Chapter V: Preface (3)

How can we _explain_ the fact that we feel something in common with the _Campagna romana?_ And the high mountain chain?

Chateaubriand in a letter to M. de Fontanes in 1803 writes his first impression of the _Campagna romana._

The President de Brosses says of the _Campagna romana_: "Il fallait que Romulus fût ivre quand il songea à bâtir une ville dans un terrain aussi laid."

Even Delacroix would have nothing to do with Rome, it frightened him. He loved Venice, just as Shakespeare, Byron, and Georges Sand did. Théophile Gautier's and Richard Wagner's dislike of Rome must not be forgotten.

Lamartine has the language for Sorrento and Posilippo.

Victor Hugo raves about Spain, "parce que aucune autre nation n'a moins emprunté à l'antiquité, parce qu'elle n'a subi aucune influence classique."

104.

The _two great attempts_ that were made to overcome the eighteenth century:

_Napoleon,_ in that he called man, the soldier, and the great struggle for power, to life again, and conceived Europe as a political power.

_Goethe,_ in that he imagined a European culture which would consist of the whole heritage of what humanity had _attained to_ up to his time.

German culture in this century inspires mistrust--the music of the period lacks that complete element which liberates and binds as well, to wit--Goethe.

The pre-eminence of _music_ in the romanticists of 1830 and 1840. Delacroix. Ingres--a passionate musician (admired Gluck, Haydn, Beethoven, Mozart), said to his pupils in Rome: "Si je pouvais vous rendre tous musiciens, vous y gagneriez comme peintres"--likewise Horace Vernet, who was particularly fond of Don Juan (as Mendelssohn assures us, 1831); Stendhal, too, who says of himself: "Combien de lieues ne ferais-je pas à pied, et à combien de jours de prison ne me soumetterais-je pas pour entendre _Don Juan ou le Matrimonio segreto_; et je ne sais pour quelle autre chose je ferais cet effort." He was then fifty-six years old.

The borrowed forms, for instance: Brahms as a typical "Epigone," likewise Mendelssohn's cultured Protestantism (a former "soul" is turned into poetry posthumously ...)

--the moral and poetical substitutions in Wagner, who used _one_ art as a stop-gap to make up for what another lacked.

--the "historical sense," inspiration derived from poems, sagas.

--that characteristic transformation of which G. Flaubert is the most striking example among Frenchmen, and Richard Wagner the most striking example among Germans, shows how the romantic belief in love and the future changes into a longing for nonentity in 1830-50.

106.

How is it that German music reaches its culminating point in the age of German romanticism? How is it that German music lacks Goethe? On the other hand, how much Schiller, or more exactly, how much "Thekla"[5] is there not in Beethoven!

Schumann has Eichendorff, Uhland, Heine, Hoffman, Tieck, in him. Richard Wagner has Freischütz, Hoffmann, Grimm, the romantic Saga, the mystic Catholicism of instinct, symbolism, "the free-spiritedness of passion" (Rousseau's intention). The _Flying Dutchman_ savours of France, where _le ténébreux_ (1830) was the type of the seducer.

_The cult of music,_ the revolutionary romanticism of form. Wagner _synthesises_ German and French romanticism.

[Footnote 5: Thekla is the sentimental heroine in Schiller's _Wallenstein._--TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.]

107.

From the point of view only of his value to Germany and to German culture, Richard Wagner is still a great problem, perhaps a German misfortune: in any case, however, a fatality. But what does it matter? Is he not very much more than a German event? It also seems to me that to no country on earth is he less related than to Germany; nothing was prepared there for his advent; his whole type is simply strange amongst Germans; there he stands in their midst, wonderful, misunderstood, incomprehensible. But people carefully avoid acknowledging this: they are too kind, too square-headed--too German for that. "Credo quia absurdus est": thus did the German spirit wish it to be, in this case too--hence it is content meanwhile to believe everything Richard Wagner wanted to have believed about himself. In all ages the spirit of Germany has been deficient in subtlety and divining powers concerning psychological matters. Now that it happens to be under the high pressure of patriotic nonsense and self-adoration, it is visibly growing thicker and coarser: how could it therefore be equal to the problem of Wagner!

108.

The Germans _are_ not yet anything, but they are _becoming_ something; that is why they have not yet any culture;--that is why they cannot yet have any culture!--They are not yet anything: that means they are all kinds of things. They are _becoming_ something: that means that they will one day cease from being all kinds of things. The latter is at bottom only a wish, scarcely a hope yet. Fortunately it is a wish with which one can live, a question of will, of work, of discipline, a question of training, as also of resentment, of longing, of privation, of discomfort,--yea, even of bitterness,--in short, we Germans _will_ get something out of ourselves, something that has not yet been wanted of us--we want something _more_!

That this "German, as he is not as yet"--has a right to something better than the present German "culture"; that all who wish to become something better, must wax angry when they perceive a sort of contentment, an impudent "setting-oneself-at-ease," or "a process of self-censing," in this quarter: that is my second principle, in regard to which my opinions have not yet changed.

_(c)_ SIGNS OF INCREASING STRENGTH.

109.

First Principle: everything that characterises modern men savours of decay: but side by side with the prevailing sickness there are signs of a strength and powerfulness of soul which are still untried. _The same causes which tend to promote the belittling of men,_ also force _the stronger and rarer individuals upwards to greatness._

110.

_General survey: the ambiguous_ character of our _modern world_--precisely the same symptoms might at the same time be indicative of either _decline_ or _strength._ And the signs of strength and of emancipation dearly bought, might in view of traditional (or _hereditary_) appreciations concerned with the feelings, be _misunderstood_ as indications of weakness. In short, _feeling,_ as a _means of fixing valuations,_ is not _on a level with the times._

_Generalised_: Every valuation is always _backward_; it is merely the expression of the conditions which favoured survival and growth in a much earlier age: it struggles against new conditions of existence out of which it did not arise, and which it therefore necessarily misunderstands: it hinders, and excites suspicion against, all that is new.

111.

_The problem of the nineteenth century._--To discover whether its strong and weak side belong to each other. Whether they have been cut from one and the same piece. Whether the variety of its ideals and their contradictions are conditioned by a higher purpose: whether they are something higher.--For it might be _the prerequisite of greatness,_ that growth should take place amid such violent tension. Dissatisfaction, Nihilism, _might be a good sign._

112.

_General survey._--As a matter of fact, all abundant growth involves a concomitant process of _crumbling to bits_ and _decay_: suffering and the symptoms of decline _belong_ to ages of enormous progress; every fruitful and powerful movement of mankind has always _brought about_ a concurrent Nihilistic movement. Under certain circumstances, the appearance of _the extremest_ form of Pessimism and actual _Nihilism_ might be the sign of a process of incisive and most essential growth, and of mankind's transit into completely new conditions of existence. _This is what I have understood._

113.

_A._

Starting out with a thoroughly courageous _appreciation_ of our men of to-day:--we must not allow ourselves to be deceived by appearance: this mankind is much less effective, but it gives quite different pledges of _lasting strength,_ its tempo is slower, but the rhythm itself is richer. _Healthiness_ is increasing, the real conditions of a healthy body are on the point of being known, and will gradually be created, "asceticism" is regarded with irony. The fear of extremes, a certain confidence in the "right way," no raving: a periodical self-habituation to narrower values (such as "mother-land," "science," etc.).

This whole picture, however, would still be _ambiguous_: it might be a movement either of _increase_ or _decline_ in Life.

_B._

The belief in "progress"--in lower spheres of intelligence, appears as increasing life: but this is self-deception;

in higher spheres of intelligence it is a sign of
_declining_ life.

Description of the symptoms.

The unity of the aspect: uncertainty in regard to the standard of valuation.

Fear of a general "in vain."

Nihilism.

114.

As a matter of fact, we are no longer so urgently in need of an antidote against the first Nihilism: Life is no longer so uncertain, accidental, and senseless in modern Europe. All such tremendous _exaggeration_ of the value of men, of the value of evil, etc., are not so necessary now; we can endure a considerable diminution of this value, we may grant a great deal of nonsense and accident: the _power_ man has acquired now allows of a _lowering_ of the means of discipline, of which the strongest was the moral interpretation of the universe. The hypothesis "God" is much too extreme.

115.

If anything shows that our _humanisation_ is a genuine sign of _progress,_ it is the fact that we no longer require excessive contraries, that we no longer require contraries at all....

We may love the senses; for we have spiritualised them in every way and made them artistic;

We have a right to all things which hitherto have been most _calumniated._

116.

_The reversal of the order of rank._--Those pious counterfeiters--the priests--are becoming Chandala in our midst:--they occupy the position of the charlatan, of the quack, of the counterfeiter, of the sorcerer: we regard them as corrupters of the will, as the great slanderers and vindictive enemies of Life, and as the _rebels_ among the bungled and the botched. We have made our middle class out of our servant-caste--the Sudra--that is to say, our people or the body which wields the political power.

On the other hand, the Chandala of former times is paramount: the _blasphemers,_ the _immoralists,_ the independents of all kinds, the artists, the Jews, the minstrels--and, at bottom, all _disreputable_ classes are in the van.

We have elevated ourselves to _honourable_ thoughts,--even more, we determine what honour is on earth,--"nobility." ... All of us to-day are _advocates of life._--We _Immoralists_ are to-day the _strongest_ power: the other great powers are in need of us ... we re-create the world in our own image.

We have transferred the label "Chandala" to the _priests,_ the _backworldsmen,_ and to the deformed _Christian society_ which has become associated with these people, together with creatures of like origin, the pessimists, Nihilists, romanticists of pity, criminals, and men of vicious habits--the whole sphere in which the idea of "God" is that of _Saviour...._

We are proud of being no longer obliged to be liars, slanderers, and detractors of Life....

117.

_The advance_ of the nineteenth century upon the eighteenth (at bottom we _good Europeans_ are carrying on a war against the eighteenth century):

(1) "The return to Nature" is getting to be understood, ever more definitely, in a way which is quite the reverse of that in which Rousseau used the phrase--_away from idylls and operas!_

(2) Ever more decided, more anti-idealistic, more objective, more fearless, more industrious, more temperate, more suspicious of sudden changes, _anti-revolutionary_;

(3) The question of _bodily health_ is being pressed ever more decidedly in front of the health of "the soul": the latter is regarded as a condition brought about by the former, and bodily health is believed to be, at least, the prerequisite to spiritual health.

118.

If anything at all has been achieved, it is a more innocent attitude towards the senses, a happier, more favourable demeanour in regard to sensuality, resembling rather the position taken up by Goethe; a prouder feeling has also been developed in knowledge, and the "reine Thor"[6] meets with little faith.

[Footnote 6: This is a reference to Wagner's _Parsifal._ The character as is well known, is written to represent a son of heart's affliction, and a child of wisdom--humble, guileless, loving, pure, and a fool.--TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.]

119.

We "_objective people._"--It is not "pity" that opens up the way for _us_ to all that is most remote and most strange in life and culture; but our accessibility and ingenuousness, which precisely does not "pity," but rather takes pleasure in hundreds of things which formerly caused pain (which in former days either outraged or moved us, or in the presence of which we were either hostile or indifferent). Pain in all its various phases is now interesting to us: on that account we are certainly _not_ the more pitiful, even though the sight of pain may shake us to our foundations and move us to tears: and we are absolutely not inclined to be more helpful in view thereof.

In this _deliberate_ desire to look on at all pain and error, we have grown stronger and more powerful than in the eighteenth century; it is a proof of our increase of strength (we have _drawn closer_ to the seventeenth and sixteenth centuries). But it is a profound mistake to regard our "romanticism" as a proof of our "beautified souls." We want _stronger_ sensations than all _coarser_ ages and classes have wanted. (This fact must not be confounded with the needs of neurotics and decadents; in their case, of course, there is a craving for pepper --even for cruelty.)

We are all seeking conditions _which are emancipated from_ the bourgeois, and to a greater degree from the priestly, notion of morality (every book which savours at all of priestdom and theology gives us the impression of pitiful _niaiserie_ and mental indigence). "Good company," in fact, finds everything insipid which is not forbidden and considered compromising in bourgeois circles; and the case is the same with books, music, politics, and opinions on women.

120.

_The simplification of man in the nineteenth century_ (The eighteenth century was that of elegance, subtlety, and generous feeling).--Not "return to nature"; for no natural humanity has ever existed yet. Scholastic, unnatural, and antinatural values are the rule and the beginning; man only reaches Nature after a long struggle--he never turns his "back" to her.... To be natural means, to dare to be as immoral as Nature is.

We are coarser, more direct, richer in irony towards generous feelings, even when we are beneath them.

Our _haute volée,_ the society consisting of our rich and leisured men, is more natural: people hunt each other, the love of the sexes is a kind of sport in which marriage is both a charm and an obstacle; people entertain each other and live for the sake of pleasure; bodily advantages stand in the first rank, and curiosity and daring are the rule.

Our attitude towards _knowledge_ is more natural; we are innocent in our absolute spiritual debauchery, we hate pathetic and hieratic manners, we delight in that which is most strictly prohibited, we should scarcely recognise any interest in knowledge if we were bored in acquiring it.

Our attitude to _morality_ is also more natural. Principles have become a laughing-stock; no one dares to speak of his "duty," unless in irony. But a helpful, benevolent disposition is highly valued. (Morality is located in _instinct_ and the rest is despised. Besides this there are few points of honour.)

Our attitude to _politics_ is more natural: we see problems of power, of the quantum of power, against another quantum. We do not believe in a right that does not proceed from a power which is able to uphold it. We regard all rights as conquests.

Our valuation of _great men and things_ is more natural: we regard passion as a privilege; we can conceive of nothing great which does not involve a great crime; all greatness is associated in our minds with a certain standing-beyond-the-pale in morality.

Our attitude to _Nature_ is more natural: we no longer love her for her "innocence," her "reason," her "beauty," we have made her beautifully devilish and "foolish." But instead of despising her on that account, since then we have felt more closely related to her and more familiar in her presence. She does _not_ aspire to virtue: we therefore respect her.

Our attitude towards _Art_ is more natural: we do not exact beautiful, empty lies, etc., from her; brutal positivism reigns supreme, and it ascertains things with perfect calm.

In short: there are signs showing that the European of the nineteenth century is less ashamed of his instincts; he has gone a long way towards acknowledging his unconditional naturalness and immorality, _without bitterness_: on the contrary, he is strong enough to endure this point of view alone.

To some ears this will sound as though _corruption_ had made strides: and certain it is that man has not drawn nearer to the "Nature" which Rousseau speaks about, but has gone one step farther in the civilisation before which Rousseau _stood in horror._ We have grown _stronger,_ we have drawn nearer to the seventeenth century, more particularly to the taste which reigned towards its close (Dancourt, Le Sage, Renard).

121.

_Culture_ versus _Civilisation._--The culminating stages of culture and civilisation lie apart: one must not be led astray as regards the fundamental antagonism existing between culture and civilisation. From the moral standpoint, great periods in the history of culture have always been periods of corruption; while on the other hand, those periods in which man was deliberately and compulsorily _tamed_ ("civilisation") have always been periods of intolerance towards the most intellectual and most audacious natures. Civilisation desires something different from what culture strives after: their aims may perhaps be opposed....

122.

_What I warn people against_: confounding the instincts of decadence with those of _humanity_;

Confounding the _dissolving means_ of civilisation _and those which necessarily promote decadence,_ with _culture_;

Confounding _debauchery,_ and the principle, "laisser aller," with the _Will to Power_ (the latter is the exact reverse of the former).

123.

The unsolved problems which I set anew: the _problem of civilisation,_ the struggle between Rousseau and Voltaire about the year 1760. Man becomes deeper, more mistrustful, more "immoral," stronger, more self-confident--and therefore "_more natural_"; that is "progress." In this way, by a process of division of labour, the more evil strata and the milder and tamer strata of society get separated: so that _the general facts_ are not visible at first sight.... It is a sign of _strength,_ and of the self-control and fascination of the strong, that these stronger strata possess the arts in order to make their greater powers for evil felt as something "_higher_" As soon as there is "progress" there is a transvaluation of the strengthened factors into the "good."

124.

Man must have the _courage_ of his natural instincts restored to him.--

_The poor opinion_ he has of himself must be destroyed (_not_ in the sense of the individual, but in the sense of the _natural_ man ...)--

The _contradictions_ in things must be eradicated, after it has been well understood that we were responsible for them--

_Social idiosyncrasies_ must be stamped out of existence (guilt, punishment, justice, honesty, freedom, love, etc. etc.)--

An advance towards "_naturalness_": in all political questions, even in the relations between parties, even in merchants', workmen's, or contractors' parties, only _questions_ of _power_ come into play:-- "what one _can_ do" is the first question, what one ought to do is only a secondary consideration.

125.

Socialism--or the _tyranny_ of the meanest and the most brainless,--that is to say, the superficial, the envious, and the mummers, brought to its zenith,--is, as a matter, of fact, the logical conclusion of "modern ideas" and their latent anarchy: but in the genial atmosphere of democratic well-being the capacity for forming resolutions or even for coming _to an end_ at all, is paralysed. Men follow--but no longer their reason. That is why socialism is on the whole a hopelessly bitter affair: and there is nothing more amusing than to observe the discord between the poisonous and desperate faces of present-day socialists--and what wretched and nonsensical feelings does not their style reveal to us!--and the childish lamblike happiness of their hopes and desires. Nevertheless, in many places in Europe, there may be violent hand-to-hand struggles and irruptions on their account: the coming century is likely to be convulsed in more than one spot, and the Paris Commune, which finds defenders and advocates even in Germany, will seem to have been but a slight indigestion compared with what is to come. Be this as it may, there will always be too many people of property for socialism ever to signify anything more than an attack of illness: and these people of property are like one man with one faith, "one must possess something in order _to be_ some one." This, however, is the oldest and most wholesome of all instincts; I should add: "one must desire more than one has in order to _become_ more." For this is the teaching which life itself preaches to all living things: the morality of Development. To have and to wish to have more, in a word, _Growth_--that is life itself. In the teaching of socialism "a will to the denial of life" is but poorly concealed: botched men and races they must be who have devised a teaching of this sort. In fact, I even wish a few experiments might be made to show that in a socialistic society, life denies itself, and itself cuts away its own roots. The earth is big enough and man is still unexhausted enough for a practical lesson of this sort and _demonstratio ad absurdum_--even if it were accomplished only by a vast expenditure of lives--to seem worth while to me. Still, Socialism, like a restless mole beneath the foundations of a society wallowing in stupidity, will be able to achieve something useful and salutary: it delays "Peace on Earth" and the whole process of character-softening of the democratic herding animal; it forces the European to have an extra supply of intellect,--that is to say, craft and caution, and prevents his entirely abandoning the manly and warlike qualities,--it also saves Europe awhile from the _marasmus femininus_ which is threatening it.

126.

The most favourable obstacles and remedies of modernity:

(1) Compulsory _military service_ with real wars in which all joking is laid aside.

(2) _National_ thick-headedness (which simplifies and concentrates).

(3) Improved _nutrition_ (meat).

(4) Increasing _cleanliness_ and wholesomeness in the home.

(5) The predominance of _physiology_ over theology, morality, economics, and politics.

(6) Military discipline in the exaction and the practice of one's "duty" (it is no longer customary to praise).

127.

I am delighted at the military development of Europe, also at the inner anarchical conditions: the period of quietude and "Chinadom" which Galiani prophesied for this century is now over. Personal and _manly_ capacity, bodily capacity recovers its value, valuations are becoming more physical, nutrition consists ever more and more of flesh. Fine men have once more become possible. Bloodless sneaks (with mandarins at their head, as Comte imagined them) are now a matter of the past. The savage in every one of us is _acknowledged,_ even the wild animal. _Precisely on that account,_ philosophers will have a better chance. --Kant is a scarecrow!

128.

I have not yet _seen_ any reasons to feel discouraged. He who acquires and preserves a _strong will,_ together with a broad mind, has a more favourable chance now than ever he had. For the _plasticity_ of man has become exceedingly great in democratic Europe: men who learn easily, who readily adapt themselves, are the rule: the gregarious animal of a high order of intelligence is prepared. He who would command finds those who _must_ obey: I have Napoleon and Bismarck in mind, for instance. The struggle against strong and unintelligent wills, which forms the surest obstacle in one's way, is really insignificant Who would not be able to knock down these "objective" gentlemen with weak wills, such as Ranke and Renan!

129.

_Spiritual enlightenment_ is an unfailing means of making men uncertain, weak of will, and needful of succour and support; in short, of developing the herding instincts in them. That is why all great artist-rulers, hitherto (Confucius in China, the Roman Empire, Napoleon, Popedom--at a time when they had the courage of their worldliness and frankly pursued power) in whom the ruling instincts, that had prevailed until their time, culminated, also made use of the spiritual enlightenment--or at least allowed it to be supreme (after the style of the Popes of the Renaissance). The self-deception of the masses on this point, in every democracy for instance, is of the greatest possible value: all that makes men smaller and more amenable is pursued under the title "progress."

130.

The highest equity and mildness as a condition of _weakness_ (the New Testament and the early Christian community--manifesting itself in the form of utter foolishness in the Englishmen, Darwin and Wallace). Your equity, ye higher men, drives you to universal suffrage, etc.; your "humanity" urges you to be milder towards crime and stupidity. In the _end_ you will thus help stupidity and harmlessness to conquer.

_Outwardly_: Ages of terrible wars, insurrections, explosions. _Inwardly_: ever more and more weakness among men; _events_ take the _form of excitants._ The Parisian as the type of the European extreme.

_Consequences_: (1) Savages (at first, of course, in conformity with the culture that has reigned hitherto); (2) _Sovereign individuals_ (where _powerful_ barbarous _masses_ and emancipation from all that has been, are crossed). The age of greatest stupidity, brutality, and wretchedness in the masses, and _in the highest individuals._

131.

An incalculable number of higher individuals now perish: but he who _escapes their fate_ is as strong as the devil. In this respect we are reminded of the conditions which prevailed in the Renaissance.

132.

How are _Good Europeans_ such as ourselves distinguished from the patriots? In the first place, we are atheists and immoralists, but we take care to support the religions and the morality which we associate with the gregarious instinct: for by means of them, an order of men is, so to speak, being prepared, which must at some time or other fall into our hands, which must actually _crave_ for our hands.

Beyond Good and Evil,--certainly; but we insist upon the unconditional and strict preservation of herd-morality.

We reserve ourselves the right to several kinds of philosophy which it is necessary to learn: under certain circumstances, the pessimistic kind as a hammer; a European Buddhism might perhaps be indispensable.

We should probably support the development and the maturation of democratic tendencies; for it conduces to weakness of will: in "Socialism" we recognise a thorn which prevents smug ease.

Attitude towards the people.. Our prejudices; we pay attention to the results of cross-breeding.

Detached, well-to-do, strong: irony concerning the "press" and its culture. Our care: that scientific men should not become journalists. We mistrust any form of culture that tolerates news-paper reading or writing.

We make our accidental positions (as Goethe and Stendhal did), our experiences, a foreground, and we lay stress upon them, so that we may deceive concerning our backgrounds. We ourselves _wait_ and avoid putting our heart into them. They serve us as refuges, such as a wanderer might require and use--but we avoid feeling at home in them. We are ahead of our fellows in that we have had a _disciplina voluntatis._ All strength is directed to the _development of the will,_ an art which allows us to wear masks, an art of understanding _beyond_ the passions (also "super-European" thought at times).

This is our preparation before becoming the law-givers of the future and the lords of the earth; if not we, at least our children. Caution where marriage is concerned.

133.

_The twentieth century._--The Abbé Galiani says somewhere: "_La prévoyance est la cause des guerres actuelles de l'Europe. Si l'on voulait se donner la peine de ne rien prévoir, tout le monde serait tranquille, et je ne crois pas qu'on serait plus malheureux parce qu'on ne ferait pas la guerre._" As I in no way share the unwarlike views of my deceased friend Galiani, I have no fear whatever of saying something beforehand with the view of conjuring in some way the cause of wars.

A condition of excessive _consciousness,_ after the worst of earthquakes: with new questions.

134.

It is the time of the _great noon, of the most appalling enlightenment_: my particular kind of _Pessimism_: the great starting-point.

(1) Fundamental contradiction between civilisation and the elevation of man.

(2) Moral valuations regarded as a history of lies and the art of calumny in the service of the Will to Power (of the will of the _herd,_ which rises against stronger men).

(3) The conditions which determine every elevation in culture (the facilitation of a _selection_ being made at the cost of a crowd) are the _conditions_ of all growth.

(4). _The multiformity_ of the world as a question of _strength,_ which sees all things in the _perspective of their growth._ The moral Christian values to be regarded as the insurrection and mendacity of slaves (in comparison with the aristocratic values of the _ancient world). _

SECOND BOOK.

CRITICISM OF THE HIGHEST VALUES THAT HAVE PREVAILED HITHERTO.

I.

CRITICISM OF RELIGION.

All the beauty and sublimity with which we have invested real and imagined things, I will show to be the property and product of man, and this should be his most beautiful apology. Man as a poet, as a thinker, as a god, as love, as power. Oh, the regal liberality with which he has lavished gifts upon things in order _to impoverish_ himself and make himself feel wretched! Hitherto, this has been his greatest disinterestedness, that he admired and worshipped, and knew how to conceal from himself that _he_ it was who had created what he admired.

1. CONCERNING THE ORIGIN OF RELIGIONS.

135.

_The origin of religion._--Just as the illiterate man of to-day believes that his wrath is the cause of his being angry, that his mind is the cause of his thinking, that his soul is the cause of his feeling, in short, just as a mass of psychological entities are still unthinkingly postulated as causes; so, in a still more primitive age, the same phenomena were interpreted by man by means of personal entities. Those conditions of his soul which seemed strange, overwhelming, and rapturous, he regarded as obsessions and bewitching influences emanating from the power of some personality. (Thus the Christian, the most puerile and backward man of this age, traces hope, peace, and the feeling of deliverance to a psychological inspiration on the part of God: being by nature a sufferer and a creature in need of repose, states of happiness, peace, and resignation, perforce seem strange to him, and seem to need some explanation.) Among intelligent, strong, and vigorous races, the epileptic is mostly the cause of a belief in the existence of some _foreign power_; but all such examples of apparent subjection--as, for instance, the bearing of the exalted man, of the poet, of the great criminal, or the passions, love and revenge--lead to the invention of supernatural powers. A condition is made concrete by being identified with a personality, and when this condition overtakes anybody, it is ascribed to that personality. In other words: in the psychological concept of God, a certain state of the soul is personified as a cause in order to appear as an effect.

The psychological logic is as follows: when the _feeling of power_ suddenly seizes and overwhelms a man,--and this takes place in the case of all the great passions,--a doubt arises in him concerning his own person: he dare not think himself the cause of this astonishing sensation--and thus he posits a _stronger_ person, a Godhead as its cause. In short, the origin of religion lies in the extreme feelings of power, which, being _strange,_ take men by surprise: and just as the sick man, who feels one of his limbs unaccountably heavy, concludes that another man must be sitting on it, so the ingenuous _homo religiosus,_ divides himself up into _several people._ Religion is an example of the "_altération de la personalité._" A sort of _fear_ and _sensation of terror_ in one's own presence.... But also a feeling of inordinate _rapture_ and _exaltation._ Among sick people, the _sensation of health_ suffices to awaken a belief in the proximity of God.

136.

_Rudimentary psychology of the religious man:--_All changes are effects; all effects are effects of will (the notion of "Nature" and of "natural law," is lacking); all effects presuppose an agent. Rudimentary psychology: one is only a cause oneself, when one knows that one has willed something.

Result: States of power impute to man the feeling that he is _not_ the cause of them, that he is not _responsible_ for them: they come without being willed to do so--consequently we cannot be their originators: will that is not free (that is to say, the knowledge of a change in our condition which we have not helped to bring about) requires a _strong_ will.

_Consequence of this rudimentary psychology_: Man has never dared to credit _himself_ with his strong and startling moods, he has always conceived them as "passive," as "imposed upon him from outside": Religion is the offshoot of a _doubt_ concerning the entity of the person, an _altération_ of the personality: in so far as everything great and strong in man was considered _superhuman_ and _foreign,_ man belittled himself,--he laid the two sides, the very pitiable and weak side, and the very strong and startling side apart, in two spheres, and called the one "Man" and the other "God."

And he has continued to act on these lines; during the period of the _moral idiosyncrasy_ he did not interpret his lofty and sublime moral states as "proceeding from his own will" or as the "work" of the person. Even the Christian himself divides his personality into two parts, the one a mean and weak fiction which he calls man, and the other which he calls God (Deliverer and Saviour).

Religion has lowered the concept "man"; its ultimate conclusion is that all goodness, greatness, and truth are superhuman, and are only obtainable by the grace of God.

137.

One way of raising man out of his self-abasement, which brought about the decline of the point of view that classed all lofty and strong states of the soul, as strange, was the theory of relationship. These lofty and strong states of the soul could at least be interpreted as the influence of our _forebears_; we belonged to each other, we were irrevocably joined; we grew in our own esteem, by acting according to the example of a model known to us all.

There is an attempt on the part of noble families to associate religion with their own feelings of self-respect. Poets and seers do the same thing; they feel proud that they have been worthy,--that they have been _selected_ for such association,--they esteem it an honour, not to be considered at all as individuals, but as mere mouthpieces (Homer).

Man gradually takes possession of the highest and proudest states of his soul, as also of his acts and his works. Formerly it was believed that one paid oneself the greatest honour by denying one's own responsibility for the highest deeds one accomplished, and by ascribing them to--God. The will which was not free, appeared to be that which imparted a higher value to a deed: in those days a god was postulated as the author of the deed.

138.

Priests are the actors of something which is supernatural, either in the way of ideals, gods, or saviours, and they have to make people believe in them; in this they find their calling, this is the purpose of their instincts; in order to make it as credible as possible, they have to exert themselves to the utmost extent in the art of posing; their actor's sagacity must, above all, aim at giving them _a clean conscience,_ by means of which, alone, it is possible to persuade effectively.

139.

The priest wishes to make it an understood thing, that he is the _highest type_ of man, that he rules,--even over those who wield the power,--that he is indispensable and unassailable,--that he is the _strongest power_ in the community, not by any means to be replaced or undervalued.

_Means thereto_: he alone is cultured; he alone is the _man of virtue_; he alone has _sovereign power over himself_: he alone is, in a certain sense, God, and ultimately goes back to the Godhead; he alone is the middleman between God and _others_; the Godhead administers punishment to every one who puts the priest at a disadvantage, or who thinks in opposition to him.

_Means thereto: Truth_ exists. There is only one way of attaining to it, and that is to become a priest. Everything good, which relates either to order, nature, or tradition, is to be traced to the wisdom of the priests. The Holy Book is their work. The whole of nature is only a fulfilment of the maxims which it contains. No other _source of goodness_ exists than the priests. Every other kind of perfection, even the _warrior's,_ is different in rank from that of the priests.

_Consequence_: If the priest is to be the _highest_ type, then the _degrees_ which lead to his _virtues_ must be the degrees of value among men. _Study, emancipation from material things, inactivity, impassibility, absence of passion, solemnity_;--the opposite of all this is found in the _lowest_ type of man.

The priest has taught a kind of morality which conduced to his being considered the _highest type_ of man. He conceives a _type_ which is the _reverse_ of his own: the Chandala. By making _these_ as contemptible as possible, some strength is lent to the _order of castes._ The priest's excessive fear of _sensuality_ also implies that the latter is the most serious threat to the _order of castes_ (that is to say, _order_ in general).... Every "free tendency" _in puncto puncti overthrows_ the laws of marriage.

140.

The _philosopher_ considered as the development of the _priestly_ type:--He has the heritage of the priest in his blood; even as a rival he is compelled to fight with the same weapons as the priest of his time;--he aspires to the _highest authority._

What is it that bestows _authority_ upon men who have no physical power to wield (no army, no arms at all ...)? How do such men gain authority _over_ those who are in possession of material power, and who represent authority? (Philosophers enter the lists against princes, victorious conquerors, and wise statesmen.)

They can do it only by establishing the belief that they are in possession of a power which is higher and stronger--_God._ Nothing is strong enough: every one is in _need_ of the mediation and the services of priests. They establish themselves as indispensable _intercessors._ The conditions of their existence are: (1) That people believe in the absolute superiority of their god, in fact believe in _their god_'; (2) that there is no other access, no direct access to god, save through them. The _second_ condition alone gives rise to the concept "heterodoxy"; the _first_ to the concept "disbelievers" (that is to say, he who believes in another god).

141.

_A Criticism of the Holy Lie._--That a lie is allowed in pursuit of holy ends 'is a principle which belongs to the theory of all priestcraft, and the object of this inquiry is to discover to what extent it belongs to its practice.

But philosophers, too, whenever they intend taking over the leadership of mankind, with the ulterior motives of priests in their minds, have never failed to arrogate to themselves the right to lie: Plato above all. But the most elaborate of lies is the double lie, developed by the typically Arian philosophers of the Vedanta: two systems, contradicting each other in all their main points, but interchangeable, complementary, and mutually expletory, when educational ends were in question. The lie of the one has to create a condition in which the truth of the other can alone become _intelligible...._

How _far_ does the holy lie of priests and philosophers go?--The question here is, what hypotheses do they advance in regard to education, and what are the dogmas they are compelled to _invent_ in order to do justice to these hypotheses?

First: they must have power, authority, and absolute credibility on their side.

Secondly: they must have the direction of the whole of Nature, so that everything affecting the individual seems to be determined by their law.

Thirdly: their domain of power must be very extensive, in order that its control may escape the notice of those they subject: they must know the penal code of the life beyond--of the life "after death,"--and, of course, the means whereby the road to blessedness may be discovered. They have to put the notion of a natural course of things out of sight, but as they are intelligent and thoughtful people, they are able to _promise_ a host of effects, which they naturally say are conditioned by prayer or by the strict observance of their law. They can, moreover, _prescribe_ a large number of things which are exceedingly reasonable --only they must not point to experience or empiricism as the source of this wisdom, but to revelation or to the fruits of the "most severe exercises of penance."

The _holy lie,_ therefore, applies principally to the _purpose_ of an action (the natural purpose, reason, is made to vanish: a moral purpose, the observance of some law, a service to God, seems to be the purpose): to the _consequence_ of an action (the natural consequence is interpreted as something supernatural, and, in order to be on surer ground, other incontrollable and supernatural consequences are foretold).

In this way the concepts _good_ and _evil_ are created, and seem quite divorced from the natural concepts: "useful," "harmful," "life-promoting," "life-retarding,"--indeed, inasmuch as _another_ life is imagined, the former concepts may even be _antagonistic_ to Nature's concepts of good and evil. In this way, the proverbial concept "conscience" is created: an inner voice, which, though it makes itself heard in regard to every action, does not measure the worth of that action according to its results, but according to its conformity or non-conformity to the "law."

The holy lie therefore invented: (1) a _god_ who _punishes_ and _rewards,_ who recognises and carefully observes the law-book of the priests, and who is particular about sending them into the world as his mouthpieces and plenipotentiaries; (2) an _After Life,_ in which, alone, the great penal machine is supposed to be active--to this end the _immortality of the soul_ was invented; (3) a _conscience in man,_ understood as the knowledge that good and evil are permanent values--that God himself speaks through it, whenever its counsels are in conformity with priestly precepts; (4) _Morality_ as the denial of all natural processes, as the subjection of all phenomena to a moral order, as the interpretation of all phenomena as the effects of a moral order of things (that is to say, the concept of punishment and reward), as the only power and only creator of all transformations; (5) _Truths_ given, revealed, and identical with the teaching of the priests: as the condition to all salvation and happiness in this and the next world.

_In short_: what is the price paid for the _improvement_ supposed to be due to morality?--The unhinging of _reason,_ the reduction of all motives to fear and hope (punishment and reward); _dependence_ upon the tutelage of priests, and upon a formulary exactitude which is supposed to express a divine will; the implantation of a "conscience" which establishes a false science in the place of experience and experiment: as though all one had to do or had not to do were predetermined--a kind of contraction of the seeking and striving spirit;--_in short_: the worst _mutilation_ of man that can be imagined, and it is pretended that "the good man" is the result.

Practically speaking, all reason, the whole heritage of intelligence, subtlety, and caution, the first condition of the priestly canon, is arbitrarily reduced, when it is too late, to a simple _mechanical_ process: conformity with the law becomes a purpose in itself, it is the highest purpose; _Life no longer contains any problems_;--the whole conception of the world is polluted by the notion of _punishment_; --Life itself, owing to the fact that the _priests life_ is upheld as the _non plus ultra_ of perfection, is transformed into a denial and pollution of life;--the concept "God" represents an aversion to Life, and even a criticism and a contemning of it. Truth is transformed in the mind, into _priestly_ prevarication; the striving after truth, into the _study of the Scriptures,_ into the way to _become a theologian._

142.

_A criticism of the Law-Book of Manu._--The whole book is founded upon the holy lie. Was it the well-being of humanity that inspired the whole of this system? Was this kind of man, who believes in the _interested_ nature of every action, interested or not interested in the success of this system? The desire to improve mankind--whence comes the inspiration to this feeling? Whence is the concept improvement taken?

We find a class of men, _the sacerdotal class,_ who consider themselves the standard pattern, the highest example and most perfect expression of the type man. The notion of "improving" mankind, to this class of men, means to make mankind like themselves. They believe in their own superiority, they _will_ be superior in practice: the cause of the holy lie is _The Will to Power...._

Establishment of the dominion: to this end, ideas which place a _non plus ultra_ of power with the priesthood are made to prevail. Power acquired by lying was the result of the recognition of the fact that it was not already possessed physically, in a military form.... Lying as a supplement to power--this is a new concept of "truth."

It is a mistake to presuppose _unconscious_ and _innocent_ development in this quarter--a sort of self-deception. Fanatics are not the discoverers of such exhaustive systems of oppression.... Cold-blooded reflection must have been at work here; the same sort of reflection which Plato showed when he worked out his "State"--"One must desire the means when one desires the end." Concerning this political maxim, all legislators have always been quite clear.

We possess the classical model, and it is specifically Arian: we can therefore hold the most gifted and most reflective type of man responsible for the most systematic lie that has ever been told.... Everywhere almost the lie was copied, and thus _Avian influence_ corrupted the world....

143.

Much is said to-day about the _Semitic_ spirit of the _New Testament_: but the thing referred to is merely priestcraft,--and in the purest example of an Arian law-book, in Manu, this kind of "Semitic spirit"--that is to say, _Sacerdotalism,_ is worse than anywhere else.

The development of the Jewish hierarchy is _not_ original: they learnt the scheme in Babylon--it is Arian. When, later on, the same thing became dominant in Europe, under the preponderance of Germanic blood, this was in conformity to the spirit of the _ruling race_: a striking case of atavism. The Germanic middle ages aimed at a revival of the _Arian order of castes_.

Mohammedanism in its turn learned from Christianity the use of a "Beyond" as an instrument of punishment.

The scheme of a _permanent community,_ with priests at its head--this oldest product of Asia's great culture in the domain of organisation--_naturally_ provoked reflection and imitation in every way.--Plato is an example of this, but above all, the Egyptians.

144.

_Moralities_ and _religions_ are the principal means by which one can modify men into whatever one likes; provided one is possessed of an overflow of creative power, and can cause one's will to prevail over long periods of time.

145.

If one wish to see an _affirmative_ Arian religion which is the product of a _ruling_ class, one should read the law-book of Manu. (The deification of the feeling of power in the Brahmin: it is interesting to note that it originated in the warrior-caste, and was later transferred to the priests.)

If one wish to see an _affirmative_ religion of the Semitic order, which is the product of the _ruling_ class, one should read the Koran or the earlier portions of the Old Testament. (_Mohammedanism,_ as a religion for men, has profound contempt for the sentimentality and prevarication of Christianity, ... which, according to Mohammedans, is a woman's religion.)

If one wish to see a _negative_ religion of the Semitic order, which is the product of the _oppressed_ class, one should read the New Testament (which, according to Indian and Arian points of view, is a religion for the Chandala).

If one wish to see a _negative_ Arian religion, which is the product of the _ruling_ classes, one should study Buddhism.

It is quite in the nature of things that we have no Arian religion which is the product of the _oppressed_ classes; for that would have been a contradiction: a race of masters is either paramount or else it goes to the dogs.

146.

Religion, _per se,_ has nothing to do with morality; yet both offshoots of the Jewish religion are _essentially_ moral religions--which prescribe the rules of living, and procure obedience to their principles by means of rewards and punishment.

147.

_Paganism--Christianity.--Paganism_ is that which says yea to all that is natural, it is innocence in being natural, "naturalness." _Christianity_ is that which says no to all that is natural, it is a certain lack of dignity in being natural; hostility to Nature.

"Innocent":--Petronius is innocent, for instance. Beside this happy man a Christian is absolutely devoid of innocence. But since even the _Christian_ status is ultimately only a natural condition, the term "Christian" soon begins to mean the _counterfeiting of the psychological interpretation._

148.

The Christian priest is from the root a mortal enemy of sensuality: one cannot imagine a greater contrast to his attitude than the guileless, slightly awed, and solemn attitude, which the religious rites of the most honourable women in Athens maintained in the presence of the symbol of sex. In all non-ascetic religions the procreative act is _the_ secret _per se_: a sort of symbol of perfection and of the designs of the future: re-birth, immortality.

149.

Our belief in ourselves is the greatest fetter, the most telling spur, and the _strongest pinion._ Christianity ought to have elevated the innocence of man to the position of an article of belief--men would then have become gods: in those days believing was still possible.

150.

The egregious _lie_ of history: as if it were the _corruption_ of Paganism that opened the road to Christianity. As a matter of fact, it was the enfeeblement and _moralisation_ of the man of antiquity. The new interpretation of natural functions, which made them appear like _vices,_ had already gone before!

151.

Religions are ultimately wrecked by the belief in morality. The idea of the Christian moral God becomes untenable,--hence "Atheism,"--as though there could be no other god.

_Culture_ is likewise wrecked by the belief in morality. For when the necessary and only possible conditions of its growth are revealed, nobody _will_ any longer countenance it (Buddhism).

152.

_The physiology of Nihilistic religions._--All in all, the _Nihilistic_ religions are _systematised histories of sickness_ described in religious and moral terminology.

In pagan cultures it is around the interpretation of the great annual cycles that the religious cult turns; in Christianity it is around a cycle of _paralytic phenomena._

153.

This _Nihilistic_ religion gathers together all the _decadent elements_ and things of like order which it can find in antiquity, viz.:--

_(a)_ The _weak_ and the _botched_ (the refuse of the ancient world, and that of which it rid itself with most violence).

_(b)_ Those who are _morally obsessed_ and _anti-pagan._

_(c)_ Those who are _weary of politics_ and indifferent (the _blasé_ Romans), the _denationalised,_ who know not what they are.

_(d)_ Those who are tired of themselves--who are happy to be party to a subterranean conspiracy.

154.

_Buddha_ versus _Christ._--Among the Nihilistic religions, Christianity and _Buddhism_ may always be sharply distinguished. _Buddhism_ is the expression of a _fine evening,_ perfectly sweet and mild--it is a sort of gratitude towards all that lies hidden, including that which it entirely lacks, viz., bitterness, disillusionment, and resentment. Finally it possesses lofty intellectual love; it has got over all the subtlety of philosophical contradictions, and is even resting after it, though it is precisely from that source that it derives its intellectual glory and its glow as of a sunset (it originated in the higher classes).

_Christianity_ is a degenerative movement, consisting of all kinds of decaying and excremental elements: it is _not_ the expression of the downfall of a race, it is, from the root, an agglomeration of all the morbid elements which are mutually attractive and which gravitate to one another.... It is therefore _not_ a national religion, _not_ determined by race: it appeals to the disinherited everywhere; it consists of a foundation of resentment against all that is successful and dominant: it is in need of a symbol which represents the damnation of everything successful and dominant. It is opposed to every form of _intellectual_ movement, to all philosophy: it takes up the cudgels for idiots, and utters a curse upon all intellect. Resentment against those who are gifted, learned, intellectually independent: in all these it suspects the element of success and domination.

155.