fact we made a long halt at the question as to the origin of this
100Will—until at last we came to an absolute standstill before a yet more
101fundamental question. We inquired about the VALUE of this Will. Granted
102that we want the truth: WHY NOT RATHER untruth? And uncertainty?
103Even ignorance? The problem of the value of truth presented itself
104before us—or was it we who presented ourselves before the problem?
105Which of us is the Oedipus here? Which the Sphinx? It would seem
106to be a rendezvous of questions and notes of interrogation. And could it
107be believed that it at last seems to us as if the problem had never been
108propounded before, as if we were the first to discern it, get a sight of it,
109and RISK RAISING it? For there is risk in raising it, perhaps there is no
110greater risk.
1112. "HOW COULD anything originate out of its opposite? For example,
112truth out of error? or the Will to Truth out of the will to deception? or the
113generous deed out of selfishness? or the pure sun-bright vision of the
114wise man out of covetousness? Such genesis is impossible; whoever
115dreams of it is a fool, nay, worse than a fool; things of the highest value
116must have a different origin, an origin of THEIR own—in this transitory,
117seductive, illusory, paltry world, in this turmoil of delusion and cupidity,
118they cannot have their source. But rather in the lap of Being, in the
119intransitory, in the concealed God, in the 'Thing-in-itself— THERE must
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121be their source, and nowhere else!"—This mode of reasoning discloses
122the typical prejudice by which metaphysicians of all times can be recognized,
123this mode of valuation is at the back of all their logical procedure;
124through this "belief" of theirs, they exert themselves for their
125"knowledge," for something that is in the end solemnly christened "the
126Truth." The fundamental belief of metaphysicians is THE BELIEF IN
127ANTITHESES OF VALUES. It never occurred even to the wariest of
128them to doubt here on the very threshold (where doubt, however, was
129most necessary); though they had made a solemn vow, "DE OMNIBUS
130DUBITANDUM." For it may be doubted, firstly, whether antitheses exist
131at all; and secondly, whether the popular valuations and antitheses of
132value upon which metaphysicians have set their seal, are not perhaps
133merely superficial estimates, merely provisional perspectives, besides being
134probably made from some corner, perhaps from below—"frog perspectives,"
135as it were, to borrow an expression current among painters.
136In spite of all the value which may belong to the true, the positive, and
137the unselfish, it might be possible that a higher and more fundamental
138value for life generally should be assigned to pretence, to the will to delusion,
139to selfishness, and cupidity. It might even be possible that WHAT
140constitutes the value of those good and respected things, consists precisely
141in their being insidiously related, knotted, and crocheted to these
142evil and apparently opposed things—perhaps even in being essentially
143identical with them. Perhaps! But who wishes to concern himself with
144such dangerous "Perhapses"! For that investigation one must await the
145advent of a new order of philosophers, such as will have other tastes and
146inclinations, the reverse of those hitherto prevalent—philosophers of the
147dangerous "Perhaps" in every sense of the term. And to speak in all seriousness,
148I see such new philosophers beginning to appear.
1493. Having kept a sharp eye on philosophers, and having read between
150their lines long enough, I now say to myself that the greater part of conscious
151thinking must be counted among the Instinctive functions, and it
152is so even in the case of philosophical thinking; one has here to learn
153anew, as one learned anew about heredity and "innateness." As little as
154the act of birth comes into consideration in the whole process and procedure
155of heredity, just as little is "being-conscious" OPPOSED to the instinctive
156in any decisive sense; the greater part of the conscious thinking
157of a philosopher is secretly influenced by his instincts, and forced into
158definite channels. And behind all logic and its seeming sovereignty of
159movement, there are valuations, or to speak more plainly, physiological
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161demands, for the maintenance of a definite mode of life For example,
162that the certain is worth more than the uncertain, that illusion is less
163valuable than "truth" such valuations, in spite of their regulative importance
164for US, might notwithstanding be only superficial valuations, special
165kinds of maiserie, such as may be necessary for the maintenance of
166beings such as ourselves. Supposing, in effect, that man is not just the
167"measure of things."
1684. The falseness of an opinion is not for us any objection to it: it is here,
169perhaps, that our new language sounds most strangely. The question is,
170how far an opinion is life-furthering, life- preserving, species-preserving,
171perhaps species-rearing, and we are fundamentally inclined to maintain
172that the falsest opinions (to which the synthetic judgments a priori belong),
173are the most indispensable to us, that without a recognition of logical
174fictions, without a comparison of reality with the purely
175IMAGINED world of the absolute and immutable, without a constant
176counterfeiting of the world by means of numbers, man could not
177live—that the renunciation of false opinions would be a renunciation of
178life, a negation of life. TO RECOGNISE UNTRUTH AS A CONDITION
179OF LIFE; that is certainly to impugn the traditional ideas of value in a
180dangerous manner, and a philosophy which ventures to do so, has
181thereby alone placed itself beyond good and evil.
1825. That which causes philosophers to be regarded half- distrustfully
183and half-mockingly, is not the oft-repeated discovery how innocent they
184are—how often and easily they make mistakes and lose their way, in
185short, how childish and childlike they are,—but that there is not enough
186honest dealing with them, whereas they all raise a loud and virtuous
187outcry when the problem of truthfulness is even hinted at in the remotest
188manner. They all pose as though their real opinions had been discovered
189and attained through the self-evolving of a cold, pure, divinely indifferent
190dialectic (in contrast to all sorts of mystics, who, fairer and foolisher,
191talk of "inspiration"), whereas, in fact, a prejudiced proposition, idea, or
192"suggestion," which is generally their heart's desire abstracted and refined,
193is defended by them with arguments sought out after the event.
194They are all advocates who do not wish to be regarded as such, generally
195astute defenders, also, of their prejudices, which they dub "truths,"— and
196VERY far from having the conscience which bravely admits this to itself,
197very far from having the good taste of the courage which goes so far as
198to let this be understood, perhaps to warn friend or foe, or in cheerful
1997
200confidence and self-ridicule. The spectacle of the Tartuffery of old Kant,
201equally stiff and decent, with which he entices us into the dialectic byways
202that lead (more correctly mislead) to his "categorical imperative"—
203makes us fastidious ones smile, we who find no small amusement in
204spying out the subtle tricks of old moralists and ethical preachers. Or,
205still more so, the hocus-pocus in mathematical form, by means of which
206Spinoza has, as it were, clad his philosophy in mail and mask—in fact,
207the "love of HIS wisdom," to translate the term fairly and squarely—in
208order thereby to strike terror at once into the heart of the assailant who
209should dare to cast a glance on that invincible maiden, that Pallas
210Athene:—how much of personal timidity and vulnerability does this
211masquerade of a sickly recluse betray!
2126. It has gradually become clear to me what every great philosophy up
213till now has consisted of—namely, the confession of its originator, and a
214species of involuntary and unconscious auto-biography; and moreover
215that the moral (or immoral) purpose in every philosophy has constituted
216the true vital germ out of which the entire plant has always grown.
217Indeed, to understand how the abstrusest metaphysical assertions of a
218philosopher have been arrived at, it is always well (and wise) to first ask
219oneself: "What morality do they (or does he) aim at?" Accordingly, I do
220not believe that an "impulse to knowledge" is the father of philosophy;
221but that another impulse, here as elsewhere, has only made use of knowledge
222(and mistaken knowledge!) as an instrument. But whoever considers
223the fundamental impulses of man with a view to determining how
224far they may have here acted as INSPIRING GENII (or as demons and
225cobolds), will find that they have all practiced philosophy at one time or
226another, and that each one of them would have been only too glad to
227look upon itself as the ultimate end of existence and the legitimate LORD
228over all the other impulses. For every impulse is imperious, and as
229SUCH, attempts to philosophize. To be sure, in the case of scholars, in
230the case of really scientific men, it may be otherwise—"better," if you
231will; there there may really be such a thing as an "impulse to knowledge,"
232some kind of small, independent clock-work, which, when well
233wound up, works away industriously to that end, WITHOUT the rest of
234the scholarly impulses taking any material part therein. The actual
235"interests" of the scholar, therefore, are generally in quite another direction—
236in the family, perhaps, or in money-making, or in politics; it is, in
237fact, almost indifferent at what point of research his little machine is
238placed, and whether the hopeful young worker becomes a good
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240philologist, a mushroom specialist, or a chemist; he is not
241CHARACTERISED by becoming this or that. In the philosopher, on the
242contrary, there is absolutely nothing impersonal; and above all, his morality
243furnishes a decided and decisive testimony as to WHO HE IS,—that
244is to say, in what order the deepest impulses of his nature stand to each
245other.
2467. How malicious philosophers can be! I know of nothing more stinging
247than the joke Epicurus took the liberty of making on Plato and the
248Platonists; he called them Dionysiokolakes. In its original sense, and on
249the face of it, the word signifies "Flatterers of Dionysius"—consequently,
250tyrants' accessories and lick-spittles; besides this, however, it is as much
251as to say, "They are all ACTORS, there is nothing genuine about them"
252(for Dionysiokolax was a popular name for an actor). And the latter is
253really the malignant reproach that Epicurus cast upon Plato: he was annoyed
254by the grandiose manner, the mise en scene style of which Plato
255and his scholars were masters—of which Epicurus was not a master! He,
256the old school-teacher of Samos, who sat concealed in his little garden at
257Athens, and wrote three hundred books, perhaps out of rage and ambitious
258envy of Plato, who knows! Greece took a hundred years to find out
259who the garden-god Epicurus really was. Did she ever find out?
2608. There is a point in every philosophy at which the "conviction" of the
261philosopher appears on the scene; or, to put it in the words of an ancient
262mystery:
263Adventavit asinus, Pulcher et fortissimus.
2649. You desire to LIVE "according to Nature"? Oh, you noble Stoics,
265what fraud of words! Imagine to yourselves a being like Nature, boundlessly
266extravagant, boundlessly indifferent, without purpose or consideration,
267without pity or justice, at once fruitful and barren and uncertain:
268imagine to yourselves INDIFFERENCE as a power—how COULD you
269live in accordance with such indifference? To live—is not that just endeavouring
270to be otherwise than this Nature? Is not living valuing, preferring,
271being unjust, being limited, endeavouring to be different? And
272granted that your imperative, "living according to Nature," means actually
273the same as "living according to life"—how could you do
274DIFFERENTLY? Why should you make a principle out of what you
275yourselves are, and must be? In reality, however, it is quite otherwise
276with you: while you pretend to read with rapture the canon of your law
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278in Nature, you want something quite the contrary, you extraordinary
279stage-players and self-deluders! In your pride you wish to dictate your
280morals and ideals to Nature, to Nature herself, and to incorporate them
281therein; you insist that it shall be Nature "according to the Stoa," and
282would like everything to be made after your own image, as a vast, eternal
283glorification and generalism of Stoicism! With all your love for truth,
284you have forced yourselves so long, so persistently, and with such hypnotic
285rigidity to see Nature FALSELY, that is to say, Stoically, that you
286are no longer able to see it otherwise— and to crown all, some unfathomable
287superciliousness gives you the Bedlamite hope that BECAUSE you
288are able to tyrannize over yourselves—Stoicism is self-tyranny—Nature
289will also allow herself to be tyrannized over: is not the Stoic a PART of
290Nature?… But this is an old and everlasting story: what happened in old
291times with the Stoics still happens today, as soon as ever a philosophy
292begins to believe in itself. It always creates the world in its own image; it
293cannot do otherwise; philosophy is this tyrannical impulse itself, the
294most spiritual Will to Power, the will to "creation of the world," the will
295to the causa prima.
29610. The eagerness and subtlety, I should even say craftiness, with
297which the problem of "the real and the apparent world" is dealt with at
298present throughout Europe, furnishes food for thought and attention;
299and he who hears only a "Will to Truth" in the background, and nothing
300else, cannot certainly boast of the sharpest ears. In rare and isolated
301cases, it may really have happened that such a Will to Truth—a certain
302extravagant and adventurous pluck, a metaphysician's ambition of the
303forlorn hope—has participated therein: that which in the end always
304prefers a handful of "certainty" to a whole cartload of beautiful possibilities;
305there may even be puritanical fanatics of conscience, who prefer to
306put their last trust in a sure nothing, rather than in an uncertain
307something. But that is Nihilism, and the sign of a despairing, mortally
308wearied soul, notwithstanding the courageous bearing such a virtue may
309display. It seems, however, to be otherwise with stronger and livelier
310thinkers who are still eager for life. In that they side AGAINST appearance,
311and speak superciliously of "perspective," in that they rank the
312credibility of their own bodies about as low as the credibility of the ocular
313evidence that "the earth stands still," and thus, apparently, allowing
314with complacency their securest possession to escape (for what does one
315at present believe in more firmly than in one's body?),—who knows if
316they are not really trying to win back something which was formerly an
31710
318even securer possession, something of the old domain of the faith of
319former times, perhaps the "immortal soul," perhaps "the old God," in
320short, ideas by which they could live better, that is to say, more vigorously
321and more joyously, than by "modern ideas"? There is DISTRUST of
322these modern ideas in this mode of looking at things, a disbelief in all
323that has been constructed yesterday and today; there is perhaps some
324slight admixture of satiety and scorn, which can no longer endure the
325BRIC-A-BRAC of ideas of the most varied origin, such as so-called Positivism
326at present throws on the market; a disgust of the more refined taste
327at the village-fair motleyness and patchiness of all these reality-philosophasters,
328in whom there is nothing either new or true, except this motleyness.
329Therein it seems to me that we should agree with those skeptical
330anti-realists and knowledge-microscopists of the present day; their instinct,
331which repels them from MODERN reality, is unrefuted … what
332do their retrograde by-paths concern us! The main thing about them is
333NOT that they wish to go "back," but that they wish to get AWAY therefrom.
334A little MORE strength, swing, courage, and artistic power, and
335they would be OFF—and not back!
33611. It seems to me that there is everywhere an attempt at present to divert
337attention from the actual influence which Kant exercised on German
338philosophy, and especially to ignore prudently the value which he set
339upon himself. Kant was first and foremost proud of his Table of Categories;
340with it in his hand he said: "This is the most difficult thing that could
341ever be undertaken on behalf of metaphysics." Let us only understand
342this "could be"! He was proud of having DISCOVERED a new faculty in
343man, the faculty of synthetic judgment a priori. Granting that he deceived
344himself in this matter; the development and rapid flourishing of
345German philosophy depended nevertheless on his pride, and on the
346eager rivalry of the younger generation to discover if possible
347something—at all events "new faculties"—of which to be still
348prouder!—But let us reflect for a moment—it is high time to do so. "How
349are synthetic judgments a priori POSSIBLE?" Kant asks himself—and
350what is really his answer? "BY MEANS OF A MEANS (faculty)"—but
351unfortunately not in five words, but so circumstantially, imposingly, and
352with such display of German profundity and verbal flourishes, that one
353altogether loses sight of the comical niaiserie allemande involved in such
354an answer. People were beside themselves with delight over this new
355faculty, and the jubilation reached its climax when Kant further discovered
356a moral faculty in man—for at that time Germans were still
35711
358moral, not yet dabbling in the "Politics of hard fact." Then came the honeymoon
359of German philosophy. All the young theologians of the Tubingen
360institution went immediately into the groves—all seeking for
361"faculties." And what did they not find—in that innocent, rich, and still
362youthful period of the German spirit, to which Romanticism, the malicious
363fairy, piped and sang, when one could not yet distinguish between
364"finding" and "inventing"! Above all a faculty for the "transcendental";
365Schelling christened it, intellectual intuition, and thereby gratified the
366most earnest longings of the naturally pious-inclined Germans. One can
367do no greater wrong to the whole of this exuberant and eccentric movement
368(which was really youthfulness, notwithstanding that it disguised
369itself so boldly, in hoary and senile conceptions), than to take it seriously,
370or even treat it with moral indignation. Enough, however—the world
371grew older, and the dream vanished. A time came when people rubbed
372their foreheads, and they still rub them today. People had been dreaming,
373and first and foremost—old Kant. "By means of a means
374(faculty)"—he had said, or at least meant to say. But, is that—an answer?
375An explanation? Or is it not rather merely a repetition of the question?
376How does opium induce sleep? "By means of a means (faculty), "namely
377the virtus dormitiva, replies the doctor in Moliere,
378Quia est in eo virtus dormitiva,
379Cujus est natura sensus assoupire.
380But such replies belong to the realm of comedy, and it is high time to
381replace the Kantian question, "How are synthetic judgments a PRIORI
382possible?" by another question, "Why is belief in such judgments necessary?"—
383in effect, it is high time that we should understand that such
384judgments must be believed to be true, for the sake of the preservation of
385creatures like ourselves; though they still might naturally be false judgments!
386Or, more plainly spoken, and roughly and readily—synthetic
387judgments a priori should not "be possible" at all; we have no right to
388them; in our mouths they are nothing but false judgments. Only, of
389course, the belief in their truth is necessary, as plausible belief and ocular
390evidence belonging to the perspective view of life. And finally, to call to
391mind the enormous influence which "German philosophy"—I hope you
392understand its right to inverted commas (goosefeet)?—has exercised
393throughout the whole of Europe, there is no doubt that a certain VIRTUS
394DORMITIVA had a share in it; thanks to German philosophy, it was a
395delight to the noble idlers, the virtuous, the mystics, the artiste, the threefourths
396Christians, and the political obscurantists of all nations, to find
39712
398an antidote to the still overwhelming sensualism which overflowed from
399the last century into this, in short—"sensus assoupire."…
40012. As regards materialistic atomism, it is one of the best- refuted theories
401that have been advanced, and in Europe there is now perhaps no
402one in the learned world so unscholarly as to attach serious signification
403to it, except for convenient everyday use (as an abbreviation of the
404means of expression)— thanks chiefly to the Pole Boscovich: he and the
405Pole Copernicus have hitherto been the greatest and most successful opponents
406of ocular evidence. For while Copernicus has persuaded us to
407believe, contrary to all the senses, that the earth does NOT stand fast, Boscovich
408has taught us to abjure the belief in the last thing that "stood fast"
409of the earth—the belief in "substance," in "matter," in the earth-residuum,
410and particle- atom: it is the greatest triumph over the senses that has
411hitherto been gained on earth. One must, however, go still further, and
412also declare war, relentless war to the knife, against the "atomistic requirements"
413which still lead a dangerous after-life in places where no
414one suspects them, like the more celebrated "metaphysical requirements":
415one must also above all give the finishing stroke to that other
416and more portentous atomism which Christianity has taught best and
417longest, the SOUL- ATOMISM. Let it be permitted to designate by this
418expression the belief which regards the soul as something indestructible,
419eternal, indivisible, as a monad, as an atomon: this belief ought to be expelled
420from science! Between ourselves, it is not at all necessary to get rid
421of "the soul" thereby, and thus renounce one of the oldest and most venerated
422hypotheses—as happens frequently to the clumsiness of naturalists,
423who can hardly touch on the soul without immediately losing it. But
424the way is open for new acceptations and refinements of the soul-hypothesis;
425and such conceptions as "mortal soul," and "soul of subjective
426multiplicity," and "soul as social structure of the instincts and passions,"
427want henceforth to have legitimate rights in science. In that the NEW
428psychologist is about to put an end to the superstitions which have
429hitherto flourished with almost tropical luxuriance around the idea of
430the soul, he is really, as it were, thrusting himself into a new desert and a
431new distrust—it is possible that the older psychologists had a merrier
432and more comfortable time of it; eventually, however, he finds that precisely
433thereby he is also condemned to INVENT—and, who knows? perhaps
434to DISCOVER the new.
43513
43613. Psychologists should bethink themselves before putting down the
437instinct of self-preservation as the cardinal instinct of an organic being. A
438living thing seeks above all to DISCHARGE its strength—life itself is
439WILL TO POWER; self-preservation is only one of the indirect and most
440frequent RESULTS thereof. In short, here, as everywhere else, let us beware
441of SUPERFLUOUS teleological principles!—one of which is the instinct
442of self- preservation (we owe it to Spinoza's inconsistency). It is
443thus, in effect, that method ordains, which must be essentially economy
444of principles.
44514. It is perhaps just dawning on five or six minds that natural philosophy
446is only a world-exposition and world-arrangement (according to
447us, if I may say so!) and NOT a world-explanation; but in so far as it is
448based on belief in the senses, it is regarded as more, and for a long time
449to come must be regarded as more—namely, as an explanation. It has
450eyes and fingers of its own, it has ocular evidence and palpableness of its
451own: this operates fascinatingly, persuasively, and CONVINCINGLY
452upon an age with fundamentally plebeian tastes—in fact, it follows instinctively
453the canon of truth of eternal popular sensualism. What is
454clear, what is "explained"? Only that which can be seen and felt—one
455must pursue every problem thus far. Obversely, however, the charm of
456the Platonic mode of thought, which was an ARISTOCRATIC mode,
457consisted precisely in RESISTANCE to obvious sense-evidence—perhaps
458among men who enjoyed even stronger and more fastidious senses than
459our contemporaries, but who knew how to find a higher triumph in remaining
460masters of them: and this by means of pale, cold, grey conceptional
461networks which they threw over the motley whirl of the
462senses—the mob of the senses, as Plato said. In this overcoming of the
463world, and interpreting of the world in the manner of Plato, there was an
464ENJOYMENT different from that which the physicists of today offer
465us—and likewise the Darwinists and anti-teleologists among the
466physiological workers, with their principle of the "smallest possible effort,"
467and the greatest possible blunder. "Where there is nothing more to
468see or to grasp, there is also nothing more for men to do"—that is certainly
469an imperative different from the Platonic one, but it may notwithstanding
470be the right imperative for a hardy, laborious race of machinists
471and bridge- builders of the future, who have nothing but ROUGH work
472to perform.
47314
47415. To study physiology with a clear conscience, one must insist on the
475fact that the sense-organs are not phenomena in the sense of the idealistic
476philosophy; as such they certainly could not be causes! Sensualism,
477therefore, at least as regulative hypothesis, if not as heuristic principle.
478What? And others say even that the external world is the work of our organs?
479But then our body, as a part of this external world, would be the
480work of our organs! But then our organs themselves would be the work
481of our organs! It seems to me that this is a complete REDUCTIO AD
482ABSURDUM, if the conception CAUSA SUI is something fundamentally
483absurd. Consequently, the external world is NOT the work of our
484organs—?
48516. There are still harmless self-observers who believe that there are
486"immediate certainties"; for instance, "I think," or as the superstition of
487Schopenhauer puts it, "I will"; as though cognition here got hold of its
488object purely and simply as "the thing in itself," without any falsification
489taking place either on the part of the subject or the object. I would repeat
490it, however, a hundred times, that "immediate certainty," as well as
491"absolute knowledge" and the "thing in itself," involve a
492CONTRADICTIO IN ADJECTO; we really ought to free ourselves from
493the misleading significance of words! The people on their part may think
494that cognition is knowing all about things, but the philosopher must say
495to himself: "When I analyze the process that is expressed in the sentence,
496'I think,' I find a whole series of daring assertions, the argumentative
497proof of which would be difficult, perhaps impossible: for instance, that
498it is _I_ who think, that there must necessarily be something that thinks,
499that thinking is an activity and operation on the part of a being who is
500thought of as a cause, that there is an 'ego,' and finally, that it is already
501determined what is to be designated by thinking—that I KNOW what
502thinking is. For if I had not already decided within myself what it is, by
503what standard could I determine whether that which is just happening is
504not perhaps 'willing' or 'feeling'? In short, the assertion 'I think,' assumes
505that I COMPARE my state at the present moment with other states of
506myself which I know, in order to determine what it is; on account of this
507retrospective connection with further 'knowledge,' it has, at any rate, no
508immediate certainty for me."—In place of the "immediate certainty" in
509which the people may believe in the special case, the philosopher thus
510finds a series of metaphysical questions presented to him, veritable conscience
511questions of the intellect, to wit: "Whence did I get the notion of
512'thinking'? Why do I believe in cause and effect? What gives me the right
51315
514to speak of an 'ego,' and even of an 'ego' as cause, and finally of an 'ego'
515as cause of thought?" He who ventures to answer these metaphysical
516questions at once by an appeal to a sort of INTUITIVE perception, like
517the person who says, "I think, and know that this, at least, is true, actual,
518and certain"—will encounter a smile and two notes of interrogation in a
519philosopher nowadays. "Sir," the philosopher will perhaps give him to
520understand, "it is improbable that you are not mistaken, but why should
521it be the truth?"
52217. With regard to the superstitions of logicians, I shall never tire of
523emphasizing a small, terse fact, which is unwillingly recognized by these
524credulous minds—namely, that a thought comes when "it" wishes, and
525not when "I" wish; so that it is a PERVERSION of the facts of the case to
526say that the subject "I" is the condition of the predicate "think." ONE
527thinks; but that this "one" is precisely the famous old "ego," is, to put it
528mildly, only a supposition, an assertion, and assuredly not an
529"immediate certainty." After all, one has even gone too far with this "one
530thinks"—even the "one" contains an INTERPRETATION of the process,
531and does not belong to the process itself. One infers here according to the
532usual grammatical formula—"To think is an activity; every activity requires
533an agency that is active; consequently"… It was pretty much on
534the same lines that the older atomism sought, besides the operating
535"power," the material particle wherein it resides and out of which it operates—
536the atom. More rigorous minds, however, learnt at last to get along
537without this "earth-residuum," and perhaps some day we shall accustom
538ourselves, even from the logician's point of view, to get along without
539the little "one" (to which the worthy old "ego" has refined itself).
54018. It is certainly not the least charm of a theory that it is refutable; it is
541precisely thereby that it attracts the more subtle minds. It seems that the
542hundred-times-refuted theory of the "free will" owes its persistence to
543this charm alone; some one is always appearing who feels himself strong
544enough to refute it.
54519. Philosophers are accustomed to speak of the will as though it were
546the best-known thing in the world; indeed, Schopenhauer has given us to
547understand that the will alone is really known to us, absolutely and completely
548known, without deduction or addition. But it again and again
549seems to me that in this case Schopenhauer also only did what philosophers
550are in the habit of doing-he seems to have adopted a POPULAR
55116
552PREJUDICE and exaggerated it. Willing-seems to me to be above all
553something COMPLICATED, something that is a unity only in
554name—and it is precisely in a name that popular prejudice lurks, which
555has got the mastery over the inadequate precautions of philosophers in
556all ages. So let us for once be more cautious, let us be "unphilosophical":
557let us say that in all willing there is firstly a plurality of sensations,
558namely, the sensation of the condition "AWAY FROM WHICH we go,"
559the sensation of the condition "TOWARDS WHICH we go," the sensation
560of this "FROM" and "TOWARDS" itself, and then besides, an accompanying
561muscular sensation, which, even without our putting in motion
562"arms and legs," commences its action by force of habit, directly we "will"
563anything. Therefore, just as sensations (and indeed many kinds of sensations)
564are to be recognized as ingredients of the will, so, in the second
565place, thinking is also to be recognized; in every act of the will there is a
566ruling thought;—and let us not imagine it possible to sever this thought
567from the "willing," as if the will would then remain over! In the third
568place, the will is not only a complex of sensation and thinking, but it is
569above all an EMOTION, and in fact the emotion of the command. That
570which is termed "freedom of the will" is essentially the emotion of supremacy
571in respect to him who must obey: "I am free, 'he' must
572obey"—this consciousness is inherent in every will; and equally so the
573straining of the attention, the straight look which fixes itself exclusively
574on one thing, the unconditional judgment that "this and nothing else is
575necessary now," the inward certainty that obedience will be
576rendered—and whatever else pertains to the position of the commander.
577A man who WILLS commands something within himself which renders
578obedience, or which he believes renders obedience. But now let us notice
579what is the strangest thing about the will,—this affair so extremely complex,
580for which the people have only one name. Inasmuch as in the given
581circumstances we are at the same time the commanding AND the obeying
582parties, and as the obeying party we know the sensations of constraint,
583impulsion, pressure, resistance, and motion, which usually commence
584immediately after the act of will; inasmuch as, on the other hand,
585we are accustomed to disregard this duality, and to deceive ourselves
586about it by means of the synthetic term "I": a whole series of erroneous
587conclusions, and consequently of false judgments about the will itself,
588has become attached to the act of willing—to such a degree that he who
589wills believes firmly that willing SUFFICES for action. Since in the majority
590of cases there has only been exercise of will when the effect of the
591command—consequently obedience, and therefore action—was to be
59217
593EXPECTED, the APPEARANCE has translated itself into the sentiment,
594as if there were a NECESSITY OF EFFECT; in a word, he who wills believes
595with a fair amount of certainty that will and action are somehow
596one; he ascribes the success, the carrying out of the willing, to the will itself,
597and thereby enjoys an increase of the sensation of power which accompanies
598all success. "Freedom of Will"—that is the expression for the
599complex state of delight of the person exercising volition, who commands
600and at the same time identifies himself with the executor of the
601order— who, as such, enjoys also the triumph over obstacles, but thinks
602within himself that it was really his own will that overcame them. In this
603way the person exercising volition adds the feelings of delight of his successful
604executive instruments, the useful "underwills" or undersouls—
605indeed, our body is but a social structure composed of many
606souls—to his feelings of delight as commander. L'EFFET C'EST MOI.
607what happens here is what happens in every well-constructed and
608happy commonwealth, namely, that the governing class identifies itself
609with the successes of the commonwealth. In all willing it is absolutely a
610question of commanding and obeying, on the basis, as already said, of a
611social structure composed of many "souls", on which account a philosopher
612should claim the right to include willing- as-such within the
613sphere of morals—regarded as the doctrine of the relations of supremacy
614under which the phenomenon of "life" manifests itself.
61520. That the separate philosophical ideas are not anything optional or
616autonomously evolving, but grow up in connection and relationship
617with each other, that, however suddenly and arbitrarily they seem to appear
618in the history of thought, they nevertheless belong just as much to a
619system as the collective members of the fauna of a Continent—is betrayed
620in the end by the circumstance: how unfailingly the most diverse
621philosophers always fill in again a definite fundamental scheme of
622POSSIBLE philosophies. Under an invisible spell, they always revolve
623once more in the same orbit, however independent of each other they
624may feel themselves with their critical or systematic wills, something
625within them leads them, something impels them in definite order the one
626after the other—to wit, the innate methodology and relationship of their
627ideas. Their thinking is, in fact, far less a discovery than a re-recognizing,
628a remembering, a return and a home-coming to a far-off, ancient
629common-household of the soul, out of which those ideas formerly grew:
630philosophizing is so far a kind of atavism of the highest order. The wonderful
631family resemblance of all Indian, Greek, and German
63218
633philosophizing is easily enough explained. In fact, where there is affinity
634of language, owing to the common philosophy of grammar—I mean owing
635to the unconscious domination and guidance of similar grammatical
636functions—it cannot but be that everything is prepared at the outset for a
637similar development and succession of philosophical systems, just as the
638way seems barred against certain other possibilities of world- interpretation.
639It is highly probable that philosophers within the domain of the
640Ural-Altaic languages (where the conception of the subject is least developed)
641look otherwise "into the world," and will be found on paths of
642thought different from those of the Indo-Germans and Mussulmans, the
643spell of certain grammatical functions is ultimately also the spell of
644PHYSIOLOGICAL valuations and racial conditions.—So much by way
645of rejecting Locke's superficiality with regard to the origin of ideas.
64621. The CAUSA SUI is the best self-contradiction that has yet been conceived,
647it is a sort of logical violation and unnaturalness; but the extravagant
648pride of man has managed to entangle itself profoundly and
649frightfully with this very folly. The desire for "freedom of will" in the superlative,
650metaphysical sense, such as still holds sway, unfortunately, in
651the minds of the half-educated, the desire to bear the entire and ultimate
652responsibility for one's actions oneself, and to absolve God, the world,
653ancestors, chance, and society therefrom, involves nothing less than to be
654precisely this CAUSA SUI, and, with more than Munchausen daring, to
655pull oneself up into existence by the hair, out of the slough of nothingness.
656If any one should find out in this manner the crass stupidity of the
657celebrated conception of "free will" and put it out of his head altogether, I
658beg of him to carry his "enlightenment" a step further, and also put out of
659his head the contrary of this monstrous conception of "free will": I mean
660"non-free will," which is tantamount to a misuse of cause and effect. One
661should not wrongly MATERIALISE "cause" and "effect," as the natural
662philosophers do (and whoever like them naturalize in thinking at
663present), according to the prevailing mechanical doltishness which
664makes the cause press and push until it "effects" its end; one should use
665"cause" and "effect" only as pure CONCEPTIONS, that is to say, as conventional
666fictions for the purpose of designation and mutual understanding,—
667NOT for explanation. In "being-in-itself" there is nothing of
668"casual- connection," of "necessity," or of "psychological non-freedom";
669there the effect does NOT follow the cause, there "law" does not obtain. It
670is WE alone who have devised cause, sequence, reciprocity, relativity,
671constraint, number, law, freedom, motive, and purpose; and when we
67219
673interpret and intermix this symbol-world, as "being-in-itself," with
674things, we act once more as we have always acted—
675MYTHOLOGICALLY. The "non-free will" is mythology; in real life
676it is only a question of STRONG and WEAK wills.—It is almost always a
677symptom of what is lacking in himself, when a thinker, in every "causalconnection"
678and "psychological necessity," manifests something of compulsion,
679indigence, obsequiousness, oppression, and non-freedom; it is
680suspicious to have such feelings—the person betrays himself. And in
681general, if I have observed correctly, the "non-freedom of the will" is regarded
682as a problem from two entirely opposite standpoints, but always
683in a profoundly PERSONAL manner: some will not give up their
684"responsibility," their belief in THEMSELVES, the personal right to
685THEIR merits, at any price (the vain races belong to this class); others on
686the contrary, do not wish to be answerable for anything, or blamed for
687anything, and owing to an inward self-contempt, seek to GET OUT OF
688THE BUSINESS, no matter how. The latter, when they write books, are
689in the habit at present of taking the side of criminals; a sort of socialistic
690sympathy is their favourite disguise. And as a matter of fact, the fatalism
691of the weak-willed embellishes itself surprisingly when it can pose as "la
692religion de la souffrance humaine"; that is ITS "good taste."
69322. Let me be pardoned, as an old philologist who cannot desist from
694the mischief of putting his finger on bad modes of interpretation, but
695"Nature's conformity to law," of which you physicists talk so proudly, as
696though—why, it exists only owing to your interpretation and bad
697"philology." It is no matter of fact, no "text," but rather just a naively humanitarian
698adjustment and perversion of meaning, with which you
699make abundant concessions to the democratic instincts of the modern
700soul! "Everywhere equality before the law—Nature is not different in
701that respect, nor better than we": a fine instance of secret motive, in
702which the vulgar antagonism to everything privileged and autocratic—
703likewise a second and more refined atheism—is once more disguised.
704"Ni dieu, ni maitre"—that, also, is what you want; and therefore
705"Cheers for natural law!"— is it not so? But, as has been said, that is interpretation,
706not text; and somebody might come along, who, with opposite
707intentions and modes of interpretation, could read out of the same
708"Nature," and with regard to the same phenomena, just the tyrannically
709inconsiderate and relentless enforcement of the claims of power—an interpreter
710who should so place the unexceptionalness and unconditionalness
711of all "Will to Power" before your eyes, that almost every word, and
71220
713the word "tyranny" itself, would eventually seem unsuitable, or like a
714weakening and softening metaphor—as being too human; and who
715should, nevertheless, end by asserting the same about this world as you
716do, namely, that it has a "necessary" and "calculable" course, NOT,
717however, because laws obtain in it, but because they are absolutely
718LACKING, and every power effects its ultimate consequences every moment.
719Granted that this also is only interpretation—and you will be
720eager enough to make this objection?—well, so much the better.
72123. All psychology hitherto has run aground on moral prejudices and
722timidities, it has not dared to launch out into the depths. In so far as it is
723allowable to recognize in that which has hitherto been written, evidence
724of that which has hitherto been kept silent, it seems as if nobody had yet
725harboured the notion of psychology as the Morphology and
726DEVELOPMENT-DOCTRINE OF THE WILL TO POWER, as I conceive
727of it. The power of moral prejudices has penetrated deeply into the most
728intellectual world, the world apparently most indifferent and unprejudiced,
729and has obviously operated in an injurious, obstructive, blinding,
730and distorting manner. A proper physio-psychology has to contend with
731unconscious antagonism in the heart of the investigator, it has "the heart"
732against it even a doctrine of the reciprocal conditionalness of the "good"
733and the "bad" impulses, causes (as refined immorality) distress and aversion
734in a still strong and manly conscience—still more so, a doctrine of
735the derivation of all good impulses from bad ones. If, however, a person
736should regard even the emotions of hatred, envy, covetousness, and imperiousness
737as life-conditioning emotions, as factors which must be
738present, fundamentally and essentially, in the general economy of life
739(which must, therefore, be further developed if life is to be further developed),
740he will suffer from such a view of things as from sea-sickness.
741And yet this hypothesis is far from being the strangest and most painful
742in this immense and almost new domain of dangerous knowledge, and
743there are in fact a hundred good reasons why every one should keep
744away from it who CAN do so! On the other hand, if one has once drifted
745hither with one's bark, well! very good! now let us set our teeth firmly!
746let us open our eyes and keep our hand fast on the helm! We sail away
747right OVER morality, we crush out, we destroy perhaps the remains of
748our own morality by daring to make our voyage thither—but what do
749WE matter. Never yet did a PROFOUNDER world of insight reveal itself
750to daring travelers and adventurers, and the psychologist who thus
751"makes a sacrifice"—it is not the sacrifizio dell' intelletto, on the
75221
753contrary!—will at least be entitled to demand in return that psychology
754shall once more be recognized as the queen of the sciences, for whose
755service and equipment the other sciences exist. For psychology is once
756more the path to the fundamental problems.
75722
758Chapter 2
759The Free Spirit
76024. O sancta simplicitas! In what strange simplification and falsification
761man lives! One can never cease wondering when once one has got eyes
762for beholding this marvel! How we have made everything around us
763clear and free and easy and simple! how we have been able to give our
764senses a passport to everything superficial, our thoughts a godlike desire
765for wanton pranks and wrong inferences!—how from the beginning, we
766have contrived to retain our ignorance in order to enjoy an almost inconceivable
767freedom, thoughtlessness, imprudence, heartiness, and
768gaiety—in order to enjoy life! And only on this solidified, granitelike
769foundation of ignorance could knowledge rear itself hitherto, the will to
770knowledge on the foundation of a far more powerful will, the will to ignorance,
771to the uncertain, to the untrue! Not as its opposite, but—as its
772refinement! It is to be hoped, indeed, that LANGUAGE, here as elsewhere,
773will not get over its awkwardness, and that it will continue to talk
774of opposites where there are only degrees and many refinements of
775gradation; it is equally to be hoped that the incarnated Tartuffery of morals,
776which now belongs to our unconquerable "flesh and blood," will turn
777the words round in the mouths of us discerning ones. Here and there we
778understand it, and laugh at the way in which precisely the best knowledge
779seeks most to retain us in this SIMPLIFIED, thoroughly artificial,
780suitably imagined, and suitably falsified world: at the way in which,
781whether it will or not, it loves error, because, as living itself, it loves life!
78225. After such a cheerful commencement, a serious word would fain
783be heard; it appeals to the most serious minds. Take care, ye philosophers
784and friends of knowledge, and beware of martyrdom! Of suffering
785"for the truth's sake"! even in your own defense! It spoils all the innocence
786and fine neutrality of your conscience; it makes you headstrong
787against objections and red rags; it stupefies, animalizes, and brutalizes,
788when in the struggle with danger, slander, suspicion, expulsion, and
78923
790even worse consequences of enmity, ye have at last to play your last card
791as protectors of truth upon earth—as though "the Truth" were such an
792innocent and incompetent creature as to require protectors! and you of
793all people, ye knights of the sorrowful countenance, Messrs Loafers and
794Cobweb-spinners of the spirit! Finally, ye know sufficiently well that it
795cannot be of any consequence if YE just carry your point; ye know that
796hitherto no philosopher has carried his point, and that there might be a
797more laudable truthfulness in every little interrogative mark which you
798place after your special words and favourite doctrines (and occasionally
799after yourselves) than in all the solemn pantomime and trumping games
800before accusers and law-courts! Rather go out of the way! Flee into concealment!
801And have your masks and your ruses, that ye may be mistaken
802for what you are, or somewhat feared! And pray, don't forget the garden,
803the garden with golden trellis-work! And have people around you who
804are as a garden—or as music on the waters at eventide, when already the
805day becomes a memory. Choose the GOOD solitude, the free, wanton,
806lightsome solitude, which also gives you the right still to remain good in
807any sense whatsoever! How poisonous, how crafty, how bad, does every
808long war make one, which cannot be waged openly by means of force!
809How PERSONAL does a long fear make one, a long watching of enemies,
810of possible enemies! These pariahs of society, these long-pursued,
811badly-persecuted ones—also the compulsory recluses, the Spinozas or
812Giordano Brunos—always become in the end, even under the most intellectual
813masquerade, and perhaps without being themselves aware of it,
814refined vengeance-seekers and poison-Brewers (just lay bare the foundation
815of Spinoza's ethics and theology!), not to speak of the stupidity of
816moral indignation, which is the unfailing sign in a philosopher that the
817sense of philosophical humour has left him. The martyrdom of the philosopher,
818his "sacrifice for the sake of truth," forces into the light whatever
819of the agitator and actor lurks in him; and if one has hitherto contemplated
820him only with artistic curiosity, with regard to many a philosopher
821it is easy to understand the dangerous desire to see him also in his deterioration
822(deteriorated into a "martyr," into a stage-and- tribune-bawler).
823Only, that it is necessary with such a desire to be clear WHAT spectacle
824one will see in any case—merely a satyric play, merely an epilogue
825farce, merely the continued proof that the long, real tragedy IS AT AN
826END, supposing that every philosophy has been a long tragedy in its
827origin.
82824
82926. Every select man strives instinctively for a citadel and a privacy,
830where he is FREE from the crowd, the many, the majority— where he
831may forget "men who are the rule," as their exception;— exclusive only
832of the case in which he is pushed straight to such men by a still stronger
833instinct, as a discerner in the great and exceptional sense. Whoever, in intercourse
834with men, does not occasionally glisten in all the green and
835grey colours of distress, owing to disgust, satiety, sympathy, gloominess,
836and solitariness, is assuredly not a man of elevated tastes; supposing,
837however, that he does not voluntarily take all this burden and disgust
838upon himself, that he persistently avoids it, and remains, as I said,
839quietly and proudly hidden in his citadel, one thing is then certain: he
840was not made, he was not predestined for knowledge. For as such, he
841would one day have to say to himself: "The devil take my good taste! but
842'the rule' is more interesting than the exception—than myself, the exception!"
843And he would go DOWN, and above all, he would go "inside." The
844long and serious study of the AVERAGE man—and consequently much
845disguise, self-overcoming, familiarity, and bad intercourse (all intercourse
846is bad intercourse except with one's equals):—that constitutes a
847necessary part of the life-history of every philosopher; perhaps the most
848disagreeable, odious, and disappointing part. If he is fortunate, however,
849as a favourite child of knowledge should be, he will meet with suitable
850auxiliaries who will shorten and lighten his task; I mean so- called cynics,
851those who simply recognize the animal, the commonplace and "the
852rule" in themselves, and at the same time have so much spirituality and
853ticklishness as to make them talk of themselves and their like BEFORE
854WITNESSES—sometimes they wallow, even in books, as on their own
855dung-hill. Cynicism is the only form in which base souls approach what
856is called honesty; and the higher man must open his ears to all the coarser
857or finer cynicism, and congratulate himself when the clown becomes
858shameless right before him, or the scientific satyr speaks out. There are
859even cases where enchantment mixes with the disgust— namely, where
860by a freak of nature, genius is bound to some such indiscreet billy-goat
861and ape, as in the case of the Abbe Galiani, the profoundest, acutest, and
862perhaps also filthiest man of his century—he was far profounder than
863Voltaire, and consequently also, a good deal more silent. It happens
864more frequently, as has been hinted, that a scientific head is placed on an
865ape's body, a fine exceptional understanding in a base soul, an occurrence
866by no means rare, especially among doctors and moral physiologists.
867And whenever anyone speaks without bitterness, or rather quite
868innocently, of man as a belly with two requirements, and a head with
86925
870one; whenever any one sees, seeks, and WANTS to see only hunger,
871sexual instinct, and vanity as the real and only motives of human actions;
872in short, when any one speaks "badly"—and not even "ill"—of man, then
873ought the lover of knowledge to hearken attentively and diligently; he
874ought, in general, to have an open ear wherever there is talk without indignation.
875For the indignant man, and he who perpetually tears and lacerates
876himself with his own teeth (or, in place of himself, the world,
877God, or society), may indeed, morally speaking, stand higher than the
878laughing and self- satisfied satyr, but in every other sense he is the more
879ordinary, more indifferent, and less instructive case. And no one is such
880a LIAR as the indignant man.
88127. It is difficult to be understood, especially when one thinks and lives
882gangasrotogati 1 among those only who think and live otherwise—
883namely, kurmagati 2 , or at best "froglike," mandeikagati 3 (I do
884everything to be "difficultly understood" myself!)—and one should be
885heartily grateful for the good will to some refinement of interpretation.
886As regards "the good friends," however, who are always too easy-going,
887and think that as friends they have a right to ease, one does well at the
888very first to grant them a play-ground and romping-place for misunderstanding—
889one can thus laugh still; or get rid of them altogether, these
890good friends— and laugh then also!
89128. What is most difficult to render from one language into another is
892the TEMPO of its style, which has its basis in the character of the race, or
893to speak more physiologically, in the average TEMPO of the assimilation
894of its nutriment. There are honestly meant translations, which, as involuntary
895vulgarizations, are almost falsifications of the original, merely because
896its lively and merry TEMPO (which overleaps and obviates all
897dangers in word and expression) could not also be rendered. A German
898is almost incapacitated for PRESTO in his language; consequently also,
899as may be reasonably inferred, for many of the most delightful and daring
900NUANCES of free, free-spirited thought. And just as the buffoon and
901satyr are foreign to him in body and conscience, so Aristophanes and
902Petronius are untranslatable for him. Everything ponderous, viscous,
903and pompously clumsy, all long-winded and wearying species of style,
904are developed in profuse variety among Germans—pardon me for
9051.Like the river Ganges: presto.
9062.Like the tortoise: lento.
9073.Like the frog: staccato.
90826
909stating the fact that even Goethe's prose, in its mixture of stiffness and elegance,
910is no exception, as a reflection of the "good old time" to which it
911belongs, and as an expression of German taste at a time when there was
912still a "German taste," which was a rococo-taste in moribus et artibus.
913Lessing is an exception, owing to his histrionic nature, which understood
914much, and was versed in many things; he who was not the translator of
915Bayle to no purpose, who took refuge willingly in the shadow of Diderot
916and Voltaire, and still more willingly among the Roman comedywriters—
917Lessing loved also free-spiritism in the TEMPO, and flight out
918of Germany. But how could the German language, even in the prose of
919Lessing, imitate the TEMPO of Machiavelli, who in his "Principe" makes
920us breathe the dry, fine air of Florence, and cannot help presenting the
921most serious events in a boisterous allegrissimo, perhaps not without a
922malicious artistic sense of the contrast he ventures to present—long,
923heavy, difficult, dangerous thoughts, and a TEMPO of the gallop, and of
924the best, wantonest humour? Finally, who would venture on a German
925translation of Petronius, who, more than any great musician hitherto,
926was a master of PRESTO in invention, ideas, and words? What matter in
927the end about the swamps of the sick, evil world, or of the "ancient
928world," when like him, one has the feet of a wind, the rush, the breath,
929the emancipating scorn of a wind, which makes everything healthy, by
930making everything RUN! And with regard to Aristophanes—that transfiguring,
931complementary genius, for whose sake one PARDONS all Hellenism
932for having existed, provided one has understood in its full profundity
933ALL that there requires pardon and transfiguration; there is
934nothing that has caused me to meditate more on PLATO'S secrecy and
935sphinx-like nature, than the happily preserved petit fait that under the
936pillow of his death-bed there was found no "Bible," nor anything Egyptian,
937Pythagorean, or Platonic—but a book of Aristophanes. How could
938even Plato have endured life—a Greek life which he repudiated—
939without an Aristophanes!
94029. It is the business of the very few to be independent; it is a privilege
941of the strong. And whoever attempts it, even with the best right, but
942without being OBLIGED to do so, proves that he is probably not only
943strong, but also daring beyond measure. He enters into a labyrinth, he
944multiplies a thousandfold the dangers which life in itself already brings
945with it; not the least of which is that no one can see how and where he
946loses his way, becomes isolated, and is torn piecemeal by some minotaur
947of conscience. Supposing such a one comes to grief, it is so far from the
94827
949comprehension of men that they neither feel it, nor sympathize with it.
950And he cannot any longer go back! He cannot even go back again to the
951sympathy of men!
95230. Our deepest insights must—and should—appear as follies, and under
953certain circumstances as crimes, when they come unauthorizedly to
954the ears of those who are not disposed and predestined for them. The
955exoteric and the esoteric, as they were formerly distinguished by philosophers—
956among the Indians, as among the Greeks, Persians, and Mussulmans,
957in short, wherever people believed in gradations of rank and
958NOT in equality and equal rights—are not so much in contradistinction
959to one another in respect to the exoteric class, standing without, and
960viewing, estimating, measuring, and judging from the outside, and not
961from the inside; the more essential distinction is that the class in question
962views things from below upwards—while the esoteric class views things
963FROM ABOVE DOWNWARDS. There are heights of the soul from
964which tragedy itself no longer appears to operate tragically; and if all the
965woe in the world were taken together, who would dare to decide whether
966the sight of it would NECESSARILY seduce and constrain to sympathy,
967and thus to a doubling of the woe?… That which serves the higher
968class of men for nourishment or refreshment, must be almost poison to
969an entirely different and lower order of human beings. The virtues of the
970common man would perhaps mean vice and weakness in a philosopher;
971it might be possible for a highly developed man, supposing him to degenerate
972and go to ruin, to acquire qualities thereby alone, for the sake of
973which he would have to be honoured as a saint in the lower world into
974which he had sunk. There are books which have an inverse value for the
975soul and the health according as the inferior soul and the lower vitality,
976or the higher and more powerful, make use of them. In the former case
977they are dangerous, disturbing, unsettling books, in the latter case they
978are herald-calls which summon the bravest to THEIR bravery. Books for
979the general reader are always ill-smelling books, the odour of paltry
980people clings to them. Where the populace eat and drink, and even
981where they reverence, it is accustomed to stink. One should not go into
982churches if one wishes to breathe PURE air.
98331. In our youthful years we still venerate and despise without the art
984of NUANCE, which is the best gain of life, and we have rightly to do
985hard penance for having fallen upon men and things with Yea and Nay.
986Everything is so arranged that the worst of all tastes, THE TASTE FOR
98728
988THE UNCONDITIONAL, is cruelly befooled and abused, until a man
989learns to introduce a little art into his sentiments, and prefers to try conclusions
990with the artificial, as do the real artists of life. The angry and
991reverent spirit peculiar to youth appears to allow itself no peace, until it
992has suitably falsified men and things, to be able to vent its passion upon
993them: youth in itself even, is something falsifying and deceptive. Later
994on, when the young soul, tortured by continual disillusions, finally turns
995suspiciously against itself—still ardent and savage even in its suspicion
996and remorse of conscience: how it upbraids itself, how impatiently it
997tears itself, how it revenges itself for its long self-blinding, as though it
998had been a voluntary blindness! In this transition one punishes oneself
999by distrust of one's sentiments; one tortures one's enthusiasm with
1000doubt, one feels even the good conscience to be a danger, as if it were the
1001self-concealment and lassitude of a more refined uprightness; and above
1002all, one espouses upon principle the cause AGAINST "youth."—A decade
1003later, and one comprehends that all this was also still—youth!
100432. Throughout the longest period of human history—one calls it the
1005prehistoric period—the value or non-value of an action was inferred
1006from its CONSEQUENCES; the action in itself was not taken into consideration,
1007any more than its origin; but pretty much as in China at present,
1008where the distinction or disgrace of a child redounds to its parents, the
1009retro-operating power of success or failure was what induced men to
1010think well or ill of an action. Let us call this period the PRE-MORAL
1011period of mankind; the imperative, "Know thyself!" was then still unknown.
1012—In the last ten thousand years, on the other hand, on certain
1013large portions of the earth, one has gradually got so far, that one no
1014longer lets the consequences of an action, but its origin, decide with regard
1015to its worth: a great achievement as a whole, an important refinement
1016of vision and of criterion, the unconscious effect of the supremacy
1017of aristocratic values and of the belief in "origin," the mark of a period
1018which may be designated in the narrower sense as the MORAL one: the
1019first attempt at self-knowledge is thereby made. Instead of the consequences,
1020the origin—what an inversion of perspective! And assuredly
1021an inversion effected only after long struggle and wavering! To be sure,
1022an ominous new superstition, a peculiar narrowness of interpretation, attained
1023supremacy precisely thereby: the origin of an action was interpreted
1024in the most definite sense possible, as origin out of an
1025INTENTION; people were agreed in the belief that the value of an action
1026lay in the value of its intention. The intention as the sole origin and
102729
1028antecedent history of an action: under the influence of this prejudice
1029moral praise and blame have been bestowed, and men have judged and
1030even philosophized almost up to the present day.—Is it not possible,
1031however, that the necessity may now have arisen of again making up our
1032minds with regard to the reversing and fundamental shifting of values,
1033owing to a new self-consciousness and acuteness in man—is it not possible
1034that we may be standing on the threshold of a period which to begin
1035with, would be distinguished negatively as ULTRA-MORAL:
1036nowadays when, at least among us immoralists, the suspicion arises that
1037the decisive value of an action lies precisely in that which is NOT
1038INTENTIONAL, and that all its intentionalness, all that is seen, sensible,
1039or "sensed" in it, belongs to its surface or skin— which, like every skin,
1040betrays something, but CONCEALS still more? In short, we believe that
1041the intention is only a sign or symptom, which first requires an explanation—
1042a sign, moreover, which has too many interpretations, and consequently
1043hardly any meaning in itself alone: that morality, in the sense
1044in which it has been understood hitherto, as intention-morality, has been
1045a prejudice, perhaps a prematureness or preliminariness, probably
1046something of the same rank as astrology and alchemy, but in any case
1047something which must be surmounted. The surmounting of morality, in
1048a certain sense even the self-mounting of morality— let that be the name
1049for the long-secret labour which has been reserved for the most refined,
1050the most upright, and also the most wicked consciences of today, as the
1051living touchstones of the soul.
105233. It cannot be helped: the sentiment of surrender, of sacrifice for
1053one's neighbour, and all self-renunciation-morality, must be mercilessly
1054called to account, and brought to judgment; just as the aesthetics of
1055"disinterested contemplation," under which the emasculation of art
1056nowadays seeks insidiously enough to create itself a good conscience.
1057There is far too much witchery and sugar in the sentiments "for others"
1058and "NOT for myself," for one not needing to be doubly distrustful here,
1059and for one asking promptly: "Are they not perhaps—
1060DECEPTIONS?"—That they PLEASE— him who has them, and
1061him who enjoys their fruit, and also the mere spectator—that is still no
1062argument in their FAVOUR, but just calls for caution. Let us therefore be
1063cautious!
106434. At whatever standpoint of philosophy one may place oneself
1065nowadays, seen from every position, the ERRONEOUSNESS of the
106630
1067world in which we think we live is the surest and most certain thing our
1068eyes can light upon: we find proof after proof thereof, which would fain
1069allure us into surmises concerning a deceptive principle in the "nature of
1070things." He, however, who makes thinking itself, and consequently "the
1071spirit," responsible for the falseness of the world—an honourable exit,
1072which every conscious or unconscious advocatus dei avails himself
1073of—he who regards this world, including space, time, form, and movement,
1074as falsely DEDUCED, would have at least good reason in the end
1075to become distrustful also of all thinking; has it not hitherto been playing
1076upon us the worst of scurvy tricks? and what guarantee would it give
1077that it would not continue to do what it has always been doing? In all
1078seriousness, the innocence of thinkers has something touching and
1079respect-inspiring in it, which even nowadays permits them to wait upon
1080consciousness with the request that it will give them HONEST answers:
1081for example, whether it be "real" or not, and why it keeps the outer world
1082so resolutely at a distance, and other questions of the same description.
1083The belief in "immediate certainties" is a MORAL NAIVETE which does
1084honour to us philosophers; but—we have now to cease being "MERELY
1085moral" men! Apart from morality, such belief is a folly which does little
1086honour to us! If in middle-class life an ever- ready distrust is regarded as
1087the sign of a "bad character," and consequently as an imprudence, here
1088among us, beyond the middle- class world and its Yeas and Nays, what
1089should prevent our being imprudent and saying: the philosopher has at
1090length a RIGHT to "bad character," as the being who has hitherto been
1091most befooled on earth—he is now under OBLIGATION to distrustfulness,
1092to the wickedest squinting out of every abyss of suspicion.—
1093Forgive me the joke of this gloomy grimace and turn of expression;
1094for I myself have long ago learned to think and estimate differently
1095with regard to deceiving and being deceived, and I keep at least a couple
1096of pokes in the ribs ready for the blind rage with which philosophers
1097struggle against being deceived. Why NOT? It is nothing more than a
1098moral prejudice that truth is worth more than semblance; it is, in fact, the
1099worst proved supposition in the world. So much must be conceded:
1100there could have been no life at all except upon the basis of perspective
1101estimates and semblances; and if, with the virtuous enthusiasm and stupidity
1102of many philosophers, one wished to do away altogether with the
1103"seeming world"—well, granted that YOU could do that,—at least nothing
1104of your "truth" would thereby remain! Indeed, what is it that forces
1105us in general to the supposition that there is an essential opposition of
1106"true" and "false"? Is it not enough to suppose degrees of seemingness,
110731
1108and as it were lighter and darker shades and tones of semblance—
1109different valeurs, as the painters say? Why might not the world
1110WHICH CONCERNS US—be a fiction? And to any one who suggested:
1111"But to a fiction belongs an originator?"—might it not be bluntly replied:
1112WHY? May not this "belong" also belong to the fiction? Is it not at length
1113permitted to be a little ironical towards the subject, just as towards the
1114predicate and object? Might not the philosopher elevate himself above
1115faith in grammar? All respect to governesses, but is it not time that philosophy
1116should renounce governess-faith?
111735. O Voltaire! O humanity! O idiocy! There is something ticklish in
1118"the truth," and in the SEARCH for the truth; and if man goes about it
1119too humanely—"il ne cherche le vrai que pour faire le bien"—I wager he
1120finds nothing!
112136. Supposing that nothing else is "given" as real but our world of desires
1122and passions, that we cannot sink or rise to any other "reality" but
1123just that of our impulses—for thinking is only a relation of these impulses
1124to one another:—are we not permitted to make the attempt and to
1125ask the question whether this which is "given" does not SUFFICE, by
1126means of our counterparts, for the understanding even of the so-called
1127mechanical (or "material") world? I do not mean as an illusion, a
1128"semblance," a "representation" (in the Berkeleyan and Schopenhauerian
1129sense), but as possessing the same degree of reality as our emotions
1130themselves—as a more primitive form of the world of emotions, in
1131which everything still lies locked in a mighty unity, which afterwards
1132branches off and develops itself in organic processes (naturally also, refines
1133and debilitates)—as a kind of instinctive life in which all organic
1134functions, including self- regulation, assimilation, nutrition, secretion,
1135and change of matter, are still synthetically united with one another—as
1136a PRIMARY FORM of life?—In the end, it is not only permitted to make
1137this attempt, it is commanded by the conscience of LOGICAL METHOD.
1138Not to assume several kinds of causality, so long as the attempt to get
1139along with a single one has not been pushed to its furthest extent (to absurdity,
1140if I may be allowed to say so): that is a morality of method which
1141one may not repudiate nowadays—it follows "from its definition," as
1142mathematicians say. The question is ultimately whether we really recognize
1143the will as OPERATING, whether we believe in the causality of the
1144will; if we do so—and fundamentally our belief IN THIS is just our belief
1145in causality itself—we MUST make the attempt to posit hypothetically
114632
1147the causality of the will as the only causality. "Will" can naturally only
1148operate on "will"—and not on "matter" (not on "nerves," for instance): in
1149short, the hypothesis must be hazarded, whether will does not operate
1150on will wherever "effects" are recognized—and whether all mechanical
1151action, inasmuch as a power operates therein, is not just the power of
1152will, the effect of will. Granted, finally, that we succeeded in explaining
1153our entire instinctive life as the development and ramification of one
1154fundamental form of will—namely, the Will to Power, as my thesis puts
1155it; granted that all organic functions could be traced back to this Will to
1156Power, and that the solution of the problem of generation and nutrition—
1157it is one problem— could also be found therein: one would thus
1158have acquired the right to define ALL active force unequivocally as
1159WILL TO POWER. The world seen from within, the world defined and
1160designated according to its "intelligible character"—it would simply be
1161"Will to Power," and nothing else.
116237. "What? Does not that mean in popular language: God is disproved,
1163but not the devil?"—On the contrary! On the contrary, my friends! And
1164who the devil also compels you to speak popularly!
116538. As happened finally in all the enlightenment of modern times with
1166the French Revolution (that terrible farce, quite superfluous when judged
1167close at hand, into which, however, the noble and visionary spectators of
1168all Europe have interpreted from a distance their own indignation and
1169enthusiasm so long and passionately, UNTIL THE TEXT HAS
1170DISAPPEARED UNDER THE INTERPRETATION), so a noble posterity
1171might once more misunderstand the whole of the past, and perhaps only
1172thereby make ITS aspect endurable.—Or rather, has not this already
1173happened? Have not we ourselves been—that "noble posterity"? And, in
1174so far as we now comprehend this, is it not—thereby already past?
117539. Nobody will very readily regard a doctrine as true merely because
1176it makes people happy or virtuous—excepting, perhaps, the amiable
1177"Idealists," who are enthusiastic about the good, true, and beautiful, and
1178let all kinds of motley, coarse, and good-natured desirabilities swim
1179about promiscuously in their pond. Happiness and virtue are no arguments.
1180It is willingly forgotten, however, even on the part of thoughtful
1181minds, that to make unhappy and to make bad are just as little counterarguments.
1182A thing could be TRUE, although it were in the highest degree
1183injurious and dangerous; indeed, the fundamental constitution of
118433
1185existence might be such that one succumbed by a full knowledge of
1186it—so that the strength of a mind might be measured by the amount of
1187"truth" it could endure—or to speak more plainly, by the extent to which
1188it REQUIRED truth attenuated, veiled, sweetened, damped, and falsified.
1189But there is no doubt that for the discovery of certain PORTIONS of
1190truth the wicked and unfortunate are more favourably situated and have
1191a greater likelihood of success; not to speak of the wicked who are
1192happy—a species about whom moralists are silent. Perhaps severity and
1193craft are more favourable conditions for the development of strong, independent
1194spirits and philosophers than the gentle, refined, yielding goodnature,
1195and habit of taking things easily, which are prized, and rightly
1196prized in a learned man. Presupposing always, to begin with, that the
1197term "philosopher" be not confined to the philosopher who writes books,
1198or even introduces HIS philosophy into books!—Stendhal furnishes a
1199last feature of the portrait of the free-spirited philosopher, which for the
1200sake of German taste I will not omit to underline—for it is OPPOSED to
1201German taste. "Pour etre bon philosophe," says this last great psychologist,
1202"il faut etre sec, clair, sans illusion. Un banquier, qui a fait fortune, a
1203une partie du caractere requis pour faire des decouvertes en philosophie,
1204c'est-a-dire pour voir clair dans ce qui est."
120540. Everything that is profound loves the mask: the profoundest things
1206have a hatred even of figure and likeness. Should not the CONTRARY
1207only be the right disguise for the shame of a God to go about in? A question
1208worth asking!—it would be strange if some mystic has not already
1209ventured on the same kind of thing. There are proceedings of such a delicate
1210nature that it is well to overwhelm them with coarseness and make
1211them unrecognizable; there are actions of love and of an extravagant
1212magnanimity after which nothing can be wiser than to take a stick and
1213thrash the witness soundly: one thereby obscures his recollection. Many
1214a one is able to obscure and abuse his own memory, in order at least to
1215have vengeance on this sole party in the secret: shame is inventive. They
1216are not the worst things of which one is most ashamed: there is not only
1217deceit behind a mask—there is so much goodness in craft. I could imagine
1218that a man with something costly and fragile to conceal, would roll
1219through life clumsily and rotundly like an old, green, heavily-hooped
1220wine-cask: the refinement of his shame requiring it to be so. A man who
1221has depths in his shame meets his destiny and his delicate decisions
1222upon paths which few ever reach, and with regard to the existence of
1223which his nearest and most intimate friends may be ignorant; his mortal
122434
1225danger conceals itself from their eyes, and equally so his regained security.
1226Such a hidden nature, which instinctively employs speech for silence
1227and concealment, and is inexhaustible in evasion of communication,
1228DESIRES and insists that a mask of himself shall occupy his place in the
1229hearts and heads of his friends; and supposing he does not desire it, his
1230eyes will some day be opened to the fact that there is nevertheless a
1231mask of him there—and that it is well to be so. Every profound spirit
1232needs a mask; nay, more, around every profound spirit there continually
1233grows a mask, owing to the constantly false, that is to say, SUPERFICIAL
1234interpretation of every word he utters, every step he takes, every sign of
1235life he manifests.
123641. One must subject oneself to one's own tests that one is destined for
1237independence and command, and do so at the right time. One must not
1238avoid one's tests, although they constitute perhaps the most dangerous
1239game one can play, and are in the end tests made only before ourselves
1240and before no other judge. Not to cleave to any person, be it even the
1241dearest—every person is a prison and also a recess. Not to cleave to a
1242fatherland, be it even the most suffering and necessitous—it is even less
1243difficult to detach one's heart from a victorious fatherland. Not to cleave
1244to a sympathy, be it even for higher men, into whose peculiar torture and
1245helplessness chance has given us an insight. Not to cleave to a science,
1246though it tempt one with the most valuable discoveries, apparently specially
1247reserved for us. Not to cleave to one's own liberation, to the voluptuous
1248distance and remoteness of the bird, which always flies further
1249aloft in order always to see more under it—the danger of the flier. Not to
1250cleave to our own virtues, nor become as a whole a victim to any of our
1251specialties, to our "hospitality" for instance, which is the danger of
1252dangers for highly developed and wealthy souls, who deal prodigally,
1253almost indifferently with themselves, and push the virtue of liberality so
1254far that it becomes a vice. One must know how TO CONSERVE
1255ONESELF—the best test of independence.
125642. A new order of philosophers is appearing; I shall venture to baptize
1257them by a name not without danger. As far as I understand them, as
1258far as they allow themselves to be understood—for it is their nature to
1259WISH to remain something of a puzzle—these philosophers of the future
1260might rightly, perhaps also wrongly, claim to be designated as
1261"tempters." This name itself is after all only an attempt, or, if it be preferred,
1262a temptation.
126335
126443. Will they be new friends of "truth," these coming philosophers?
1265Very probably, for all philosophers hitherto have loved their truths. But
1266assuredly they will not be dogmatists. It must be contrary to their pride,
1267and also contrary to their taste, that their truth should still be truth for
1268every one—that which has hitherto been the secret wish and ultimate
1269purpose of all dogmatic efforts. "My opinion is MY opinion: another person
1270has not easily a right to it"—such a philosopher of the future will say,
1271perhaps. One must renounce the bad taste of wishing to agree with
1272many people. "Good" is no longer good when one's neighbour takes it into
1273his mouth. And how could there be a "common good"! The expression
1274contradicts itself; that which can be common is always of small value. In
1275the end things must be as they are and have always been—the great
1276things remain for the great, the abysses for the profound, the delicacies
1277and thrills for the refined, and, to sum up shortly, everything rare for the
1278rare.
127944. Need I say expressly after all this that they will be free, VERY free
1280spirits, these philosophers of the future—as certainly also they will not
1281be merely free spirits, but something more, higher, greater, and fundamentally
1282different, which does not wish to be misunderstood and mistaken?
1283But while I say this, I feel under OBLIGATION almost as much to
1284them as to ourselves (we free spirits who are their heralds and forerunners),
1285to sweep away from ourselves altogether a stupid old prejudice
1286and misunderstanding, which, like a fog, has too long made the conception
1287of "free spirit" obscure. In every country of Europe, and the same in
1288America, there is at present something which makes an abuse of this
1289name a very narrow, prepossessed, enchained class of spirits, who desire
1290almost the opposite of what our intentions and instincts prompt—not to
1291mention that in respect to the NEW philosophers who are appearing,
1292they must still more be closed windows and bolted doors. Briefly and regrettably,
1293they belong to the LEVELLERS, these wrongly named "free
1294spirits"—as glib-tongued and scribe-fingered slaves of the democratic
1295taste and its "modern ideas" all of them men without solitude, without
1296personal solitude, blunt honest fellows to whom neither courage nor
1297honourable conduct ought to be denied, only, they are not free, and are
1298ludicrously superficial, especially in their innate partiality for seeing the
1299cause of almost ALL human misery and failure in the old forms in which
1300society has hitherto existed—a notion which happily inverts the truth entirely!
1301What they would fain attain with all their strength, is the
130236
1303universal, green-meadow happiness of the herd, together with security,
1304safety, comfort, and alleviation of life for every one, their two most frequently
1305chanted songs and doctrines are called "Equality of Rights" and
1306"Sympathy with All Sufferers"—and suffering itself is looked upon by
1307them as something which must be DONE AWAY WITH. We opposite
1308ones, however, who have opened our eye and conscience to the question
1309how and where the plant "man" has hitherto grown most vigorously, believe
1310that this has always taken place under the opposite conditions, that
1311for this end the dangerousness of his situation had to be increased
1312enormously, his inventive faculty and dissembling power (his "spirit")
1313had to develop into subtlety and daring under long oppression and compulsion,
1314and his Will to Life had to be increased to the unconditioned
1315Will to Power—we believe that severity, violence, slavery, danger in the
1316street and in the heart, secrecy, stoicism, tempter's art and devilry of
1317every kind,—that everything wicked, terrible, tyrannical, predatory, and
1318serpentine in man, serves as well for the elevation of the human species
1319as its opposite—we do not even say enough when we only say THIS
1320MUCH, and in any case we find ourselves here, both with our speech
1321and our silence, at the OTHER extreme of all modern ideology and
1322gregarious desirability, as their anti-podes perhaps? What wonder that
1323we "free spirits" are not exactly the most communicative spirits? that we
1324do not wish to betray in every respect WHAT a spirit can free itself from,
1325and WHERE perhaps it will then be driven? And as to the import of the
1326dangerous formula, "Beyond Good and Evil," with which we at least
1327avoid confusion, we ARE something else than "libres-penseurs," "liben
1328pensatori" "free-thinkers," and whatever these honest advocates of
1329"modern ideas" like to call themselves. Having been at home, or at least
1330guests, in many realms of the spirit, having escaped again and again
1331from the gloomy, agreeable nooks in which preferences and prejudices,
1332youth, origin, the accident of men and books, or even the weariness of
1333travel seemed to confine us, full of malice against the seductions of dependency
1334which he concealed in honours, money, positions, or exaltation
1335of the senses, grateful even for distress and the vicissitudes of illness,
1336because they always free us from some rule, and its "prejudice,"
1337grateful to the God, devil, sheep, and worm in us, inquisitive to a fault,
1338investigators to the point of cruelty, with unhesitating fingers for the intangible,
1339with teeth and stomachs for the most indigestible, ready for any
1340business that requires sagacity and acute senses, ready for every adventure,
1341owing to an excess of "free will", with anterior and posterior souls,
1342into the ultimate intentions of which it is difficult to pry, with
134337
1344foregrounds and backgrounds to the end of which no foot may run, hidden
1345ones under the mantles of light, appropriators, although we resemble
1346heirs and spendthrifts, arrangers and collectors from morning till
1347night, misers of our wealth and our full-crammed drawers, economical
1348in learning and forgetting, inventive in scheming, sometimes proud of
1349tables of categories, sometimes pedants, sometimes night-owls of work
1350even in full day, yea, if necessary, even scarecrows—and it is necessary
1351nowadays, that is to say, inasmuch as we are the born, sworn, jealous
1352friends of SOLITUDE, of our own profoundest midnight and midday
1353solitude—such kind of men are we, we free spirits! And perhaps ye are
1354also something of the same kind, ye coming ones? ye NEW
1355philosophers?
135638
1357Chapter 3
1358What is Religious
135945. The human soul and its limits, the range of man's inner experiences
1360hitherto attained, the heights, depths, and distances of these experiences,
1361the entire history of the soul UP TO THE PRESENT TIME, and its still
1362unexhausted possibilities: this is the preordained hunting-domain for a
1363born psychologist and lover of a "big hunt". But how often must he say
1364despairingly to himself: "A single individual! alas, only a single individual!
1365and this great forest, this virgin forest!" So he would like to have
1366some hundreds of hunting assistants, and fine trained hounds, that he
1367could send into the history of the human soul, to drive HIS game together.
1368In vain: again and again he experiences, profoundly and bitterly, how
1369difficult it is to find assistants and dogs for all the things that directly excite
1370his curiosity. The evil of sending scholars into new and dangerous
1371hunting- domains, where courage, sagacity, and subtlety in every sense
1372are required, is that they are no longer serviceable just when the "BIG
1373hunt," and also the great danger commences,—it is precisely then that
1374they lose their keen eye and nose. In order, for instance, to divine and determine
1375what sort of history the problem of KNOWLEDGE AND
1376CONSCIENCE has hitherto had in the souls of homines religiosi, a person
1377would perhaps himself have to possess as profound, as bruised, as
1378immense an experience as the intellectual conscience of Pascal; and then
1379he would still require that wide-spread heaven of clear, wicked spirituality,
1380which, from above, would be able to oversee, arrange, and effectively
1381formulize this mass of dangerous and painful experiences.—But who
1382could do me this service! And who would have time to wait for such servants!—
1383they evidently appear too rarely, they are so improbable at all
1384times! Eventually one must do everything ONESELF in order to know
1385something; which means that one has MUCH to do!—But a curiosity like
1386mine is once for all the most agreeable of vices—pardon me! I mean to
1387say that the love of truth has its reward in heaven, and already upon
1388earth.
138939
139046. Faith, such as early Christianity desired, and not infrequently
1391achieved in the midst of a skeptical and southernly free-spirited world,
1392which had centuries of struggle between philosophical schools behind it
1393and in it, counting besides the education in tolerance which the Imperium
1394Romanum gave—this faith is NOT that sincere, austere slave-faith by
1395which perhaps a Luther or a Cromwell, or some other northern barbarian
1396of the spirit remained attached to his God and Christianity, it is much
1397rather the faith of Pascal, which resembles in a terrible manner a continuous
1398suicide of reason—a tough, long-lived, worm-like reason, which is
1399not to be slain at once and with a single blow. The Christian faith from
1400the beginning, is sacrifice the sacrifice of all freedom, all pride, all selfconfidence
1401of spirit, it is at the same time subjection, self-derision, and
1402self-mutilation. There is cruelty and religious Phoenicianism in this faith,
1403which is adapted to a tender, many-sided, and very fastidious conscience,
1404it takes for granted that the subjection of the spirit is indescribably
1405PAINFUL, that all the past and all the habits of such a spirit resist
1406the absurdissimum, in the form of which "faith" comes to it. Modern
1407men, with their obtuseness as regards all Christian nomenclature, have
1408no longer the sense for the terribly superlative conception which was implied
1409to an antique taste by the paradox of the formula, "God on the
1410Cross". Hitherto there had never and nowhere been such boldness in inversion,
1411nor anything at once so dreadful, questioning, and questionable
1412as this formula: it promised a transvaluation of all ancient values—It was
1413the Orient, the PROFOUND Orient, it was the Oriental slave who thus
1414took revenge on Rome and its noble, light-minded toleration, on the Roman
1415"Catholicism" of non-faith, and it was always not the faith, but the
1416freedom from the faith, the half-stoical and smiling indifference to the
1417seriousness of the faith, which made the slaves indignant at their masters
1418and revolt against them. "Enlightenment" causes revolt, for the slave desires
1419the unconditioned, he understands nothing but the tyrannous, even
1420in morals, he loves as he hates, without NUANCE, to the very depths, to
1421the point of pain, to the point of sickness—his many HIDDEN sufferings
1422make him revolt against the noble taste which seems to DENY suffering.
1423The skepticism with regard to suffering, fundamentally only an attitude
1424of aristocratic morality, was not the least of the causes, also, of the last
1425great slave-insurrection which began with the French Revolution.
142647. Wherever the religious neurosis has appeared on the earth so far,
1427we find it connected with three dangerous prescriptions as to regimen:
142840
1429solitude, fasting, and sexual abstinence—but without its being possible
1430to determine with certainty which is cause and which is effect, or IF any
1431relation at all of cause and effect exists there. This latter doubt is justified
1432by the fact that one of the most regular symptoms among savage as well
1433as among civilized peoples is the most sudden and excessive sensuality,
1434which then with equal suddenness transforms into penitential
1435paroxysms, world-renunciation, and will-renunciation, both symptoms
1436perhaps explainable as disguised epilepsy? But nowhere is it MORE obligatory
1437to put aside explanations around no other type has there grown
1438such a mass of absurdity and superstition, no other type seems to have
1439been more interesting to men and even to philosophers—perhaps it is
1440time to become just a little indifferent here, to learn caution, or, better
1441still, to look AWAY, TO GO AWAY—Yet in the background of the most
1442recent philosophy, that of Schopenhauer, we find almost as the problem
1443in itself, this terrible note of interrogation of the religious crisis and
1444awakening. How is the negation of will POSSIBLE? how is the saint possible?—
1445that seems to have been the very question with which Schopenhauer
1446made a start and became a philosopher. And thus it was a genuine
1447Schopenhauerian consequence, that his most convinced adherent
1448(perhaps also his last, as far as Germany is concerned), namely, Richard
1449Wagner, should bring his own life- work to an end just here, and should
1450finally put that terrible and eternal type upon the stage as Kundry, type
1451vecu, and as it loved and lived, at the very time that the mad-doctors in
1452almost all European countries had an opportunity to study the type close
1453at hand, wherever the religious neurosis—or as I call it, "the religious
1454mood"—made its latest epidemical outbreak and display as the
1455"Salvation Army"—If it be a question, however, as to what has been so
1456extremely interesting to men of all sorts in all ages, and even to philosophers,
1457in the whole phenomenon of the saint, it is undoubtedly the appearance
1458of the miraculous therein—namely, the immediate
1459SUCCESSION OF OPPOSITES, of states of the soul regarded as morally
1460antithetical: it was believed here to be self-evident that a "bad man" was
1461all at once turned into a "saint," a good man. The hitherto existing psychology
1462was wrecked at this point, is it not possible it may have
1463happened principally because psychology had placed itself under the
1464dominion of morals, because it BELIEVED in oppositions of moral values,
1465and saw, read, and INTERPRETED these oppositions into the text
1466and facts of the case? What? "Miracle" only an error of interpretation? A
1467lack of philology?
146841
146948. It seems that the Latin races are far more deeply attached to their
1470Catholicism than we Northerners are to Christianity generally, and that
1471consequently unbelief in Catholic countries means something quite different
1472from what it does among Protestants—namely, a sort of revolt
1473against the spirit of the race, while with us it is rather a return to the spirit
1474(or non- spirit) of the race.
1475We Northerners undoubtedly derive our origin from barbarous races,
1476even as regards our talents for religion—we have POOR talents for it.
1477One may make an exception in the case of the Celts, who have theretofore
1478furnished also the best soil for Christian infection in the North: the
1479Christian ideal blossomed forth in France as much as ever the pale sun of
1480the north would allow it. How strangely pious for our taste are still these
1481later French skeptics, whenever there is any Celtic blood in their origin!
1482How Catholic, how un-German does Auguste Comte's Sociology seem to
1483us, with the Roman logic of its instincts! How Jesuitical, that amiable and
1484shrewd cicerone of Port Royal, Sainte-Beuve, in spite of all his hostility to
1485Jesuits! And even Ernest Renan: how inaccessible to us Northerners does
1486the language of such a Renan appear, in whom every instant the merest
1487touch of religious thrill throws his refined voluptuous and comfortably
1488couching soul off its balance! Let us repeat after him these fine sentences—
1489and what wickedness and haughtiness is immediately aroused
1490by way of answer in our probably less beautiful but harder souls, that is
1491to say, in our more German souls!—"DISONS DONC HARDIMENT
1492QUE LA RELIGION EST UN PRODUIT DE L'HOMME NORMAL, QUE
1493L'HOMME EST LE PLUS DANS LE VRAI QUANT IL EST LE PLUS
1494RELIGIEUX ET LE PLUS ASSURE D'UNE DESTINEE INFINIE… . C'EST
1495QUAND IL EST BON QU'IL VEUT QUE LA VIRTU CORRESPONDE A
1496UN ORDER ETERNAL, C'EST QUAND IL CONTEMPLE LES CHOSES
1497D'UNE MANIERE DESINTERESSEE QU'IL TROUVE LA MORT
1498REVOLTANTE ET ABSURDE. COMMENT NE PAS SUPPOSER QUE
1499C'EST DANS CES MOMENTS-LA, QUE L'HOMME VOIT LE
1500MIEUX?"… These sentences are so extremely ANTIPODAL to my ears
1501and habits of thought, that in my first impulse of rage on finding them, I
1502wrote on the margin, "LA NIAISERIE RELIGIEUSE PAR
1503EXCELLENCE!"—until in my later rage I even took a fancy to them,
1504these sentences with their truth absolutely inverted! It is so nice and such
1505a distinction to have one's own antipodes!
150642
150749. That which is so astonishing in the religious life of the ancient
1508Greeks is the irrestrainable stream of GRATITUDE which it pours
1509forth—it is a very superior kind of man who takes SUCH an attitude towards
1510nature and life.—Later on, when the populace got the upper hand
1511in Greece, FEAR became rampant also in religion; and Christianity was
1512preparing itself.
151350. The passion for God: there are churlish, honest-hearted, and importunate
1514kinds of it, like that of Luther—the whole of Protestantism lacks
1515the southern DELICATEZZA. There is an Oriental exaltation of the mind
1516in it, like that of an undeservedly favoured or elevated slave, as in the
1517case of St. Augustine, for instance, who lacks in an offensive manner, all
1518nobility in bearing and desires. There is a feminine tenderness and sensuality
1519in it, which modestly and unconsciously longs for a UNIO
1520MYSTICA ET PHYSICA, as in the case of Madame de Guyon. In many
1521cases it appears, curiously enough, as the disguise of a girl's or youth's
1522puberty; here and there even as the hysteria of an old maid, also as her
1523last ambition. The Church has frequently canonized the woman in such a
1524case.
152551. The mightiest men have hitherto always bowed reverently before
1526the saint, as the enigma of self-subjugation and utter voluntary privation—
1527why did they thus bow? They divined in him— and as it were behind
1528the questionableness of his frail and wretched appearance—the superior
1529force which wished to test itself by such a subjugation; the
1530strength of will, in which they recognized their own strength and love of
1531power, and knew how to honour it: they honoured something in themselves
1532when they honoured the saint. In addition to this, the contemplation
1533of the saint suggested to them a suspicion: such an enormity of selfnegation
1534and anti-naturalness will not have been coveted for nothing—
1535they have said, inquiringly. There is perhaps a reason for it, some
1536very great danger, about which the ascetic might wish to be more accurately
1537informed through his secret interlocutors and visitors? In a word,
1538the mighty ones of the world learned to have a new fear before him, they
1539divined a new power, a strange, still unconquered enemy:—it was the
1540"Will to Power" which obliged them to halt before the saint. They had to
1541question him.
154252. In the Jewish "Old Testament," the book of divine justice, there are
1543men, things, and sayings on such an immense scale, that Greek and
154443
1545Indian literature has nothing to compare with it. One stands with fear
1546and reverence before those stupendous remains of what man was
1547formerly, and one has sad thoughts about old Asia and its little outpushed
1548peninsula Europe, which would like, by all means, to figure before
1549Asia as the "Progress of Mankind." To be sure, he who is himself
1550only a slender, tame house-animal, and knows only the wants of a
1551house-animal (like our cultured people of today, including the Christians
1552of "cultured" Christianity), need neither be amazed nor even sad amid
1553those ruins—the taste for the Old Testament is a touchstone with respect
1554to "great" and "small": perhaps he will find that the New Testament, the
1555book of grace, still appeals more to his heart (there is much of the odour
1556of the genuine, tender, stupid beadsman and petty soul in it). To have
1557bound up this New Testament (a kind of ROCOCO of taste in every respect)
1558along with the Old Testament into one book, as the "Bible," as "The
1559Book in Itself," is perhaps the greatest audacity and "sin against the Spirit"
1560which literary Europe has upon its conscience.
156153. Why Atheism nowadays? "The father" in God is thoroughly refuted;
1562equally so "the judge," "the rewarder." Also his "free will": he does
1563not hear—and even if he did, he would not know how to help. The worst
1564is that he seems incapable of communicating himself clearly; is he uncertain?—
1565This is what I have made out (by questioning and listening at a
1566variety of conversations) to be the cause of the decline of European theism;
1567it appears to me that though the religious instinct is in vigorous
1568growth,—it rejects the theistic satisfaction with profound distrust.
156954. What does all modern philosophy mainly do? Since Descartes—
1570and indeed more in defiance of him than on the basis of his procedure—
1571an ATTENTAT has been made on the part of all philosophers on
1572the old conception of the soul, under the guise of a criticism of the subject
1573and predicate conception—that is to say, an ATTENTAT on the fundamental
1574presupposition of Christian doctrine. Modern philosophy, as
1575epistemological skepticism, is secretly or openly ANTI-CHRISTIAN, although
1576(for keener ears, be it said) by no means anti-religious. Formerly,
1577in effect, one believed in "the soul" as one believed in grammar and the
1578grammatical subject: one said, "I" is the condition, "think" is the predicate
1579and is conditioned—to think is an activity for which one MUST suppose
1580a subject as cause. The attempt was then made, with marvelous tenacity
1581and subtlety, to see if one could not get out of this net,—to see if the opposite
1582was not perhaps true: "think" the condition, and "I" the
158344
1584conditioned; "I," therefore, only a synthesis which has been MADE by
1585thinking itself. KANT really wished to prove that, starting from the subject,
1586the subject could not be proved—nor the object either: the possibility
1587of an APPARENT EXISTENCE of the subject, and therefore of "the soul,"
1588may not always have been strange to him,—the thought which once had
1589an immense power on earth as the Vedanta philosophy.
159055. There is a great ladder of religious cruelty, with many rounds; but
1591three of these are the most important. Once on a time men sacrificed human
1592beings to their God, and perhaps just those they loved the best—to
1593this category belong the firstling sacrifices of all primitive religions, and
1594also the sacrifice of the Emperor Tiberius in the Mithra-Grotto on the Island
1595of Capri, that most terrible of all Roman anachronisms. Then, during
1596the moral epoch of mankind, they sacrificed to their God the
1597strongest instincts they possessed, their "nature"; THIS festal joy shines
1598in the cruel glances of ascetics and "anti-natural" fanatics. Finally, what
1599still remained to be sacrificed? Was it not necessary in the end for men to
1600sacrifice everything comforting, holy, healing, all hope, all faith in hidden
1601harmonies, in future blessedness and justice? Was it not necessary to
1602sacrifice God himself, and out of cruelty to themselves to worship stone,
1603stupidity, gravity, fate, nothingness? To sacrifice God for nothingness—
1604this paradoxical mystery of the ultimate cruelty has been reserved
1605for the rising generation; we all know something thereof already.
160656. Whoever, like myself, prompted by some enigmatical desire, has
1607long endeavoured to go to the bottom of the question of pessimism and
1608free it from the half-Christian, half-German narrowness and stupidity in
1609which it has finally presented itself to this century, namely, in the form
1610of Schopenhauer's philosophy; whoever, with an Asiatic and super-Asiatic
1611eye, has actually looked inside, and into the most world-renouncing
1612of all possible modes of thought—beyond good and evil, and no longer
1613like Buddha and Schopenhauer, under the dominion and delusion of
1614morality,—whoever has done this, has perhaps just thereby, without
1615really desiring it, opened his eyes to behold the opposite ideal: the ideal
1616of the most world-approving, exuberant, and vivacious man, who has
1617not only learnt to compromise and arrange with that which was and is,
1618but wishes to have it again AS IT WAS AND IS, for all eternity, insatiably
1619calling out de capo, not only to himself, but to the whole piece and
1620play; and not only the play, but actually to him who requires the
1621play—and makes it necessary; because he always requires himself
162245
1623anew—and makes himself necessary.—What? And this would not
1624be—circulus vitiosus deus?
162557. The distance, and as it were the space around man, grows with the
1626strength of his intellectual vision and insight: his world becomes profounder;
1627new stars, new enigmas, and notions are ever coming into view.
1628Perhaps everything on which the intellectual eye has exercised its acuteness
1629and profundity has just been an occasion for its exercise, something
1630of a game, something for children and childish minds. Perhaps the most
1631solemn conceptions that have caused the most fighting and suffering, the
1632conceptions "God" and "sin," will one day seem to us of no more importance
1633than a child's plaything or a child's pain seems to an old man;— and
1634perhaps another plaything and another pain will then be necessary once
1635more for "the old man"—always childish enough, an eternal child!
163658. Has it been observed to what extent outward idleness, or semi-idleness,
1637is necessary to a real religious life (alike for its favourite microscopic
1638labour of self-examination, and for its soft placidity called "prayer," the
1639state of perpetual readiness for the "coming of God"), I mean the idleness
1640with a good conscience, the idleness of olden times and of blood, to
1641which the aristocratic sentiment that work is DISHONOURING—that it
1642vulgarizes body and soul—is not quite unfamiliar? And that consequently
1643the modern, noisy, time-engrossing, conceited, foolishly proud
1644laboriousness educates and prepares for "unbelief" more than anything
1645else? Among these, for instance, who are at present living apart from religion
1646in Germany, I find "free-thinkers" of diversified species and origin,
1647but above all a majority of those in whom laboriousness from generation
1648to generation has dissolved the religious instincts; so that they no longer
1649know what purpose religions serve, and only note their existence in the
1650world with a kind of dull astonishment. They feel themselves already
1651fully occupied, these good people, be it by their business or by their
1652pleasures, not to mention the "Fatherland," and the newspapers, and
1653their "family duties"; it seems that they have no time whatever left for religion;
1654and above all, it is not obvious to them whether it is a question of
1655a new business or a new pleasure—for it is impossible, they say to themselves,
1656that people should go to church merely to spoil their tempers.
1657They are by no means enemies of religious customs; should certain circumstances,
1658State affairs perhaps, require their participation in such customs,
1659they do what is required, as so many things are done—with a patient
1660and unassuming seriousness, and without much curiosity or
166146
1662discomfort;—they live too much apart and outside to feel even the necessity
1663for a FOR or AGAINST in such matters. Among those indifferent
1664persons may be reckoned nowadays the majority of German Protestants
1665of the middle classes, especially in the great laborious centres of trade
1666and commerce; also the majority of laborious scholars, and the entire
1667University personnel (with the exception of the theologians, whose existence
1668and possibility there always gives psychologists new and more
1669subtle puzzles to solve). On the part of pious, or merely church-going
1670people, there is seldom any idea of HOW MUCH good-will, one might
1671say arbitrary will, is now necessary for a German scholar to take the
1672problem of religion seriously; his whole profession (and as I have said,
1673his whole workmanlike laboriousness, to which he is compelled by his
1674modern conscience) inclines him to a lofty and almost charitable serenity
1675as regards religion, with which is occasionally mingled a slight disdain
1676for the "uncleanliness" of spirit which he takes for granted wherever any
1677one still professes to belong to the Church. It is only with the help of history
1678(NOT through his own personal experience, therefore) that the
1679scholar succeeds in bringing himself to a respectful seriousness, and to a
1680certain timid deference in presence of religions; but even when his sentiments
1681have reached the stage of gratitude towards them, he has not personally
1682advanced one step nearer to that which still maintains itself as
1683Church or as piety; perhaps even the contrary. The practical indifference
1684to religious matters in the midst of which he has been born and brought
1685up, usually sublimates itself in his case into circumspection and cleanliness,
1686which shuns contact with religious men and things; and it may be
1687just the depth of his tolerance and humanity which prompts him to
1688avoid the delicate trouble which tolerance itself brings with it.—Every
1689age has its own divine type of naivete, for the discovery of which other
1690ages may envy it: and how much naivete—adorable, childlike, and
1691boundlessly foolish naivete is involved in this belief of the scholar in his
1692superiority, in the good conscience of his tolerance, in the unsuspecting,
1693simple certainty with which his instinct treats the religious man as a
1694lower and less valuable type, beyond, before, and ABOVE which he himself
1695has developed—he, the little arrogant dwarf and mob-man, the sedulously
1696alert, head-and-hand drudge of "ideas," of "modern ideas"!
169759. Whoever has seen deeply into the world has doubtless divined
1698what wisdom there is in the fact that men are superficial. It is their preservative
1699instinct which teaches them to be flighty, lightsome, and false.
1700Here and there one finds a passionate and exaggerated adoration of
170147
1702"pure forms" in philosophers as well as in artists: it is not to be doubted
1703that whoever has NEED of the cult of the superficial to that extent, has at
1704one time or another made an unlucky dive BENEATH it. Perhaps there is
1705even an order of rank with respect to those burnt children, the born
1706artists who find the enjoyment of life only in trying to FALSIFY its image
1707(as if taking wearisome revenge on it), one might guess to what degree
1708life has disgusted them, by the extent to which they wish to see its image
1709falsified, attenuated, ultrified, and deified,—one might reckon the homines
1710religiosi among the artists, as their HIGHEST rank. It is the profound,
1711suspicious fear of an incurable pessimism which compels whole
1712centuries to fasten their teeth into a religious interpretation of existence:
1713the fear of the instinct which divines that truth might be attained TOO
1714soon, before man has become strong enough, hard enough, artist
1715enough… . Piety, the "Life in God," regarded in this light, would appear
1716as the most elaborate and ultimate product of the FEAR of truth, as
1717artist-adoration and artist- intoxication in presence of the most logical of
1718all falsifications, as the will to the inversion of truth, to untruth at any
1719price. Perhaps there has hitherto been no more effective means of beautifying
1720man than piety, by means of it man can become so artful, so superficial,
1721so iridescent, and so good, that his appearance no longer offends.
172260. To love mankind FOR GOD'S SAKE—this has so far been the
1723noblest and remotest sentiment to which mankind has attained. That
1724love to mankind, without any redeeming intention in the background, is
1725only an ADDITIONAL folly and brutishness, that the inclination to this
1726love has first to get its proportion, its delicacy, its gram of salt and
1727sprinkling of ambergris from a higher inclination—whoever first perceived
1728and "experienced" this, however his tongue may have stammered
1729as it attempted to express such a delicate matter, let him for all time be
1730holy and respected, as the man who has so far flown highest and gone
1731astray in the finest fashion!
173261. The philosopher, as WE free spirits understand him—as the man of
1733the greatest responsibility, who has the conscience for the general development
1734of mankind,—will use religion for his disciplining and educating
1735work, just as he will use the contemporary political and economic conditions.
1736The selecting and disciplining influence—destructive, as well as
1737creative and fashioning—which can be exercised by means of religion is
1738manifold and varied, according to the sort of people placed under its
1739spell and protection. For those who are strong and independent,
174048
1741destined and trained to command, in whom the judgment and skill of a
1742ruling race is incorporated, religion is an additional means for overcoming
1743resistance in the exercise of authority—as a bond which binds rulers
1744and subjects in common, betraying and surrendering to the former the
1745conscience of the latter, their inmost heart, which would fain escape
1746obedience. And in the case of the unique natures of noble origin, if by
1747virtue of superior spirituality they should incline to a more retired and
1748contemplative life, reserving to themselves only the more refined forms
1749of government (over chosen disciples or members of an order), religion
1750itself may be used as a means for obtaining peace from the noise and
1751trouble of managing GROSSER affairs, and for securing immunity from
1752the UNAVOIDABLE filth of all political agitation. The Brahmins, for instance,
1753understood this fact. With the help of a religious organization,
1754they secured to themselves the power of nominating kings for the
1755people, while their sentiments prompted them to keep apart and outside,
1756as men with a higher and super-regal mission. At the same time religion
1757gives inducement and opportunity to some of the subjects to qualify
1758themselves for future ruling and commanding the slowly ascending
1759ranks and classes, in which, through fortunate marriage customs, volitional
1760power and delight in self-control are on the increase. To them religion
1761offers sufficient incentives and temptations to aspire to higher intellectuality,
1762and to experience the sentiments of authoritative self-control,
1763of silence, and of solitude. Asceticism and Puritanism are almost indispensable
1764means of educating and ennobling a race which seeks to rise
1765above its hereditary baseness and work itself upwards to future supremacy.
1766And finally, to ordinary men, to the majority of the people, who exist
1767for service and general utility, and are only so far entitled to exist, religion
1768gives invaluable contentedness with their lot and condition, peace
1769of heart, ennoblement of obedience, additional social happiness and
1770sympathy, with something of transfiguration and embellishment,
1771something of justification of all the commonplaceness, all the meanness,
1772all the semi-animal poverty of their souls. Religion, together with the religious
1773significance of life, sheds sunshine over such perpetually harassed
1774men, and makes even their own aspect endurable to them, it operates
1775upon them as the Epicurean philosophy usually operates upon sufferers
1776of a higher order, in a refreshing and refining manner, almost
1777TURNING suffering TO ACCOUNT, and in the end even hallowing and
1778vindicating it. There is perhaps nothing so admirable in Christianity and
1779Buddhism as their art of teaching even the lowest to elevate themselves
1780by piety to a seemingly higher order of things, and thereby to retain their
178149
1782satisfaction with the actual world in which they find it difficult enough
1783to live—this very difficulty being necessary.
178462. To be sure—to make also the bad counter-reckoning against such
1785religions, and to bring to light their secret dangers—the cost is always
1786excessive and terrible when religions do NOT operate as an educational
1787and disciplinary medium in the hands of the philosopher, but rule voluntarily
1788and PARAMOUNTLY, when they wish to be the final end, and
1789not a means along with other means. Among men, as among all other animals,
1790there is a surplus of defective, diseased, degenerating, infirm, and
1791necessarily suffering individuals; the successful cases, among men also,
1792are always the exception; and in view of the fact that man is THE
1793ANIMAL NOT YET PROPERLY ADAPTED TO HIS ENVIRONMENT,
1794the rare exception. But worse still. The higher the type a man represents,
1795the greater is the improbability that he will SUCCEED; the accidental,
1796the law of irrationality in the general constitution of mankind, manifests
1797itself most terribly in its destructive effect on the higher orders of men,
1798the conditions of whose lives are delicate, diverse, and difficult to determine.
1799What, then, is the attitude of the two greatest religions abovementioned
1800to the SURPLUS of failures in life? They endeavour to preserve
1801and keep alive whatever can be preserved; in fact, as the religions
1802FOR SUFFERERS, they take the part of these upon principle; they are always
1803in favour of those who suffer from life as from a disease, and they
1804would fain treat every other experience of life as false and impossible.
1805However highly we may esteem this indulgent and preservative care
1806(inasmuch as in applying to others, it has applied, and applies also to the
1807highest and usually the most suffering type of man), the hitherto
1808PARAMOUNT religions—to give a general appreciation of them—are
1809among the principal causes which have kept the type of "man" upon a
1810lower level—they have preserved too much THAT WHICH SHOULD
1811HAVE PERISHED. One has to thank them for invaluable services; and
1812who is sufficiently rich in gratitude not to feel poor at the contemplation
1813of all that the "spiritual men" of Christianity have done for Europe
1814hitherto! But when they had given comfort to the sufferers, courage to
1815the oppressed and despairing, a staff and support to the helpless, and
1816when they had allured from society into convents and spiritual penitentiaries
1817the broken-hearted and distracted: what else had they to do in order
1818to work systematically in that fashion, and with a good conscience,
1819for the preservation of all the sick and suffering, which means, in deed
1820and in truth, to work for the DETERIORATION OF THE EUROPEAN
182150
1822RACE? To REVERSE all estimates of value—THAT is what they had to
1823do! And to shatter the strong, to spoil great hopes, to cast suspicion on
1824the delight in beauty, to break down everything autonomous, manly,
1825conquering, and imperious—all instincts which are natural to the highest
1826and most successful type of "man"— into uncertainty, distress of conscience,
1827and self-destruction; forsooth, to invert all love of the earthly
1828and of supremacy over the earth, into hatred of the earth and earthly
1829things—THAT is the task the Church imposed on itself, and was obliged
1830to impose, until, according to its standard of value, "unworldliness,"
1831"unsensuousness," and "higher man" fused into one sentiment. If one
1832could observe the strangely painful, equally coarse and refined comedy
1833of European Christianity with the derisive and impartial eye of an Epicurean
1834god, I should think one would never cease marvelling and laughing;
1835does it not actually seem that some single will has ruled over Europe
1836for eighteen centuries in order to make a SUBLIME ABORTION of man?
1837He, however, who, with opposite requirements (no longer Epicurean)
1838and with some divine hammer in his hand, could approach this almost
1839voluntary degeneration and stunting of mankind, as exemplified in the
1840European Christian (Pascal, for instance), would he not have to cry aloud
1841with rage, pity, and horror: "Oh, you bunglers, presumptuous pitiful
1842bunglers, what have you done! Was that a work for your hands? How
1843you have hacked and botched my finest stone! What have you presumed
1844to do!"—I should say that Christianity has hitherto been the most
1845portentous of presumptions. Men, not great enough, nor hard enough, to
1846be entitled as artists to take part in fashioning MAN; men, not sufficiently
1847strong and far-sighted to ALLOW, with sublime self- constraint,
1848the obvious law of the thousandfold failures and perishings to prevail;
1849men, not sufficiently noble to see the radically different grades of rank
1850and intervals of rank that separate man from man:—SUCH men, with
1851their "equality before God," have hitherto swayed the destiny of Europe;
1852until at last a dwarfed, almost ludicrous species has been produced, a
1853gregarious animal, something obliging, sickly, mediocre, the European
1854of the present day.
185551
1856Chapter 4
1857Apophthegms and Interludes
185863. He who is thouroughly a teacher takes all things seriously only in relation
1859to his pupils—even himself.
186064. "Knowledge for its own sake" — that is the last snare laid by morality:
1861we are thereby completely entangled in morals once more.
186265. The charm of knowledge would be small, were it not so much
1863shame has to be overcome on the way to it.
186465A. We are most dishonourable towards our God: he is not
1865PERMITTED to sin.
186666. The tendency of a person to degrade himself, to allow himself to be
1867robbed, deceived, and exploited might be the diffidence of a God among
1868men.
186967. Love to one only is a barbarity, for it is exercised at the expense of
1870all others. Love to God also!
187168. "I did that," says my memory. "I could not have done that," says my
1872pride, and remains inexorable. Eventually—the memory yields.
187369. One has regarded life carelessly, if one has failed to see the hand
1874that—kills with leniency.
187570. If a man has character, he has also his typical experience, which always
1876recurs.
187771. THE SAGE AS ASTRONOMER.—So long as thou feelest the stars
1878as an "above thee," thou lackest the eye of the discerning one.
187952
188072. It is not the strength, but the duration of great sentiments that
1881makes those high among mankind.
188273. He who attains his ideal, precisely thereby surpasses it.
188373A. Many a peacock hides his tail from every eye—and calls it his
1884pride.
188574. A man of genius is unbearable, unless he possess at least two
1886things besides: gratitude and purity.
188775. The degree and nature of a person's gender extends to the highest
1888altitudes of their spirit.
188976. Under peaceful conditions the militant man attacks himself.
189077. With his principles a man seeks either to tyrranize, or justify, or
1891honour, or reproach, or conceal his habits: two men with the same principles
1892probably seek fundamentally different ends therewith.
189378. He who despises himself, does still esteem himself as a despiser.
189479. A soul which knows that it is loved, but does not itself love, betrays
1895its sediment: its dregs come up.
189680. A thing that is explained ceases to concern us—What did the God
1897mean who gave the advice, "Know thyself!" Did it perhaps imply "Cease
1898to be concerned about thyself! become objective!"— And Socrates?—And
1899the "scientific man"?
190081. It is terrible to die of thirst at sea. Is it necessary that you should so
1901salt your truth that it will no longer—quench the thirst?
190282. "Sympathy for all"—would be harshness and tyranny for THEE,
1903my good neighbour.
190483. INSTINCT—When the house is on fire one forgets even the dinner—
1905Yes, but one recovers it from among the ashes.
190653
190784. Woman learns how to hate in proportion as she—forgets how to
1908charm.
190985. The same emotions are in man and woman, but in different
1910TEMPO: therefore man and woman never cease to misunderstand one
1911another.
191286. In the background of all their personal vanity, women themselves
1913have still their impersonal scorn—for "woman".
191487. FETTERED HEART, FREE SPIRIT—When one firmly fetters one's
1915heart and keeps it prisoner, one can allow one's spirit many liberties: I
1916said this once before. But people do not believe it when I say so, unless
1917they know it already.
191888. One begins to distrust very clever persons when they become
1919embarrassed.
192089. Dreadful experiences raise the question whether he who experiences
1921them is not something dreadful also.
192290. Heavy, melancholy men turn lighter, and come temporarily to their
1923surface, precisely by that which makes others heavy—by hatred and
1924love.
192591. So cold, so icy, that one burns one's finger at the touch of him!
1926Every hand that lays hold of him shrinks back!—And for that very reason
1927many think him red-hot.
192892. Who has not, at one time or another—sacrificed himself for the
1929sake of his good name?
193093. In affability there is no hatred of men, but precisely on that account
1931a great deal too much contempt of men.
193294. The maturity of man—that means, to have reacquired the seriousness
1933that one had as a child at play.
193495. To be ashamed of one's immorality is a step on the ladder at the
1935end of which one is ashamed also of one's morality.
193654
193796. One should part from life as Ulysses parted from Nausicaa— blessing
1938it more than in love with it.
193997. What? A great man? I always see merely the play-actor of his own
1940ideal.
194198. When we train our conscience, it imminently kisses us, by biting.
194299. THE DISAPPOINTED ONE SPEAKS—"I listened for reverberations
1943and I heard only praise".
1944100. We all feign to ourselves that we are simpler than we are: we
1945thereby relax ourselves away from our fellows.
1946101. Today a discerning one might easily wish to regard himself as the
1947animalization of God.
1948102. Discovering reciprocal love should really disenchant the lover
1949with regard to the beloved. "What! She is modest enough to love even
1950you? Or stupid enough? Or—or—"
1951103. THE DANGER IN HAPPINESS.—"Everything now turns out best
1952for me, I now love every fate:—who would like to be my fate?"
1953104. Not their love of humanity, but the impotence of their love, prevents
1954the Christians of today—burning us.
1955105. The pia fraus is still more repugnant to the taste (the "piety") of
1956the free spirit (the "pious man of knowledge") than the impia fraus.
1957Hence the profound lack of judgment, in comparison with the Church,
1958characteristic of the type "free spirit"—as ITS non-freedom.
1959106. By means of music the very passions enjoy themselves.
1960107. A sign of strong character, when once the resolution has been
1961taken, to shut the ear even to the best counter-arguments. Occasionally,
1962therefore, a will to stupidity.
196355
1964108. There is no such thing as moral phenomena, but only a moral interpretation
1965of phenomena.
1966109. The criminal is often enough not equal to his deed: he extenuates
1967and maligns it.
1968110. The advocates of a criminal are seldom artists enough to turn the
1969beautiful terribleness of the deed to the advantage of the doer.
1970111. Our vanity is most difficult to wound just when our pride has
1971been wounded.
1972112. To him who feels himself preordained to contemplation and not
1973to belief, all believers are too noisy and obtrusive; he guards against
1974them.
1975113. "You want to prepossess him in your favour? Then you must be
1976embarrassed before him."
1977114. The immense expectation with regard to sexual love, and the coyness
1978in this expectation, spoils all the perspectives of women at the
1979outset.
1980115. Where there is neither love nor hatred in the game, woman's play
1981is mediocre.
1982116. The great epochs of our life are at the points when we gain courage
1983to rebaptize our badness as the best in us.
1984117. The will to overcome an emotion, is ultimately only the will of another,
1985or of several other, emotions.
1986118. There is an innocence of admiration: it is possessed by him to
1987whom it has not yet occurred that he himself may be admired some day.
1988119. Our loathing of dirt may be so great as to prevent our cleaning
1989ourselves—"justifying" ourselves.
1990120. Sensuality often forces the growth of love too much, so that its
1991root remains weak, and is easily torn up.
199256
1993121. It is a curious thing that God learned Greek when he wished to
1994turn author—and that he did not learn it better.
1995122. To rejoice on account of praise is in many cases merely politeness
1996of heart—and the very opposite of vanity of spirit.
1997123. Even concubinage has been corrupted—by marriage.
1998124. He who exults at the stake, does not triumph over pain, but because
1999of the fact that he does not feel pain where he expected it. A
2000parable.
2001125. When we have to change an opinion about any one, we charge
2002heavily to his account the inconvenience he thereby causes us.
2003126. A nation is a detour of nature to arrive at six or seven great
2004men.—Yes, and then to get round them.
2005127. In the eyes of all true women science is hostile to the sense of
2006shame. They feel as if one wished to peep under their skin with it—or
2007worse still! under their dress and finery.
2008128. The more abstract the truth you wish to teach, the more must you
2009allure the senses to it.
2010129. The devil has the most extensive perspectives for God; on that account
2011he keeps so far away from him:—the devil, in effect, as the oldest
2012friend of knowledge.
2013130. What a person IS begins to betray itself when his talent decreases,—
2014when he ceases to show what he CAN do. Talent is also an adornment;
2015an adornment is also a concealment.
2016131. The sexes deceive themselves about each other: the reason is that
2017in reality they honour and love only themselves (or their own ideal, to
2018express it more agreeably). Thus man wishes woman to be peaceable:
2019but in fact woman is ESSENTIALLY unpeaceable, like the cat, however
2020well she may have assumed the peaceable demeanour.
202157
2022132. One is punished best for one's virtues.
2023133. He who cannot find the way to HIS ideal, lives more frivolously
2024and shamelessly than the man without an ideal.
2025134. From the senses originate all trustworthiness, all good conscience,
2026all evidence of truth.
2027135. Pharisaism is not a deterioration of the good man; a considerable
2028part of it is rather an essential condition of being good.
2029136. The one seeks an accoucheur for his thoughts, the other seeks
2030some one whom he can assist: a good conversation thus originates.
2031137. In intercourse with scholars and artists one readily makes mistakes
2032of opposite kinds: in a remarkable scholar one not infrequently
2033finds a mediocre man; and often, even in a mediocre artist, one finds a
2034very remarkable man.
2035138. We do the same when awake as when dreaming: we only invent
2036and imagine him with whom we have intercourse—and forget it
2037immediately.
2038139. In revenge and in love woman is more barbarous than man.
2039140. ADVICE AS A RIDDLE.—"If the band is not to break, bite it
2040first—secure to make!"
2041141. The belly is the reason why man does not so readily take himself
2042for a God.
2043142. The chastest utterance I ever heard: "Dans le veritable amour c'est
2044I l'ame qui enveloppe le corps."
2045143. Our vanity would like what we do best to pass precisely for what
2046is most difficult to us.—Concerning the origin of many systems of
2047morals.
2048144. When a woman has scholarly inclinations there is generally
2049something wrong with her sexual nature. Barrenness itself conduces to a
205058
2051certain virility of taste; man, indeed, if I may say so, is "the barren
2052animal."
2053145. Comparing man and woman generally, one may say that woman
2054would not have the genius for adornment, if she had not the instinct for
2055the SECONDARY role.
2056146. He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become
2057a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also
2058gaze into thee.
2059147. From old Florentine novels—moreover, from life: Buona femmina
2060e mala femmina vuol bastone.—Sacchetti, Nov. 86.
2061148. To seduce their neighbour to a favourable opinion, and afterwards
2062to believe implicitly in this opinion of their neighbour—who can
2063do this conjuring trick so well as women?
2064149. That which an age considers evil is usually an unseasonable echo
2065of what was formerly considered good—the atavism of an old ideal.
2066150. Around the hero everything becomes a tragedy; around the demigod
2067everything becomes a satyr-play; and around God everything becomes—
2068what? perhaps a "world"?
2069151. It is not enough to possess a talent: one must also have your permission
2070to possess it;—eh, my friends?
2071152. "Where there is the tree of knowledge, there is always Paradise":
2072so say the most ancient and the most modern serpents.
2073153. What is done out of love always takes place beyond good and
2074evil.
2075154. Objection, evasion, joyous distrust, and love of irony are signs of
2076health; everything absolute belongs to pathology.
2077155. The sense of the tragic increases and declines with sensuousness.
207859
2079156. Insanity in individuals is something rare—but in groups, parties,
2080nations, and epochs it is the rule.
2081157. The thought of suicide is a great consolation: by means of it one
2082gets successfully through many a bad night.
2083158. Not only our reason, but also our conscience, truckles to our
2084strongest impulse—the tyrant in us.
2085159. One MUST repay good and ill; but why just to the person who did
2086us good or ill?
2087160. One no longer loves one's knowledge sufficiently after one has
2088communicated it.
2089161. Poets act shamelessly towards their experiences: they exploit
2090them.
2091162. "Our fellow-creature is not our neighbour, but our neighbour's
2092neighbour":—so thinks every nation.
2093163. Love brings to light the noble and hidden qualities of a lover—his
2094rare and exceptional traits: it is thus liable to be deceptive as to his normal
2095character.
2096164. Jesus said to his Jews: "The law was for servants;—love God as I
2097love him, as his Son! What have we Sons of God to do with morals!"
2098165. IN SIGHT OF EVERY PARTY.—A shepherd has always need of a
2099bell-wether—or he has himself to be a wether occasionally.
2100166. One may indeed lie with the mouth; but with the accompanying
2101grimace one nevertheless tells the truth.
2102167. To vigorous men intimacy is a matter of shame—and something
2103precious.
2104168. Christianity gave Eros poison to drink; he did not die of it, certainly,
2105but degenerated to Vice.
210660
2107169. To talk much about oneself may also be a means of concealing
2108oneself.
2109170. In praise there is more obtrusiveness than in blame.
2110171. Pity has an almost ludicrous effect on a man of knowledge, like
2111tender hands on a Cyclops.
2112172. One occasionally embraces some one or other, out of love to mankind
2113(because one cannot embrace all); but this is what one must never
2114confess to the individual.
2115173. One does not hate as long as one disesteems, but only when one
2116esteems equal or superior.
2117174. Ye Utilitarians—ye, too, love the UTILE only as a VEHICLE for
2118your inclinations,—ye, too, really find the noise of its wheels
2119insupportable!
2120175. One loves ultimately one's desires, not the thing desired.
2121176. The vanity of others is only counter to our taste when it is counter
2122to our vanity.
2123177. With regard to what "truthfulness" is, perhaps nobody has ever
2124been sufficiently truthful.
2125178. One does not believe in the follies of clever men: what a forfeiture
2126of the rights of man!
2127179. The consequences of our actions seize us by the forelock, very indifferent
2128to the fact that we have meanwhile "reformed."
2129180. There is an innocence in lying which is the sign of good faith in a
2130cause.
2131181. It is inhuman to bless when one is being cursed.
2132182. The familiarity of superiors embitters one, because it may not be
2133returned.
213461
2135183. "I am affected, not because you have deceived me, but because I
2136can no longer believe in you."
2137184. There is a haughtiness of kindness which has the appearance of
2138wickedness.
2139185. "I dislike him."—Why?—"I am not a match for him."—Did any
2140one ever answer so?
214162
2142Chapter 5
2143The Natural History of Morals
2144186. The moral sentiment in Europe at present is perhaps as subtle, belated,
2145diverse, sensitive, and refined, as the "Science of Morals" belonging
2146thereto is recent, initial, awkward, and coarse-fingered:—an interesting
2147contrast, which sometimes becomes incarnate and obvious in the very
2148person of a moralist. Indeed, the expression, "Science of Morals" is, in respect
2149to what is designated thereby, far too presumptuous and counter
2150to GOOD taste,—which is always a foretaste of more modest expressions.
2151One ought to avow with the utmost fairness WHAT is still necessary
2152here for a long time, WHAT is alone proper for the present: namely,
2153the collection of material, the comprehensive survey and classification of
2154an immense domain of delicate sentiments of worth, and distinctions of
2155worth, which live, grow, propagate, and perish—and perhaps attempts
2156to give a clear idea of the recurring and more common forms of these living
2157crystallizations—as preparation for a THEORY OF TYPES of morality.
2158To be sure, people have not hitherto been so modest. All the philosophers,
2159with a pedantic and ridiculous seriousness, demanded of themselves
2160something very much higher, more pretentious, and ceremonious,
2161when they concerned themselves with morality as a science: they wanted
2162to GIVE A BASIC to morality— and every philosopher hitherto has believed
2163that he has given it a basis; morality itself, however, has been regarded
2164as something "given." How far from their awkward pride was the
2165seemingly insignificant problem—left in dust and decay—of a description
2166of forms of morality, notwithstanding that the finest hands and
2167senses could hardly be fine enough for it! It was precisely owing to moral
2168philosophers' knowing the moral facts imperfectly, in an arbitrary epitome,
2169or an accidental abridgement—perhaps as the morality of their environment,
2170their position, their church, their Zeitgeist, their climate and
2171zone—it was precisely because they were badly instructed with regard to
2172nations, eras, and past ages, and were by no means eager to know about
2173these matters, that they did not even come in sight of the real problems
217463
2175of morals—problems which only disclose themselves by a comparison of
2176MANY kinds of morality. In every "Science of Morals" hitherto, strange
2177as it may sound, the problem of morality itself has been OMITTED: there
2178has been no suspicion that there was anything problematic there! That
2179which philosophers called "giving a basis to morality," and endeavoured
2180to realize, has, when seen in a right light, proved merely a learned form
2181of good FAITH in prevailing morality, a new means of its EXPRESSION,
2182consequently just a matter-of-fact within the sphere of a definite morality,
2183yea, in its ultimate motive, a sort of denial that it is LAWFUL for this
2184morality to be called in question—and in any case the reverse of the testing,
2185analyzing, doubting, and vivisecting of this very faith. Hear, for instance,
2186with what innocence—almost worthy of honour—Schopenhauer
2187represents his own task, and draw your conclusions concerning the scientificness
2188of a "Science" whose latest master still talks in the strain of
2189children and old wives: "The principle," he says (page 136 of the
2190Grundprobleme der Ethik), 4 "the axiom about the purport of which all
2191moralists are PRACTICALLY agreed: neminem laede, immo omnes
2192quantum potes juva—is REALLY the proposition which all moral teachers
2193strive to establish, … the REAL basis of ethics which has been sought,
2194like the philosopher's stone, for centuries."—The difficulty of establishing
2195the proposition referred to may indeed be great—it is well known
2196that Schopenhauer also was unsuccessful in his efforts; and whoever has
2197thoroughly realized how absurdly false and sentimental this proposition
2198is, in a world whose essence is Will to Power, may be reminded that
2199Schopenhauer, although a pessimist, ACTUALLY—played the flute …
2200daily after dinner: one may read about the matter in his biography. A
2201question by the way: a pessimist, a repudiator of God and of the world,
2202who MAKES A HALT at morality—who assents to morality, and plays
2203the flute to laede-neminem morals, what? Is that really—a pessimist?
2204187. Apart from the value of such assertions as "there is a categorical
2205imperative in us," one can always ask: What does such an assertion indicate
2206about him who makes it? There are systems of morals which are
2207meant to justify their author in the eyes of other people; other systems of
2208morals are meant to tranquilize him, and make him self-satisfied; with
2209other systems he wants to crucify and humble himself, with others he
2210wishes to take revenge, with others to conceal himself, with others to
2211glorify himself and gave superiority and distinction,—this system of
22124.Pages 54-55 of Schopenhauer's Basis of Morality, translated by Arthur B. Bullock,
2213M.A. (1903).
221464
2215morals helps its author to forget, that system makes him, or something of
2216him, forgotten, many a moralist would like to exercise power and creative
2217arbitrariness over mankind, many another, perhaps, Kant especially,
2218gives us to understand by his morals that "what is estimable in me, is
2219that I know how to obey—and with you it SHALL not be otherwise than
2220with me!" In short, systems of morals are only a SIGN-LANGUAGE OF
2221THE EMOTIONS.
2222188. In contrast to laisser-aller, every system of morals is a sort of
2223tyranny against "nature" and also against "reason", that is, however, no
2224objection, unless one should again decree by some system of morals, that
2225all kinds of tyranny and unreasonableness are unlawful What is essential
2226and invaluable in every system of morals, is that it is a long constraint. In
2227order to understand Stoicism, or Port Royal, or Puritanism, one should
2228remember the constraint under which every language has attained to
2229strength and freedom—the metrical constraint, the tyranny of rhyme and
2230rhythm. How much trouble have the poets and orators of every nation
2231given themselves!—not excepting some of the prose writers of today, in
2232whose ear dwells an inexorable conscientiousness— "for the sake of a
2233folly," as utilitarian bunglers say, and thereby deem themselves
2234wise—"from submission to arbitrary laws," as the anarchists say, and
2235thereby fancy themselves "free," even free-spirited. The singular fact remains,
2236however, that everything of the nature of freedom, elegance,
2237boldness, dance, and masterly certainty, which exists or has existed,
2238whether it be in thought itself, or in administration, or in speaking and
2239persuading, in art just as in conduct, has only developed by means of the
2240tyranny of such arbitrary law, and in all seriousness, it is not at all improbable
2241that precisely this is "nature" and "natural"—and not laisser-aller!
2242Every artist knows how different from the state of letting himself go,
2243is his "most natural" condition, the free arranging, locating, disposing,
2244and constructing in the moments of "inspiration"—and how strictly and
2245delicately he then obeys a thousand laws, which, by their very rigidness
2246and precision, defy all formulation by means of ideas (even the most
2247stable idea has, in comparison therewith, something floating, manifold,
2248and ambiguous in it). The essential thing "in heaven and in earth" is, apparently
2249(to repeat it once more), that there should be long OBEDIENCE
2250in the same direction, there thereby results, and has always resulted in
2251the long run, something which has made life worth living; for instance,
2252virtue, art, music, dancing, reason, spirituality— anything whatever that
2253is transfiguring, refined, foolish, or divine. The long bondage of the
225465
2255spirit, the distrustful constraint in the communicability of ideas, the discipline
2256which the thinker imposed on himself to think in accordance with
2257the rules of a church or a court, or conformable to Aristotelian premises,
2258the persistent spiritual will to interpret everything that happened according
2259to a Christian scheme, and in every occurrence to rediscover and justify
2260the Christian God:—all this violence, arbitrariness, severity, dreadfulness,
2261and unreasonableness, has proved itself the disciplinary means
2262whereby the European spirit has attained its strength, its remorseless
2263curiosity and subtle mobility; granted also that much irrecoverable
2264strength and spirit had to be stifled, suffocated, and spoilt in the process
2265(for here, as everywhere, "nature" shows herself as she is, in all her extravagant
2266and INDIFFERENT magnificence, which is shocking, but nevertheless
2267noble). That for centuries European thinkers only thought in order
2268to prove something-nowadays, on the contrary, we are suspicious of
2269every thinker who "wishes to prove something"—that it was always
2270settled beforehand what WAS TO BE the result of their strictest thinking,
2271as it was perhaps in the Asiatic astrology of former times, or as it is still
2272at the present day in the innocent, Christian-moral explanation of immediate
2273personal events "for the glory of God," or "for the good of the
2274soul":—this tyranny, this arbitrariness, this severe and magnificent stupidity,
2275has EDUCATED the spirit; slavery, both in the coarser and the
2276finer sense, is apparently an indispensable means even of spiritual education
2277and discipline. One may look at every system of morals in this
2278light: it is "nature" therein which teaches to hate the laisser-aller, the too
2279great freedom, and implants the need for limited horizons, for immediate
2280duties—it teaches the NARROWING OF PERSPECTIVES, and thus,
2281in a certain sense, that stupidity is a condition of life and development.
2282"Thou must obey some one, and for a long time; OTHERWISE thou wilt
2283come to grief, and lose all respect for thyself"—this seems to me to be the
2284moral imperative of nature, which is certainly neither "categorical," as
2285old Kant wished (consequently the "otherwise"), nor does it address itself
2286to the individual (what does nature care for the individual!), but to nations,
2287races, ages, and ranks; above all, however, to the animal "man"
2288generally, to MANKIND.
2289189. Industrious races find it a great hardship to be idle: it was a master
2290stroke of ENGLISH instinct to hallow and begloom Sunday to such
2291an extent that the Englishman unconsciously hankers for his week—and
2292work-day again:—as a kind of cleverly devised, cleverly intercalated
2293FAST, such as is also frequently found in the ancient world (although, as
229466
2295is appropriate in southern nations, not precisely with respect to work).
2296Many kinds of fasts are necessary; and wherever powerful influences
2297and habits prevail, legislators have to see that intercalary days are appointed,
2298on which such impulses are fettered, and learn to hunger anew.
2299Viewed from a higher standpoint, whole generations and epochs, when
2300they show themselves infected with any moral fanaticism, seem like
2301those intercalated periods of restraint and fasting, during which an impulse
2302learns to humble and submit itself—at the same time also to
2303PURIFY and SHARPEN itself; certain philosophical sects likewise admit
2304of a similar interpretation (for instance, the Stoa, in the midst of Hellenic
2305culture, with the atmosphere rank and overcharged with Aphrodisiacal
2306odours).—Here also is a hint for the explanation of the paradox, why it
2307was precisely in the most Christian period of European history, and in
2308general only under the pressure of Christian sentiments, that the sexual
2309impulse sublimated into love (amour-passion).
2310190. There is something in the morality of Plato which does not really
2311belong to Plato, but which only appears in his philosophy, one might
2312say, in spite of him: namely, Socratism, for which he himself was too
2313noble. "No one desires to injure himself, hence all evil is done unwittingly.
2314The evil man inflicts injury on himself; he would not do so,
2315however, if he knew that evil is evil. The evil man, therefore, is only evil
2316through error; if one free him from error one will necessarily make
2317him—good."—This mode of reasoning savours of the POPULACE, who
2318perceive only the unpleasant consequences of evil-doing, and practically
2319judge that "it is STUPID to do wrong"; while they accept "good" as
2320identical with "useful and pleasant," without further thought. As regards
2321every system of utilitarianism, one may at once assume that it has the
2322same origin, and follow the scent: one will seldom err.— Plato did all he
2323could to interpret something refined and noble into the tenets of his
2324teacher, and above all to interpret himself into them—he, the most daring
2325of all interpreters, who lifted the entire Socrates out of the street, as a
2326popular theme and song, to exhibit him in endless and impossible modifications
2327—namely, in all his own disguises and multiplicities. In jest,
2328and in Homeric language as well, what is the Platonic Socrates, if not—
2329[Greek words inserted here.]
2330191. The old theological problem of "Faith" and "Knowledge," or more
2331plainly, of instinct and reason—the question whether, in respect to the
2332valuation of things, instinct deserves more authority than rationality,
233367
2334which wants to appreciate and act according to motives, according to a
2335"Why," that is to say, in conformity to purpose and utility—it is always
2336the old moral problem that first appeared in the person of Socrates, and
2337had divided men's minds long before Christianity. Socrates himself, following,
2338of course, the taste of his talent—that of a surpassing dialectician—
2339took first the side of reason; and, in fact, what did he do all his
2340life but laugh at the awkward incapacity of the noble Athenians, who
2341were men of instinct, like all noble men, and could never give satisfactory
2342answers concerning the motives of their actions? In the end,
2343however, though silently and secretly, he laughed also at himself: with
2344his finer conscience and introspection, he found in himself the same difficulty
2345and incapacity. "But why"—he said to himself— "should one on
2346that account separate oneself from the instincts! One must set them right,
2347and the reason ALSO—one must follow the instincts, but at the same
2348time persuade the reason to support them with good arguments." This
2349was the real FALSENESS of that great and mysterious ironist; he brought
2350his conscience up to the point that he was satisfied with a kind of selfoutwitting:
2351in fact, he perceived the irrationality in the moral judgment.—
2352Plato, more innocent in such matters, and without the craftiness
2353of the plebeian, wished to prove to himself, at the expenditure of all his
2354strength—the greatest strength a philosopher had ever expended—that
2355reason and instinct lead spontaneously to one goal, to the good, to
2356"God"; and since Plato, all theologians and philosophers have followed
2357the same path—which means that in matters of morality, instinct (or as
2358Christians call it, "Faith," or as I call it, "the herd") has hitherto triumphed.
2359Unless one should make an exception in the case of Descartes,
2360the father of rationalism (and consequently the grandfather of the Revolution),
2361who recognized only the authority of reason: but reason is
2362only a tool, and Descartes was superficial.
2363192. Whoever has followed the history of a single science, finds in its
2364development a clue to the understanding of the oldest and commonest
2365processes of all "knowledge and cognizance": there, as here, the premature
2366hypotheses, the fictions, the good stupid will to "belief," and the lack
2367of distrust and patience are first developed—our senses learn late, and
2368never learn completely, to be subtle, reliable, and cautious organs of
2369knowledge. Our eyes find it easier on a given occasion to produce a picture
2370already often produced, than to seize upon the divergence and novelty
2371of an impression: the latter requires more force, more "morality." It is
2372difficult and painful for the ear to listen to anything new; we hear
237368
2374strange music badly. When we hear another language spoken, we involuntarily
2375attempt to form the sounds into words with which we are more
2376familiar and conversant—it was thus, for example, that the Germans
2377modified the spoken word ARCUBALISTA into ARMBRUST (crossbow).
2378Our senses are also hostile and averse to the new; and generally,
2379even in the "simplest" processes of sensation, the emotions
2380DOMINATE—such as fear, love, hatred, and the passive emotion of indolence.—
2381As little as a reader nowadays reads all the single words (not
2382to speak of syllables) of a page —he rather takes about five out of every
2383twenty words at random, and "guesses" the probably appropriate sense
2384to them—just as little do we see a tree correctly and completely in respect
2385to its leaves, branches, colour, and shape; we find it so much easier
2386to fancy the chance of a tree. Even in the midst of the most remarkable
2387experiences, we still do just the same; we fabricate the greater part of the
2388experience, and can hardly be made to contemplate any event, EXCEPT
2389as "inventors" thereof. All this goes to prove that from our fundamental
2390nature and from remote ages we have been—ACCUSTOMED TO
2391LYING. Or, to express it more politely and hypocritically, in short, more
2392pleasantly—one is much more of an artist than one is aware of.—In an
2393animated conversation, I often see the face of the person with whom I am
2394speaking so clearly and sharply defined before me, according to the
2395thought he expresses, or which I believe to be evoked in his mind, that
2396the degree of distinctness far exceeds the STRENGTH of my visual faculty—
2397the delicacy of the play of the muscles and of the expression of the
2398eyes MUST therefore be imagined by me. Probably the person put on
2399quite a different expression, or none at all.
2400193. Quidquid luce fuit, tenebris agit: but also contrariwise. What we
2401experience in dreams, provided we experience it often, pertains at last
2402just as much to the general belongings of our soul as anything "actually"
2403experienced; by virtue thereof we are richer or poorer, we have a requirement
2404more or less, and finally, in broad daylight, and even in the
2405brightest moments of our waking life, we are ruled to some extent by the
2406nature of our dreams. Supposing that someone has often flown in his
2407dreams, and that at last, as soon as he dreams, he is conscious of the
2408power and art of flying as his privilege and his peculiarly enviable happiness;
2409such a person, who believes that on the slightest impulse, he can
2410actualize all sorts of curves and angles, who knows the sensation of a
2411certain divine levity, an "upwards" without effort or constraint, a
2412"downwards" without descending or lowering—without
241369
2414TROUBLE!—how could the man with such dream- experiences and
2415dream-habits fail to find "happiness" differently coloured and defined,
2416even in his waking hours! How could he fail—to long DIFFERENTLY for
2417happiness? "Flight," such as is described by poets, must, when compared
2418with his own "flying," be far too earthly, muscular, violent, far too
2419"troublesome" for him.
2420194. The difference among men does not manifest itself only in the difference
2421of their lists of desirable things—in their regarding different
2422good things as worth striving for, and being disagreed as to the greater
2423or less value, the order of rank, of the commonly recognized desirable
2424things:—it manifests itself much more in what they regard as actually
2425HAVING and POSSESSING a desirable thing. As regards a woman, for
2426instance, the control over her body and her sexual gratification serves as
2427an amply sufficient sign of ownership and possession to the more modest
2428man; another with a more suspicious and ambitious thirst for possession,
2429sees the "questionableness," the mere apparentness of such ownership,
2430and wishes to have finer tests in order to know especially whether
2431the woman not only gives herself to him, but also gives up for his sake
2432what she has or would like to have— only THEN does he look upon her
2433as "possessed." A third, however, has not even here got to the limit of his
2434distrust and his desire for possession: he asks himself whether the woman,
2435when she gives up everything for him, does not perhaps do so for a
2436phantom of him; he wishes first to be thoroughly, indeed, profoundly
2437well known; in order to be loved at all he ventures to let himself be
2438found out. Only then does he feel the beloved one fully in his possession,
2439when she no longer deceives herself about him, when she loves him just
2440as much for the sake of his devilry and concealed insatiability, as for his
2441goodness, patience, and spirituality. One man would like to possess a nation,
2442and he finds all the higher arts of Cagliostro and Catalina suitable
2443for his purpose. Another, with a more refined thirst for possession, says
2444to himself: "One may not deceive where one desires to possess"—he is irritated
2445and impatient at the idea that a mask of him should rule in the
2446hearts of the people: "I must, therefore, MAKE myself known, and first of
2447all learn to know myself!" Among helpful and charitable people, one almost
2448always finds the awkward craftiness which first gets up suitably
2449him who has to be helped, as though, for instance, he should "merit"
2450help, seek just THEIR help, and would show himself deeply grateful, attached,
2451and subservient to them for all help. With these conceits, they
2452take control of the needy as a property, just as in general they are
245370
2454charitable and helpful out of a desire for property. One finds them jealous
2455when they are crossed or forestalled in their charity. Parents involuntarily
2456make something like themselves out of their children—they call
2457that "education"; no mother doubts at the bottom of her heart that the
2458child she has borne is thereby her property, no father hesitates about his
2459right to HIS OWN ideas and notions of worth. Indeed, in former times
2460fathers deemed it right to use their discretion concerning the life or death
2461of the newly born (as among the ancient Germans). And like the father,
2462so also do the teacher, the class, the priest, and the prince still see in
2463every new individual an unobjectionable opportunity for a new possession.
2464The consequence is…
2465195. The Jews—a people "born for slavery," as Tacitus and the whole
2466ancient world say of them; "the chosen people among the nations," as
2467they themselves say and believe—the Jews performed the miracle of the
2468inversion of valuations, by means of which life on earth obtained a new
2469and dangerous charm for a couple of millenniums. Their prophets fused
2470into one the expressions "rich," "godless," "wicked," "violent," "sensual,"
2471and for the first time coined the word "world" as a term of reproach. In
2472this inversion of valuations (in which is also included the use of the
2473word "poor" as synonymous with "saint" and "friend") the significance of
2474the Jewish people is to be found; it is with THEM that the SLAVEINSURRECTION
2475IN MORALS commences.
2476196. It is to be INFERRED that there are countless dark bodies near the
2477sun—such as we shall never see. Among ourselves, this is an allegory;
2478and the psychologist of morals reads the whole star-writing merely as an
2479allegorical and symbolic language in which much may be unexpressed.
2480197. The beast of prey and the man of prey (for instance, Caesar Borgia)
2481are fundamentally misunderstood, "nature" is misunderstood, so
2482long as one seeks a "morbidness" in the constitution of these healthiest of
2483all tropical monsters and growths, or even an innate "hell" in them—as
2484almost all moralists have done hitherto. Does it not seem that there is a
2485hatred of the virgin forest and of the tropics among moralists? And that
2486the "tropical man" must be discredited at all costs, whether as disease
2487and deterioration of mankind, or as his own hell and self-torture? And
2488why? In favour of the "temperate zones"? In favour of the temperate
2489men? The "moral"? The mediocre?—This for the chapter: "Morals as
2490Timidity."
249171
2492198. All the systems of morals which address themselves with a view
2493to their "happiness," as it is called—what else are they but suggestions
2494for behaviour adapted to the degree of DANGER from themselves in
2495which the individuals live; recipes for their passions, their good and bad
2496propensities, insofar as such have the Will to Power and would like to
2497play the master; small and great expediencies and elaborations, permeated
2498with the musty odour of old family medicines and old-wife wisdom;
2499all of them grotesque and absurd in their form—because they address
2500themselves to "all," because they generalize where generalization is
2501not authorized; all of them speaking unconditionally, and taking themselves
2502unconditionally; all of them flavoured not merely with one grain
2503of salt, but rather endurable only, and sometimes even seductive, when
2504they are over-spiced and begin to smell dangerously, especially of "the
2505other world." That is all of little value when estimated intellectually, and
2506is far from being "science," much less "wisdom"; but, repeated once more,
2507and three times repeated, it is expediency, expediency, expediency,
2508mixed with stupidity, stupidity, stupidity—whether it be the indifference
2509and statuesque coldness towards the heated folly of the emotions,
2510which the Stoics advised and fostered; or the no- more-laughing and nomore-
2511weeping of Spinoza, the destruction of the emotions by their analysis
2512and vivisection, which he recommended so naively; or the lowering
2513of the emotions to an innocent mean at which they may be satisfied, the
2514Aristotelianism of morals; or even morality as the enjoyment of the emotions
2515in a voluntary attenuation and spiritualization by the symbolism of
2516art, perhaps as music, or as love of God, and of mankind for God's
2517sake—for in religion the passions are once more enfranchised, provided
2518that… ; or, finally, even the complaisant and wanton surrender to the
2519emotions, as has been taught by Hafis and Goethe, the bold letting-go of
2520the reins, the spiritual and corporeal licentia morum in the exceptional
2521cases of wise old codgers and drunkards, with whom it "no longer has
2522much danger." —This also for the chapter: "Morals as Timidity."
2523199. Inasmuch as in all ages, as long as mankind has existed, there
2524have also been human herds (family alliances, communities, tribes,
2525peoples, states, churches), and always a great number who obey in proportion
2526to the small number who command—in view, therefore, of the
2527fact that obedience has been most practiced and fostered among mankind
2528hitherto, one may reasonably suppose that, generally speaking, the
2529need thereof is now innate in every one, as a kind of FORMAL
253072
2531CONSCIENCE which gives the command "Thou shalt unconditionally
2532do something, unconditionally refrain from something", in short, "Thou
2533shalt". This need tries to satisfy itself and to fill its form with a content,
2534according to its strength, impatience, and eagerness, it at once seizes as
2535an omnivorous appetite with little selection, and accepts whatever is
2536shouted into its ear by all sorts of commanders—parents, teachers, laws,
2537class prejudices, or public opinion. The extraordinary limitation of human
2538development, the hesitation, protractedness, frequent retrogression,
2539and turning thereof, is attributable to the fact that the herd-instinct of
2540obedience is transmitted best, and at the cost of the art of command. If
2541one imagine this instinct increasing to its greatest extent, commanders
2542and independent individuals will finally be lacking altogether, or they
2543will suffer inwardly from a bad conscience, and will have to impose a
2544deception on themselves in the first place in order to be able to command
2545just as if they also were only obeying. This condition of things actually
2546exists in Europe at present—I call it the moral hypocrisy of the commanding
2547class. They know no other way of protecting themselves from
2548their bad conscience than by playing the role of executors of older and
2549higher orders (of predecessors, of the constitution, of justice, of the law,
2550or of God himself), or they even justify themselves by maxims from the
2551current opinions of the herd, as "first servants of their people," or
2552"instruments of the public weal". On the other hand, the gregarious
2553European man nowadays assumes an air as if he were the only kind of
2554man that is allowable, he glorifies his qualities, such as public spirit,
2555kindness, deference, industry, temperance, modesty, indulgence, sympathy,
2556by virtue of which he is gentle, endurable, and useful to the herd,
2557as the peculiarly human virtues. In cases, however, where it is believed
2558that the leader and bell-wether cannot be dispensed with, attempt after
2559attempt is made nowadays to replace commanders by the summing together
2560of clever gregarious men all representative constitutions, for example,
2561are of this origin. In spite of all, what a blessing, what a deliverance
2562from a weight becoming unendurable, is the appearance of an absolute
2563ruler for these gregarious Europeans—of this fact the effect of the
2564appearance of Napoleon was the last great proof the history of the influence
2565of Napoleon is almost the history of the higher happiness to which
2566the entire century has attained in its worthiest individuals and periods.
2567200. The man of an age of dissolution which mixes the races with one
2568another, who has the inheritance of a diversified descent in his
2569body—that is to say, contrary, and often not only contrary, instincts and
257073
2571standards of value, which struggle with one another and are seldom at
2572peace—such a man of late culture and broken lights, will, on an average,
2573be a weak man. His fundamental desire is that the war which is IN HIM
2574should come to an end; happiness appears to him in the character of a
2575soothing medicine and mode of thought (for instance, Epicurean or
2576Christian); it is above all things the happiness of repose, of undisturbedness,
2577of repletion, of final unity—it is the "Sabbath of Sabbaths," to use
2578the expression of the holy rhetorician, St. Augustine, who was himself
2579such a man.—Should, however, the contrariety and conflict in such
2580natures operate as an ADDITIONAL incentive and stimulus to life—and
2581if, on the other hand, in addition to their powerful and irreconcilable instincts,
2582they have also inherited and indoctrinated into them a proper
2583mastery and subtlety for carrying on the conflict with themselves (that is
2584to say, the faculty of self-control and self-deception), there then arise
2585those marvelously incomprehensible and inexplicable beings, those enigmatical
2586men, predestined for conquering and circumventing others, the
2587finest examples of which are Alcibiades and Caesar (with whom I should
2588like to associate the FIRST of Europeans according to my taste, the Hohenstaufen,
2589Frederick the Second), and among artists, perhaps Leonardo
2590da Vinci. They appear precisely in the same periods when that weaker
2591type, with its longing for repose, comes to the front; the two types are
2592complementary to each other, and spring from the same causes.
2593201. As long as the utility which determines moral estimates is only
2594gregarious utility, as long as the preservation of the community is only
2595kept in view, and the immoral is sought precisely and exclusively in
2596what seems dangerous to the maintenance of the community, there can
2597be no "morality of love to one's neighbour." Granted even that there is
2598already a little constant exercise of consideration, sympathy, fairness,
2599gentleness, and mutual assistance, granted that even in this condition of
2600society all those instincts are already active which are latterly distinguished
2601by honourable names as "virtues," and eventually almost coincide
2602with the conception "morality": in that period they do not as yet belong
2603to the domain of moral valuations—they are still ULTRA-MORAL.
2604A sympathetic action, for instance, is neither called good nor bad, moral
2605nor immoral, in the best period of the Romans; and should it be praised,
2606a sort of resentful disdain is compatible with this praise, even at the best,
2607directly the sympathetic action is compared with one which contributes
2608to the welfare of the whole, to the RES PUBLICA. After all, "love to our
2609neighbour" is always a secondary matter, partly conventional and
261074
2611arbitrarily manifested in relation to our FEAR OF OUR NEIGHBOUR.
2612After the fabric of society seems on the whole established and secured
2613against external dangers, it is this fear of our neighbour which again creates
2614new perspectives of moral valuation. Certain strong and dangerous
2615instincts, such as the love of enterprise, foolhardiness, revengefulness,
2616astuteness, rapacity, and love of power, which up till then had not only
2617to be honoured from the point of view of general utility—under other
2618names, of course, than those here given—but had to be fostered and cultivated
2619(because they were perpetually required in the common danger
2620against the common enemies), are now felt in their dangerousness to be
2621doubly strong—when the outlets for them are lacking—and are gradually
2622branded as immoral and given over to calumny. The contrary instincts
2623and inclinations now attain to moral honour, the gregarious instinct
2624gradually draws its conclusions. How much or how little dangerousness
2625to the community or to equality is contained in an opinion, a
2626condition, an emotion, a disposition, or an endowment— that is now the
2627moral perspective, here again fear is the mother of morals. It is by the
2628loftiest and strongest instincts, when they break out passionately and
2629carry the individual far above and beyond the average, and the low level
2630of the gregarious conscience, that the self-reliance of the community is
2631destroyed, its belief in itself, its backbone, as it were, breaks, consequently
2632these very instincts will be most branded and defamed. The
2633lofty independent spirituality, the will to stand alone, and even the cogent
2634reason, are felt to be dangers, everything that elevates the individual
2635above the herd, and is a source of fear to the neighbour, is henceforth
2636called EVIL, the tolerant, unassuming, self-adapting, self-equalizing disposition,
2637the MEDIOCRITY of desires, attains to moral distinction and
2638honour. Finally, under very peaceful circumstances, there is always less
2639opportunity and necessity for training the feelings to severity and rigour,
2640and now every form of severity, even in justice, begins to disturb the
2641conscience, a lofty and rigorous nobleness and self-responsibility almost
2642offends, and awakens distrust, "the lamb," and still more "the sheep,"
2643wins respect. There is a point of diseased mellowness and effeminacy in
2644the history of society, at which society itself takes the part of him who injures
2645it, the part of the CRIMINAL, and does so, in fact, seriously and
2646honestly. To punish, appears to it to be somehow unfair—it is certain
2647that the idea of "punishment" and "the obligation to punish" are then
2648painful and alarming to people. "Is it not sufficient if the criminal be
2649rendered HARMLESS? Why should we still punish? Punishment itself is
2650terrible!"—with these questions gregarious morality, the morality of fear,
265175
2652draws its ultimate conclusion. If one could at all do away with danger,
2653the cause of fear, one would have done away with this morality at the
2654same time, it would no longer be necessary, it WOULD NOT CONSIDER
2655ITSELF any longer necessary!—Whoever examines the conscience of the
2656present-day European, will always elicit the same imperative from its
2657thousand moral folds and hidden recesses, the imperative of the timidity
2658of the herd "we wish that some time or other there may be NOTHING
2659MORE TO FEAR!" Some time or other—the will and the way THERETO
2660is nowadays called "progress" all over Europe.
2661202. Let us at once say again what we have already said a hundred
2662times, for people's ears nowadays are unwilling to hear such
2663truths—OUR truths. We know well enough how offensive it sounds
2664when any one plainly, and without metaphor, counts man among the animals,
2665but it will be accounted to us almost a CRIME, that it is precisely
2666in respect to men of "modern ideas" that we have constantly applied the
2667terms "herd," "herd-instincts," and such like expressions. What avail is it?
2668We cannot do otherwise, for it is precisely here that our new insight is.
2669We have found that in all the principal moral judgments, Europe has become
2670unanimous, including likewise the countries where European influence
2671prevails in Europe people evidently KNOW what Socrates
2672thought he did not know, and what the famous serpent of old once
2673promised to teach—they "know" today what is good and evil. It must
2674then sound hard and be distasteful to the ear, when we always insist that
2675that which here thinks it knows, that which here glorifies itself with
2676praise and blame, and calls itself good, is the instinct of the herding human
2677animal, the instinct which has come and is ever coming more and
2678more to the front, to preponderance and supremacy over other instincts,
2679according to the increasing physiological approximation and resemblance
2680of which it is the symptom. MORALITY IN EUROPE AT PRESENT
2681IS HERDING-ANIMAL MORALITY, and therefore, as we understand
2682the matter, only one kind of human morality, beside which, before
2683which, and after which many other moralities, and above all HIGHER
2684moralities, are or should be possible. Against such a "possibility," against
2685such a "should be," however, this morality defends itself with all its
2686strength, it says obstinately and inexorably "I am morality itself and
2687nothing else is morality!" Indeed, with the help of a religion which has
2688humoured and flattered the sublimest desires of the herding-animal,
2689things have reached such a point that we always find a more visible expression
2690of this morality even in political and social arrangements: the
269176
2692DEMOCRATIC movement is the inheritance of the Christian movement.
2693That its TEMPO, however, is much too slow and sleepy for the more impatient
2694ones, for those who are sick and distracted by the herding-instinct,
2695is indicated by the increasingly furious howling, and always less
2696disguised teeth- gnashing of the anarchist dogs, who are now roving
2697through the highways of European culture. Apparently in opposition to
2698the peacefully industrious democrats and Revolution-ideologues, and
2699still more so to the awkward philosophasters and fraternity- visionaries
2700who call themselves Socialists and want a "free society," those are really
2701at one with them all in their thorough and instinctive hostility to every
2702form of society other than that of the AUTONOMOUS herd (to the extent
2703even of repudiating the notions "master" and "servant"—ni dieu ni
2704maitre, says a socialist formula); at one in their tenacious opposition to
2705every special claim, every special right and privilege (this means ultimately
2706opposition to EVERY right, for when all are equal, no one needs
2707"rights" any longer); at one in their distrust of punitive justice (as though
2708it were a violation of the weak, unfair to the NECESSARY consequences
2709of all former society); but equally at one in their religion of sympathy, in
2710their compassion for all that feels, lives, and suffers (down to the very
2711animals, up even to "God"—the extravagance of "sympathy for God" belongs
2712to a democratic age); altogether at one in the cry and impatience of
2713their sympathy, in their deadly hatred of suffering generally, in their almost
2714feminine incapacity for witnessing it or ALLOWING it; at one in
2715their involuntary beglooming and heart-softening, under the spell of
2716which Europe seems to be threatened with a new Buddhism; at one in
2717their belief in the morality of MUTUAL sympathy, as though it were
2718morality in itself, the climax, the ATTAINED climax of mankind, the sole
2719hope of the future, the consolation of the present, the great discharge
2720from all the obligations of the past; altogether at one in their belief in the
2721community as the DELIVERER, in the herd, and therefore in
2722"themselves."
2723203. We, who hold a different belief—we, who regard the democratic
2724movement, not only as a degenerating form of political organization, but
2725as equivalent to a degenerating, a waning type of man, as involving his
2726mediocrising and depreciation: where have WE to fix our hopes? In
2727NEW PHILOSOPHERS—there is no other alternative: in minds strong
2728and original enough to initiate opposite estimates of value, to transvalue
2729and invert "eternal valuations"; in forerunners, in men of the future, who
2730in the present shall fix the constraints and fasten the knots which will
273177
2732compel millenniums to take NEW paths. To teach man the future of humanity
2733as his WILL, as depending on human will, and to make preparation
2734for vast hazardous enterprises and collective attempts in rearing and
2735educating, in order thereby to put an end to the frightful rule of folly and
2736chance which has hitherto gone by the name of "history" (the folly of the
2737"greatest number" is only its last form)—for that purpose a new type of
2738philosopher and commander will some time or other be needed, at the
2739very idea of which everything that has existed in the way of occult, terrible,
2740and benevolent beings might look pale and dwarfed. The image of
2741such leaders hovers before OUR eyes:—is it lawful for me to say it aloud,
2742ye free spirits? The conditions which one would partly have to create
2743and partly utilize for their genesis; the presumptive methods and tests by
2744virtue of which a soul should grow up to such an elevation and power as
2745to feel a CONSTRAINT to these tasks; a transvaluation of values, under
2746the new pressure and hammer of which a conscience should be steeled
2747and a heart transformed into brass, so as to bear the weight of such responsibility;
2748and on the other hand the necessity for such leaders, the
2749dreadful danger that they might be lacking, or miscarry and degenerate:—
2750these are OUR real anxieties and glooms, ye know it well, ye free
2751spirits! these are the heavy distant thoughts and storms which sweep
2752across the heaven of OUR life. There are few pains so grievous as to have
2753seen, divined, or experienced how an exceptional man has missed his
2754way and deteriorated; but he who has the rare eye for the universal
2755danger of "man" himself DETERIORATING, he who like us has recognized
2756the extraordinary fortuitousness which has hitherto played its
2757game in respect to the future of mankind—a game in which neither the
2758hand, nor even a "finger of God" has participated!—he who divines the
2759fate that is hidden under the idiotic unwariness and blind confidence of
2760"modern ideas," and still more under the whole of Christo-European
2761morality-suffers from an anguish with which no other is to be compared.
2762He sees at a glance all that could still BE MADE OUT OF MAN through
2763a favourable accumulation and augmentation of human powers and arrangements;
2764he knows with all the knowledge of his conviction how unexhausted
2765man still is for the greatest possibilities, and how often in the
2766past the type man has stood in presence of mysterious decisions and new
2767paths:—he knows still better from his painfulest recollections on what
2768wretched obstacles promising developments of the highest rank have
2769hitherto usually gone to pieces, broken down, sunk, and become contemptible.
2770The UNIVERSAL DEGENERACY OF MANKIND to the level
2771of the "man of the future"—as idealized by the socialistic fools and
277278
2773shallow-pates—this degeneracy and dwarfing of man to an absolutely
2774gregarious animal (or as they call it, to a man of "free society"), this brutalizing
2775of man into a pigmy with equal rights and claims, is undoubtedly
2776POSSIBLE! He who has thought out this possibility to its ultimate
2777conclusion knows ANOTHER loathing unknown to the rest of
2778mankind—and perhaps also a new MISSION!
277979
2780Chapter 6
2781We Scholars
2782204. At the risk that moralizing may also reveal itself here as that which
2783it has always been—namely, resolutely MONTRER SES PLAIES, according
2784to Balzac—I would venture to protest against an improper and injurious
2785alteration of rank, which quite unnoticed, and as if with the best conscience,
2786threatens nowadays to establish itself in the relations of science
2787and philosophy. I mean to say that one must have the right out of one's
2788own EXPERIENCE—experience, as it seems to me, always implies unfortunate
2789experience?—to treat of such an important question of rank, so as
2790not to speak of colour like the blind, or AGAINST science like women
2791and artists ("Ah! this dreadful science!" sigh their instinct and their
2792shame, "it always FINDS THINGS OUT!"). The declaration of independence
2793of the scientific man, his emancipation from philosophy, is one of
2794the subtler after-effects of democratic organization and disorganization:
2795the self- glorification and self-conceitedness of the learned man is now
2796everywhere in full bloom, and in its best springtime—which does not
2797mean to imply that in this case self-praise smells sweet. Here also the instinct
2798of the populace cries, "Freedom from all masters!" and after science
2799has, with the happiest results, resisted theology, whose "hand-maid" it
2800had been too long, it now proposes in its wantonness and indiscretion to
2801lay down laws for philosophy, and in its turn to play the "master"—what
2802am I saying! to play the PHILOSOPHER on its own account. My
2803memory— the memory of a scientific man, if you please!—teems with
2804the naivetes of insolence which I have heard about philosophy and
2805philosophers from young naturalists and old physicians (not to mention
2806the most cultured and most conceited of all learned men, the philologists
2807and schoolmasters, who are both the one and the other by profession).
2808On one occasion it was the specialist and the Jack Horner who instinctively
2809stood on the defensive against all synthetic tasks and capabilities;
2810at another time it was the industrious worker who had got a scent of
2811OTIUM and refined luxuriousness in the internal economy of the
281280
2813philosopher, and felt himself aggrieved and belittled thereby. On another
2814occasion it was the colour-blindness of the utilitarian, who sees nothing
2815in philosophy but a series of REFUTED systems, and an extravagant
2816expenditure which "does nobody any good". At another time the fear of
2817disguised mysticism and of the boundary-adjustment of knowledge became
2818conspicuous, at another time the disregard of individual philosophers,
2819which had involuntarily extended to disregard of philosophy
2820generally. In fine, I found most frequently, behind the proud disdain of
2821philosophy in young scholars, the evil after-effect of some particular
2822philosopher, to whom on the whole obedience had been foresworn,
2823without, however, the spell of his scornful estimates of other philosophers
2824having been got rid of—the result being a general ill-will to all philosophy.
2825(Such seems to me, for instance, the after-effect of Schopenhauer
2826on the most modern Germany: by his unintelligent rage against Hegel,
2827he has succeeded in severing the whole of the last generation of Germans
2828from its connection with German culture, which culture, all things considered,
2829has been an elevation and a divining refinement of the
2830HISTORICAL SENSE, but precisely at this point Schopenhauer himself
2831was poor, irreceptive, and un-German to the extent of ingeniousness.)
2832On the whole, speaking generally, it may just have been the humanness,
2833all-too-humanness of the modern philosophers themselves, in short,
2834their contemptibleness, which has injured most radically the reverence
2835for philosophy and opened the doors to the instinct of the populace. Let
2836it but be acknowledged to what an extent our modern world diverges
2837from the whole style of the world of Heraclitus, Plato, Empedocles, and
2838whatever else all the royal and magnificent anchorites of the spirit were
2839called, and with what justice an honest man of science MAY feel himself
2840of a better family and origin, in view of such representatives of philosophy,
2841who, owing to the fashion of the present day, are just as much
2842aloft as they are down below—in Germany, for instance, the two lions of
2843Berlin, the anarchist Eugen Duhring and the amalgamist Eduard von
2844Hartmann. It is especially the sight of those hotch-potch philosophers,
2845who call themselves "realists," or "positivists," which is calculated to implant
2846a dangerous distrust in the soul of a young and ambitious scholar
2847those philosophers, at the best, are themselves but scholars and specialists,
2848that is very evident! All of them are persons who have been vanquished
2849and BROUGHT BACK AGAIN under the dominion of science,
2850who at one time or another claimed more from themselves, without having
2851a right to the "more" and its responsibility—and who now, creditably,
2852rancorously, and vindictively, represent in word and deed,
285381
2854DISBELIEF in the master-task and supremacy of philosophy After all,
2855how could it be otherwise? Science flourishes nowadays and has the
2856good conscience clearly visible on its countenance, while that to which
2857the entire modern philosophy has gradually sunk, the remnant of philosophy
2858of the present day, excites distrust and displeasure, if not scorn
2859and pity Philosophy reduced to a "theory of knowledge," no more in fact
2860than a diffident science of epochs and doctrine of forbearance a philosophy
2861that never even gets beyond the threshold, and rigorously
2862DENIES itself the right to enter—that is philosophy in its last throes, an
2863end, an agony, something that awakens pity. How could such a philosophy—
2864RULE!
2865205. The dangers that beset the evolution of the philosopher are, in
2866fact, so manifold nowadays, that one might doubt whether this fruit
2867could still come to maturity. The extent and towering structure of the sciences
2868have increased enormously, and therewith also the probability that
2869the philosopher will grow tired even as a learner, or will attach himself
2870somewhere and "specialize" so that he will no longer attain to his elevation,
2871that is to say, to his superspection, his circumspection, and his
2872DESPECTION. Or he gets aloft too late, when the best of his maturity
2873and strength is past, or when he is impaired, coarsened, and deteriorated,
2874so that his view, his general estimate of things, is no longer of much
2875importance. It is perhaps just the refinement of his intellectual conscience
2876that makes him hesitate and linger on the way, he dreads the temptation
2877to become a dilettante, a millepede, a milleantenna, he knows too well
2878that as a discerner, one who has lost his self-respect no longer commands,
2879no longer LEADS, unless he should aspire to become a great
2880play-actor, a philosophical Cagliostro and spiritual rat- catcher—in short,
2881a misleader. This is in the last instance a question of taste, if it has not
2882really been a question of conscience. To double once more the
2883philosopher's difficulties, there is also the fact that he demands from
2884himself a verdict, a Yea or Nay, not concerning science, but concerning
2885life and the worth of life—he learns unwillingly to believe that it is his
2886right and even his duty to obtain this verdict, and he has to seek his way
2887to the right and the belief only through the most extensive (perhaps disturbing
2888and destroying) experiences, often hesitating, doubting, and
2889dumbfounded. In fact, the philosopher has long been mistaken and confused
2890by the multitude, either with the scientific man and ideal scholar,
2891or with the religiously elevated, desensualized, desecularized visionary
2892and God- intoxicated man; and even yet when one hears anybody
289382
2894praised, because he lives "wisely," or "as a philosopher," it hardly means
2895anything more than "prudently and apart." Wisdom: that seems to the
2896populace to be a kind of flight, a means and artifice for withdrawing successfully
2897from a bad game; but the GENUINE philosopher—does it not
2898seem so to US, my friends?—lives "unphilosophically" and "unwisely,"
2899above all, IMPRUDENTLY, and feels the obligation and burden of a hundred
2900attempts and temptations of life—he risks HIMSELF constantly, he
2901plays THIS bad game.
2902206. In relation to the genius, that is to say, a being who either
2903ENGENDERS or PRODUCES—both words understood in their fullest
2904sense—the man of learning, the scientific average man, has always
2905something of the old maid about him; for, like her, he is not conversant
2906with the two principal functions of man. To both, of course, to the scholar
2907and to the old maid, one concedes respectability, as if by way of indemnification—
2908in these cases one emphasizes the respectability—and
2909yet, in the compulsion of this concession, one has the same admixture of
2910vexation. Let us examine more closely: what is the scientific man? Firstly,
2911a commonplace type of man, with commonplace virtues: that is to say, a
2912non-ruling, non-authoritative, and non-self-sufficient type of man; he
2913possesses industry, patient adaptableness to rank and file, equability and
2914moderation in capacity and requirement; he has the instinct for people
2915like himself, and for that which they require—for instance: the portion of
2916independence and green meadow without which there is no rest from labour,
2917the claim to honour and consideration (which first and foremost
2918presupposes recognition and recognisability), the sunshine of a good
2919name, the perpetual ratification of his value and usefulness, with which
2920the inward DISTRUST which lies at the bottom of the heart of all dependent
2921men and gregarious animals, has again and again to be overcome.
2922The learned man, as is appropriate, has also maladies and faults of
2923an ignoble kind: he is full of petty envy, and has a lynx-eye for the weak
2924points in those natures to whose elevations he cannot attain. He is confiding,
2925yet only as one who lets himself go, but does not FLOW; and precisely
2926before the man of the great current he stands all the colder and
2927more reserved— his eye is then like a smooth and irresponsive lake,
2928which is no longer moved by rapture or sympathy. The worst and most
2929dangerous thing of which a scholar is capable results from the instinct of
2930mediocrity of his type, from the Jesuitism of mediocrity, which labours
2931instinctively for the destruction of the exceptional man, and endeavours
2932to break—or still better, to relax—every bent bow To relax, of course,
293383
2934with consideration, and naturally with an indulgent hand—to RELAX
2935with confiding sympathy that is the real art of Jesuitism, which has always
2936understood how to introduce itself as the religion of sympathy.
2937207. However gratefully one may welcome the OBJECTIVE spirit—
2938and who has not been sick to death of all subjectivity and its confounded
2939IPSISIMOSITY!—in the end, however, one must learn caution
2940even with regard to one's gratitude, and put a stop to the exaggeration
2941with which the unselfing and depersonalizing of the spirit has recently
2942been celebrated, as if it were the goal in itself, as if it were salvation and
2943glorification—as is especially accustomed to happen in the pessimist
2944school, which has also in its turn good reasons for paying the highest
2945honours to "disinterested knowledge" The objective man, who no longer
2946curses and scolds like the pessimist, the IDEAL man of learning in whom
2947the scientific instinct blossoms forth fully after a thousand complete and
2948partial failures, is assuredly one of the most costly instruments that exist,
2949but his place is in the hand of one who is more powerful He is only an
2950instrument, we may say, he is a MIRROR—he is no "purpose in himself"
2951The objective man is in truth a mirror accustomed to prostration before
2952everything that wants to be known, with such desires only as knowing
2953or "reflecting" implies—he waits until something comes, and then expands
2954himself sensitively, so that even the light footsteps and glidingpast
2955of spiritual beings may not be lost on his surface and film Whatever
2956"personality" he still possesses seems to him accidental, arbitrary, or still
2957oftener, disturbing, so much has he come to regard himself as the passage
2958and reflection of outside forms and events He calls up the recollection
2959of "himself" with an effort, and not infrequently wrongly, he readily
2960confounds himself with other persons, he makes mistakes with regard to
2961his own needs, and here only is he unrefined and negligent Perhaps he is
2962troubled about the health, or the pettiness and confined atmosphere of
2963wife and friend, or the lack of companions and society—indeed, he sets
2964himself to reflect on his suffering, but in vain! His thoughts already rove
2965away to the MORE GENERAL case, and tomorrow he knows as little as
2966he knew yesterday how to help himself He does not now take himself
2967seriously and devote time to himself he is serene, NOT from lack of
2968trouble, but from lack of capacity for grasping and dealing with HIS
2969trouble The habitual complaisance with respect to all objects and experiences,
2970the radiant and impartial hospitality with which he receives
2971everything that comes his way, his habit of inconsiderate good-nature, of
2972dangerous indifference as to Yea and Nay: alas! there are enough of cases
297384
2974in which he has to atone for these virtues of his!—and as man generally,
2975he becomes far too easily the CAPUT MORTUUM of such virtues.
2976Should one wish love or hatred from him—I mean love and hatred as
2977God, woman, and animal understand them—he will do what he can, and
2978furnish what he can. But one must not be surprised if it should not be
2979much—if he should show himself just at this point to be false, fragile,
2980questionable, and deteriorated. His love is constrained, his hatred is artificial,
2981and rather UNN TOUR DE FORCE, a slight ostentation and exaggeration.
2982He is only genuine so far as he can be objective; only in his serene
2983totality is he still "nature" and "natural." His mirroring and eternally
2984self-polishing soul no longer knows how to affirm, no longer how to
2985deny; he does not command; neither does he destroy. "JE NE MEPRISE
2986PRESQUE RIEN"— he says, with Leibniz: let us not overlook nor undervalue
2987the PRESQUE! Neither is he a model man; he does not go in advance
2988of any one, nor after, either; he places himself generally too far off
2989to have any reason for espousing the cause of either good or evil. If he
2990has been so long confounded with the PHILOSOPHER, with the Caesarian
2991trainer and dictator of civilization, he has had far too much honour,
2992and what is more essential in him has been overlooked—he is an instrument,
2993something of a slave, though certainly the sublimest sort of slave,
2994but nothing in himself—PRESQUE RIEN! The objective man is an instrument,
2995a costly, easily injured, easily tarnished measuring instrument and
2996mirroring apparatus, which is to be taken care of and respected; but he is
2997no goal, not outgoing nor upgoing, no complementary man in whom the
2998REST of existence justifies itself, no termination— and still less a commencement,
2999an engendering, or primary cause, nothing hardy, powerful,
3000self-centred, that wants to be master; but rather only a soft, inflated, delicate,
3001movable potter's- form, that must wait for some kind of content
3002and frame to "shape" itself thereto—for the most part a man without
3003frame and content, a "selfless" man. Consequently, also, nothing for women,
3004IN PARENTHESI.
3005208. When a philosopher nowadays makes known that he is not a
3006skeptic—I hope that has been gathered from the foregoing description of
3007the objective spirit?—people all hear it impatiently; they regard him on
3008that account with some apprehension, they would like to ask so many,
3009many questions… indeed among timid hearers, of whom there are now
3010so many, he is henceforth said to be dangerous. With his repudiation of
3011skepticism, it seems to them as if they heard some evil- threatening
3012sound in the distance, as if a new kind of explosive were being tried
301385
3014somewhere, a dynamite of the spirit, perhaps a newly discovered Russian
3015NIHILINE, a pessimism BONAE VOLUNTATIS, that not only denies,
3016means denial, but-dreadful thought! PRACTISES denial. Against this
3017kind of "good-will"—a will to the veritable, actual negation of life—there
3018is, as is generally acknowledged nowadays, no better soporific and sedative
3019than skepticism, the mild, pleasing, lulling poppy of skepticism;
3020and Hamlet himself is now prescribed by the doctors of the day as an antidote
3021to the "spirit," and its underground noises. "Are not our ears
3022already full of bad sounds?" say the skeptics, as lovers of repose, and almost
3023as a kind of safety police; "this subterranean Nay is terrible! Be still,
3024ye pessimistic moles!" The skeptic, in effect, that delicate creature, is far
3025too easily frightened; his conscience is schooled so as to start at every
3026Nay, and even at that sharp, decided Yea, and feels something like a bite
3027thereby. Yea! and Nay!—they seem to him opposed to morality; he loves,
3028on the contrary, to make a festival to his virtue by a noble aloofness,
3029while perhaps he says with Montaigne: "What do I know?" Or with Socrates:
3030"I know that I know nothing." Or: "Here I do not trust myself, no
3031door is open to me." Or: "Even if the door were open, why should I enter
3032immediately?" Or: "What is the use of any hasty hypotheses? It might
3033quite well be in good taste to make no hypotheses at all. Are you absolutely
3034obliged to straighten at once what is crooked? to stuff every hole
3035with some kind of oakum? Is there not time enough for that? Has not the
3036time leisure? Oh, ye demons, can ye not at all WAIT? The uncertain also
3037has its charms, the Sphinx, too, is a Circe, and Circe, too, was a philosopher."—
3038Thus does a skeptic console himself; and in truth he needs
3039some consolation. For skepticism is the most spiritual expression of a
3040certain many-sided physiological temperament, which in ordinary language
3041is called nervous debility and sickliness; it arises whenever races
3042or classes which have been long separated, decisively and suddenly
3043blend with one another. In the new generation, which has inherited as it
3044were different standards and valuations in its blood, everything is disquiet,
3045derangement, doubt, and tentativeness; the best powers operate
3046restrictively, the very virtues prevent each other growing and becoming
3047strong, equilibrium, ballast, and perpendicular stability are lacking in
3048body and soul. That, however, which is most diseased and degenerated
3049in such nondescripts is the WILL; they are no longer familiar with independence
3050of decision, or the courageous feeling of pleasure in willing—
3051they are doubtful of the "freedom of the will" even in their dreams
3052Our present-day Europe, the scene of a senseless, precipitate attempt at a
3053radical blending of classes, and CONSEQUENTLY of races, is therefore
305486
3055skeptical in all its heights and depths, sometimes exhibiting the mobile
3056skepticism which springs impatiently and wantonly from branch to
3057branch, sometimes with gloomy aspect, like a cloud over-charged with
3058interrogative signs—and often sick unto death of its will! Paralysis of
3059will, where do we not find this cripple sitting nowadays! And yet how
3060bedecked oftentimes' How seductively ornamented! There are the finest
3061gala dresses and disguises for this disease, and that, for instance, most of
3062what places itself nowadays in the show-cases as "objectiveness," "the
3063scientific spirit," "L'ART POUR L'ART," and "pure voluntary knowledge,"
3064is only decked-out skepticism and paralysis of will—I am ready
3065to answer for this diagnosis of the European disease—The disease of the
3066will is diffused unequally over Europe, it is worst and most varied where
3067civilization has longest prevailed, it decreases according as "the barbarian"
3068still—or again—asserts his claims under the loose drapery of
3069Western culture It is therefore in the France of today, as can be readily
3070disclosed and comprehended, that the will is most infirm, and France,
3071which has always had a masterly aptitude for converting even the
3072portentous crises of its spirit into something charming and seductive,
3073now manifests emphatically its intellectual ascendancy over Europe, by
3074being the school and exhibition of all the charms of skepticism The
3075power to will and to persist, moreover, in a resolution, is already somewhat
3076stronger in Germany, and again in the North of Germany it is
3077stronger than in Central Germany, it is considerably stronger in England,
3078Spain, and Corsica, associated with phlegm in the former and with hard
3079skulls in the latter—not to mention Italy, which is too young yet to know
3080what it wants, and must first show whether it can exercise will, but it is
3081strongest and most surprising of all in that immense middle empire
3082where Europe as it were flows back to Asia—namely, in Russia There the
3083power to will has been long stored up and accumulated, there the
3084will—uncertain whether to be negative or affirmative—waits threateningly
3085to be discharged (to borrow their pet phrase from our physicists)
3086Perhaps not only Indian wars and complications in Asia would be necessary
3087to free Europe from its greatest danger, but also internal subversion,
3088the shattering of the empire into small states, and above all the introduction
3089of parliamentary imbecility, together with the obligation of every
3090one to read his newspaper at breakfast I do not say this as one who desires
3091it, in my heart I should rather prefer the contrary—I mean such an
3092increase in the threatening attitude of Russia, that Europe would have to
3093make up its mind to become equally threatening—namely, TO
3094ACQUIRE ONE WILL, by means of a new caste to rule over the
309587
3096Continent, a persistent, dreadful will of its own, that can set its aims
3097thousands of years ahead; so that the long spun-out comedy of its pettystatism,
3098and its dynastic as well as its democratic many-willed-ness,
3099might finally be brought to a close. The time for petty politics is past; the
3100next century will bring the struggle for the dominion of the world—the
3101COMPULSION to great politics.
3102209. As to how far the new warlike age on which we Europeans have
3103evidently entered may perhaps favour the growth of another and
3104stronger kind of skepticism, I should like to express myself preliminarily
3105merely by a parable, which the lovers of German history will already understand.
3106That unscrupulous enthusiast for big, handsome grenadiers
3107(who, as King of Prussia, brought into being a military and skeptical
3108genius—and therewith, in reality, the new and now triumphantly
3109emerged type of German), the problematic, crazy father of Frederick the
3110Great, had on one point the very knack and lucky grasp of the genius: he
3111knew what was then lacking in Germany, the want of which was a hundred
3112times more alarming and serious than any lack of culture and social
3113form—his ill-will to the young Frederick resulted from the anxiety of a
3114profound instinct. MEN WERE LACKING; and he suspected, to his
3115bitterest regret, that his own son was not man enough. There, however,
3116he deceived himself; but who would not have deceived himself in his
3117place? He saw his son lapsed to atheism, to the ESPRIT, to the pleasant
3118frivolity of clever Frenchmen—he saw in the background the great
3119bloodsucker, the spider skepticism; he suspected the incurable wretchedness
3120of a heart no longer hard enough either for evil or good, and of a
3121broken will that no longer commands, is no longer ABLE to command.
3122Meanwhile, however, there grew up in his son that new kind of harder
3123and more dangerous skepticism—who knows TO WHAT EXTENT it
3124was encouraged just by his father's hatred and the icy melancholy of a
3125will condemned to solitude?—the skepticism of daring manliness, which
3126is closely related to the genius for war and conquest, and made its first
3127entrance into Germany in the person of the great Frederick. This skepticism
3128despises and nevertheless grasps; it undermines and takes possession;
3129it does not believe, but it does not thereby lose itself; it gives the
3130spirit a dangerous liberty, but it keeps strict guard over the heart. It is the
3131GERMAN form of skepticism, which, as a continued Fredericianism, risen
3132to the highest spirituality, has kept Europe for a considerable time under
3133the dominion of the German spirit and its critical and historical distrust
3134Owing to the insuperably strong and tough masculine character of
313588
3136the great German philologists and historical critics (who, rightly estimated,
3137were also all of them artists of destruction and dissolution), a NEW
3138conception of the German spirit gradually established itself—in spite of
3139all Romanticism in music and philosophy—in which the leaning towards
3140masculine skepticism was decidedly prominent whether, for instance, as
3141fearlessness of gaze, as courage and sternness of the dissecting hand, or
3142as resolute will to dangerous voyages of discovery, to spiritualized
3143North Pole expeditions under barren and dangerous skies. There may be
3144good grounds for it when warm-blooded and superficial humanitarians
3145cross themselves before this spirit, CET ESPRIT FATALISTE,
3146IRONIQUE, MEPHISTOPHELIQUE, as Michelet calls it, not without a
3147shudder. But if one would realize how characteristic is this fear of the
3148"man" in the German spirit which awakened Europe out of its "dogmatic
3149slumber," let us call to mind the former conception which had to be overcome
3150by this new one—and that it is not so very long ago that a masculinized
3151woman could dare, with unbridled presumption, to recommend
3152the Germans to the interest of Europe as gentle, goodhearted,
3153weak-willed, and poetical fools. Finally, let us only understand profoundly
3154enough Napoleon's astonishment when he saw Goethe it reveals
3155what had been regarded for centuries as the "German spirit" "VOILA UN
3156HOMME!"—that was as much as to say "But this is a MAN! And I only
3157expected to see a German!"
3158Supposing, then, that in the picture of the philosophers of the future,
3159some trait suggests the question whether they must not perhaps be skeptics
3160in the last-mentioned sense, something in them would only be designated
3161thereby—and not they themselves. With equal right they might
3162call themselves critics, and assuredly they will be men of experiments.
3163By the name with which I ventured to baptize them, I have already expressly
3164emphasized their attempting and their love of attempting is this
3165because, as critics in body and soul, they will love to make use of experiments
3166in a new, and perhaps wider and more dangerous sense? In their
3167passion for knowledge, will they have to go further in daring and painful
3168attempts than the sensitive and pampered taste of a democratic century
3169can approve of?—There is no doubt these coming ones will be least able
3170to dispense with the serious and not unscrupulous qualities which distinguish
3171the critic from the skeptic I mean the certainty as to standards of
3172worth, the conscious employment of a unity of method, the wary courage,
3173the standing-alone, and the capacity for self-responsibility, indeed,
3174they will avow among themselves a DELIGHT in denial and dissection,
317589
3176and a certain considerate cruelty, which knows how to handle the knife
3177surely and deftly, even when the heart bleeds They will be STERNER
3178(and perhaps not always towards themselves only) than humane people
3179may desire, they will not deal with the "truth" in order that it may
3180"please" them, or "elevate" and "inspire" them—they will rather have
3181little faith in "TRUTH" bringing with it such revels for the feelings. They
3182will smile, those rigourous spirits, when any one says in their presence
3183"That thought elevates me, why should it not be true?" or "That work enchants
3184me, why should it not be beautiful?" or "That artist enlarges me,
3185why should he not be great?" Perhaps they will not only have a smile,
3186but a genuine disgust for all that is thus rapturous, idealistic, feminine,
3187and hermaphroditic, and if any one could look into their inmost hearts,
3188he would not easily find therein the intention to reconcile "Christian sentiments"
3189with "antique taste," or even with "modern parliamentarism"
3190(the kind of reconciliation necessarily found even among philosophers in
3191our very uncertain and consequently very conciliatory century). Critical
3192discipline, and every habit that conduces to purity and rigour in intellectual
3193matters, will not only be demanded from themselves by these philosophers
3194of the future, they may even make a display thereof as their special
3195adornment— nevertheless they will not want to be called critics on
3196that account. It will seem to them no small indignity to philosophy to
3197have it decreed, as is so welcome nowadays, that "philosophy itself is criticism
3198and critical science—and nothing else whatever!" Though this estimate
3199of philosophy may enjoy the approval of all the Positivists of
3200France and Germany (and possibly it even flattered the heart and taste of
3201KANT: let us call to mind the titles of his principal works), our new
3202philosophers will say, notwithstanding, that critics are instruments of the
3203philosopher, and just on that account, as instruments, they are far from
3204being philosophers themselves! Even the great Chinaman of Konigsberg
3205was only a great critic.
3206211. I insist upon it that people finally cease confounding philosophical
3207workers, and in general scientific men, with philosophers—that precisely
3208here one should strictly give "each his own," and not give those far
3209too much, these far too little. It may be necessary for the education of the
3210real philosopher that he himself should have once stood upon all those
3211steps upon which his servants, the scientific workers of philosophy, remain
3212standing, and MUST remain standing he himself must perhaps
3213have been critic, and dogmatist, and historian, and besides, poet, and
3214collector, and traveler, and riddle-reader, and moralist, and seer, and
321590
3216"free spirit," and almost everything, in order to traverse the whole range
3217of human values and estimations, and that he may BE ABLE with a variety
3218of eyes and consciences to look from a height to any distance, from a
3219depth up to any height, from a nook into any expanse. But all these are
3220only preliminary conditions for his task; this task itself demands
3221something else—it requires him TO CREATE VALUES. The philosophical
3222workers, after the excellent pattern of Kant and Hegel, have to fix and
3223formalize some great existing body of valuations—that is to say, former
3224DETERMINATIONS OF VALUE, creations of value, which have become
3225prevalent, and are for a time called "truths"—whether in the domain of
3226the LOGICAL, the POLITICAL (moral), or the ARTISTIC. It is for these
3227investigators to make whatever has happened and been esteemed
3228hitherto, conspicuous, conceivable, intelligible, and manageable, to
3229shorten everything long, even "time" itself, and to SUBJUGATE the entire
3230past: an immense and wonderful task, in the carrying out of which all refined
3231pride, all tenacious will, can surely find satisfaction. THE REAL
3232PHILOSOPHERS, HOWEVER, ARE COMMANDERS AND LAWGIVERS;
3233they say: "Thus SHALL it be!" They determine first the Whither
3234and the Why of mankind, and thereby set aside the previous labour of all
3235philosophical workers, and all subjugators of the past—they grasp at the
3236future with a creative hand, and whatever is and was, becomes for them
3237thereby a means, an instrument, and a hammer. Their "knowing" is
3238CREATING, their creating is a law-giving, their will to truth is—WILL
3239TO POWER. —Are there at present such philosophers? Have there ever
3240been such philosophers? MUST there not be such philosophers some
3241day? …
3242212. It is always more obvious to me that the philosopher, as a man
3243INDISPENSABLE for the morrow and the day after the morrow, has
3244ever found himself, and HAS BEEN OBLIGED to find himself, in contradiction
3245to the day in which he lives; his enemy has always been the ideal
3246of his day. Hitherto all those extraordinary furtherers of humanity whom
3247one calls philosophers—who rarely regarded themselves as lovers of
3248wisdom, but rather as disagreeable fools and dangerous interrogators—
3249have found their mission, their hard, involuntary, imperative mission
3250(in the end, however, the greatness of their mission), in being the
3251bad conscience of their age. In putting the vivisector's knife to the breast
3252of the very VIRTUES OF THEIR AGE, they have betrayed their own
3253secret; it has been for the sake of a NEW greatness of man, a new untrodden
3254path to his aggrandizement. They have always disclosed how much
325591
3256hypocrisy, indolence, self-indulgence, and self-neglect, how much falsehood
3257was concealed under the most venerated types of contemporary
3258morality, how much virtue was OUTLIVED, they have always said "We
3259must remove hence to where YOU are least at home" In the face of a
3260world of "modern ideas," which would like to confine every one in a
3261corner, in a "specialty," a philosopher, if there could be philosophers
3262nowadays, would be compelled to place the greatness of man, the conception
3263of "greatness," precisely in his comprehensiveness and multifariousness,
3264in his all-roundness, he would even determine worth and rank
3265according to the amount and variety of that which a man could bear and
3266take upon himself, according to the EXTENT to which a man could
3267stretch his responsibility Nowadays the taste and virtue of the age weaken
3268and attenuate the will, nothing is so adapted to the spirit of the age as
3269weakness of will consequently, in the ideal of the philosopher, strength
3270of will, sternness, and capacity for prolonged resolution, must specially
3271be included in the conception of "greatness", with as good a right as the
3272opposite doctrine, with its ideal of a silly, renouncing, humble, selfless
3273humanity, was suited to an opposite age—such as the sixteenth century,
3274which suffered from its accumulated energy of will, and from the wildest
3275torrents and floods of selfishness In the time of Socrates, among men
3276only of worn-out instincts, old conservative Athenians who let themselves
3277go—"for the sake of happiness," as they said, for the sake of pleasure,
3278as their conduct indicated—and who had continually on their lips
3279the old pompous words to which they had long forfeited the right by the
3280life they led, IRONY was perhaps necessary for greatness of soul, the
3281wicked Socratic assurance of the old physician and plebeian, who cut
3282ruthlessly into his own flesh, as into the flesh and heart of the "noble,"
3283with a look that said plainly enough "Do not dissemble before me!
3284here—we are equal!" At present, on the contrary, when throughout
3285Europe the herding- animal alone attains to honours, and dispenses honours,
3286when "equality of right" can too readily be transformed into equality
3287in wrong—I mean to say into general war against everything rare,
3288strange, and privileged, against the higher man, the higher soul, the
3289higher duty, the higher responsibility, the creative plenipotence and
3290lordliness—at present it belongs to the conception of "greatness" to be
3291noble, to wish to be apart, to be capable of being different, to stand alone,
3292to have to live by personal initiative, and the philosopher will betray
3293something of his own ideal when he asserts "He shall be the greatest who
3294can be the most solitary, the most concealed, the most divergent, the man
3295beyond good and evil, the master of his virtues, and of super-abundance
329692
3297of will; precisely this shall be called GREATNESS: as diversified as can
3298be entire, as ample as can be full." And to ask once more the question: Is
3299greatness POSSIBLE— nowadays?
3300213. It is difficult to learn what a philosopher is, because it cannot be
3301taught: one must "know" it by experience—or one should have the pride
3302NOT to know it. The fact that at present people all talk of things of which
3303they CANNOT have any experience, is true more especially and unfortunately
3304as concerns the philosopher and philosophical matters:—the very
3305few know them, are permitted to know them, and all popular ideas
3306about them are false. Thus, for instance, the truly philosophical combination
3307of a bold, exuberant spirituality which runs at presto pace, and a
3308dialectic rigour and necessity which makes no false step, is unknown to
3309most thinkers and scholars from their own experience, and therefore,
3310should any one speak of it in their presence, it is incredible to them. They
3311conceive of every necessity as troublesome, as a painful compulsory
3312obedience and state of constraint; thinking itself is regarded by them as
3313something slow and hesitating, almost as a trouble, and often enough as
3314"worthy of the SWEAT of the noble"—but not at all as something easy
3315and divine, closely related to dancing and exuberance! "To think" and to
3316take a matter "seriously," "arduously"—that is one and the same thing to
3317them; such only has been their "experience."— Artists have here perhaps
3318a finer intuition; they who know only too well that precisely when they
3319no longer do anything "arbitrarily," and everything of necessity, their
3320feeling of freedom, of subtlety, of power, of creatively fixing, disposing,
3321and shaping, reaches its climax—in short, that necessity and "freedom of
3322will" are then the same thing with them. There is, in fine, a gradation of
3323rank in psychical states, to which the gradation of rank in the problems
3324corresponds; and the highest problems repel ruthlessly every one who
3325ventures too near them, without being predestined for their solution by
3326the loftiness and power of his spirituality. Of what use is it for nimble,
3327everyday intellects, or clumsy, honest mechanics and empiricists to
3328press, in their plebeian ambition, close to such problems, and as it were
3329into this "holy of holies"—as so often happens nowadays! But coarse feet
3330must never tread upon such carpets: this is provided for in the primary
3331law of things; the doors remain closed to those intruders, though they
3332may dash and break their heads thereon. People have always to be born
3333to a high station, or, more definitely, they have to be BRED for it: a person
3334has only a right to philosophy—taking the word in its higher significance—
3335in virtue of his descent; the ancestors, the "blood," decide here
333693
3337also. Many generations must have prepared the way for the coming of
3338the philosopher; each of his virtues must have been separately acquired,
3339nurtured, transmitted, and embodied; not only the bold, easy, delicate
3340course and current of his thoughts, but above all the readiness for great
3341responsibilities, the majesty of ruling glance and contemning look, the
3342feeling of separation from the multitude with their duties and virtues,
3343the kindly patronage and defense of whatever is misunderstood and calumniated,
3344be it God or devil, the delight and practice of supreme justice,
3345the art of commanding, the amplitude of will, the lingering eye which
3346rarely admires, rarely looks up, rarely loves… .
334794
3348Chapter 7
3349Our Virtues
3350214. OUR Virtues?—It is probable that we, too, have still our virtues, althoughnaturally
3351they are not those sincere and massive virtues on account
3352of which we hold our grandfathers in esteem and also at a little
3353distance from us. We Europeans of the day after tomorrow, we firstlings
3354of the twentieth century—with all our dangerous curiosity, our multifariousness
3355and art of disguising, our mellow and seemingly sweetened
3356cruelty in sense and spirit—we shall presumably, IF we must have virtues,
3357have those only which have come to agreement with our most
3358secret and heartfelt inclinations, with our most ardent requirements:
3359well, then, let us look for them in our labyrinths!—where, as we know,
3360so many things lose themselves, so many things get quite lost! And is
3361there anything finer than to SEARCH for one's own virtues? Is it not almost
3362to BELIEVE in one's own virtues? But this "believing in one's own
3363virtues"—is it not practically the same as what was formerly called one's
3364"good conscience," that long, respectable pigtail of an idea, which our
3365grandfathers used to hang behind their heads, and often enough also behind
3366their understandings? It seems, therefore, that however little we
3367may imagine ourselves to be old-fashioned and grandfatherly respectable
3368in other respects, in one thing we are nevertheless the worthy
3369grandchildren of our grandfathers, we last Europeans with good consciences:
3370we also still wear their pigtail.—Ah! if you only knew how
3371soon, so very soon—it will be different!
3372215. As in the stellar firmament there are sometimes two suns which
3373determine the path of one planet, and in certain cases suns of different
3374colours shine around a single planet, now with red light, now with
3375green, and then simultaneously illumine and flood it with motley colours:
3376so we modern men, owing to the complicated mechanism of our
3377"firmament," are determined by DIFFERENT moralities; our actions
3378shine alternately in different colours, and are seldom unequivocal—and
337995
3380there are often cases, also, in which our actions are MOTLEYCOLOURED.
3381216. To love one's enemies? I think that has been well learnt: it takes
3382place thousands of times at present on a large and small scale; indeed, at
3383times the higher and sublimer thing takes place:—we learn to DESPISE
3384when we love, and precisely when we love best; all of it, however, unconsciously,
3385without noise, without ostentation, with the shame and
3386secrecy of goodness, which forbids the utterance of the pompous word
3387and the formula of virtue. Morality as attitude—is opposed to our taste
3388nowadays. This is ALSO an advance, as it was an advance in our fathers
3389that religion as an attitude finally became opposed to their taste, including
3390the enmity and Voltairean bitterness against religion (and all that
3391formerly belonged to freethinker- pantomime). It is the music in our conscience,
3392the dance in our spirit, to which Puritan litanies, moral sermons,
3393and goody- goodness won't chime.
3394217. Let us be careful in dealing with those who attach great importance
3395to being credited with moral tact and subtlety in moral discernment!
3396They never forgive us if they have once made a mistake BEFORE
3397us (or even with REGARD to us)—they inevitably become our instinctive
3398calumniators and detractors, even when they still remain our
3399"friends."—Blessed are the forgetful: for they "get the better" even of their
3400blunders.
3401218. The psychologists of France—and where else are there still psychologists
3402nowadays?—have never yet exhausted their bitter and manifold
3403enjoyment of the betise bourgeoise, just as though… in short, they
3404betray something thereby. Flaubert, for instance, the honest citizen of
3405Rouen, neither saw, heard, nor tasted anything else in the end; it was his
3406mode of self-torment and refined cruelty. As this is growing wearisome,
3407I would now recommend for a change something else for a pleasure—
3408namely, the unconscious astuteness with which good, fat, honest
3409mediocrity always behaves towards loftier spirits and the tasks they
3410have to perform, the subtle, barbed, Jesuitical astuteness, which is a
3411thousand times subtler than the taste and understanding of the middleclass
3412in its best moments—subtler even than the understanding of its victims:—
3413a repeated proof that "instinct" is the most intelligent of all kinds
3414of intelligence which have hitherto been discovered. In short, you psychologists,
3415study the philosophy of the "rule" in its struggle with the
341696
3417"exception": there you have a spectacle fit for Gods and godlike malignity!
3418Or, in plainer words, practise vivisection on "good people," on the
3419"homo bonae voluntatis," ON YOURSELVES!
3420219. The practice of judging and condemning morally, is the favourite
3421revenge of the intellectually shallow on those who are less so, it is also a
3422kind of indemnity for their being badly endowed by nature, and finally,
3423it is an opportunity for acquiring spirit and BECOMING subtle—malice
3424spiritualises. They are glad in their inmost heart that there is a standard
3425according to which those who are over-endowed with intellectual goods
3426and privileges, are equal to them, they contend for the "equality of all before
3427God," and almost NEED the belief in God for this purpose. It is
3428among them that the most powerful antagonists of atheism are found. If
3429any one were to say to them "A lofty spirituality is beyond all comparison
3430with the honesty and respectability of a merely moral man"—it would
3431make them furious, I shall take care not to say so. I would rather flatter
3432them with my theory that lofty spirituality itself exists only as the ultimate
3433product of moral qualities, that it is a synthesis of all qualities attributed
3434to the "merely moral" man, after they have been acquired singly
3435through long training and practice, perhaps during a whole series of
3436generations, that lofty spirituality is precisely the spiritualising of justice,
3437and the beneficent severity which knows that it is authorized to maintain
3438GRADATIONS OF RANK in the world, even among things—and not
3439only among men.
3440220. Now that the praise of the "disinterested person" is so popular one
3441must—probably not without some danger—get an idea of WHAT people
3442actually take an interest in, and what are the things generally which fundamentally
3443and profoundly concern ordinary men—including the cultured,
3444even the learned, and perhaps philosophers also, if appearances
3445do not deceive. The fact thereby becomes obvious that the greater part of
3446what interests and charms higher natures, and more refined and fastidious
3447tastes, seems absolutely "uninteresting" to the average man—if, notwithstanding,
3448he perceive devotion to these interests, he calls it desinteresse,
3449and wonders how it is possible to act "disinterestedly." There
3450have been philosophers who could give this popular astonishment a seductive
3451and mystical, other-worldly expression (perhaps because they
3452did not know the higher nature by experience?), instead of stating the
3453naked and candidly reasonable truth that "disinterested" action is very
3454interesting and "interested" action, provided that… "And love?"—What!
345597
3456Even an action for love's sake shall be "unegoistic"? But you fools—!
3457"And the praise of the self- sacrificer?"—But whoever has really offered
3458sacrifice knows that he wanted and obtained something for it—perhaps
3459something from himself for something from himself; that he relinquished
3460here in order to have more there, perhaps in general to be more, or even
3461feel himself "more." But this is a realm of questions and answers in which
3462a more fastidious spirit does not like to stay: for here truth has to stifle
3463her yawns so much when she is obliged to answer. And after all, truth is
3464a woman; one must not use force with her.
3465221. "It sometimes happens," said a moralistic pedant and trifle- retailer,
3466"that I honour and respect an unselfish man: not, however, because he
3467is unselfish, but because I think he has a right to be useful to another
3468man at his own expense. In short, the question is always who HE is, and
3469who THE OTHER is. For instance, in a person created and destined for
3470command, self- denial and modest retirement, instead of being virtues,
3471would be the waste of virtues: so it seems to me. Every system of unegoistic
3472morality which takes itself unconditionally and appeals to every
3473one, not only sins against good taste, but is also an incentive to sins of
3474omission, an ADDITIONAL seduction under the mask of philanthropy—
3475and precisely a seduction and injury to the higher, rarer, and
3476more privileged types of men. Moral systems must be compelled first of
3477all to bow before the GRADATIONS OF RANK; their presumption must
3478be driven home to their conscience—until they thoroughly understand at
3479last that it is IMMORAL to say that 'what is right for one is proper for another.'"—
3480So said my moralistic pedant and bonhomme. Did he perhaps
3481deserve to be laughed at when he thus exhorted systems of morals to
3482practise morality? But one should not be too much in the right if one
3483wishes to have the laughers on ONE'S OWN side; a grain of wrong pertains
3484even to good taste.
3485222. Wherever sympathy (fellow-suffering) is preached nowadays—
3486and, if I gather rightly, no other religion is any longer preached—let the
3487psychologist have his ears open through all the vanity, through all the
3488noise which is natural to these preachers (as to all preachers), he will
3489hear a hoarse, groaning, genuine note of SELF-CONTEMPT. It belongs to
3490the overshadowing and uglifying of Europe, which has been on the increase
3491for a century (the first symptoms of which are already specified
3492documentarily in a thoughtful letter of Galiani to Madame d'Epinay)—IF
3493IT IS NOT REALLY THE CAUSE THEREOF! The man of "modern
349498
3495ideas," the conceited ape, is excessively dissatisfied with himself-this is
3496perfectly certain. He suffers, and his vanity wants him only "to suffer
3497with his fellows."
3498223. The hybrid European—a tolerably ugly plebeian, taken all in
3499all—absolutely requires a costume: he needs history as a storeroom of
3500costumes. To be sure, he notices that none of the costumes fit him properly—
3501he changes and changes. Let us look at the nineteenth century with
3502respect to these hasty preferences and changes in its masquerades of
3503style, and also with respect to its moments of desperation on account of
3504"nothing suiting" us. It is in vain to get ourselves up as romantic, or classical,
3505or Christian, or Florentine, or barocco, or "national," in moribus et
3506artibus: it does not "clothe us"! But the "spirit," especially the "historical
3507spirit," profits even by this desperation: once and again a new sample of
3508the past or of the foreign is tested, put on, taken off, packed up, and
3509above all studied—we are the first studious age in puncto of "costumes,"
3510I mean as concerns morals, articles of belief, artistic tastes, and religions;
3511we are prepared as no other age has ever been for a carnival in the grand
3512style, for the most spiritual festival—laughter and arrogance, for the
3513transcendental height of supreme folly and Aristophanic ridicule of the
3514world. Perhaps we are still discovering the domain of our invention just
3515here, the domain where even we can still be original, probably as parodists
3516of the world's history and as God's Merry-Andrews,—perhaps,
3517though nothing else of the present have a future, our laughter itself may
3518have a future!
3519224. The historical sense (or the capacity for divining quickly the order
3520of rank of the valuations according to which a people, a community, or
3521an individual has lived, the "divining instinct" for the relationships of
3522these valuations, for the relation of the authority of the valuations to the
3523authority of the operating forces),—this historical sense, which we
3524Europeans claim as our specialty, has come to us in the train of the enchanting
3525and mad semi-barbarity into which Europe has been plunged
3526by the democratic mingling of classes and races—it is only the nineteenth
3527century that has recognized this faculty as its sixth sense. Owing
3528to this mingling, the past of every form and mode of life, and of cultures
3529which were formerly closely contiguous and superimposed on one another,
3530flows forth into us "modern souls"; our instincts now run back in
3531all directions, we ourselves are a kind of chaos: in the end, as we have
3532said, the spirit perceives its advantage therein. By means of our semi-
353399
3534barbarity in body and in desire, we have secret access everywhere, such
3535as a noble age never had; we have access above all to the labyrinth of imperfect
3536civilizations, and to every form of semi-barbarity that has at any
3537time existed on earth; and in so far as the most considerable part of human
3538civilization hitherto has just been semi-barbarity, the "historical
3539sense" implies almost the sense and instinct for everything, the taste and
3540tongue for everything: whereby it immediately proves itself to be an
3541IGNOBLE sense. For instance, we enjoy Homer once more: it is perhaps
3542our happiest acquisition that we know how to appreciate Homer, whom
3543men of distinguished culture (as the French of the seventeenth century,
3544like Saint- Evremond, who reproached him for his ESPRIT VASTE, and
3545even Voltaire, the last echo of the century) cannot and could not so easily
3546appropriate—whom they scarcely permitted themselves to enjoy. The
3547very decided Yea and Nay of their palate, their promptly ready disgust,
3548their hesitating reluctance with regard to everything strange, their horror
3549of the bad taste even of lively curiosity, and in general the averseness of
3550every distinguished and self-sufficing culture to avow a new desire, a
3551dissatisfaction with its own condition, or an admiration of what is
3552strange: all this determines and disposes them unfavourably even towards
3553the best things of the world which are not their property or could
3554not become their prey—and no faculty is more unintelligible to such men
3555than just this historical sense, with its truckling, plebeian curiosity. The
3556case is not different with Shakespeare, that marvelous Spanish-Moorish-
3557Saxon synthesis of taste, over whom an ancient Athenian of the circle of
3558Eschylus would have half-killed himself with laughter or irritation: but
3559we—accept precisely this wild motleyness, this medley of the most delicate,
3560the most coarse, and the most artificial, with a secret confidence and
3561cordiality; we enjoy it as a refinement of art reserved expressly for us,
3562and allow ourselves to be as little disturbed by the repulsive fumes and
3563the proximity of the English populace in which Shakespeare's art and
3564taste lives, as perhaps on the Chiaja of Naples, where, with all our senses
3565awake, we go our way, enchanted and voluntarily, in spite of the drainodour
3566of the lower quarters of the town. That as men of the "historical
3567sense" we have our virtues, is not to be disputed:— we are unpretentious,
3568unselfish, modest, brave, habituated to self-control and self-renunciation,
3569very grateful, very patient, very complaisant—but with all this
3570we are perhaps not very "tasteful." Let us finally confess it, that what is
3571most difficult for us men of the "historical sense" to grasp, feel, taste, and
3572love, what finds us fundamentally prejudiced and almost hostile, is precisely
3573the perfection and ultimate maturity in every culture and art, the
3574100
3575essentially noble in works and men, their moment of smooth sea and
3576halcyon self-sufficiency, the goldenness and coldness which all things
3577show that have perfected themselves. Perhaps our great virtue of the historical
3578sense is in necessary contrast to GOOD taste, at least to the very
3579bad taste; and we can only evoke in ourselves imperfectly, hesitatingly,
3580and with compulsion the small, short, and happy godsends and glorifications
3581of human life as they shine here and there: those moments and
3582marvelous experiences when a great power has voluntarily come to a
3583halt before the boundless and infinite,—when a super-abundance of refined
3584delight has been enjoyed by a sudden checking and petrifying, by
3585standing firmly and planting oneself fixedly on still trembling ground.
3586PROPORTIONATENESS is strange to us, let us confess it to ourselves;
3587our itching is really the itching for the infinite, the immeasurable. Like
3588the rider on his forward panting horse, we let the reins fall before the infinite,
3589we modern men, we semi- barbarians—and are only in OUR
3590highest bliss when we—ARE IN MOST DANGER.
3591225. Whether it be hedonism, pessimism, utilitarianism, or eudaemonism,
3592all those modes of thinking which measure the worth of things according
3593to PLEASURE and PAIN, that is, according to accompanying circumstances
3594and secondary considerations, are plausible modes of
3595thought and naivetes, which every one conscious of CREATIVE powers
3596and an artist's conscience will look down upon with scorn, though not
3597without sympathy. Sympathy for you!—to be sure, that is not sympathy
3598as you understand it: it is not sympathy for social "distress," for "society"
3599with its sick and misfortuned, for the hereditarily vicious and defective
3600who lie on the ground around us; still less is it sympathy for the
3601grumbling, vexed, revolutionary slave-classes who strive after
3602power—they call it "freedom." OUR sympathy is a loftier and furthersighted
3603sympathy:—we see how MAN dwarfs himself, how YOU dwarf
3604him! and there are moments when we view YOUR sympathy with an indescribable
3605anguish, when we resist it,—when we regard your seriousness
3606as more dangerous than any kind of levity. You want, if possible—
3607and there is not a more foolish "if possible" —TO DO AWAY
3608WITH SUFFERING; and we?—it really seems that WE would rather
3609have it increased and made worse than it has ever been! Well-being, as
3610you understand it—is certainly not a goal; it seems to us an END; a condition
3611which at once renders man ludicrous and contemptible—and
3612makes his destruction DESIRABLE! The discipline of suffering, of
3613GREAT suffering—know ye not that it is only THIS discipline that has
3614101
3615produced all the elevations of humanity hitherto? The tension of soul in
3616misfortune which communicates to it its energy, its shuddering in view
3617of rack and ruin, its inventiveness and bravery in undergoing, enduring,
3618interpreting, and exploiting misfortune, and whatever depth, mystery,
3619disguise, spirit, artifice, or greatness has been bestowed upon the
3620soul—has it not been bestowed through suffering, through the discipline
3621of great suffering? In man CREATURE and CREATOR are united: in
3622man there is not only matter, shred, excess, clay, mire, folly, chaos; but
3623there is also the creator, the sculptor, the hardness of the hammer, the divinity
3624of the spectator, and the seventh day—do ye understand this contrast?
3625And that YOUR sympathy for the "creature in man" applies to that
3626which has to be fashioned, bruised, forged, stretched, roasted, annealed,
3627refined—to that which must necessarily SUFFER, and IS MEANT to suffer?
3628And our sympathy—do ye not understand what our REVERSE sympathy
3629applies to, when it resists your sympathy as the worst of all pampering
3630and enervation?—So it is sympathy AGAINST sympathy!—But to
3631repeat it once more, there are higher problems than the problems of
3632pleasure and pain and sympathy; and all systems of philosophy which
3633deal only with these are naivetes.
3634226. WE IMMORALISTS.-This world with which WE are concerned, in
3635which we have to fear and love, this almost invisible, inaudible world of
3636delicate command and delicate obedience, a world of "almost" in every
3637respect, captious, insidious, sharp, and tender—yes, it is well protected
3638from clumsy spectators and familiar curiosity! We are woven into a
3639strong net and garment of duties, and CANNOT disengage
3640ourselves—precisely here, we are "men of duty," even we! Occasionally,
3641it is true, we dance in our "chains" and betwixt our "swords"; it is none
3642the less true that more often we gnash our teeth under the circumstances,
3643and are impatient at the secret hardship of our lot. But do what we will,
3644fools and appearances say of us: "These are men WITHOUT duty,"— we
3645have always fools and appearances against us!
3646227. Honesty, granting that it is the virtue of which we cannot rid
3647ourselves, we free spirits—well, we will labour at it with all our perversity
3648and love, and not tire of "perfecting" ourselves in OUR virtue,
3649which alone remains: may its glance some day overspread like a gilded,
3650blue, mocking twilight this aging civilization with its dull gloomy seriousness!
3651And if, nevertheless, our honesty should one day grow weary,
3652and sigh, and stretch its limbs, and find us too hard, and would fain
3653102
3654have it pleasanter, easier, and gentler, like an agreeable vice, let us remain
3655HARD, we latest Stoics, and let us send to its help whatever devilry
3656we have in us:—our disgust at the clumsy and undefined, our
3657"NITIMUR IN VETITUM," our love of adventure, our sharpened and fastidious
3658curiosity, our most subtle, disguised, intellectual Will to Power
3659and universal conquest, which rambles and roves avidiously around all
3660the realms of the future—let us go with all our "devils" to the help of our
3661"God"! It is probable that people will misunderstand and mistake us on
3662that account: what does it matter! They will say: "Their 'honesty'—that is
3663their devilry, and nothing else!" What does it matter! And even if they
3664were right—have not all Gods hitherto been such sanctified, re-baptized
3665devils? And after all, what do we know of ourselves? And what the spirit
3666that leads us wants TO BE CALLED? (It is a question of names.) And
3667how many spirits we harbour? Our honesty, we free spirits—let us be
3668careful lest it become our vanity, our ornament and ostentation, our limitation,
3669our stupidity! Every virtue inclines to stupidity, every stupidity
3670to virtue; "stupid to the point of sanctity," they say in Russia,— let us be
3671careful lest out of pure honesty we eventually become saints and bores!
3672Is not life a hundred times too short for us— to bore ourselves? One
3673would have to believe in eternal life in order to…
3674228. I hope to be forgiven for discovering that all moral philosophy
3675hitherto has been tedious and has belonged to the soporific appliances—
3676and that "virtue," in my opinion, has been MORE injured by the
3677TEDIOUSNESS of its advocates than by anything else; at the same time,
3678however, I would not wish to overlook their general usefulness. It is desirable
3679that as few people as possible should reflect upon morals, and
3680consequently it is very desirable that morals should not some day become
3681interesting! But let us not be afraid! Things still remain today as
3682they have always been: I see no one in Europe who has (or DISCLOSES)
3683an idea of the fact that philosophizing concerning morals might be conducted
3684in a dangerous, captious, and ensnaring manner—that
3685CALAMITY might be involved therein. Observe, for example, the indefatigable,
3686inevitable English utilitarians: how ponderously and respectably
3687they stalk on, stalk along (a Homeric metaphor expresses it
3688better) in the footsteps of Bentham, just as he had already stalked in the
3689footsteps of the respectable Helvetius! (no, he was not a dangerous man,
3690Helvetius, CE SENATEUR POCOCURANTE, to use an expression of
3691Galiani). No new thought, nothing of the nature of a finer turning or better
3692expression of an old thought, not even a proper history of what has
3693103
3694been previously thought on the subject: an IMPOSSIBLE literature, taking
3695it all in all, unless one knows how to leaven it with some mischief. In
3696effect, the old English vice called CANT, which is MORAL
3697TARTUFFISM, has insinuated itself also into these moralists (whom one
3698must certainly read with an eye to their motives if one MUST read them),
3699concealed this time under the new form of the scientific spirit; moreover,
3700there is not absent from them a secret struggle with the pangs of conscience,
3701from which a race of former Puritans must naturally suffer, in all
3702their scientific tinkering with morals. (Is not a moralist the opposite of a
3703Puritan? That is to say, as a thinker who regards morality as questionable,
3704as worthy of interrogation, in short, as a problem? Is moralizing
3705not-immoral?) In the end, they all want English morality to be recognized
3706as authoritative, inasmuch as mankind, or the "general utility," or
3707"the happiness of the greatest number,"—no! the happiness of
3708ENGLAND, will be best served thereby. They would like, by all means,
3709to convince themselves that the striving after English happiness, I mean
3710after COMFORT and FASHION (and in the highest instance, a seat in
3711Parliament), is at the same time the true path of virtue; in fact, that in so
3712far as there has been virtue in the world hitherto, it has just consisted in
3713such striving. Not one of those ponderous, conscience-stricken herdinganimals
3714(who undertake to advocate the cause of egoism as conducive to
3715the general welfare) wants to have any knowledge or inkling of the facts
3716that the "general welfare" is no ideal, no goal, no notion that can be at all
3717grasped, but is only a nostrum,—that what is fair to one MAY NOT at all
3718be fair to another, that the requirement of one morality for all is really a
3719detriment to higher men, in short, that there is a DISTINCTION OF
3720RANK between man and man, and consequently between morality and
3721morality. They are an unassuming and fundamentally mediocre species
3722of men, these utilitarian Englishmen, and, as already remarked, in so far
3723as they are tedious, one cannot think highly enough of their utility. One
3724ought even to ENCOURAGE them, as has been partially attempted in
3725the following rhymes:—
3726Hail, ye worthies, barrow-wheeling,
3727"Longer—better," aye revealing,
3728Stiffer aye in head and knee;
3729Unenraptured, never jesting,
3730Mediocre everlasting,
3731SANS GENIE ET SANS ESPRIT!
3732104
3733229. In these later ages, which may be proud of their humanity, there
3734still remains so much fear, so much SUPERSTITION of the fear, of the
3735"cruel wild beast," the mastering of which constitutes the very pride of
3736these humaner ages—that even obvious truths, as if by the agreement of
3737centuries, have long remained unuttered, because they have the appearance
3738of helping the finally slain wild beast back to life again. I perhaps
3739risk something when I allow such a truth to escape; let others capture it
3740again and give it so much "milk of pious sentiment" 5 to drink, that it will
3741lie down quiet and forgotten, in its old corner.—One ought to learn anew
3742about cruelty, and open one's eyes; one ought at last to learn impatience,
3743in order that such immodest gross errors—as, for instance, have been
3744fostered by ancient and modern philosophers with regard to
3745tragedy—may no longer wander about virtuously and boldly. Almost
3746everything that we call "higher culture" is based upon the spiritualising
3747and intensifying of CRUELTY—this is my thesis; the "wild beast" has not
3748been slain at all, it lives, it flourishes, it has only been— transfigured.
3749That which constitutes the painful delight of tragedy is cruelty; that
3750which operates agreeably in so-called tragic sympathy, and at the basis
3751even of everything sublime, up to the highest and most delicate thrills of
3752metaphysics, obtains its sweetness solely from the intermingled ingredient
3753of cruelty. What the Roman enjoys in the arena, the Christian in the
3754ecstasies of the cross, the Spaniard at the sight of the faggot and stake, or
3755of the bull-fight, the present-day Japanese who presses his way to the
3756tragedy, the workman of the Parisian suburbs who has a homesickness
3757for bloody revolutions, the Wagnerienne who, with unhinged will,
3758"undergoes" the performance of "Tristan and Isolde"—what all these enjoy,
3759and strive with mysterious ardour to drink in, is the philtre of the
3760great Circe "cruelty." Here, to be sure, we must put aside entirely the
3761blundering psychology of former times, which could only teach with regard
3762to cruelty that it originated at the sight of the suffering of OTHERS:
3763there is an abundant, super-abundant enjoyment even in one's own suffering,
3764in causing one's own suffering—and wherever man has allowed
3765himself to be persuaded to self-denial in the RELIGIOUS sense, or to selfmutilation,
3766as among the Phoenicians and ascetics, or in general, to desensualisation,
3767decarnalisation, and contrition, to Puritanical repentancespasms,
3768to vivisection of conscience and to Pascal- like SACRIFIZIA
3769DELL' INTELLETO, he is secretly allured and impelled forwards by his
3770cruelty, by the dangerous thrill of cruelty TOWARDS
3771HIMSELF.—Finally, let us consider that even the seeker of knowledge
37725.An expression from Schiller's William Tell, Act IV, Scene 3.
3773105
3774operates as an artist and glorifier of cruelty, in that he compels his spirit
3775to perceive AGAINST its own inclination, and often enough against the
3776wishes of his heart:—he forces it to say Nay, where he would like to affirm,
3777love, and adore; indeed, every instance of taking a thing profoundly
3778and fundamentally, is a violation, an intentional injuring of the
3779fundamental will of the spirit, which instinctively aims at appearance
3780and superficiality,—even in every desire for knowledge there is a drop of
3781cruelty.
3782230. Perhaps what I have said here about a "fundamental will of the
3783spirit" may not be understood without further details; I may be allowed
3784a word of explanation.—That imperious something which is popularly
3785called "the spirit," wishes to be master internally and externally, and to
3786feel itself master; it has the will of a multiplicity for a simplicity, a binding,
3787taming, imperious, and essentially ruling will. Its requirements and
3788capacities here, are the same as those assigned by physiologists to
3789everything that lives, grows, and multiplies. The power of the spirit to
3790appropriate foreign elements reveals itself in a strong tendency to assimilate
3791the new to the old, to simplify the manifold, to overlook or repudiate
3792the absolutely contradictory; just as it arbitrarily re-underlines, makes
3793prominent, and falsifies for itself certain traits and lines in the foreign
3794elements, in every portion of the "outside world." Its object thereby is the
3795incorporation of new "experiences," the assortment of new things in the
3796old arrangements—in short, growth; or more properly, the FEELING of
3797growth, the feeling of increased power—is its object. This same will has
3798at its service an apparently opposed impulse of the spirit, a suddenly adopted
3799preference of ignorance, of arbitrary shutting out, a closing of windows,
3800an inner denial of this or that, a prohibition to approach, a sort of
3801defensive attitude against much that is knowable, a contentment with
3802obscurity, with the shutting-in horizon, an acceptance and approval of
3803ignorance: as that which is all necessary according to the degree of its appropriating
3804power, its "digestive power," to speak figuratively (and in
3805fact "the spirit" resembles a stomach more than anything else). Here also
3806belong an occasional propensity of the spirit to let itself be deceived
3807(perhaps with a waggish suspicion that it is NOT so and so, but is only
3808allowed to pass as such), a delight in uncertainty and ambiguity, an exulting
3809enjoyment of arbitrary, out-of-the-way narrowness and mystery,
3810of the too-near, of the foreground, of the magnified, the diminished, the
3811misshapen, the beautified—an enjoyment of the arbitrariness of all these
3812manifestations of power. Finally, in this connection, there is the not
3813106
3814unscrupulous readiness of the spirit to deceive other spirits and dissemble
3815before them— the constant pressing and straining of a creating,
3816shaping, changeable power: the spirit enjoys therein its craftiness and its
3817variety of disguises, it enjoys also its feeling of security therein—it is precisely
3818by its Protean arts that it is best protected and concealed!—
3819COUNTER TO this propensity for appearance, for simplification,
3820for a disguise, for a cloak, in short, for an outside—for every outside
3821is a cloak—there operates the sublime tendency of the man of knowledge,
3822which takes, and INSISTS on taking things profoundly, variously,
3823and thoroughly; as a kind of cruelty of the intellectual conscience and
3824taste, which every courageous thinker will acknowledge in himself,
3825provided, as it ought to be, that he has sharpened and hardened his eye
3826sufficiently long for introspection, and is accustomed to severe discipline
3827and even severe words. He will say: "There is something cruel in the
3828tendency of my spirit": let the virtuous and amiable try to convince him
3829that it is not so! In fact, it would sound nicer, if, instead of our cruelty,
3830perhaps our "extravagant honesty" were talked about, whispered about,
3831and glorified—we free, VERY free spirits—and some day perhaps SUCH
3832will actually be our—posthumous glory! Meanwhile— for there is plenty
3833of time until then—we should be least inclined to deck ourselves out in
3834such florid and fringed moral verbiage; our whole former work has just
3835made us sick of this taste and its sprightly exuberance. They are beautiful,
3836glistening, jingling, festive words: honesty, love of truth, love of wisdom,
3837sacrifice for knowledge, heroism of the truthful— there is
3838something in them that makes one's heart swell with pride. But we anchorites
3839and marmots have long ago persuaded ourselves in all the
3840secrecy of an anchorite's conscience, that this worthy parade of verbiage
3841also belongs to the old false adornment, frippery, and gold-dust of unconscious
3842human vanity, and that even under such flattering colour and
3843repainting, the terrible original text HOMO NATURA must again be recognized.
3844In effect, to translate man back again into nature; to master the
3845many vain and visionary interpretations and subordinate meanings
3846which have hitherto been scratched and daubed over the eternal original
3847text, HOMO NATURA; to bring it about that man shall henceforth stand
3848before man as he now, hardened by the discipline of science, stands before
3849the OTHER forms of nature, with fearless Oedipus-eyes, and
3850stopped Ulysses-ears, deaf to the enticements of old metaphysical birdcatchers,
3851who have piped to him far too long: "Thou art more! thou art
3852higher! thou hast a different origin!"—this may be a strange and foolish
3853task, but that it is a TASK, who can deny! Why did we choose it, this
3854107
3855foolish task? Or, to put the question differently: "Why knowledge at all?"
3856Every one will ask us about this. And thus pressed, we, who have asked
3857ourselves the question a hundred times, have not found and cannot find
3858any better answer…
3859231. Learning alters us, it does what all nourishment does that does
3860not merely "conserve"—as the physiologist knows. But at the bottom of
3861our souls, quite "down below," there is certainly something unteachable,
3862a granite of spiritual fate, of predetermined decision and answer to predetermined,
3863chosen questions. In each cardinal problem there speaks an
3864unchangeable "I am this"; a thinker cannot learn anew about man and
3865woman, for instance, but can only learn fully—he can only follow to the
3866end what is "fixed" about them in himself. Occasionally we find certain
3867solutions of problems which make strong beliefs for us; perhaps they are
3868henceforth called "convictions." Later on—one sees in them only footsteps
3869to self-knowledge, guide-posts to the problem which we ourselves
3870ARE—or more correctly to the great stupidity which we embody, our
3871spiritual fate, the UNTEACHABLE in us, quite "down below."—In view
3872of this liberal compliment which I have just paid myself, permission will
3873perhaps be more readily allowed me to utter some truths about "woman
3874as she is," provided that it is known at the outset how literally they are
3875merely—MY truths.
3876232. Woman wishes to be independent, and therefore she begins to enlighten
3877men about "woman as she is"—THIS is one of the worst developments
3878of the general UGLIFYING of Europe. For what must these
3879clumsy attempts of feminine scientificality and self- exposure bring to
3880light! Woman has so much cause for shame; in woman there is so much
3881pedantry, superficiality, schoolmasterliness, petty presumption, unbridledness,
3882and indiscretion concealed—study only woman's behaviour
3883towards children!—which has really been best restrained and dominated
3884hitherto by the FEAR of man. Alas, if ever the "eternally tedious in woman"—
3885she has plenty of it!—is allowed to venture forth! if she begins
3886radically and on principle to unlearn her wisdom and art-of charming, of
3887playing, of frightening away sorrow, of alleviating and taking easily; if
3888she forgets her delicate aptitude for agreeable desires! Female voices are
3889already raised, which, by Saint Aristophanes! make one afraid:—with
3890medical explicitness it is stated in a threatening manner what woman
3891first and last REQUIRES from man. Is it not in the very worst taste that
3892woman thus sets herself up to be scientific? Enlightenment hitherto has
3893108
3894fortunately been men's affair, men's gift-we remained therewith "among
3895ourselves"; and in the end, in view of all that women write about
3896"woman," we may well have considerable doubt as to whether woman
3897really DESIRES enlightenment about herself—and CAN desire it. If woman
3898does not thereby seek a new ORNAMENT for herself—I believe ornamentation
3899belongs to the eternally feminine?—why, then, she wishes
3900to make herself feared: perhaps she thereby wishes to get the mastery.
3901But she does not want truth—what does woman care for truth? From the
3902very first, nothing is more foreign, more repugnant, or more hostile to
3903woman than truth—her great art is falsehood, her chief concern is appearance
3904and beauty. Let us confess it, we men: we honour and love this
3905very art and this very instinct in woman: we who have the hard task, and
3906for our recreation gladly seek the company of beings under whose
3907hands, glances, and delicate follies, our seriousness, our gravity, and
3908profundity appear almost like follies to us. Finally, I ask the question:
3909Did a woman herself ever acknowledge profundity in a woman's mind,
3910or justice in a woman's heart? And is it not true that on the whole
3911"woman" has hitherto been most despised by woman herself, and not at
3912all by us?—We men desire that woman should not continue to compromise
3913herself by enlightening us; just as it was man's care and the consideration
3914for woman, when the church decreed: mulier taceat in ecclesia.
3915It was to the benefit of woman when Napoleon gave the too eloquent
3916Madame de Stael to understand: mulier taceat in politicis!—and in my
3917opinion, he is a true friend of woman who calls out to women today:
3918mulier taceat de mulierel.
3919233. It betrays corruption of the instincts—apart from the fact that it
3920betrays bad taste—when a woman refers to Madame Roland, or Madame
3921de Stael, or Monsieur George Sand, as though something were proved
3922thereby in favour of "woman as she is." Among men, these are the three
3923comical women as they are—nothing more!—and just the best
3924involuntary counter-arguments against feminine emancipation and
3925autonomy.
3926234. Stupidity in the kitchen; woman as cook; the terrible thoughtlessness
3927with which the feeding of the family and the master of the house is
3928managed! Woman does not understand what food means, and she insists
3929on being cook! If woman had been a thinking creature, she should certainly,
3930as cook for thousands of years, have discovered the most important
3931physiological facts, and should likewise have got possession of the
3932109
3933healing art! Through bad female cooks—through the entire lack of reason
3934in the kitchen—the development of mankind has been longest retarded
3935and most interfered with: even today matters are very little better.
3936A word to High School girls.
3937235. There are turns and casts of fancy, there are sentences, little handfuls
3938of words, in which a whole culture, a whole society suddenly crystallises
3939itself. Among these is the incidental remark of Madame de Lambert
3940to her son: "MON AMI, NE VOUS PERMETTEZ JAMAIS QUE DES
3941FOLIES, QUI VOUS FERONT GRAND PLAISIR"—the motherliest and
3942wisest remark, by the way, that was ever addressed to a son.
3943236. I have no doubt that every noble woman will oppose what Dante
3944and Goethe believed about woman—the former when he sang, "ELLA
3945GUARDAVA SUSO, ED IO IN LEI," and the latter when he interpreted
3946it, "the eternally feminine draws us ALOFT"; for THIS is just what she
3947believes of the eternally masculine.
3948237.
3949SEVEN APOPHTHEGMS FOR WOMEN
3950How the longest ennui flees, When a man comes to our knees!
3951Age, alas! and science staid, Furnish even weak virtue aid.
3952Sombre garb and silence meet: Dress for every dame—discreet.
3953Whom I thank when in my bliss? God!—and my good tailoress!
3954Young, a flower-decked cavern home; Old, a dragon thence doth
3955roam.
3956Noble title, leg that's fine, Man as well: Oh, were HE mine!
3957Speech in brief and sense in mass—Slippery for the jenny-ass!
3958237A. Woman has hitherto been treated by men like birds, which, losing
3959their way, have come down among them from an elevation: as
3960something delicate, fragile, wild, strange, sweet, and animating- -but as
3961something also which must be cooped up to prevent it flying away.
3962238. To be mistaken in the fundamental problem of "man and woman,"
3963to deny here the profoundest antagonism and the necessity for an eternally
3964hostile tension, to dream here perhaps of equal rights, equal training,
3965equal claims and obligations: that is a TYPICAL sign of shallowmindedness;
3966and a thinker who has proved himself shallow at this dangerous
3967spot—shallow in instinct!—may generally be regarded as
3968110
3969suspicious, nay more, as betrayed, as discovered; he will probably prove
3970too "short" for all fundamental questions of life, future as well as present,
3971and will be unable to descend into ANY of the depths. On the other
3972hand, a man who has depth of spirit as well as of desires, and has also
3973the depth of benevolence which is capable of severity and harshness, and
3974easily confounded with them, can only think of woman as ORIENTALS
3975do: he must conceive of her as a possession, as confinable property, as a
3976being predestined for service and accomplishing her mission therein—he
3977must take his stand in this matter upon the immense rationality of Asia,
3978upon the superiority of the instinct of Asia, as the Greeks did formerly;
3979those best heirs and scholars of Asia—who, as is well known, with their
3980INCREASING culture and amplitude of power, from Homer to the time
3981of Pericles, became gradually STRICTER towards woman, in short, more
3982Oriental. HOW necessary, HOW logical, even HOW humanely desirable
3983this was, let us consider for ourselves!
3984239. The weaker sex has in no previous age been treated with so much
3985respect by men as at present—this belongs to the tendency and fundamental
3986taste of democracy, in the same way as disrespectfulness to old
3987age—what wonder is it that abuse should be immediately made of this
3988respect? They want more, they learn to make claims, the tribute of respect
3989is at last felt to be well-nigh galling; rivalry for rights, indeed actual
3990strife itself, would be preferred: in a word, woman is losing modesty.
3991And let us immediately add that she is also losing taste. She is unlearning
3992to FEAR man: but the woman who "unlearns to fear" sacrifices her
3993most womanly instincts. That woman should venture forward when the
3994fear-inspiring quality in man—or more definitely, the MAN in man—is
3995no longer either desired or fully developed, is reasonable enough and
3996also intelligible enough; what is more difficult to understand is that precisely
3997thereby— woman deteriorates. This is what is happening
3998nowadays: let us not deceive ourselves about it! Wherever the industrial
3999spirit has triumphed over the military and aristocratic spirit, woman
4000strives for the economic and legal independence of a clerk: "woman as
4001clerkess" is inscribed on the portal of the modern society which is in
4002course of formation. While she thus appropriates new rights, aspires to
4003be "master," and inscribes "progress" of woman on her flags and banners,
4004the very opposite realises itself with terrible obviousness: WOMAN
4005RETROGRADES. Since the French Revolution the influence of woman in
4006Europe has DECLINED in proportion as she has increased her rights and
4007claims; and the "emancipation of woman," insofar as it is desired and
4008111
4009demanded by women themselves (and not only by masculine shallowpates),
4010thus proves to be a remarkable symptom of the increased weakening
4011and deadening of the most womanly instincts. There is
4012STUPIDITY in this movement, an almost masculine stupidity, of which a
4013well-reared woman—who is always a sensible woman—might be heartily
4014ashamed. To lose the intuition as to the ground upon which she can
4015most surely achieve victory; to neglect exercise in the use of her proper
4016weapons; to let-herself-go before man, perhaps even "to the book," where
4017formerly she kept herself in control and in refined, artful humility; to
4018neutralize with her virtuous audacity man's faith in a VEILED, fundamentally
4019different ideal in woman, something eternally, necessarily feminine;
4020to emphatically and loquaciously dissuade man from the idea that
4021woman must be preserved, cared for, protected, and indulged, like some
4022delicate, strangely wild, and often pleasant domestic animal; the clumsy
4023and indignant collection of everything of the nature of servitude and
4024bondage which the position of woman in the hitherto existing order of
4025society has entailed and still entails (as though slavery were a counterargument,
4026and not rather a condition of every higher culture, of every elevation
4027of culture):—what does all this betoken, if not a disintegration of
4028womanly instincts, a defeminising? Certainly, there are enough of idiotic
4029friends and corrupters of woman among the learned asses of the masculine
4030sex, who advise woman to defeminize herself in this manner, and to
4031imitate all the stupidities from which "man" in Europe, European
4032"manliness," suffers,—who would like to lower woman to "general culture,"
4033indeed even to newspaper reading and meddling with politics.
4034Here and there they wish even to make women into free spirits and literary
4035workers: as though a woman without piety would not be something
4036perfectly obnoxious or ludicrous to a profound and godless
4037man;—almost everywhere her nerves are being ruined by the most morbid
4038and dangerous kind of music (our latest German music), and she is
4039daily being made more hysterical and more incapable of fulfilling her
4040first and last function, that of bearing robust children. They wish to
4041"cultivate" her in general still more, and intend, as they say, to make the
4042"weaker sex" STRONG by culture: as if history did not teach in the most
4043emphatic manner that the "cultivating" of mankind and his weakening—
4044that is to say, the weakening, dissipating, and languishing of his
4045FORCE OF WILL—have always kept pace with one another, and that the
4046most powerful and influential women in the world (and lastly, the mother
4047of Napoleon) had just to thank their force of will—and not their
4048schoolmasters—for their power and ascendancy over men. That which
4049112
4050inspires respect in woman, and often enough fear also, is her NATURE,
4051which is more "natural" than that of man, her genuine, carnivora-like,
4052cunning flexibility, her tiger-claws beneath the glove, her NAIVETE in
4053egoism, her untrainableness and innate wildness, the incomprehensibleness,
4054extent, and deviation of her desires and virtues. That which, in
4055spite of fear, excites one's sympathy for the dangerous and beautiful cat,
4056"woman," is that she seems more afflicted, more vulnerable, more necessitous
4057of love, and more condemned to disillusionment than any other
4058creature. Fear and sympathy it is with these feelings that man has
4059hitherto stood in the presence of woman, always with one foot already in
4060tragedy, which rends while it delights—What? And all that is now to be
4061at an end? And the DISENCHANTMENT of woman is in progress? The
4062tediousness of woman is slowly evolving? Oh Europe! Europe! We know
4063the horned animal which was always most attractive to thee, from which
4064danger is ever again threatening thee! Thy old fable might once more become
4065"history"—an immense stupidity might once again overmaster thee
4066and carry thee away! And no God concealed beneath it—no! only an
4067"idea," a "modern idea"!
4068113
4069Chapter 8
4070Peoples and Fatherlands
4071240. I HEARD, once again for the first time, Richard Wagner's overture
4072to the Mastersinger: it is a piece of magnificent, gorgeous, heavy, latterday
4073art, which has the pride to presuppose two centuries of music as still
4074living, in order that it may be understood:—it is an honour to Germans
4075that such a pride did not miscalculate! What flavours and forces, what
4076seasons and climes do we not find mingled in it! It impresses us at one
4077time as ancient, at another time as foreign, bitter, and too modern, it is as
4078arbitrary as it is pompously traditional, it is not infrequently roguish,
4079still oftener rough and coarse—it has fire and courage, and at the same
4080time the loose, dun- coloured skin of fruits which ripen too late. It flows
4081broad and full: and suddenly there is a moment of inexplicable hesitation,
4082like a gap that opens between cause and effect, an oppression that
4083makes us dream, almost a nightmare; but already it broadens and
4084widens anew, the old stream of delight-the most manifold delight,—of
4085old and new happiness; including ESPECIALLY the joy of the artist in
4086himself, which he refuses to conceal, his astonished, happy cognizance of
4087his mastery of the expedients here employed, the new, newly acquired,
4088imperfectly tested expedients of art which he apparently betrays to us.
4089All in all, however, no beauty, no South, nothing of the delicate southern
4090clearness of the sky, nothing of grace, no dance, hardly a will to logic; a
4091certain clumsiness even, which is also emphasized, as though the artist
4092wished to say to us: "It is part of my intention"; a cumbersome drapery,
4093something arbitrarily barbaric and ceremonious, a flirring of learned and
4094venerable conceits and witticisms; something German in the best and
4095worst sense of the word, something in the German style, manifold, formless,
4096and inexhaustible; a certain German potency and super-plenitude of
4097soul, which is not afraid to hide itself under the RAFFINEMENTS of decadence—
4098which, perhaps, feels itself most at ease there; a real, genuine
4099token of the German soul, which is at the same time young and aged, too
4100ripe and yet still too rich in futurity. This kind of music expresses best
4101114
4102what I think of the Germans: they belong to the day before yesterday and
4103the day after tomorrow— THEY HAVE AS YET NO TODAY.
4104241. We "good Europeans," we also have hours when we allow
4105ourselves a warm-hearted patriotism, a plunge and relapse into old loves
4106and narrow views—I have just given an example of it— hours of national
4107excitement, of patriotic anguish, and all other sorts of old-fashioned
4108floods of sentiment. Duller spirits may perhaps only get done with what
4109confines its operations in us to hours and plays itself out in hours—in a
4110considerable time: some in half a year, others in half a lifetime, according
4111to the speed and strength with which they digest and "change their material."
4112Indeed, I could think of sluggish, hesitating races, which even in
4113our rapidly moving Europe, would require half a century ere they could
4114surmount such atavistic attacks of patriotism and soil-attachment, and
4115return once more to reason, that is to say, to "good Europeanism." And
4116while digressing on this possibility, I happen to become an ear-witness
4117of a conversation between two old patriots—they were evidently both
4118hard of hearing and consequently spoke all the louder. "HE has as much,
4119and knows as much, philosophy as a peasant or a corps-student," said
4120the one— "he is still innocent. But what does that matter nowadays! It is
4121the age of the masses: they lie on their belly before everything that is
4122massive. And so also in politicis. A statesman who rears up for them a
4123new Tower of Babel, some monstrosity of empire and power, they call
4124'great'—what does it matter that we more prudent and conservative ones
4125do not meanwhile give up the old belief that it is only the great thought
4126that gives greatness to an action or affair. Supposing a statesman were to
4127bring his people into the position of being obliged henceforth to practise
4128'high politics,' for which they were by nature badly endowed and prepared,
4129so that they would have to sacrifice their old and reliable virtues,
4130out of love to a new and doubtful mediocrity;— supposing a statesman
4131were to condemn his people generally to 'practise politics,' when they
4132have hitherto had something better to do and think about, and when in
4133the depths of their souls they have been unable to free themselves from a
4134prudent loathing of the restlessness, emptiness, and noisy wranglings of
4135the essentially politics-practising nations;—supposing such a statesman
4136were to stimulate the slumbering passions and avidities of his people,
4137were to make a stigma out of their former diffidence and delight in aloofness,
4138an offence out of their exoticism and hidden permanency, were to
4139depreciate their most radical proclivities, subvert their consciences, make
4140their minds narrow, and their tastes 'national'—what! a statesman who
4141115
4142should do all this, which his people would have to do penance for
4143throughout their whole future, if they had a future, such a statesman
4144would be GREAT, would he?"—"Undoubtedly!" replied the other old
4145patriot vehemently, "otherwise he COULD NOT have done it! It was
4146mad perhaps to wish such a thing! But perhaps everything great has
4147been just as mad at its commencement!"— "Misuse of words!" cried his
4148interlocutor, contradictorily— "strong! strong! Strong and mad! NOT
4149great!"—The old men had obviously become heated as they thus shouted
4150their "truths" in each other's faces, but I, in my happiness and apartness,
4151considered how soon a stronger one may become master of the strong,
4152and also that there is a compensation for the intellectual superficialising
4153of a nation—namely, in the deepening of another.
4154242. Whether we call it "civilization," or "humanising," or "progress,"
4155which now distinguishes the European, whether we call it simply,
4156without praise or blame, by the political formula the DEMOCRATIC
4157movement in Europe—behind all the moral and political foregrounds
4158pointed to by such formulas, an immense PHYSIOLOGICAL PROCESS
4159goes on, which is ever extending the process of the assimilation of
4160Europeans, their increasing detachment from the conditions under
4161which, climatically and hereditarily, united races originate, their increasing
4162independence of every definite milieu, that for centuries would fain
4163inscribe itself with equal demands on soul and body,—that is to say, the
4164slow emergence of an essentially SUPER-NATIONAL and nomadic species
4165of man, who possesses, physiologically speaking, a maximum of the
4166art and power of adaptation as his typical distinction. This process of the
4167EVOLVING EUROPEAN, which can be retarded in its TEMPO by great
4168relapses, but will perhaps just gain and grow thereby in vehemence and
4169depth—the still-raging storm and stress of "national sentiment" pertains
4170to it, and also the anarchism which is appearing at present—this process
4171will probably arrive at results on which its naive propagators and panegyrists,
4172the apostles of "modern ideas," would least care to reckon. The
4173same new conditions under which on an average a levelling and mediocrising
4174of man will take place—a useful, industrious, variously serviceable,
4175and clever gregarious man—are in the highest degree suitable
4176to give rise to exceptional men of the most dangerous and attractive
4177qualities. For, while the capacity for adaptation, which is every day trying
4178changing conditions, and begins a new work with every generation,
4179almost with every decade, makes the POWERFULNESS of the type impossible;
4180while the collective impression of such future Europeans will
4181116
4182probably be that of numerous, talkative, weak-willed, and very handy
4183workmen who REQUIRE a master, a commander, as they require their
4184daily bread; while, therefore, the democratising of Europe will tend to
4185the production of a type prepared for SLAVERY in the most subtle sense
4186of the term: the STRONG man will necessarily in individual and exceptional
4187cases, become stronger and richer than he has perhaps ever been
4188before—owing to the unprejudicedness of his schooling, owing to the
4189immense variety of practice, art, and disguise. I meant to say that the
4190democratising of Europe is at the same time an involuntary arrangement
4191for the rearing of TYRANTS—taking the word in all its meanings, even
4192in its most spiritual sense.
4193243. I hear with pleasure that our sun is moving rapidly towards the
4194constellation Hercules: and I hope that the men on this earth will do like
4195the sun. And we foremost, we good Europeans!
4196244. There was a time when it was customary to call Germans "deep"
4197by way of distinction; but now that the most successful type of new Germanism
4198is covetous of quite other honours, and perhaps misses
4199"smartness" in all that has depth, it is almost opportune and patriotic to
4200doubt whether we did not formerly deceive ourselves with that commendation:
4201in short, whether German depth is not at bottom something
4202different and worse—and something from which, thank God, we are on
4203the point of successfully ridding ourselves. Let us try, then, to relearn
4204with regard to German depth; the only thing necessary for the purpose is
4205a little vivisection of the German soul.—The German soul is above all
4206manifold, varied in its source, aggregated and super- imposed, rather
4207than actually built: this is owing to its origin. A German who would embolden
4208himself to assert: "Two souls, alas, dwell in my breast," would
4209make a bad guess at the truth, or, more correctly, he would come far
4210short of the truth about the number of souls. As a people made up of the
4211most extraordinary mixing and mingling of races, perhaps even with a
4212preponderance of the pre-Aryan element as the "people of the centre" in
4213every sense of the term, the Germans are more intangible, more ample,
4214more contradictory, more unknown, more incalculable, more surprising,
4215and even more terrifying than other peoples are to themselves:—they escape
4216DEFINITION, and are thereby alone the despair of the French. It IS
4217characteristic of the Germans that the question: "What is German?" never
4218dies out among them. Kotzebue certainly knew his Germans well
4219enough: "We are known," they cried jubilantly to him—but Sand also
4220117
4221thought he knew them. Jean Paul knew what he was doing when he declared
4222himself incensed at Fichte's lying but patriotic flatteries and exaggerations,—
4223but it is probable that Goethe thought differently about Germans
4224from Jean Paul, even though he acknowledged him to be right with
4225regard to Fichte. It is a question what Goethe really thought about the
4226Germans?—But about many things around him he never spoke explicitly,
4227and all his life he knew how to keep an astute silence—probably he
4228had good reason for it. It is certain that it was not the "Wars of Independence"
4229that made him look up more joyfully, any more than it was the
4230French Revolution,—the event on account of which he
4231RECONSTRUCTED his "Faust," and indeed the whole problem of "man,"
4232was the appearance of Napoleon. There are words of Goethe in which he
4233condemns with impatient severity, as from a foreign land, that which
4234Germans take a pride in, he once defined the famous German turn of
4235mind as "Indulgence towards its own and others' weaknesses." Was he
4236wrong? it is characteristic of Germans that one is seldom entirely wrong
4237about them. The German soul has passages and galleries in it, there are
4238caves, hiding- places, and dungeons therein, its disorder has much of the
4239charm of the mysterious, the German is well acquainted with the
4240bypaths to chaos. And as everything loves its symbol, so the German
4241loves the clouds and all that is obscure, evolving, crepuscular, damp, and
4242shrouded, it seems to him that everything uncertain, undeveloped, selfdisplacing,
4243and growing is "deep". The German himself does not EXIST,
4244he is BECOMING, he is "developing himself". "Development" is therefore
4245the essentially German discovery and hit in the great domain of
4246philosophical formulas,— a ruling idea, which, together with German
4247beer and German music, is labouring to Germanise all Europe. Foreigners
4248are astonished and attracted by the riddles which the conflicting
4249nature at the basis of the German soul propounds to them (riddles which
4250Hegel systematised and Richard Wagner has in the end set to music).
4251"Good-natured and spiteful"—such a juxtaposition, preposterous in the
4252case of every other people, is unfortunately only too often justified in
4253Germany one has only to live for a while among Swabians to know this!
4254The clumsiness of the German scholar and his social distastefulness
4255agree alarmingly well with his physical rope-dancing and nimble boldness,
4256of which all the Gods have learnt to be afraid. If any one wishes to
4257see the "German soul" demonstrated ad oculos, let him only look at German
4258taste, at German arts and manners what boorish indifference to
4259"taste"! How the noblest and the commonest stand there in juxtaposition!
4260How disorderly and how rich is the whole constitution of this soul! The
4261118
4262German DRAGS at his soul, he drags at everything he experiences. He
4263digests his events badly; he never gets "done" with them; and German
4264depth is often only a difficult, hesitating "digestion." And just as all
4265chronic invalids, all dyspeptics like what is convenient, so the German
4266loves "frankness" and "honesty"; it is so CONVENIENT to be frank and
4267honest!—This confidingness, this complaisance, this showing-the-cards
4268of German HONESTY, is probably the most dangerous and most successful
4269disguise which the German is up to nowadays: it is his proper
4270Mephistophelean art; with this he can "still achieve much"! The German
4271lets himself go, and thereby gazes with faithful, blue, empty German
4272eyes—and other countries immediately confound him with his dressinggown!—
4273I meant to say that, let "German depth" be what it will—among
4274ourselves alone we perhaps take the liberty to laugh at it—we shall do
4275well to continue henceforth to honour its appearance and good name,
4276and not barter away too cheaply our old reputation as a people of depth
4277for Prussian "smartness," and Berlin wit and sand. It is wise for a people
4278to pose, and LET itself be regarded, as profound, clumsy, good-natured,
4279honest, and foolish: it might even be—profound to do so! Finally, we
4280should do honour to our name—we are not called the "TIUSCHE VOLK"
4281(deceptive people) for nothing… .
4282245. The "good old" time is past, it sang itself out in Mozart— how
4283happy are WE that his ROCOCO still speaks to us, that his "good company,"
4284his tender enthusiasm, his childish delight in the Chinese and its
4285flourishes, his courtesy of heart, his longing for the elegant, the amorous,
4286the tripping, the tearful, and his belief in the South, can still appeal to
4287SOMETHING LEFT in us! Ah, some time or other it will be over with
4288it!—but who can doubt that it will be over still sooner with the intelligence
4289and taste for Beethoven! For he was only the last echo of a break
4290and transition in style, and NOT, like Mozart, the last echo of a great
4291European taste which had existed for centuries. Beethoven is the intermediate
4292event between an old mellow soul that is constantly breaking
4293down, and a future over-young soul that is always COMING; there is
4294spread over his music the twilight of eternal loss and eternal extravagant
4295hope,—the same light in which Europe was bathed when it dreamed
4296with Rousseau, when it danced round the Tree of Liberty of the Revolution,
4297and finally almost fell down in adoration before Napoleon. But how
4298rapidly does THIS very sentiment now pale, how difficult nowadays is
4299even the APPREHENSION of this sentiment, how strangely does the language
4300of Rousseau, Schiller, Shelley, and Byron sound to our ear, in
4301119
4302whom COLLECTIVELY the same fate of Europe was able to SPEAK,
4303which knew how to SING in Beethoven!—Whatever German music
4304came afterwards, belongs to Romanticism, that is to say, to a movement
4305which, historically considered, was still shorter, more fleeting, and more
4306superficial than that great interlude, the transition of Europe from
4307Rousseau to Napoleon, and to the rise of democracy. Weber—but what
4308do WE care nowadays for "Freischutz" and "Oberon"! Or Marschner's
4309"Hans Heiling" and "Vampyre"! Or even Wagner's "Tannhauser"! That is
4310extinct, although not yet forgotten music. This whole music of Romanticism,
4311besides, was not noble enough, was not musical enough, to maintain
4312its position anywhere but in the theatre and before the masses; from
4313the beginning it was second-rate music, which was little thought of by
4314genuine musicians. It was different with Felix Mendelssohn, that halcyon
4315master, who, on account of his lighter, purer, happier soul, quickly acquired
4316admiration, and was equally quickly forgotten: as the beautiful
4317EPISODE of German music. But with regard to Robert Schumann, who
4318took things seriously, and has been taken seriously from the first—he
4319was the last that founded a school,—do we not now regard it as a satisfaction,
4320a relief, a deliverance, that this very Romanticism of Schumann's
4321has been surmounted? Schumann, fleeing into the "Saxon Switzerland"
4322of his soul, with a half Werther-like, half Jean-Paul-like nature (assuredly
4323not like Beethoven! assuredly not like Byron!)—his MANFRED music is
4324a mistake and a misunderstanding to the extent of injustice; Schumann,
4325with his taste, which was fundamentally a PETTY taste (that is to say, a
4326dangerous propensity—doubly dangerous among Germans—for quiet
4327lyricism and intoxication of the feelings), going constantly apart, timidly
4328withdrawing and retiring, a noble weakling who revelled in nothing but
4329anonymous joy and sorrow, from the beginning a sort of girl and NOLI
4330ME TANGERE—this Schumann was already merely a GERMAN event
4331in music, and no longer a European event, as Beethoven had been, as in a
4332still greater degree Mozart had been; with Schumann German music was
4333threatened with its greatest danger, that of LOSING THE VOICE FOR
4334THE SOUL OF EUROPE and sinking into a merely national affair.
4335246. What a torture are books written in German to a reader who has a
4336THIRD ear! How indignantly he stands beside the slowly turning
4337swamp of sounds without tune and rhythms without dance, which Germans
4338call a "book"! And even the German who READS books! How
4339lazily, how reluctantly, how badly he reads! How many Germans know,
4340and consider it obligatory to know, that there is ART in every good
4341120
4342sentence—art which must be divined, if the sentence is to be understood!
4343If there is a misunderstanding about its TEMPO, for instance, the sentence
4344itself is misunderstood! That one must not be doubtful about the
4345rhythm-determining syllables, that one should feel the breaking of the
4346too-rigid symmetry as intentional and as a charm, that one should lend a
4347fine and patient ear to every STACCATO and every RUBATO, that one
4348should divine the sense in the sequence of the vowels and diphthongs,
4349and how delicately and richly they can be tinted and retinted in the order
4350of their arrangement—who among book-reading Germans is complaisant
4351enough to recognize such duties and requirements, and to listen
4352to so much art and intention in language? After all, one just "has no ear
4353for it"; and so the most marked contrasts of style are not heard, and the
4354most delicate artistry is as it were SQUANDERED on the deaf.—These
4355were my thoughts when I noticed how clumsily and unintuitively two
4356masters in the art of prose- writing have been confounded: one, whose
4357words drop down hesitatingly and coldly, as from the roof of a damp
4358cave—he counts on their dull sound and echo; and another who manipulates
4359his language like a flexible sword, and from his arm down into his
4360toes feels the dangerous bliss of the quivering, over-sharp blade, which
4361wishes to bite, hiss, and cut.
4362247. How little the German style has to do with harmony and with the
4363ear, is shown by the fact that precisely our good musicians themselves
4364write badly. The German does not read aloud, he does not read for the
4365ear, but only with his eyes; he has put his ears away in the drawer for the
4366time. In antiquity when a man read— which was seldom enough—he
4367read something to himself, and in a loud voice; they were surprised
4368when any one read silently, and sought secretly the reason of it. In a loud
4369voice: that is to say, with all the swellings, inflections, and variations of
4370key and changes of TEMPO, in which the ancient PUBLIC world took
4371delight. The laws of the written style were then the same as those of the
4372spoken style; and these laws depended partly on the surprising development
4373and refined requirements of the ear and larynx; partly on the
4374strength, endurance, and power of the ancient lungs. In the ancient
4375sense, a period is above all a physiological whole, inasmuch as it is comprised
4376in one breath. Such periods as occur in Demosthenes and Cicero,
4377swelling twice and sinking twice, and all in one breath, were pleasures to
4378the men of ANTIQUITY, who knew by their own schooling how to appreciate
4379the virtue therein, the rareness and the difficulty in the deliverance
4380of such a period;—WE have really no right to the BIG period, we
4381121
4382modern men, who are short of breath in every sense! Those ancients, indeed,
4383were all of them dilettanti in speaking, consequently connoisseurs,
4384consequently critics—they thus brought their orators to the highest pitch;
4385in the same manner as in the last century, when all Italian ladies and
4386gentlemen knew how to sing, the virtuosoship of song (and with it also
4387the art of melody) reached its elevation. In Germany, however (until
4388quite recently when a kind of platform eloquence began shyly and awkwardly
4389enough to flutter its young wings), there was properly speaking
4390only one kind of public and APPROXIMATELY artistical discourse—that
4391delivered from the pulpit. The preacher was the only one in Germany
4392who knew the weight of a syllable or a word, in what manner a sentence
4393strikes, springs, rushes, flows, and comes to a close; he alone had a conscience
4394in his ears, often enough a bad conscience: for reasons are not
4395lacking why proficiency in oratory should be especially seldom attained
4396by a German, or almost always too late. The masterpiece of German
4397prose is therefore with good reason the masterpiece of its greatest
4398preacher: the BIBLE has hitherto been the best German book. Compared
4399with Luther's Bible, almost everything else is merely
4400"literature"—something which has not grown in Germany, and therefore
4401has not taken and does not take root in German hearts, as the Bible has
4402done.
4403248. There are two kinds of geniuses: one which above all engenders
4404and seeks to engender, and another which willingly lets itself be fructified
4405and brings forth. And similarly, among the gifted nations, there are
4406those on whom the woman's problem of pregnancy has devolved, and
4407the secret task of forming, maturing, and perfecting—the Greeks, for instance,
4408were a nation of this kind, and so are the French; and others
4409which have to fructify and become the cause of new modes of life—like
4410the Jews, the Romans, and, in all modesty be it asked: like the Germans?—
4411nations tortured and enraptured by unknown fevers and irresistibly
4412forced out of themselves, amorous and longing for foreign races
4413(for such as "let themselves be fructified"), and withal imperious, like
4414everything conscious of being full of generative force, and consequently
4415empowered "by the grace of God." These two kinds of geniuses seek each
4416other like man and woman; but they also misunderstand each other—
4417like man and woman.
4418249. Every nation has its own "Tartuffery," and calls that its virtue.—
4419One does not know—cannot know, the best that is in one.
4420122
4421250. What Europe owes to the Jews?—Many things, good and bad, and
4422above all one thing of the nature both of the best and the worst: the
4423grand style in morality, the fearfulness and majesty of infinite demands,
4424of infinite significations, the whole Romanticism and sublimity of moral
4425questionableness—and consequently just the most attractive, ensnaring,
4426and exquisite element in those iridescences and allurements to life, in the
4427aftersheen of which the sky of our European culture, its evening sky,
4428now glows—perhaps glows out. For this, we artists among the spectators
4429and philosophers, are—grateful to the Jews.
4430251. It must be taken into the bargain, if various clouds and disturbances—
4431in short, slight attacks of stupidity—pass over the spirit of a
4432people that suffers and WANTS to suffer from national nervous fever
4433and political ambition: for instance, among present-day Germans there is
4434alternately the anti-French folly, the anti-Semitic folly, the anti-Polish
4435folly, the Christian-romantic folly, the Wagnerian folly, the Teutonic
4436folly, the Prussian folly (just look at those poor historians, the Sybels and
4437Treitschkes, and their closely bandaged heads), and whatever else these
4438little obscurations of the German spirit and conscience may be called.
4439May it be forgiven me that I, too, when on a short daring sojourn on very
4440infected ground, did not remain wholly exempt from the disease, but
4441like every one else, began to entertain thoughts about matters which did
4442not concern me—the first symptom of political infection. About the Jews,
4443for instance, listen to the following:—I have never yet met a German
4444who was favourably inclined to the Jews; and however decided the repudiation
4445of actual anti-Semitism may be on the part of all prudent and
4446political men, this prudence and policy is not perhaps directed against
4447the nature of the sentiment itself, but only against its dangerous excess,
4448and especially against the distasteful and infamous expression of this excess
4449of sentiment; —on this point we must not deceive ourselves. That
4450Germany has amply SUFFICIENT Jews, that the German stomach, the
4451German blood, has difficulty (and will long have difficulty) in disposing
4452only of this quantity of "Jew"—as the Italian, the Frenchman, and the
4453Englishman have done by means of a stronger digestion:—that is the unmistakable
4454declaration and language of a general instinct, to which one
4455must listen and according to which one must act. "Let no more Jews
4456come in! And shut the doors, especially towards the East (also towards
4457Austria)!"—thus commands the instinct of a people whose nature is still
4458feeble and uncertain, so that it could be easily wiped out, easily
4459123
4460extinguished, by a stronger race. The Jews, however, are beyond all
4461doubt the strongest, toughest, and purest race at present living in
4462Europe, they know how to succeed even under the worst conditions (in
4463fact better than under favourable ones), by means of virtues of some sort,
4464which one would like nowadays to label as vices—owing above all to a
4465resolute faith which does not need to be ashamed before "modern ideas",
4466they alter only, WHEN they do alter, in the same way that the Russian
4467Empire makes its conquest—as an empire that has plenty of time and is
4468not of yesterday—namely, according to the principle, "as slowly as possible"!
4469A thinker who has the future of Europe at heart, will, in all his
4470perspectives concerning the future, calculate upon the Jews, as he will
4471calculate upon the Russians, as above all the surest and likeliest factors
4472in the great play and battle of forces. That which is at present called a
4473"nation" in Europe, and is really rather a RES FACTA than NATA
4474(indeed, sometimes confusingly similar to a RES FICTA ET PICTA), is in
4475every case something evolving, young, easily displaced, and not yet a
4476race, much less such a race AERE PERENNUS, as the Jews are such
4477"nations" should most carefully avoid all hotheaded rivalry and hostility!
4478It is certain that the Jews, if they desired—or if they were driven to it, as
4479the anti-Semites seem to wish—COULD now have the ascendancy, nay,
4480literally the supremacy, over Europe, that they are NOT working and
4481planning for that end is equally certain. Meanwhile, they rather wish and
4482desire, even somewhat importunely, to be insorbed and absorbed by
4483Europe, they long to be finally settled, authorized, and respected somewhere,
4484and wish to put an end to the nomadic life, to the "wandering
4485Jew",—and one should certainly take account of this impulse and tendency,
4486and MAKE ADVANCES to it (it possibly betokens a mitigation of
4487the Jewish instincts) for which purpose it would perhaps be useful and
4488fair to banish the anti-Semitic bawlers out of the country. One should
4489make advances with all prudence, and with selection, pretty much as the
4490English nobility do It stands to reason that the more powerful and
4491strongly marked types of new Germanism could enter into relation with
4492the Jews with the least hesitation, for instance, the nobleman officer from
4493the Prussian border it would be interesting in many ways to see whether
4494the genius for money and patience (and especially some intellect and intellectuality—
4495sadly lacking in the place referred to) could not in addition
4496be annexed and trained to the hereditary art of commanding and obeying—
4497for both of which the country in question has now a classic reputation
4498But here it is expedient to break off my festal discourse and my
4499sprightly Teutonomania for I have already reached my SERIOUS TOPIC,
4500124
4501the "European problem," as I understand it, the rearing of a new ruling
4502caste for Europe.
4503252. They are not a philosophical race—the English: Bacon represents
4504an ATTACK on the philosophical spirit generally, Hobbes, Hume, and
4505Locke, an abasement, and a depreciation of the idea of a "philosopher"
4506for more than a century. It was AGAINST Hume that Kant uprose and
4507raised himself; it was Locke of whom Schelling RIGHTLY said, "JE
4508MEPRISE LOCKE"; in the struggle against the English mechanical stultification
4509of the world, Hegel and Schopenhauer (along with Goethe) were
4510of one accord; the two hostile brother-geniuses in philosophy, who
4511pushed in different directions towards the opposite poles of German
4512thought, and thereby wronged each other as only brothers will
4513do.—What is lacking in England, and has always been lacking, that halfactor
4514and rhetorician knew well enough, the absurd muddle-head,
4515Carlyle, who sought to conceal under passionate grimaces what he knew
4516about himself: namely, what was LACKING in Carlyle—real POWER of
4517intellect, real DEPTH of intellectual perception, in short, philosophy. It is
4518characteristic of such an unphilosophical race to hold on firmly to Christianity—
4519they NEED its discipline for "moralizing" and humanizing. The
4520Englishman, more gloomy, sensual, headstrong, and brutal than the German—
4521is for that very reason, as the baser of the two, also the most pious:
4522he has all the MORE NEED of Christianity. To finer nostrils, this English
4523Christianity itself has still a characteristic English taint of spleen and alcoholic
4524excess, for which, owing to good reasons, it is used as an antidote—
4525the finer poison to neutralize the coarser: a finer form of poisoning
4526is in fact a step in advance with coarse-mannered people, a step towards
4527spiritualization. The English coarseness and rustic demureness is still
4528most satisfactorily disguised by Christian pantomime, and by praying
4529and psalm-singing (or, more correctly, it is thereby explained and differently
4530expressed); and for the herd of drunkards and rakes who formerly
4531learned moral grunting under the influence of Methodism (and more recently
4532as the "Salvation Army"), a penitential fit may really be the relatively
4533highest manifestation of "humanity" to which they can be elevated:
4534so much may reasonably be admitted. That, however, which offends
4535even in the humanest Englishman is his lack of music, to speak figuratively
4536(and also literally): he has neither rhythm nor dance in the movements
4537of his soul and body; indeed, not even the desire for rhythm and
4538dance, for "music." Listen to him speaking; look at the most beautiful
4539Englishwoman WALKING—in no country on earth are there more
4540125
4541beautiful doves and swans; finally, listen to them singing! But I ask too
4542much …
4543253. There are truths which are best recognized by mediocre minds,
4544because they are best adapted for them, there are truths which only possess
4545charms and seductive power for mediocre spirits:—one is pushed to
4546this probably unpleasant conclusion, now that the influence of respectable
4547but mediocre Englishmen—I may mention Darwin, John Stuart Mill,
4548and Herbert Spencer—begins to gain the ascendancy in the middle-class
4549region of European taste. Indeed, who could doubt that it is a useful
4550thing for SUCH minds to have the ascendancy for a time? It would be an
4551error to consider the highly developed and independently soaring minds
4552as specially qualified for determining and collecting many little common
4553facts, and deducing conclusions from them; as exceptions, they are rather
4554from the first in no very favourable position towards those who are "the
4555rules." After all, they have more to do than merely to perceive:—in effect,
4556they have to BE something new, they have to SIGNIFY something new,
4557they have to REPRESENT new values! The gulf between knowledge and
4558capacity is perhaps greater, and also more mysterious, than one thinks:
4559the capable man in the grand style, the creator, will possibly have to be
4560an ignorant person;—while on the other hand, for scientific discoveries
4561like those of Darwin, a certain narrowness, aridity, and industrious carefulness
4562(in short, something English) may not be unfavourable for arriving
4563at them.—Finally, let it not be forgotten that the English, with their
4564profound mediocrity, brought about once before a general depression of
4565European intelligence.
4566What is called "modern ideas," or "the ideas of the eighteenth century,"
4567or "French ideas"—that, consequently, against which the GERMAN mind
4568rose up with profound disgust—is of English origin, there is no doubt
4569about it. The French were only the apes and actors of these ideas, their
4570best soldiers, and likewise, alas! their first and profoundest VICTIMS; for
4571owing to the diabolical Anglomania of "modern ideas," the AME
4572FRANCAIS has in the end become so thin and emaciated, that at present
4573one recalls its sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, its profound, passionate
4574strength, its inventive excellency, almost with disbelief. One must,
4575however, maintain this verdict of historical justice in a determined manner,
4576and defend it against present prejudices and appearances: the
4577European NOBLESSE—of sentiment, taste, and manners, taking the
4578word in every high sense—is the work and invention of FRANCE; the
4579126
4580European ignobleness, the plebeianism of modern ideas—is
4581ENGLAND'S work and invention.
4582254. Even at present France is still the seat of the most intellectual and
4583refined culture of Europe, it is still the high school of taste; but one must
4584know how to find this "France of taste." He who belongs to it keeps himself
4585well concealed:—they may be a small number in whom it lives and is
4586embodied, besides perhaps being men who do not stand upon the
4587strongest legs, in part fatalists, hypochondriacs, invalids, in part persons
4588over- indulged, over-refined, such as have the AMBITION to conceal
4589themselves.
4590They have all something in common: they keep their ears closed in
4591presence of the delirious folly and noisy spouting of the democratic
4592BOURGEOIS. In fact, a besotted and brutalized France at present
4593sprawls in the foreground—it recently celebrated a veritable orgy of bad
4594taste, and at the same time of self- admiration, at the funeral of Victor
4595Hugo. There is also something else common to them: a predilection to
4596resist intellectual Germanizing—and a still greater inability to do so! In
4597this France of intellect, which is also a France of pessimism, Schopenhauer
4598has perhaps become more at home, and more indigenous than he
4599has ever been in Germany; not to speak of Heinrich Heine, who has long
4600ago been re-incarnated in the more refined and fastidious lyrists of Paris;
4601or of Hegel, who at present, in the form of Taine—the FIRST of living
4602historians—exercises an almost tyrannical influence. As regards Richard
4603Wagner, however, the more French music learns to adapt itself to the actual
4604needs of the AME MODERNE, the more will it "Wagnerite"; one can
4605safely predict that beforehand,—it is already taking place sufficiently!
4606There are, however, three things which the French can still boast of with
4607pride as their heritage and possession, and as indelible tokens of their
4608ancient intellectual superiority in Europe, in spite of all voluntary or involuntary
4609Germanizing and vulgarizing of taste. FIRSTLY, the capacity
4610for artistic emotion, for devotion to "form," for which the expression,
4611L'ART POUR L'ART, along with numerous others, has been invented:—
4612such capacity has not been lacking in France for three centuries;
4613and owing to its reverence for the "small number," it has again and again
4614made a sort of chamber music of literature possible, which is sought for
4615in vain elsewhere in Europe.—The SECOND thing whereby the French
4616can lay claim to a superiority over Europe is their ancient, many-sided,
4617MORALISTIC culture, owing to which one finds on an average, even in
4618127
4619the petty ROMANCIERS of the newspapers and chance
4620BOULEVARDIERS DE PARIS, a psychological sensitiveness and curiosity,
4621of which, for example, one has no conception (to say nothing of the
4622thing itself!) in Germany. The Germans lack a couple of centuries of the
4623moralistic work requisite thereto, which, as we have said, France has not
4624grudged: those who call the Germans "naive" on that account give them
4625commendation for a defect. (As the opposite of the German inexperience
4626and innocence IN VOLUPTATE PSYCHOLOGICA, which is not too remotely
4627associated with the tediousness of German intercourse,—and as
4628the most successful expression of genuine French curiosity and inventive
4629talent in this domain of delicate thrills, Henri Beyle may be noted; that
4630remarkable anticipatory and forerunning man, who, with a Napoleonic
4631TEMPO, traversed HIS Europe, in fact, several centuries of the European
4632soul, as a surveyor and discoverer thereof:—it has required two generations
4633to OVERTAKE him one way or other, to divine long afterwards
4634some of the riddles that perplexed and enraptured him—this strange
4635Epicurean and man of interrogation, the last great psychologist of
4636France).—There is yet a THIRD claim to superiority: in the French character
4637there is a successful half-way synthesis of the North and South,
4638which makes them comprehend many things, and enjoins upon them
4639other things, which an Englishman can never comprehend. Their temperament,
4640turned alternately to and from the South, in which from time
4641to time the Provencal and Ligurian blood froths over, preserves them
4642from the dreadful, northern grey-in-grey, from sunless conceptual-spectrism
4643and from poverty of blood—our GERMAN infirmity of taste, for
4644the excessive prevalence of which at the present moment, blood and
4645iron, that is to say "high politics," has with great resolution been prescribed
4646(according to a dangerous healing art, which bids me wait and
4647wait, but not yet hope).—There is also still in France a pre-understanding
4648and ready welcome for those rarer and rarely gratified men, who are too
4649comprehensive to find satisfaction in any kind of fatherlandism, and
4650know how to love the South when in the North and the North when in
4651the South—the born Midlanders, the "good Europeans." For them BIZET
4652has made music, this latest genius, who has seen a new beauty and seduction,—
4653who has discovered a piece of the SOUTH IN MUSIC.
4654255. I hold that many precautions should be taken against German
4655music. Suppose a person loves the South as I love it—as a great school of
4656recovery for the most spiritual and the most sensuous ills, as a boundless
4657solar profusion and effulgence which o'erspreads a sovereign existence
4658128
4659believing in itself—well, such a person will learn to be somewhat on his
4660guard against German music, because, in injuring his taste anew, it will
4661also injure his health anew. Such a Southerner, a Southerner not by origin
4662but by BELIEF, if he should dream of the future of music, must also
4663dream of it being freed from the influence of the North; and must have in
4664his ears the prelude to a deeper, mightier, and perhaps more perverse
4665and mysterious music, a super-German music, which does not fade, pale,
4666and die away, as all German music does, at the sight of the blue, wanton
4667sea and the Mediterranean clearness of sky—a super-European music,
4668which holds its own even in presence of the brown sunsets of the desert,
4669whose soul is akin to the palm-tree, and can be at home and can roam
4670with big, beautiful, lonely beasts of prey… I could imagine a music of
4671which the rarest charm would be that it knew nothing more of good and
4672evil; only that here and there perhaps some sailor's home-sickness, some
4673golden shadows and tender weaknesses might sweep lightly over it; an
4674art which, from the far distance, would see the colours of a sinking and
4675almost incomprehensible MORAL world fleeing towards it, and would
4676be hospitable enough and profound enough to receive such belated
4677fugitives.
4678256. Owing to the morbid estrangement which the nationality-craze
4679has induced and still induces among the nations of Europe, owing also to
4680the short-sighted and hasty-handed politicians, who with the help of this
4681craze, are at present in power, and do not suspect to what extent the disintegrating
4682policy they pursue must necessarily be only an interlude
4683policy—owing to all this and much else that is altogether unmentionable
4684at present, the most unmistakable signs that EUROPE WISHES TO BE
4685ONE, are now overlooked, or arbitrarily and falsely misinterpreted. With
4686all the more profound and large-minded men of this century, the real
4687general tendency of the mysterious labour of their souls was to prepare
4688the way for that new SYNTHESIS, and tentatively to anticipate the
4689European of the future; only in their simulations, or in their weaker moments,
4690in old age perhaps, did they belong to the "fatherlands"—they
4691only rested from themselves when they became "patriots." I think of such
4692men as Napoleon, Goethe, Beethoven, Stendhal, Heinrich Heine,
4693Schopenhauer: it must not be taken amiss if I also count Richard Wagner
4694among them, about whom one must not let oneself be deceived by his
4695own misunderstandings (geniuses like him have seldom the right to understand
4696themselves), still less, of course, by the unseemly noise with
4697which he is now resisted and opposed in France: the fact remains,
4698129
4699nevertheless, that Richard Wagner and the LATER FRENCH
4700ROMANTICISM of the forties, are most closely and intimately related to
4701one another. They are akin, fundamentally akin, in all the heights and
4702depths of their requirements; it is Europe, the ONE Europe, whose soul
4703presses urgently and longingly, outwards and upwards, in their multifarious
4704and boisterous art—whither? into a new light? towards a new
4705sun? But who would attempt to express accurately what all these masters
4706of new modes of speech could not express distinctly? It is certain
4707that the same storm and stress tormented them, that they SOUGHT in
4708the same manner, these last great seekers! All of them steeped in literature
4709to their eyes and ears—the first artists of universal literary culture—
4710for the most part even themselves writers, poets, intermediaries
4711and blenders of the arts and the senses (Wagner, as musician is reckoned
4712among painters, as poet among musicians, as artist generally among actors);
4713all of them fanatics for EXPRESSION "at any cost"—I specially mention
4714Delacroix, the nearest related to Wagner; all of them great discoverers
4715in the realm of the sublime, also of the loathsome and dreadful, still
4716greater discoverers in effect, in display, in the art of the show-shop; all of
4717them talented far beyond their genius, out and out VIRTUOSI, with mysterious
4718accesses to all that seduces, allures, constrains, and upsets; born
4719enemies of logic and of the straight line, hankering after the strange, the
4720exotic, the monstrous, the crooked, and the self-contradictory; as men,
4721Tantaluses of the will, plebeian parvenus, who knew themselves to be incapable
4722of a noble TEMPO or of a LENTO in life and action— think of
4723Balzac, for instance,—unrestrained workers, almost destroying themselves
4724by work; antinomians and rebels in manners, ambitious and insatiable,
4725without equilibrium and enjoyment; all of them finally shattering
4726and sinking down at the Christian cross (and with right and reason, for
4727who of them would have been sufficiently profound and sufficiently original
4728for an ANTI- CHRISTIAN philosophy?);—on the whole, a boldly
4729daring, splendidly overbearing, high-flying, and aloft-up-dragging class
4730of higher men, who had first to teach their century-and it is the century
4731of the MASSES—the conception "higher man." … Let the German friends
4732of Richard Wagner advise together as to whether there is anything
4733purely German in the Wagnerian art, or whether its distinction does not
4734consist precisely in coming from SUPER- GERMAN sources and impulses:
4735in which connection it may not be underrated how indispensable
4736Paris was to the development of his type, which the strength of his instincts
4737made him long to visit at the most decisive time—and how the
4738whole style of his proceedings, of his self-apostolate, could only perfect
4739130
4740itself in sight of the French socialistic original. On a more subtle comparison
4741it will perhaps be found, to the honour of Richard Wagner's German
4742nature, that he has acted in everything with more strength, daring, severity,
4743and elevation than a nineteenth- century Frenchman could have
4744done—owing to the circumstance that we Germans are as yet nearer to
4745barbarism than the French;— perhaps even the most remarkable creation
4746of Richard Wagner is not only at present, but for ever inaccessible, incomprehensible,
4747and inimitable to the whole latter-day Latin race: the
4748figure of Siegfried, that VERY FREE man, who is probably far too free,
4749too hard, too cheerful, too healthy, too ANTI-CATHOLIC for the taste of
4750old and mellow civilized nations. He may even have been a sin against
4751Romanticism, this anti-Latin Siegfried: well, Wagner atoned amply for
4752this sin in his old sad days, when—anticipating a taste which has meanwhile
4753passed into politics—he began, with the religious vehemence peculiar
4754to him, to preach, at least, THE WAY TO ROME, if not to walk
4755therein.—That these last words may not be misunderstood, I will call to
4756my aid a few powerful rhymes, which will even betray to less delicate
4757ears what I mean —what I mean COUNTER TO the "last Wagner" and
4758his Parsifal music:—
4759—Is this our mode?—From German heart came this vexed ululating?
4760From German body, this self-lacerating? Is ours this priestly hand-dilation,
4761This incense-fuming exaltation? Is ours this faltering, falling, shambling,
4762This quite uncertain ding-dong- dangling? This sly nun-ogling,
4763Ave-hour-bell ringing, This wholly false enraptured heaveno'erspringing?—
4764Is this our mode?—Think well!—ye still wait for admission—
4765For what ye hear is ROME— ROME'S FAITH BY INTUITION!
4766131
4767Chapter 9
4768What is Noble?
4769257. EVERY elevation of the type "man," has hitherto been the work of an
4770aristocratic society and so it will always be—a society believing in a long
4771scale of gradations of rank and differences of worth among human beings,
4772and requiring slavery in some form or other. Without the PATHOS
4773OF DISTANCE, such as grows out of the incarnated difference of classes,
4774out of the constant out-looking and down-looking of the ruling caste on
4775subordinates and instruments, and out of their equally constant practice
4776of obeying and commanding, of keeping down and keeping at a distance—
4777that other more mysterious pathos could never have arisen, the
4778longing for an ever new widening of distance within the soul itself, the
4779formation of ever higher, rarer, further, more extended, more comprehensive
4780states, in short, just the elevation of the type "man," the
4781continued "self-surmounting of man," to use a moral formula in a supermoral
4782sense. To be sure, one must not resign oneself to any humanitarian
4783illusions about the history of the origin of an aristocratic society (that is
4784to say, of the preliminary condition for the elevation of the type "man"):
4785the truth is hard. Let us acknowledge unprejudicedly how every higher
4786civilization hitherto has ORIGINATED! Men with a still natural nature,
4787barbarians in every terrible sense of the word, men of prey, still in possession
4788of unbroken strength of will and desire for power, threw themselves
4789upon weaker, more moral, more peaceful races (perhaps trading
4790or cattle-rearing communities), or upon old mellow civilizations in
4791which the final vital force was flickering out in brilliant fireworks of wit
4792and depravity. At the commencement, the noble caste was always the
4793barbarian caste: their superiority did not consist first of all in their physical,
4794but in their psychical power—they were more COMPLETE men
4795(which at every point also implies the same as "more complete beasts").
4796258. Corruption—as the indication that anarchy threatens to break out
4797among the instincts, and that the foundation of the emotions, called
4798132
4799"life," is convulsed—is something radically different according to the organization
4800in which it manifests itself. When, for instance, an aristocracy
4801like that of France at the beginning of the Revolution, flung away its
4802privileges with sublime disgust and sacrificed itself to an excess of its
4803moral sentiments, it was corruption:—it was really only the closing act of
4804the corruption which had existed for centuries, by virtue of which that
4805aristocracy had abdicated step by step its lordly prerogatives and
4806lowered itself to a FUNCTION of royalty (in the end even to its decoration
4807and parade-dress). The essential thing, however, in a good and
4808healthy aristocracy is that it should not regard itself as a function either
4809of the kingship or the commonwealth, but as the SIGNIFICANCE and
4810highest justification thereof—that it should therefore accept with a good
4811conscience the sacrifice of a legion of individuals, who, FOR ITS SAKE,
4812must be suppressed and reduced to imperfect men, to slaves and instruments.
4813Its fundamental belief must be precisely that society is NOT allowed
4814to exist for its own sake, but only as a foundation and scaffolding,
4815by means of which a select class of beings may be able to elevate themselves
4816to their higher duties, and in general to a higher EXISTENCE: like
4817those sun- seeking climbing plants in Java—they are called Sipo Matador,—
4818which encircle an oak so long and so often with their arms, until
4819at last, high above it, but supported by it, they can unfold their tops in
4820the open light, and exhibit their happiness.
4821259. To refrain mutually from injury, from violence, from exploitation,
4822and put one's will on a par with that of others: this may result in a certain
4823rough sense in good conduct among individuals when the necessary
4824conditions are given (namely, the actual similarity of the individuals in
4825amount of force and degree of worth, and their co-relation within one organization).
4826As soon, however, as one wished to take this principle more
4827generally, and if possible even as the FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLE OF
4828SOCIETY, it would immediately disclose what it really is—namely, a
4829Will to the DENIAL of life, a principle of dissolution and decay. Here
4830one must think profoundly to the very basis and resist all sentimental
4831weakness: life itself is ESSENTIALLY appropriation, injury, conquest of
4832the strange and weak, suppression, severity, obtrusion of peculiar forms,
4833incorporation, and at the least, putting it mildest, exploitation;—but why
4834should one for ever use precisely these words on which for ages a disparaging
4835purpose has been stamped? Even the organization within
4836which, as was previously supposed, the individuals treat each other as
4837equal—it takes place in every healthy aristocracy—must itself, if it be a
4838133
4839living and not a dying organization, do all that towards other bodies,
4840which the individuals within it refrain from doing to each other it will
4841have to be the incarnated Will to Power, it will endeavour to grow, to
4842gain ground, attract to itself and acquire ascendancy— not owing to any
4843morality or immorality, but because it LIVES, and because life IS precisely
4844Will to Power. On no point, however, is the ordinary consciousness
4845of Europeans more unwilling to be corrected than on this matter,
4846people now rave everywhere, even under the guise of science, about
4847coming conditions of society in which "the exploiting character" is to be
4848absent—that sounds to my ears as if they promised to invent a mode of
4849life which should refrain from all organic functions. "Exploitation" does
4850not belong to a depraved, or imperfect and primitive society it belongs to
4851the nature of the living being as a primary organic function, it is a consequence
4852of the intrinsic Will to Power, which is precisely the Will to
4853Life—Granting that as a theory this is a novelty—as a reality it is the
4854FUNDAMENTAL FACT of all history let us be so far honest towards
4855ourselves!
4856260. In a tour through the many finer and coarser moralities which
4857have hitherto prevailed or still prevail on the earth, I found certain traits
4858recurring regularly together, and connected with one another, until finally
4859two primary types revealed themselves to me, and a radical distinction
4860was brought to light. There is MASTER-MORALITY and
4861SLAVE-MORALITY,—I would at once add, however, that in all higher
4862and mixed civilizations, there are also attempts at the reconciliation of
4863the two moralities, but one finds still oftener the confusion and mutual
4864misunderstanding of them, indeed sometimes their close juxtaposition—
4865even in the same man, within one soul. The distinctions of moral
4866values have either originated in a ruling caste, pleasantly conscious of
4867being different from the ruled—or among the ruled class, the slaves and
4868dependents of all sorts. In the first case, when it is the rulers who determine
4869the conception "good," it is the exalted, proud disposition which
4870is regarded as the distinguishing feature, and that which determines the
4871order of rank. The noble type of man separates from himself the beings
4872in whom the opposite of this exalted, proud disposition displays itself he
4873despises them. Let it at once be noted that in this first kind of morality
4874the antithesis "good" and "bad" means practically the same as "noble"
4875and "despicable",—the antithesis "good" and "EVIL" is of a different origin.
4876The cowardly, the timid, the insignificant, and those thinking merely
4877of narrow utility are despised; moreover, also, the distrustful, with their
4878134
4879constrained glances, the self- abasing, the dog-like kind of men who let
4880themselves be abused, the mendicant flatterers, and above all the liars:—
4881it is a fundamental belief of all aristocrats that the common people
4882are untruthful. "We truthful ones"—the nobility in ancient Greece called
4883themselves. It is obvious that everywhere the designations of moral
4884value were at first applied to MEN; and were only derivatively and at a
4885later period applied to ACTIONS; it is a gross mistake, therefore, when
4886historians of morals start with questions like, "Why have sympathetic actions
4887been praised?" The noble type of man regards HIMSELF as a determiner
4888of values; he does not require to be approved of; he passes the
4889judgment: "What is injurious to me is injurious in itself;" he knows that it
4890is he himself only who confers honour on things; he is a CREATOR OF
4891VALUES. He honours whatever he recognizes in himself: such morality
4892equals self-glorification. In the foreground there is the feeling of plenitude,
4893of power, which seeks to overflow, the happiness of high tension,
4894the consciousness of a wealth which would fain give and bestow:—the
4895noble man also helps the unfortunate, but not—or scarcely—out of pity,
4896but rather from an impulse generated by the super-abundance of power.
4897The noble man honours in himself the powerful one, him also who has
4898power over himself, who knows how to speak and how to keep silence,
4899who takes pleasure in subjecting himself to severity and hardness, and
4900has reverence for all that is severe and hard. "Wotan placed a hard heart
4901in my breast," says an old Scandinavian Saga: it is thus rightly expressed
4902from the soul of a proud Viking. Such a type of man is even proud of not
4903being made for sympathy; the hero of the Saga therefore adds warningly:
4904"He who has not a hard heart when young, will never have one." The
4905noble and brave who think thus are the furthest removed from the morality
4906which sees precisely in sympathy, or in acting for the good of others,
4907or in DESINTERESSEMENT, the characteristic of the moral; faith in
4908oneself, pride in oneself, a radical enmity and irony towards
4909"selflessness," belong as definitely to noble morality, as do a careless
4910scorn and precaution in presence of sympathy and the "warm heart."—It
4911is the powerful who KNOW how to honour, it is their art, their domain
4912for invention. The profound reverence for age and for tradition—all law
4913rests on this double reverence,— the belief and prejudice in favour of ancestors
4914and unfavourable to newcomers, is typical in the morality of the
4915powerful; and if, reversely, men of "modern ideas" believe almost instinctively
4916in "progress" and the "future," and are more and more lacking
4917in respect for old age, the ignoble origin of these "ideas" has complacently
4918betrayed itself thereby. A morality of the ruling class, however, is
4919135
4920more especially foreign and irritating to present-day taste in the sternness
4921of its principle that one has duties only to one's equals; that one may
4922act towards beings of a lower rank, towards all that is foreign, just as
4923seems good to one, or "as the heart desires," and in any case "beyond
4924good and evil": it is here that sympathy and similar sentiments can have
4925a place. The ability and obligation to exercise prolonged gratitude and
4926prolonged revenge—both only within the circle of equals,— artfulness in
4927retaliation, RAFFINEMENT of the idea in friendship, a certain necessity
4928to have enemies (as outlets for the emotions of envy, quarrelsomeness,
4929arrogance—in fact, in order to be a good FRIEND): all these are typical
4930characteristics of the noble morality, which, as has been pointed out, is
4931not the morality of "modern ideas," and is therefore at present difficult to
4932realize, and also to unearth and disclose.—It is otherwise with the
4933second type of morality, SLAVE-MORALITY. Supposing that the abused,
4934the oppressed, the suffering, the unemancipated, the weary, and
4935those uncertain of themselves should moralize, what will be the common
4936element in their moral estimates? Probably a pessimistic suspicion with
4937regard to the entire situation of man will find expression, perhaps a condemnation
4938of man, together with his situation. The slave has an unfavourable
4939eye for the virtues of the powerful; he has a skepticism and distrust,
4940a REFINEMENT of distrust of everything "good" that is there honoured—
4941he would fain persuade himself that the very happiness there is
4942not genuine. On the other hand, THOSE qualities which serve to alleviate
4943the existence of sufferers are brought into prominence and flooded
4944with light; it is here that sympathy, the kind, helping hand, the warm
4945heart, patience, diligence, humility, and friendliness attain to honour; for
4946here these are the most useful qualities, and almost the only means of
4947supporting the burden of existence. Slave-morality is essentially the morality
4948of utility. Here is the seat of the origin of the famous antithesis
4949"good" and "evil":—power and dangerousness are assumed to reside in
4950the evil, a certain dreadfulness, subtlety, and strength, which do not admit
4951of being despised. According to slave-morality, therefore, the "evil"
4952man arouses fear; according to master-morality, it is precisely the "good"
4953man who arouses fear and seeks to arouse it, while the bad man is regarded
4954as the despicable being. The contrast attains its maximum when,
4955in accordance with the logical consequences of slave-morality, a shade of
4956depreciation—it may be slight and well-intentioned—at last attaches itself
4957to the "good" man of this morality; because, according to the servile
4958mode of thought, the good man must in any case be the SAFE man: he is
4959good-natured, easily deceived, perhaps a little stupid, un bonhomme.
4960136
4961Everywhere that slave- morality gains the ascendancy, language shows a
4962tendency to approximate the significations of the words "good" and
4963"stupid."- -A last fundamental difference: the desire for FREEDOM, the
4964instinct for happiness and the refinements of the feeling of liberty belong
4965as necessarily to slave-morals and morality, as artifice and enthusiasm in
4966reverence and devotion are the regular symptoms of an aristocratic
4967mode of thinking and estimating.— Hence we can understand without
4968further detail why love AS A PASSION—it is our European specialty—
4969must absolutely be of noble origin; as is well known, its invention
4970is due to the Provencal poet-cavaliers, those brilliant, ingenious men
4971of the "gai saber," to whom Europe owes so much, and almost owes
4972itself.
4973261. Vanity is one of the things which are perhaps most difficult for a
4974noble man to understand: he will be tempted to deny it, where another
4975kind of man thinks he sees it self-evidently. The problem for him is to
4976represent to his mind beings who seek to arouse a good opinion of themselves
4977which they themselves do not possess—and consequently also do
4978not "deserve,"—and who yet BELIEVE in this good opinion afterwards.
4979This seems to him on the one hand such bad taste and so self-disrespectful,
4980and on the other hand so grotesquely unreasonable, that he would
4981like to consider vanity an exception, and is doubtful about it in most
4982cases when it is spoken of. He will say, for instance: "I may be mistaken
4983about my value, and on the other hand may nevertheless demand that
4984my value should be acknowledged by others precisely as I rate it:—that,
4985however, is not vanity (but self-conceit, or, in most cases, that which is
4986called 'humility,' and also 'modesty')." Or he will even say: "For many
4987reasons I can delight in the good opinion of others, perhaps because I
4988love and honour them, and rejoice in all their joys, perhaps also because
4989their good opinion endorses and strengthens my belief in my own good
4990opinion, perhaps because the good opinion of others, even in cases
4991where I do not share it, is useful to me, or gives promise of usefulness:—
4992all this, however, is not vanity." The man of noble character must
4993first bring it home forcibly to his mind, especially with the aid of history,
4994that, from time immemorial, in all social strata in any way dependent,
4995the ordinary man WAS only that which he PASSED FOR:—not being at
4996all accustomed to fix values, he did not assign even to himself any other
4997value than that which his master assigned to him (it is the peculiar
4998RIGHT OF MASTERS to create values). It may be looked upon as the result
4999of an extraordinary atavism, that the ordinary man, even at present,
5000137
5001is still always WAITING for an opinion about himself, and then instinctively
5002submitting himself to it; yet by no means only to a "good" opinion,
5003but also to a bad and unjust one (think, for instance, of the greater part of
5004the self- appreciations and self-depreciations which believing women
5005learn from their confessors, and which in general the believing Christian
5006learns from his Church). In fact, conformably to the slow rise of the
5007democratic social order (and its cause, the blending of the blood of masters
5008and slaves), the originally noble and rare impulse of the masters to
5009assign a value to themselves and to "think well" of themselves, will now
5010be more and more encouraged and extended; but it has at all times an
5011older, ampler, and more radically ingrained propensity opposed to
5012it—and in the phenomenon of "vanity" this older propensity overmasters
5013the younger. The vain person rejoices over EVERY good opinion which
5014he hears about himself (quite apart from the point of view of its usefulness,
5015and equally regardless of its truth or falsehood), just as he suffers
5016from every bad opinion: for he subjects himself to both, he feels himself
5017subjected to both, by that oldest instinct of subjection which breaks forth
5018in him.—It is "the slave" in the vain man's blood, the remains of the
5019slave's craftiness—and how much of the "slave" is still left in woman, for
5020instance!—which seeks to SEDUCE to good opinions of itself; it is the
5021slave, too, who immediately afterwards falls prostrate himself before
5022these opinions, as though he had not called them forth.—And to repeat it
5023again: vanity is an atavism.
5024262. A SPECIES originates, and a type becomes established and strong
5025in the long struggle with essentially constant UNFAVOURABLE conditions.
5026On the other hand, it is known by the experience of breeders that
5027species which receive super-abundant nourishment, and in general a surplus
5028of protection and care, immediately tend in the most marked way to
5029develop variations, and are fertile in prodigies and monstrosities (also in
5030monstrous vices). Now look at an aristocratic commonwealth, say an ancient
5031Greek polis, or Venice, as a voluntary or involuntary contrivance
5032for the purpose of REARING human beings; there are there men beside
5033one another, thrown upon their own resources, who want to make their
5034species prevail, chiefly because they MUST prevail, or else run the terrible
5035danger of being exterminated. The favour, the super-abundance,
5036the protection are there lacking under which variations are fostered; the
5037species needs itself as species, as something which, precisely by virtue of
5038its hardness, its uniformity, and simplicity of structure, can in general
5039prevail and make itself permanent in constant struggle with its
5040138
5041neighbours, or with rebellious or rebellion-threatening vassals. The most
5042varied experience teaches it what are the qualities to which it principally
5043owes the fact that it still exists, in spite of all Gods and men, and has
5044hitherto been victorious: these qualities it calls virtues, and these virtues
5045alone it develops to maturity. It does so with severity, indeed it desires
5046severity; every aristocratic morality is intolerant in the education of
5047youth, in the control of women, in the marriage customs, in the relations
5048of old and young, in the penal laws (which have an eye only for the degenerating):
5049it counts intolerance itself among the virtues, under the
5050name of "justice." A type with few, but very marked features, a species of
5051severe, warlike, wisely silent, reserved, and reticent men (and as such,
5052with the most delicate sensibility for the charm and nuances of society) is
5053thus established, unaffected by the vicissitudes of generations; the constant
5054struggle with uniform UNFAVOURABLE conditions is, as already
5055remarked, the cause of a type becoming stable and hard. Finally,
5056however, a happy state of things results, the enormous tension is relaxed;
5057there are perhaps no more enemies among the neighbouring
5058peoples, and the means of life, even of the enjoyment of life, are present
5059in superabundance. With one stroke the bond and constraint of the old
5060discipline severs: it is no longer regarded as necessary, as a condition of
5061existence—if it would continue, it can only do so as a form of LUXURY,
5062as an archaizing TASTE. Variations, whether they be deviations (into the
5063higher, finer, and rarer), or deteriorations and monstrosities, appear suddenly
5064on the scene in the greatest exuberance and splendour; the individual
5065dares to be individual and detach himself. At this turning-point of
5066history there manifest themselves, side by side, and often mixed and entangled
5067together, a magnificent, manifold, virgin-forest-like up-growth
5068and up-striving, a kind of TROPICAL TEMPO in the rivalry of growth,
5069and an extraordinary decay and self- destruction, owing to the savagely
5070opposing and seemingly exploding egoisms, which strive with one another
5071"for sun and light," and can no longer assign any limit, restraint, or
5072forbearance for themselves by means of the hitherto existing morality. It
5073was this morality itself which piled up the strength so enormously,
5074which bent the bow in so threatening a manner:—it is now "out of date,"
5075it is getting "out of date." The dangerous and disquieting point has been
5076reached when the greater, more manifold, more comprehensive life IS
5077LIVED BEYOND the old morality; the "individual" stands out, and is obliged
5078to have recourse to his own law-giving, his own arts and artifices
5079for self-preservation, self-elevation, and self-deliverance. Nothing but
5080new "Whys," nothing but new "Hows," no common formulas any longer,
5081139
5082misunderstanding and disregard in league with each other, decay, deterioration,
5083and the loftiest desires frightfully entangled, the genius of
5084the race overflowing from all the cornucopias of good and bad, a
5085portentous simultaneousness of Spring and Autumn, full of new charms
5086and mysteries peculiar to the fresh, still inexhausted, still unwearied corruption.
5087Danger is again present, the mother of morality, great danger;
5088this time shifted into the individual, into the neighbour and friend, into
5089the street, into their own child, into their own heart, into all the most personal
5090and secret recesses of their desires and volitions. What will the
5091moral philosophers who appear at this time have to preach? They discover,
5092these sharp onlookers and loafers, that the end is quickly approaching,
5093that everything around them decays and produces decay,
5094that nothing will endure until the day after tomorrow, except one species
5095of man, the incurably MEDIOCRE. The mediocre alone have a prospect
5096of continuing and propagating themselves—they will be the men of the
5097future, the sole survivors; "be like them! become mediocre!" is now the
5098only morality which has still a significance, which still obtains a hearing.—
5099But it is difficult to preach this morality of mediocrity! it can never
5100avow what it is and what it desires! it has to talk of moderation and dignity
5101and duty and brotherly love—it will have difficulty IN
5102CONCEALING ITS IRONY!
5103263. There is an INSTINCT FOR RANK, which more than anything
5104else is already the sign of a HIGH rank; there is a DELIGHT in the
5105NUANCES of reverence which leads one to infer noble origin and habits.
5106The refinement, goodness, and loftiness of a soul are put to a perilous
5107test when something passes by that is of the highest rank, but is not yet
5108protected by the awe of authority from obtrusive touches and incivilities:
5109something that goes its way like a living touchstone, undistinguished,
5110undiscovered, and tentative, perhaps voluntarily veiled and disguised.
5111He whose task and practice it is to investigate souls, will avail himself of
5112many varieties of this very art to determine the ultimate value of a soul,
5113the unalterable, innate order of rank to which it belongs: he will test it by
5114its INSTINCT FOR REVERENCE. DIFFERENCE ENGENDRE HAINE:
5115the vulgarity of many a nature spurts up suddenly like dirty water,
5116when any holy vessel, any jewel from closed shrines, any book bearing
5117the marks of great destiny, is brought before it; while on the other hand,
5118there is an involuntary silence, a hesitation of the eye, a cessation of all
5119gestures, by which it is indicated that a soul FEELS the nearness of what
5120is worthiest of respect. The way in which, on the whole, the reverence for
5121140
5122the BIBLE has hitherto been maintained in Europe, is perhaps the best
5123example of discipline and refinement of manners which Europe owes to
5124Christianity: books of such profoundness and supreme significance require
5125for their protection an external tyranny of authority, in order to acquire
5126the PERIOD of thousands of years which is necessary to exhaust
5127and unriddle them. Much has been achieved when the sentiment has
5128been at last instilled into the masses (the shallow-pates and the boobies
5129of every kind) that they are not allowed to touch everything, that there
5130are holy experiences before which they must take off their shoes and
5131keep away the unclean hand—it is almost their highest advance towards
5132humanity. On the contrary, in the so-called cultured classes, the believers
5133in "modern ideas," nothing is perhaps so repulsive as their lack of shame,
5134the easy insolence of eye and hand with which they touch, taste, and finger
5135everything; and it is possible that even yet there is more RELATIVE
5136nobility of taste, and more tact for reverence among the people, among
5137the lower classes of the people, especially among peasants, than among
5138the newspaper-reading DEMIMONDE of intellect, the cultured class.
5139264. It cannot be effaced from a man's soul what his ancestors have
5140preferably and most constantly done: whether they were perhaps diligent
5141economizers attached to a desk and a cash-box, modest and citizenlike
5142in their desires, modest also in their virtues; or whether they were
5143accustomed to commanding from morning till night, fond of rude pleasures
5144and probably of still ruder duties and responsibilities; or whether,
5145finally, at one time or another, they have sacrificed old privileges of birth
5146and possession, in order to live wholly for their faith—for their
5147"God,"—as men of an inexorable and sensitive conscience, which blushes
5148at every compromise. It is quite impossible for a man NOT to have the
5149qualities and predilections of his parents and ancestors in his constitution,
5150whatever appearances may suggest to the contrary. This is the
5151problem of race. Granted that one knows something of the parents, it is
5152admissible to draw a conclusion about the child: any kind of offensive incontinence,
5153any kind of sordid envy, or of clumsy self-vaunting—the
5154three things which together have constituted the genuine plebeian type
5155in all times—such must pass over to the child, as surely as bad blood;
5156and with the help of the best education and culture one will only succeed
5157in DECEIVING with regard to such heredity.—And what else does education
5158and culture try to do nowadays! In our very democratic, or rather,
5159very plebeian age, "education" and "culture" MUST be essentially the art
5160of deceiving—deceiving with regard to origin, with regard to the
5161141
5162inherited plebeianism in body and soul. An educator who nowadays
5163preached truthfulness above everything else, and called out constantly to
5164his pupils: "Be true! Be natural! Show yourselves as you are!"—even such
5165a virtuous and sincere ass would learn in a short time to have recourse to
5166the FURCA of Horace, NATURAM EXPELLERE: with what results?
5167"Plebeianism" USQUE RECURRET. 6
5168265. At the risk of displeasing innocent ears, I submit that egoism belongs
5169to the essence of a noble soul, I mean the unalterable belief that to a
5170being such as "we," other beings must naturally be in subjection, and
5171have to sacrifice themselves. The noble soul accepts the fact of his egoism
5172without question, and also without consciousness of harshness, constraint,
5173or arbitrariness therein, but rather as something that may have its
5174basis in the primary law of things:—if he sought a designation for it he
5175would say: "It is justice itself." He acknowledges under certain circumstances,
5176which made him hesitate at first, that there are other equally
5177privileged ones; as soon as he has settled this question of rank, he moves
5178among those equals and equally privileged ones with the same assurance,
5179as regards modesty and delicate respect, which he enjoys in intercourse
5180with himself—in accordance with an innate heavenly mechanism
5181which all the stars understand. It is an ADDITIONAL instance of his
5182egoism, this artfulness and self-limitation in intercourse with his
5183equals—every star is a similar egoist; he honours HIMSELF in them, and
5184in the rights which he concedes to them, he has no doubt that the exchange
5185of honours and rights, as the ESSENCE of all intercourse, belongs
5186also to the natural condition of things. The noble soul gives as he takes,
5187prompted by the passionate and sensitive instinct of requital, which is at
5188the root of his nature. The notion of "favour" has, INTER PARES, neither
5189significance nor good repute; there may be a sublime way of letting gifts
5190as it were light upon one from above, and of drinking them thirstily like
5191dew-drops; but for those arts and displays the noble soul has no
5192aptitude. His egoism hinders him here: in general, he looks "aloft" unwillingly—
5193he looks either FORWARD, horizontally and deliberately, or
5194downwards—HE KNOWS THAT HE IS ON A HEIGHT.
5195266. "One can only truly esteem him who does not LOOK OUT FOR
5196himself."—Goethe to Rath Schlosser.
51976.Horace's "Epistles," I. x. 24.
5198142
5199267. The Chinese have a proverb which mothers even teach their
5200children: "SIAO-SIN" ("MAKE THY HEART SMALL"). This is the essentially
5201fundamental tendency in latter-day civilizations. I have no doubt
5202that an ancient Greek, also, would first of all remark the self-dwarfing in
5203us Europeans of today—in this respect alone we should immediately be
5204"distasteful" to him.
5205268. What, after all, is ignobleness?—Words are vocal symbols for
5206ideas; ideas, however, are more or less definite mental symbols for frequently
5207returning and concurring sensations, for groups of sensations. It
5208is not sufficient to use the same words in order to understand one another:
5209we must also employ the same words for the same kind of internal
5210experiences, we must in the end have experiences IN COMMON. On this
5211account the people of one nation understand one another better than
5212those belonging to different nations, even when they use the same language;
5213or rather, when people have lived long together under similar
5214conditions (of climate, soil, danger, requirement, toil) there
5215ORIGINATES therefrom an entity that "understands itself"—namely, a
5216nation. In all souls a like number of frequently recurring experiences
5217have gained the upper hand over those occurring more rarely: about
5218these matters people understand one another rapidly and always more
5219rapidly—the history of language is the history of a process of abbreviation;
5220on the basis of this quick comprehension people always unite
5221closer and closer. The greater the danger, the greater is the need of agreeing
5222quickly and readily about what is necessary; not to misunderstand
5223one another in danger—that is what cannot at all be dispensed with in
5224intercourse. Also in all loves and friendships one has the experience that
5225nothing of the kind continues when the discovery has been made that in
5226using the same words, one of the two parties has feelings, thoughts, intuitions,
5227wishes, or fears different from those of the other. (The fear of the
5228"eternal misunderstanding": that is the good genius which so often keeps
5229persons of different sexes from too hasty attachments, to which sense
5230and heart prompt them—and NOT some Schopenhauerian "genius of the
5231species"!) Whichever groups of sensations within a soul awaken most
5232readily, begin to speak, and give the word of command—these decide as
5233to the general order of rank of its values, and determine ultimately its list
5234of desirable things. A man's estimates of value betray something of the
5235STRUCTURE of his soul, and wherein it sees its conditions of life, its intrinsic
5236needs. Supposing now that necessity has from all time drawn together
5237only such men as could express similar requirements and similar
5238143
5239experiences by similar symbols, it results on the whole that the easy
5240COMMUNICABILITY of need, which implies ultimately the undergoing
5241only of average and COMMON experiences, must have been the most
5242potent of all the forces which have hitherto operated upon mankind. The
5243more similar, the more ordinary people, have always had and are still
5244having the advantage; the more select, more refined, more unique, and
5245difficultly comprehensible, are liable to stand alone; they succumb to accidents
5246in their isolation, and seldom propagate themselves. One must
5247appeal to immense opposing forces, in order to thwart this natural, alltoo-
5248natural PROGRESSUS IN SIMILE, the evolution of man to the similar,
5249the ordinary, the average, the gregarious —to the IGNOBLE!—
5250269. The more a psychologist—a born, an unavoidable psychologist
5251and soul-diviner—turns his attention to the more select cases and individuals,
5252the greater is his danger of being suffocated by sympathy: he
5253NEEDS sternness and cheerfulness more than any other man. For the
5254corruption, the ruination of higher men, of the more unusually constituted
5255souls, is in fact, the rule: it is dreadful to have such a rule always
5256before one's eyes. The manifold torment of the psychologist who has discovered
5257this ruination, who discovers once, and then discovers ALMOST
5258repeatedly throughout all history, this universal inner "desperateness" of
5259higher men, this eternal "too late!" in every sense—may perhaps one day
5260be the cause of his turning with bitterness against his own lot, and of his
5261making an attempt at self-destruction—of his "going to ruin" himself.
5262One may perceive in almost every psychologist a tell-tale inclination for
5263delightful intercourse with commonplace and well-ordered men; the fact
5264is thereby disclosed that he always requires healing, that he needs a sort
5265of flight and forgetfulness, away from what his insight and incisiveness—
5266from what his "business"—has laid upon his conscience. The fear
5267of his memory is peculiar to him. He is easily silenced by the judgment
5268of others; he hears with unmoved countenance how people honour, admire,
5269love, and glorify, where he has PERCEIVED—or he even conceals
5270his silence by expressly assenting to some plausible opinion. Perhaps the
5271paradox of his situation becomes so dreadful that, precisely where he has
5272learnt GREAT SYMPATHY, together with great CONTEMPT, the multitude,
5273the educated, and the visionaries, have on their part learnt great
5274reverence—reverence for "great men" and marvelous animals, for the
5275sake of whom one blesses and honours the fatherland, the earth, the dignity
5276of mankind, and one's own self, to whom one points the young, and
5277in view of whom one educates them. And who knows but in all great
5278144
5279instances hitherto just the same happened: that the multitude worshipped
5280a God, and that the "God" was only a poor sacrificial animal!
5281SUCCESS has always been the greatest liar—and the "work" itself is a
5282success; the great statesman, the conqueror, the discoverer, are disguised
5283in their creations until they are unrecognizable; the "work" of the artist,
5284of the philosopher, only invents him who has created it, is REPUTED to
5285have created it; the "great men," as they are reverenced, are poor little fictions
5286composed afterwards; in the world of historical values spurious
5287coinage PREVAILS. Those great poets, for example, such as Byron, Musset,
5288Poe, Leopardi, Kleist, Gogol (I do not venture to mention much
5289greater names, but I have them in my mind), as they now appear, and
5290were perhaps obliged to be: men of the moment, enthusiastic, sensuous,
5291and childish, light- minded and impulsive in their trust and distrust;
5292with souls in which usually some flaw has to be concealed; often taking
5293revenge with their works for an internal defilement, often seeking forgetfulness
5294in their soaring from a too true memory, often lost in the mud
5295and almost in love with it, until they become like the Will-o'-the-Wisps
5296around the swamps, and PRETEND TO BE stars—the people then call
5297them idealists,—often struggling with protracted disgust, with an everreappearing
5298phantom of disbelief, which makes them cold, and obliges
5299them to languish for GLORIA and devour "faith as it is" out of the hands
5300of intoxicated adulators:—what a TORMENT these great artists are and
5301the so-called higher men in general, to him who has once found them
5302out! It is thus conceivable that it is just from woman—who is clairvoyant
5303in the world of suffering, and also unfortunately eager to help and save
5304to an extent far beyond her powers—that THEY have learnt so readily
5305those outbreaks of boundless devoted SYMPATHY, which the multitude,
5306above all the reverent multitude, do not understand, and overwhelm
5307with prying and self-gratifying interpretations. This sympathizing
5308invariably deceives itself as to its power; woman would like to believe
5309that love can do EVERYTHING—it is the SUPERSTITION peculiar
5310to her. Alas, he who knows the heart finds out how poor, helpless, pretentious,
5311and blundering even the best and deepest love is—he finds that
5312it rather DESTROYS than saves!—It is possible that under the holy fable
5313and travesty of the life of Jesus there is hidden one of the most painful
5314cases of the martyrdom of KNOWLEDGE ABOUT LOVE: the martyrdom
5315of the most innocent and most craving heart, that never had enough
5316of any human love, that DEMANDED love, that demanded inexorably
5317and frantically to be loved and nothing else, with terrible outbursts
5318against those who refused him their love; the story of a poor soul
5319145
5320insatiated and insatiable in love, that had to invent hell to send thither
5321those who WOULD NOT love him—and that at last, enlightened about
5322human love, had to invent a God who is entire love, entire CAPACITY
5323for love—who takes pity on human love, because it is so paltry, so ignorant!
5324He who has such sentiments, he who has such KNOWLEDGE about
5325love—SEEKS for death!—But why should one deal with such painful
5326matters? Provided, of course, that one is not obliged to do so.
5327270. The intellectual haughtiness and loathing of every man who has
5328suffered deeply—it almost determines the order of rank HOW deeply
5329men can suffer—the chilling certainty, with which he is thoroughly imbued
5330and coloured, that by virtue of his suffering he KNOWS MORE
5331than the shrewdest and wisest can ever know, that he has been familiar
5332with, and "at home" in, many distant, dreadful worlds of which "YOU
5333know nothing"!—this silent intellectual haughtiness of the sufferer, this
5334pride of the elect of knowledge, of the "initiated," of the almost sacrificed,
5335finds all forms of disguise necessary to protect itself from contact with
5336officious and sympathizing hands, and in general from all that is not its
5337equal in suffering. Profound suffering makes noble: it separates.—One of
5338the most refined forms of disguise is Epicurism, along with a certain ostentatious
5339boldness of taste, which takes suffering lightly, and puts itself
5340on the defensive against all that is sorrowful and profound. They are
5341"gay men" who make use of gaiety, because they are misunderstood on
5342account of it—they WISH to be misunderstood. There are "scientific
5343minds" who make use of science, because it gives a gay appearance, and
5344because scientificness leads to the conclusion that a person is superficial—
5345they WISH to mislead to a false conclusion. There are free insolent
5346minds which would fain conceal and deny that they are broken, proud,
5347incurable hearts (the cynicism of Hamlet—the case of Galiani); and occasionally
5348folly itself is the mask of an unfortunate OVER- ASSURED
5349knowledge.—From which it follows that it is the part of a more refined
5350humanity to have reverence "for the mask," and not to make use of psychology
5351and curiosity in the wrong place.
5352271. That which separates two men most profoundly is a different
5353sense and grade of purity. What does it matter about all their honesty
5354and reciprocal usefulness, what does it matter about all their mutual
5355good-will: the fact still remains—they "cannot smell each other!" The
5356highest instinct for purity places him who is affected with it in the most
5357extraordinary and dangerous isolation, as a saint: for it is just
5358146
5359holiness—the highest spiritualization of the instinct in question. Any
5360kind of cognizance of an indescribable excess in the joy of the bath, any
5361kind of ardour or thirst which perpetually impels the soul out of night
5362into the morning, and out of gloom, out of "affliction" into clearness,
5363brightness, depth, and refinement:—just as much as such a tendency
5364DISTINGUISHES—it is a noble tendency—it also SEPARATES.—The
5365pity of the saint is pity for the FILTH of the human, all-too-human. And
5366there are grades and heights where pity itself is regarded by him as impurity,
5367as filth.
5368272. Signs of nobility: never to think of lowering our duties to the rank
5369of duties for everybody; to be unwilling to renounce or to share our responsibilities;
5370to count our prerogatives, and the exercise of them, among
5371our DUTIES.
5372273. A man who strives after great things, looks upon every one whom
5373he encounters on his way either as a means of advance, or a delay and
5374hindrance—or as a temporary resting-place. His peculiar lofty BOUNTY
5375to his fellow-men is only possible when he attains his elevation and
5376dominates. Impatience, and the consciousness of being always condemned
5377to comedy up to that time—for even strife is a comedy, and conceals
5378the end, as every means does—spoil all intercourse for him; this
5379kind of man is acquainted with solitude, and what is most poisonous in
5380it.
5381274. THE PROBLEM OF THOSE WHO WAIT.—Happy chances are
5382necessary, and many incalculable elements, in order that a higher man in
5383whom the solution of a problem is dormant, may yet take action, or
5384"break forth," as one might say—at the right moment. On an average it
5385DOES NOT happen; and in all corners of the earth there are waiting ones
5386sitting who hardly know to what extent they are waiting, and still less
5387that they wait in vain. Occasionally, too, the waking call comes too
5388late—the chance which gives "permission" to take action—when their
5389best youth, and strength for action have been used up in sitting still; and
5390how many a one, just as he "sprang up," has found with horror that his
5391limbs are benumbed and his spirits are now too heavy! "It is too late," he
5392has said to himself—and has become self-distrustful and henceforth for
5393ever useless.—In the domain of genius, may not the "Raphael without
5394hands" (taking the expression in its widest sense) perhaps not be the exception,
5395but the rule?—Perhaps genius is by no means so rare: but rather
5396147
5397the five hundred HANDS which it requires in order to tyrannize over the
5398[GREEK INSERTED HERE], "the right time"—in order to take chance by
5399the forelock!
5400275. He who does not WISH to see the height of a man, looks all the
5401more sharply at what is low in him, and in the foreground— and thereby
5402betrays himself.
5403276. In all kinds of injury and loss the lower and coarser soul is better
5404off than the nobler soul: the dangers of the latter must be greater, the
5405probability that it will come to grief and perish is in fact immense, considering
5406the multiplicity of the conditions of its existence.—In a lizard a
5407finger grows again which has been lost; not so in man.—
5408277. It is too bad! Always the old story! When a man has finished
5409building his house, he finds that he has learnt unawares something
5410which he OUGHT absolutely to have known before he— began to build.
5411The eternal, fatal "Too late!" The melancholia of everything
5412COMPLETED!—
5413278.—Wanderer, who art thou? I see thee follow thy path without
5414scorn, without love, with unfathomable eyes, wet and sad as a plummet
5415which has returned to the light insatiated out of every depth—what did
5416it seek down there?—with a bosom that never sighs, with lips that conceal
5417their loathing, with a hand which only slowly grasps: who art thou?
5418what hast thou done? Rest thee here: this place has hospitality for every
5419one—refresh thyself! And whoever thou art, what is it that now pleases
5420thee? What will serve to refresh thee? Only name it, whatever I have I offer
5421thee! "To refresh me? To refresh me? Oh, thou prying one, what sayest
5422thou! But give me, I pray thee—" What? what? Speak out! "Another
5423mask! A second mask!"
5424279. Men of profound sadness betray themselves when they are
5425happy: they have a mode of seizing upon happiness as though they
5426would choke and strangle it, out of jealousy—ah, they know only too
5427well that it will flee from them!
5428280. "Bad! Bad! What? Does he not—go back?" Yes! But you misunderstand
5429him when you complain about it. He goes back like every one who
5430is about to make a great spring.
5431148
5432281.—"Will people believe it of me? But I insist that they believe it of
5433me: I have always thought very unsatisfactorily of myself and about myself,
5434only in very rare cases, only compulsorily, always without delight in
5435'the subject,' ready to digress from 'myself,' and always without faith in
5436the result, owing to an unconquerable distrust of the POSSIBILITY of
5437self- knowledge, which has led me so far as to feel a CONTRADICTIO
5438IN ADJECTO even in the idea of 'direct knowledge' which theorists allow
5439themselves:—this matter of fact is almost the most certain thing I
5440know about myself. There must be a sort of repugnance in me to
5441BELIEVE anything definite about myself.—Is there perhaps some enigma
5442therein? Probably; but fortunately nothing for my own
5443teeth.—Perhaps it betrays the species to which I belong?—but not to myself,
5444as is sufficiently agreeable to me."
5445282.—"But what has happened to you?"—"I do not know," he said,
5446hesitatingly; "perhaps the Harpies have flown over my table."—It sometimes
5447happens nowadays that a gentle, sober, retiring man becomes suddenly
5448mad, breaks the plates, upsets the table, shrieks, raves, and shocks
5449everybody—and finally withdraws, ashamed, and raging at himself—
5450whither? for what purpose? To famish apart? To suffocate with his
5451memories?—To him who has the desires of a lofty and dainty soul, and
5452only seldom finds his table laid and his food prepared, the danger will
5453always be great—nowadays, however, it is extraordinarily so. Thrown
5454into the midst of a noisy and plebeian age, with which he does not like to
5455eat out of the same dish, he may readily perish of hunger and thirst—or,
5456should he nevertheless finally "fall to," of sudden nausea.—We have
5457probably all sat at tables to which we did not belong; and precisely the
5458most spiritual of us, who are most difficult to nourish, know the dangerous
5459DYSPEPSIA which originates from a sudden insight and disillusionment
5460about our food and our messmates—the AFTER-DINNER
5461NAUSEA.
5462283. If one wishes to praise at all, it is a delicate and at the same time a
5463noble self-control, to praise only where one DOES NOT
5464agree—otherwise in fact one would praise oneself, which is contrary to
5465good taste:—a self-control, to be sure, which offers excellent opportunity
5466and provocation to constant MISUNDERSTANDING. To be able to allow
5467oneself this veritable luxury of taste and morality, one must not live
5468among intellectual imbeciles, but rather among men whose
5469149
5470misunderstandings and mistakes amuse by their refinement—or one will
5471have to pay dearly for it!—"He praises me, THEREFORE he acknowledges
5472me to be right"—this asinine method of inference spoils half of the
5473life of us recluses, for it brings the asses into our neighbourhood and
5474friendship.
5475284. To live in a vast and proud tranquility; always beyond … To have,
5476or not to have, one's emotions, one's For and Against, according to
5477choice; to lower oneself to them for hours; to SEAT oneself on them as
5478upon horses, and often as upon asses:—for one must know how to make
5479use of their stupidity as well as of their fire. To conserve one's three hundred
5480foregrounds; also one's black spectacles: for there are circumstances
5481when nobody must look into our eyes, still less into our "motives." And
5482to choose for company that roguish and cheerful vice, politeness. And to
5483remain master of one's four virtues, courage, insight, sympathy, and
5484solitude. For solitude is a virtue with us, as a sublime bent and bias to
5485purity, which divines that in the contact of man and man—"in society"—
5486it must be unavoidably impure. All society makes one somehow,
5487somewhere, or sometime—"commonplace."
5488285. The greatest events and thoughts—the greatest thoughts,
5489however, are the greatest events—are longest in being comprehended:
5490the generations which are contemporary with them do not EXPERIENCE
5491such events—they live past them. Something happens there as in the
5492realm of stars. The light of the furthest stars is longest in reaching man;
5493and before it has arrived man DENIES—that there are stars there. "How
5494many centuries does a mind require to be understood?"—that is also a
5495standard, one also makes a gradation of rank and an etiquette therewith,
5496such as is necessary for mind and for star.
5497286. "Here is the prospect free, the mind exalted." 7 — But there is a reverse
5498kind of man, who is also upon a height, and has also a free prospect—
5499but looks DOWNWARDS.
5500287. What is noble? What does the word "noble" still mean for us
5501nowadays? How does the noble man betray himself, how is he recognized
5502under this heavy overcast sky of the commencing plebeianism, by
5503which everything is rendered opaque and leaden?— It is not his actions
5504which establish his claim—actions are always ambiguous, always
55057.Goethe's "Faust," Part II, Act V. The words of Dr. Marianus.
5506150
5507inscrutable; neither is it his "works." One finds nowadays among artists
5508and scholars plenty of those who betray by their works that a profound
5509longing for nobleness impels them; but this very NEED of nobleness is
5510radically different from the needs of the noble soul itself, and is in fact
5511the eloquent and dangerous sign of the lack thereof. It is not the works,
5512but the BELIEF which is here decisive and determines the order of
5513rank—to employ once more an old religious formula with a new and
5514deeper meaning—it is some fundamental certainty which a noble soul
5515has about itself, something which is not to be sought, is not to be found,
5516and perhaps, also, is not to be lost.—THE NOBLE SOUL HAS
5517REVERENCE FOR ITSELF.—
5518288. There are men who are unavoidably intellectual, let them turn
5519and twist themselves as they will, and hold their hands before their
5520treacherous eyes—as though the hand were not a betrayer; it always
5521comes out at last that they have something which they hide—namely, intellect.
5522One of the subtlest means of deceiving, at least as long as possible,
5523and of successfully representing oneself to be stupider than one
5524really is—which in everyday life is often as desirable as an umbrella,—is
5525called ENTHUSIASM, including what belongs to it, for instance, virtue.
5526For as Galiani said, who was obliged to know it: VERTU EST
5527ENTHOUSIASME.
5528289. In the writings of a recluse one always hears something of the
5529echo of the wilderness, something of the murmuring tones and timid vigilance
5530of solitude; in his strongest words, even in his cry itself, there
5531sounds a new and more dangerous kind of silence, of concealment. He
5532who has sat day and night, from year's end to year's end, alone with his
5533soul in familiar discord and discourse, he who has become a cave-bear,
5534or a treasure- seeker, or a treasure-guardian and dragon in his cave—it
5535may be a labyrinth, but can also be a gold-mine—his ideas themselves
5536eventually acquire a twilight-colour of their own, and an odour, as much
5537of the depth as of the mould, something uncommunicative and repulsive,
5538which blows chilly upon every passerby. The recluse does not believe
5539that a philosopher—supposing that a philosopher has always in the
5540first place been a recluse—ever expressed his actual and ultimate opinions
5541in books: are not books written precisely to hide what is in
5542us?—indeed, he will doubt whether a philosopher CAN have "ultimate
5543and actual" opinions at all; whether behind every cave in him there is
5544not, and must necessarily be, a still deeper cave: an ampler, stranger,
5545151
5546richer world beyond the surface, an abyss behind every bottom, beneath
5547every "foundation." Every philosophy is a foreground philosophy—this
5548is a recluse's verdict: "There is something arbitrary in the fact that the
5549PHILOSOPHER came to a stand here, took a retrospect, and looked
5550around; that he HERE laid his spade aside and did not dig any deeper—
5551there is also something suspicious in it." Every philosophy also
5552CONCEALS a philosophy; every opinion is also a LURKING-PLACE,
5553every word is also a MASK.
5554290. Every deep thinker is more afraid of being understood than of being
5555misunderstood. The latter perhaps wounds his vanity; but the former
5556wounds his heart, his sympathy, which always says: "Ah, why would
5557you also have as hard a time of it as I have?"
5558291. Man, a COMPLEX, mendacious, artful, and inscrutable animal,
5559uncanny to the other animals by his artifice and sagacity, rather than by
5560his strength, has invented the good conscience in order finally to enjoy
5561his soul as something SIMPLE; and the whole of morality is a long, audacious
5562falsification, by virtue of which generally enjoyment at the sight of
5563the soul becomes possible. From this point of view there is perhaps much
5564more in the conception of "art" than is generally believed.
5565292. A philosopher: that is a man who constantly experiences, sees,
5566hears, suspects, hopes, and dreams extraordinary things; who is struck
5567by his own thoughts as if they came from the outside, from above and
5568below, as a species of events and lightning-flashes PECULIAR TO HIM;
5569who is perhaps himself a storm pregnant with new lightnings; a portentous
5570man, around whom there is always rumbling and mumbling and
5571gaping and something uncanny going on. A philosopher: alas, a being
5572who often runs away from himself, is often afraid of himself—but whose
5573curiosity always makes him "come to himself" again.
5574293. A man who says: "I like that, I take it for my own, and mean to
5575guard and protect it from every one"; a man who can conduct a case,
5576carry out a resolution, remain true to an opinion, keep hold of a woman,
5577punish and overthrow insolence; a man who has his indignation and his
5578sword, and to whom the weak, the suffering, the oppressed, and even
5579the animals willingly submit and naturally belong; in short, a man who
5580is a MASTER by nature— when such a man has sympathy, well! THAT
5581sympathy has value! But of what account is the sympathy of those who
5582152
5583suffer! Or of those even who preach sympathy! There is nowadays,
5584throughout almost the whole of Europe, a sickly irritability and sensitiveness
5585towards pain, and also a repulsive irrestrainableness in complaining,
5586an effeminizing, which, with the aid of religion and philosophical
5587nonsense, seeks to deck itself out as something superior—there is a
5588regular cult of suffering. The UNMANLINESS of that which is called
5589"sympathy" by such groups of visionaries, is always, I believe, the first
5590thing that strikes the eye.—One must resolutely and radically taboo this
5591latest form of bad taste; and finally I wish people to put the good amulet,
5592"GAI SABER" ("gay science," in ordinary language), on heart and neck, as
5593a protection against it.
5594294. THE OLYMPIAN VICE.—Despite the philosopher who, as a
5595genuine Englishman, tried to bring laughter into bad repute in all thinking
5596minds—"Laughing is a bad infirmity of human nature, which every
5597thinking mind will strive to overcome" (Hobbes),—I would even allow
5598myself to rank philosophers according to the quality of their laughing—
5599up to those who are capable of GOLDEN laughter. And supposing
5600that Gods also philosophize, which I am strongly inclined to believe, owing
5601to many reasons—I have no doubt that they also know how to laugh
5602thereby in an overman-like and new fashion—and at the expense of all
5603serious things! Gods are fond of ridicule: it seems that they cannot refrain
5604from laughter even in holy matters.
5605295. The genius of the heart, as that great mysterious one possesses it,
5606the tempter-god and born rat-catcher of consciences, whose voice can
5607descend into the nether-world of every soul, who neither speaks a word
5608nor casts a glance in which there may not be some motive or touch of allurement,
5609to whose perfection it pertains that he knows how to appear,—
5610not as he is, but in a guise which acts as an ADDITIONAL constraint
5611on his followers to press ever closer to him, to follow him more
5612cordially and thoroughly;—the genius of the heart, which imposes silence
5613and attention on everything loud and self-conceited, which
5614smoothes rough souls and makes them taste a new longing—to lie placid
5615as a mirror, that the deep heavens may be reflected in them;—the genius
5616of the heart, which teaches the clumsy and too hasty hand to hesitate,
5617and to grasp more delicately; which scents the hidden and forgotten
5618treasure, the drop of goodness and sweet spirituality under thick dark
5619ice, and is a divining- rod for every grain of gold, long buried and imprisoned
5620in mud and sand; the genius of the heart, from contact with
5621153
5622which every one goes away richer; not favoured or surprised, not as
5623though gratified and oppressed by the good things of others; but richer
5624in himself, newer than before, broken up, blown upon, and sounded by a
5625thawing wind; more uncertain, perhaps, more delicate, more fragile,
5626more bruised, but full of hopes which as yet lack names, full of a new
5627will and current, full of a new ill-will and counter-current… but what
5628am I doing, my friends? Of whom am I talking to you? Have I forgotten
5629myself so far that I have not even told you his name? Unless it be that
5630you have already divined of your own accord who this questionable God
5631and spirit is, that wishes to be PRAISED in such a manner? For, as it happens
5632to every one who from childhood onward has always been on his
5633legs, and in foreign lands, I have also encountered on my path many
5634strange and dangerous spirits; above all, however, and again and again,
5635the one of whom I have just spoken: in fact, no less a personage than the
5636God DIONYSUS, the great equivocator and tempter, to whom, as you
5637know, I once offered in all secrecy and reverence my first-fruits—the last,
5638as it seems to me, who has offered a SACRIFICE to him, for I have found
5639no one who could understand what I was then doing. In the meantime,
5640however, I have learned much, far too much, about the philosophy of
5641this God, and, as I said, from mouth to mouth—I, the last disciple and
5642initiate of the God Dionysus: and perhaps I might at last begin to give
5643you, my friends, as far as I am allowed, a little taste of this philosophy?
5644In a hushed voice, as is but seemly: for it has to do with much that is
5645secret, new, strange, wonderful, and uncanny. The very fact that
5646Dionysus is a philosopher, and that therefore Gods also philosophize,
5647seems to me a novelty which is not unensnaring, and might perhaps
5648arouse suspicion precisely among philosophers;—among you, my
5649friends, there is less to be said against it, except that it comes too late and
5650not at the right time; for, as it has been disclosed to me, you are loth
5651nowadays to believe in God and gods. It may happen, too, that in the
5652frankness of my story I must go further than is agreeable to the strict usages
5653of your ears? Certainly the God in question went further, very much
5654further, in such dialogues, and was always many paces ahead of me …
5655Indeed, if it were allowed, I should have to give him, according to human
5656usage, fine ceremonious tides of lustre and merit, I should have to
5657extol his courage as investigator and discoverer, his fearless honesty,
5658truthfulness, and love of wisdom. But such a God does not know what to
5659do with all that respectable trumpery and pomp. "Keep that," he would
5660say, "for thyself and those like thee, and whoever else require it! I—have
5661no reason to cover my nakedness!" One suspects that this kind of
5662154
5663divinity and philosopher perhaps lacks shame?—He once said: "Under
5664certain circumstances I love mankind"—and referred thereby to Ariadne,
5665who was present; "in my opinion man is an agreeable, brave, inventive
5666animal, that has not his equal upon earth, he makes his way even
5667through all labyrinths. I like man, and often think how I can still further
5668advance him, and make him stronger, more evil, and more profound."—"
5669Stronger, more evil, and more profound?" I asked in horror.
5670"Yes," he said again, "stronger, more evil, and more profound; also more
5671beautiful"—and thereby the tempter-god smiled with his halcyon smile,
5672as though he had just paid some charming compliment. One here sees at
5673once that it is not only shame that this divinity lacks;—and in general
5674there are good grounds for supposing that in some things the Gods
5675could all of them come to us men for instruction. We men are—more
5676human.—
5677296. Alas! what are you, after all, my written and painted thoughts!
5678Not long ago you were so variegated, young and malicious, so full of
5679thorns and secret spices, that you made me sneeze and laugh—and now?
5680You have already doffed your novelty, and some of you, I fear, are ready
5681to become truths, so immortal do they look, so pathetically honest, so tedious!
5682And was it ever otherwise? What then do we write and paint, we
5683mandarins with Chinese brush, we immortalisers of things which LEND
5684themselves to writing, what are we alone capable of painting? Alas, only
5685that which is just about to fade and begins to lose its odour! Alas, only
5686exhausted and departing storms and belated yellow sentiments! Alas,
5687only birds strayed and fatigued by flight, which now let themselves be
5688captured with the hand—with OUR hand! We immortalize what cannot
5689live and fly much longer, things only which are exhausted and mellow!
5690And it is only for your AFTERNOON, you, my written and painted
5691thoughts, for which alone I have colours, many colours, perhaps, many
5692variegated softenings, and fifty yellows and browns and greens and
5693reds;— but nobody will divine thereby how ye looked in your morning,
5694you sudden sparks and marvels of my solitude, you, my old, beloved—
5695EVIL thoughts!
5696155
5697Chapter 10
5698Aftersong - 'From the Heights'
56991.
5700MIDDAY of Life! Oh, season of delight!
5701My summer's park!
5702Uneaseful joy to look, to lurk, to hark–
5703I peer for friends, am ready day and night,–
5704Where linger ye, my friends? The time is right!
57052.
5706Is not the glacier's grey today for you
5707Rose-garlanded?
5708The brooklet seeks you, wind, cloud, with longing thread
5709And thrust themselves yet higher to the blue,
5710To spy for you from farthest eagle's view
57113.
5712My table was spread out for you on high–
5713Who dwelleth so
5714Star-near, so near the grisly pit below?–
5715My realm–what realm hath wider boundary?
5716My honey–who hath sipped its fragrancy?
57174.
5718Friends, ye are there! Woe me,–yet I am not
5719He whom ye seek?
5720Ye stare and stop–better your wrath could speak!
5721156
5722I am not I? Hand, gait, face, changed? And what
5723I am, to you my friends, now am I not?
57245.
5725Am I an other? Strange am I to Me?
5726Yet from Me sprung?
5727A wrestler, by himself too oft self-wrung?
5728Hindering too oft my own self's potency,
5729Wounded and hampered by self-victory?
57306.
5731I sought where-so the wind blows keenest. There
5732I learned to dwell
5733Where no man dwells, on lonesome ice-lorn fell,
5734And unlearned Man and God and curse and prayer?
5735Became a ghost haunting the glaciers bare?
57367.
5737Ye, my old friends! Look! Ye turn pale, filled o'er
5738With love and fear!
5739Go! Yet not in wrath. Ye could ne'er live here.
5740Here in the farthest realm of ice and scaur,
5741A huntsman must one be, like chamois soar.
57428.
5743An evil huntsman was I? See how taut
5744My bow was bent!
5745Strongest was he by whom such bolt were sent–
5746Woe now! That arrow is with peril fraught,
5747Perilous as none.–Have yon safe home ye sought!
57489.
5749Ye go! Thou didst endure enough, oh, heart;–
5750Strong was thy hope;
5751Unto new friends thy portals widely ope,
5752157
5753Let old ones be. Bid memory depart!
5754Wast thou young then, now–better young thou art!
575510.
5756What linked us once together, one hope's tie–
5757(Who now doth con
5758Those lines, now fading, Love once wrote thereon?)–
5759Is like a parchment, which the hand is shy
5760To touch–like crackling leaves, all seared, all dry.
576111.
5762Oh! Friends no more! They are–what name for those?–
5763Friends' phantom-flight
5764Knocking at my heart's window-pane at night,
5765Gazing on me, that speaks "We were" and goes,–
5766Oh, withered words, once fragrant as the rose!
576712.
5768Pinings of youth that might not understand!
5769For which I pined,
5770Which I deemed changed with me, kin of my kind:
5771But they grew old, and thus were doomed and banned:
5772None but new kith are native of my land!
577313.
5774Midday of life! My second youth's delight!
5775My summer's park!
5776Unrestful joy to long, to lurk, to hark!
5777I peer for friends!–am ready day and night,
5778For my new friends. Come! Come! The time is right!
577914.
5780This song is done,–the sweet sad cry of rue
5781Sang out its end;
5782A wizard wrought it, he the timely friend,
5783158
5784The midday-friend,–no, do not ask me who;
5785At midday 'twas, when one became as two.
578615.
5787We keep our Feast of Feasts, sure of our bourne,
5788Our aims self-same:
5789The Guest of Guests, friend Zarathustra, came!
5790The world now laughs, the grisly veil was torn,
5791And Light and Dark were one that wedding-morn.
5792159
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5832160
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5841The Antichrist
5842Friedrich Nietzsche's "The Antichrist" might be more aptly named
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5850Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
5851Thus Spake Zarathustra
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5862featuring as protagonist a fictionalized Zarathustra. A central
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