Chapter III: Eternal Recurrence (2)

The categories are "truths" only in the sense that they are the conditions of our existence, just as Euclid's Space is a conditional "truth." (Between ourselves, as no one will maintain that men are absolutely necessary, reason, as well as Euclid's Space, are seen to be but an idiosyncrasy of one particular species of animals, one idiosyncrasy alone among many others....)

The subjective constraint which prevents one from contradicting here, is a biological constraint: the instinct which makes us see the utility of concluding as we do conclude, is in our blood, we _are_ almost this instinct.... But what simplicity it is to attempt to derive from this fact that we possess an absolute truth! ... The inability to contradict anything is a proof of impotence but not of "truth."

516.

We are not able to affirm and to deny one and the same thing: that is a principle of subjective experience--which is not in the least "necessary," _but only a sign of inability._

If, according to Aristotle, the _principium contradictionis_ is the most certain of all principles; if it is the most ultimate of all, and the basis of every demonstration; if the principle of every other axiom lie within it: then one should analyse it all the more severely, in order to discover how many assumptions _already lie_ at its root. It either assumes something concerning reality and Being, as if these had become known in some other sphere--that is to say, as if it were _impossible_ to ascribe the opposite attributes to it; or the proposition means: that the opposites _should_ not be ascribed to it. In that case, logic would be an imperative, _not_ directed at the knowledge of truth, but at the adjusting and fixing of a world _which must seem true to us._

In short, the question is a debatable one: are the axioms of logic adequate to reality, or are they measures and means by which alone we can, _create_ realities, or the concept "reality"?... In order to affirm the first alternative, however, one would, as we have seen, require a previous knowledge of Being; which is certainly not the case. The proposition therefore contains no _criterion of truth,_ but an _imperative_ concerning that which _should_ pass as true.

Supposing there were no such thing as A identical with itself, as every logical (and mathematical) proposition presupposes, and that A is in itself an _appearance,_ then logic would have a mere world _of appearance_ as its first condition. As a matter of fact, we believe in that proposition, under the influence of an endless empiricism which seems to _confirm_ it every minute. The "thing"--that is the real substratum of A; _our belief in things_ is the first condition of our faith in logic. The A in logic is, like the atom, a reconstruction of the thing.... By not understanding this, and by making logic into a criterion of _real being,_ we are already on the road to the classification of all those hypostases, substance, attribute, object, subject, action, etc., as realities--that is to say, the conception of a metaphysical world or a "real world" (--_this is, however, once more the world of appearance..._).

The primitive acts of thought, affirmation, and negation, the holding of a thing for true, and the holding of a thing for not true,--in so far as they do not only presuppose a mere habit, but the very _right_ to postulate truth or untruth at all,--are already dominated by a belief, _that there is such a thing as knowledge for us,_ and _that judgments can really hit the truth:_ in short, logic never doubts that it is able to pronounce something concerning truth in itself (--that is to say, that to the thing which is in itself true, no opposite attributes _can_ be ascribed).

In this belief there _reigns_ the sensual and coarse prejudice that our sensations teach us _truths_ concerning things,--that I cannot at the same moment of time say of one and the same thing that it is _hard_ and _soft._ (The instinctive proof, "I cannot have two opposite sensations at once," is quite _coarse_ and _false_.)

That all contradiction in concepts should be forbidden, is the result of a belief, that we _are able_ to form concepts, that a concept not only characterises but also _holds_ the essence of a thing.... As a matter of fact, logic (like geometry and arithmetic) only holds good of _assumed existences which we have created._ Logic is _the attempt on our part to understand the actual world according to a scheme of Being devised by ourselves; or, more exactly, it is our attempt at making the actual world more calculable and more susceptible to formulation, for our own purposes...._

517.

In order to be able to think and to draw conclusions, it is necessary to _acknowledge that which exists:_ logic only deals with formulæ for things which are constant. That is why this acknowledgment would not in the least prove reality: "that which is" is part of our optics. The ego regarded as Being (not affected by either Becoming or evolution).

The _assumed world_ of subject, substance, reason, etc., is necessary, an adjusting, simplifying falsifying, artificially-separating power resides in us. "Truth" is the will to be master over the manifold sensations that reach consciousness; it is the will to _classify_ phenomena according to definite categories. In this way we start out with a belief in the "true nature" of things (we regard phenomena as real).

The character of the world in the process of Becoming _is not susceptible of formulation;_ it is "false" and "contradicts itself." _Knowledge_ and the process of _evolution_ exclude each other. _Consequently,_ knowledge must be something else: it must be preceded by a will to make things knowable, a kind of Becoming in itself must create the _illusion_ of _Being._

518.

If our "ego" is the only form of Being, according to which we make and understand all Being: very good! In that case it were very proper to doubt whether an _illusion_ of perspective were not active here--the apparent unity which everything assumes in our eyes on the horizon-line. Appealing to the body for our guidance, we are confronted by such appalling manifoldness, that for the sake of method it is allowable to use that phenomenon which is _richer_ and more easily studied as a clue to the understanding of the poorer phenomenon.

Finally: admitting that all is Becoming, _knowledge is only possible when based on a belief in Being._

519.

If there is "only one form of Being, the ego," and all other forms of Being are made in its own image,--if, in short, the belief in the "ego," together with the belief in logic, stands and falls with the metaphysical truth of the categories of reason: if, in addition, the "ego" is shown to be something that is _evolving: then----_

520.

The continual transitions that occur, forbid our speaking of the "individual," etc.; the "number" of beings itself fluctuates. We should know nothing of time or of movement, if, in a rough way, we did not believe we saw things "standing still" behind or in front of things moving. We should also know just as little about cause and effect, and without the erroneous idea of "empty space" we should never have arrived at the concept of space at all. The principle of identity is based on the "fact of appearance" that there are some things alike. Strictly speaking, it would not be possible to "understand" and "know" an evolving world; something which is called "knowledge" exists only in so far as the "understanding" and "knowing" intellect already finds an adjusted and rough world to hand, fashioned out of a host of mere appearances, but become fixed _to_ the extent in which this kind of appearance has helped to preserve life; only to this extent is "knowledge" possible--that is to say, as a measuring of earlier and more recent errors by one another.

521.

_Concerning logical appearance._--The concept "individual" and the concept "species" are equally false and only apparent. "_Species_" only expresses the fact that an abundance of similar creatures come forth at the same time, and that the speed of their further growth and of their further transformation has been made almost imperceptible for a long time: so that the actual and trivial changes and increase of growth are of no account at all (--a stage of evolution in which the process of evolving is not visible, so that, not only does a state of equilibrium _seem_ to have been reached, but the road is also made clear for the error of supposing _that an actual goal has been reached_--and that evolution had a goal...).

The form seems to be something enduring, and therefore valuable; but the form was invented merely by ourselves; and however often "the same form is attained," it does not signify that it _is the same form,--because something new always appears_; and we alone, who compare, reckon the new with the old, in so far as it resembles the latter, and embody the two in the unity of "form." As if a _type_ had to be reached and were actually intended by the formative processes.

_Form, species, law, idea, purpose_--the same fault is made in respect of all these concepts, namely, that of giving a false realism to a piece of fiction: as if all phenomena were infused with some sort of obedient spirit--an artificial distinction is here made between that _which_ acts and that _which_ guides action (but both these things are only fixed in order to agree with our metaphysico-logical dogma: they are not "facts").

We should not interpret this _constraint_ in ourselves, to imagine concepts, species, forms, purposes, and laws ("_a world of identical cases_") as if we were in a position to construct a _real world_; but as a constraint to adjust a world by means of which _our existence_ will be ensured: we thereby create a world which is determinable, simplified, comprehensible, etc., for us.

The very same constraint is active in _the functions of the senses_ which support the reason--by means of simplification, coarsening, accentuation, and interpretation; whereon all "recognition," all the ability of making one's self intelligible rests. Our _needs_ have made our senses so precise, that the "same world of appearance" always returns, and has thus acquired the semblance of _reality._

Our subjective constraint to have faith in logic, is expressive only of the fact that long before logic itself became conscious in us, we did nothing _save introduce its postulates into the nature of things:_ now we find ourselves in their presence,--we can no longer help it,--and now we would fain believe that this constraint is a guarantee of "truth." We it was who created the "thing," the "same thing," the subject, the attribute, the action, the object, the substance, and the form, after we had carried the process of equalising, coarsening, and simplifying as far as possible. The world _seems_ logical to us, because we have already made it logical.

522.

_Fundamental solution._--We believe in reason: this is, however, the philosophy of colourless _concepts._ Language is built upon the most _naïf_ prejudices.

Now we read discord and problems into things, because we are able to _think only_ in the form of language--we also believe in the "eternal truth" of "wisdom" (for instance, subject, attribute, etc.).

_We cease from thinking if we do not wish to think under the control of language_; the most we can do is to attain to an attitude of doubt concerning the question whether the boundary here really is a boundary.

_Rational thought is a process of interpreting according to a scheme which we cannot reject._

(_f_) Consciousness.

523.

There is no greater error than that of making psychical and physical phenomena the two faces, the two manifestations of the same substance. By this means nothing is explained: the concept _"substance"_ is utterly useless as a means of explanation. _Consciousness_ may be regarded as secondary, almost an indifferent and superfluous thing, probably destined to disappear and to be superseded by perfect automatism--

When we observe mental phenomena we may be likened to the deaf and dumb who divine the spoken word, which they do not hear, from the movements of the speaker's lips. From the appearance of the inner mind we draw conclusions concerning invisible and other phenomena, which we could ascertain if our powers of observation were adequate for the purpose.

For this inner world we have no finer organs, and that is why a _complexity which is thousandfold_ reaches our consciousness as a simple entity, and we invent a process of causation in it, despite the fact that we can perceive no cause either of the movement or of the change--the sequence of thoughts and feelings is nothing more than their becoming visible to consciousness. That this sequence has anything to do with a chain of causes is not worthy of belief: consciousness never communicates an example of cause and effect to us.

524.

_The part "consciousness" plays,_--It is essential that one should not mistake the part that "consciousness plays" it is our _relation to the outer world; it was the outer world that developed it._ On the other hand, the _direction_--that is to say, the care and cautiousness which is concerned with the inter-relation of the bodily functions, does _not_ enter into our consciousness any more than does the _storing activity_ of the intellect: that there is a superior controlling force at work in these things cannot be doubted--a sort of directing committee, in which the various _leading desires_ make their votes and their power felt. "Pleasure" and "pain" are indications which reach us from this sphere: as are also _acts of will_ and _ideas._

_In short:_ That which becomes conscious has causal relations which are completely and absolutely concealed from our knowledge--the sequence of thoughts, feelings, and ideas, in consciousness, does not signify that the order in which they come is a causal order: it is _so apparently,_ however, in the highest degree. We have _based_ the whole of our notion of _intellect, reason, logic,_ etc., upon this _apparent truth_ (all these things do not exist: they are imaginary syntheses and entities), and we then projected the latter into and _behind_ all things!

As a rule _consciousness_ itself is understood to be the general sensorium and highest ruling centre; albeit, it is only a _means of communication:_ it was developed by intercourse, and with a view to the interests of intercourse.... "Intercourse" is understood, here, as "relation," and is intended to cover the action of the outer world upon us and our necessary response to it, as also our actual influence _upon_ the outer world. It is _not_ the conducting force, but an _organ of the latter._

525.

My principle, compressed into a formula which savours of antiquity, of Christianity, Scholasticism, and other kinds of musk: in the concept, "God is _spirit,_" God as perfection is "_denied...._"

526.

Wherever people have observed a certain unity in the grouping of things, _spirit_ has always been regarded as the cause of this co-ordination: an assumption for which reasons are entirely lacking. Why should the idea of a complex fact be one of the conditions of that fact? Or why should the _notion_ of a complex fact have to precede it as its cause?

We must be on our guard against explaining _finality_ by the spirit: there is absolutely no reason whatever for ascribing to spirit the peculiar power of organising and systematising. The domain of the nervous system is much more extensive: the realm of consciousness is superadded. In the collective process of adaptation and systematising, consciousness plays no part at all.

527.

Physiologists, like philosophers, believe that consciousness increases in _value_ in proportion as it _gains_ in clearness: the most lucid consciousness and the most logical and impassive thought are of the _first_ order. Meanwhile--according to what standard is this value determined?--In regard to the _discharge of will-power_ the most superficial and _most simple_ thought is the most useful--it might therefore, etc. etc. (because it leaves few motives over).

_Precision in action_ is opposed to the _far-sighted_ and often uncertain judgments of _caution:_ the latter is led by the _deeper_ instinct.

528.

_The chief error of psychologists:_ they regard the indistinct idea as of a lower _kind_ than the distinct; but that which keeps at a distance from our consciousness and which is therefore _obscure, may_ on that very account be quite clear in itself. _The fact that a thing becomes obscure_ is a question _of the perspective of consciousness._

529.

The great misapprehensions:--

(1) The senseless _overestimation of consciousness,_ its elevation to the dignity of an entity: "a spirit," "a soul," something that feels, thinks, and wills;

(2) The spirit regarded as a _cause,_ especially where finality, system, and co-ordination appear;

(3) Consciousness classed as the highest form attainable, as the most superior kind of being, as "God";

(4) Will introduced wherever effects are observed;

(5) The "real world" regarded as the spiritual world, accessible by means of the facts of consciousness;

(6) Absolute knowledge regarded as the faculty of consciousness, wherever knowledge exists at all.

_Consequences:_--

Every step forward consists of a step forward in consciousness; every step backwards is a step into unconsciousness (unconsciousness was regarded as a falling-back upon the _passions_ and _senses--_as a state of _animalism ..._.)

Man approaches reality and real being through dialectics: man _departs_ from them by means of instincts, senses, and automatism....

To convert man into a spirit, would mean to make a god of him: spirit, will, goodness--all one.

_All goodness_ must take its root in spirituality, must be a fact of consciousness.

Every step made towards _something better_ can be only a step forward in _consciousness._

(g) Judgment. True--false.

530.

Kant's theological bias, his unconscious dogmatism, his moral outlook, ruled, guided, and directed him.

The πρῶτον ψεῡδος: how is the fact knowledge possible? Is knowledge a fact at all? What is knowledge? If we do not _know_ what knowledge is, we cannot possibly reply to the question, Is there such a thing as knowledge? Very _fine!_ But if I do not already "know" whether there is, or can be, such a thing as knowledge, I cannot reasonably ask the question, "What is knowledge?" Kant _believes_ in the fact of knowledge: what he requires is a piece of _naïveté: the knowledge of knowledge!_

"Knowledge is judgment." But judgment is a belief that something is this or that! And not knowledge! "All knowledge consists in synthetic judgments" which have the character of being _universally true_ (the fact is _so_ in all cases, and does not change), and which have the character of being _necessary_ (the reverse of the proposition cannot be imagined to exist).

The _validity_ of a belief in knowledge is always taken for granted; as is also the _validity_ of the feelings which conscience dictates. Here _moral ontology_ is the _ruling_ bias.

The conclusion, therefore, is: (1) there are propositions which we believe to be universally true and necessary.

(2) This character of universal truth and of necessity cannot spring from experience.

(3) Consequently it must base itself upon no experience at all, _but upon something else_, it must be derived from another source of knowledge!

Kant concludes (1) that there are some propositions which hold good only on one condition; (2) this condition is that they do not spring from experience, but from pure reason.

Thus, the question is, whence do we derive our reasons for _believing_ in the truth of such propositions? No, whence does our belief get its cause? But the _origin of a belief,_ of a strong conviction, is a psychological problem: and very limited and narrow experience frequently brings about such a belief! _It already presupposes_ that there are not only "data _a posteriori_" but also "data _a priori_"-- that is to say, "previous to experience." Necessary and universal truth cannot be given by experience: it is therefore quite clear that it has come to us without experience at all?

There is no such thing as an isolated judgment!

An isolated judgment is never "true," it is never knowledge; only in _connection with,_ and when _related to,_ many other judgments, is a guarantee of its truth forthcoming.

What is the difference between true and false belief? What is knowledge? He "knows" it, that is heavenly! Necessary and universal truth cannot be given by experience! It is therefore independent of experience, _of_ all experience! The view which comes quite _a priori,_ and therefore independent of all experience, _merely out of reason,_ is "pure knowledge"!

"The principles of logic, the principle of identity and of contradiction, are examples of pure knowledge, because they precede all experience."--But these principles are not cognitions, but _regulative articles of faith._

In order to establish the _a priori_ character (the pure rationality) of mathematical axioms, space _must be conceived as a form of pure reason._

Hume had declared that there were no _a priori_ synthetic judgments. Kant says there are--the mathematical ones! And if there are such judgments, there may also be such things as metaphysics and a knowledge of things by means of pure reason!

Mathematics is possible under conditions which are _not_ allowed to metaphysics. All human knowledge is either experience or mathematics.

A judgment is synthetic--that is to say, it co-ordinates various ideas. It is _a priori_--that is to say, this co-ordination is universally true and necessary, and is arrived at, not by sensual experience, but by pure reason.

If there are such things as _a priori_ judgments, then reason must be able to co-ordinate: co-ordination is a form. Reason must _possess a formative faculty._

531.

_Judging_ is our oldest faith; it is our habit of believing this to be true or false, of asserting or denying, our certainty that something is thus and not otherwise, our belief that we really "know"--_what_ is believed to be true in all judgments?

What are _attributes_?--We did not regard changes in ourselves merely as such, but as "things in themselves," which are strange to us, and which we only "perceive"; and we did _not_ class them as phenomena, but as Being, as "attributes"; and in addition we invented a creature to which they attach themselves--that is to say, we made the _effect_ the _working cause,_ and _the latter_ we made _Being._ But even in this plain statement, the concept "effect" is arbitrary: for in regard to those changes which occur in us, and of which we are convinced we ourselves are _not_ the cause, we still argue that they must be effects: and this is in accordance with the belief that "every change must have its author";--but this belief in itself is already mythology; for it _separates_ the working _cause from_ the cause in work. When I say the "lightning flashes," I set the flash down, once as an action and a second time as a subject acting; and thus a thing is fancifully affixed to a phenomenon, which is not one with it, but which is _stable,_ which _is,_ and does not "come."--_To make the phenomenon the working cause,_ and to make _the effect into a thing--into Being:_ this is the _double_ error, or _interpretation,_ of which we are guilty.

532.

The _Judgment_--that is the faith: "This and this is so. In every judgment, therefore, there lies the admission that an "identical" case has been met with: it thus takes some sort of comparison for granted, with the help of the memory. Judgment does _not_ create the idea that an identical case seems to be there. It believes rather that it actually perceives such a case; it works on the hypothesis that there are such things as identical cases. But what is that much _older_ function called, which must have been active much earlier, and which in itself equalises unequal cases and makes them alike? What is that second function called, which with this first one as a basis, etc. etc, "That which provokes the same sensations as another thing is equal to that other thing": but what is that called which makes sensations equal, which regards them as equal?--There could be no judgments if a sort of equalising process were not active within all sensations: memory is only possible by means of the underscoring of all that has already been experienced and learned. Before a judgment can be formed, _the process of assimilation must already have been completed_: thus, even here, an intellectual activity is to be observed which does not enter consciousness in at all the same way as the pain which accompanies a wound. Probably the psychic phenomena correspond to all the organic functions--that is to say, they consist of assimilation, rejection, growth, etc.

The essential thing is to start out from the body and to use it as the general clue. It is by far the richer phenomenon, and allows of much more accurate observation. The belief in the body is much more soundly established than the belief in spirit.

"However strongly a thing may be believed, the degree of belief is no criterion of its truth." But what is truth? Perhaps it is a form of faith, which has become a condition of existence? Then _strength_ would certainly be a criterion; for instance, in regard to causality.

533.

Logical accuracy, transparency, considered as the criterion of truth ("_omne illud verum est, quod clare et distincte percipitur._"--Descartes): by this means the mechanical hypothesis of the world becomes desirable and credible.

But this is gross confusion: like _simplex sigillum veri._ Whence comes the knowledge that the real nature of things stands in _this_ relation to our intellect? Could it not be otherwise? Could it not be this, that the hypothesis which gives the intellect the greatest feeling of power and security, is _preferred, valued,_ and marked as _true_--The intellect sets its _freest_ and _strongest faculty_ and _ability_ as the criterion of what is most valuable, consequently of what is _true...._

"True"--from the standpoint of sentiment--is that which most
provokes sentiment ("I");

from the standpoint of thought--is that which gives thought
the greatest sensation of strength;

from the standpoint of touch, sight, and hearing--is that
which calls forth the greatest resistance.

Thus it is the _highest degrees of activity_ which awaken belief in regard to the _object_, in regard to its "reality." The sensations of strength, struggle, and resistance convince the subject that there is something which is being resisted.

534.

The criterion of truth lies in the enhancement of the feeling of power.

535.

According to my way of thinking, "truth" does not necessarily mean the opposite of error, but, in the most fundamental cases, merely the relation of different errors to each other: thus one error might be older, deeper than another, perhaps altogether ineradicable, one without which organic creatures like ourselves could not exist; whereas other errors might not tyrannise over us to that extent as conditions of existence, but when measured according to the standard of those other "tyrants," could even be laid aside and "refuted." Why should an irrefutable assumption necessarily be "true"? This question may exasperate the logicians who limit _things_ according to the limitations they find in themselves: but I have long since declared war with this logician's optimism.

536.

Everything simple is simply imaginary, but not "true." That which is real and true is, however, neither a unity nor reducible to a unity.

537.

_What is truth?_--Inertia; _that_ hypothesis which brings satisfaction, the smallest expense of intellectual strength, etc.

538.

First proposition. The _easier_ way of thinking always triumphs over the more difficult way;--_dogmatically_: _simplex sigillum veri_.--_Dico_: to suppose that _clearness_ is any proof of truth, is absolute childishness. . . .

Second proposition. The teaching of Being, of things, and of all those constant entities, is a _hundred times more easy_ than the teaching of _Becoming_ and of evolution. . .

Third proposition. Logic was intended to be a method of _facilitating_ thought: a _means of expression_, --not truth. . . . Later on it got to _act_ like truth. . . .

539.

Parmenides said: "One can form no concept of the non-existent";--we are at the other extreme, and say, "That Of which a concept can be formed, is certainly fictional."

540.

There are many kinds of eyes. Even the Sphinx has eyes--therefore there must be many kinds of "truths," and consequently there can be no truth.

541.

_Inscriptions over the porch of a modern lunatic asylum._

"That which is necessarily true in thought must be necessarily true in morality."--HERBERT SPENCER.

"The ultimate test of the truth of a proposition is the inconceivableness of its negation,"--HERBERT SPENCER.

542.

If the character of existence were false,:--and this would be possible,--what would truth then be, all our truth? ... An unprincipled falsification of the false? A higher degree of falseness? ...

543.

In a world which was essentially false, truthfulness would be an _anti-natural tendency_: its only purpose would be to provide a means of attaining to a _higher degree of falsity._ For a world of truth and Being to be simulated, the truthful one would first have to be created (it being understood that he must believe himself to be "truthful").

Simple, transparent, not in contradiction with himself, lasting, remaining always the same to himself, free from faults, sudden changes, dissimulation, and form: such a man conceives a world of Being as "_God_" in His own image.

In order that truthfulness may be possible, the whole sphere in which man moves must be very tidy, small, and respectable: the advantage in every respect must be with the truthful one.--Lies, tricks, dissimulations, must cause astonishment.

544.

_"Dissimulation"_ increases in accordance with the rising _order of rank_ among organic beings. In the inorganic world it seems to be entirely absent. There power opposes power quite roughly _--ruse_ begins in the organic world; plants are already masters of it. The greatest men, such as Cæsar and Napoleon (see Stendhal's remark concerning him),[3] as also the higher races (the Italians), the Greeks (Odysseus); the most supreme cunning, belongs to the very _essence_ of the elevation of man. ... The problem of the actor. My Dionysian ideal.... The optics of all the organic functions, of all the strongest vital instincts: the power which _will_ have error in all life; error as the very first principle of thought itself. Before "thought" is possible, "fancy" must first have done its work; the _picturing_ of identical cases, of the _seemingness_ of identity, is more primeval than the cognition of identity.

[Footnote 3: The reference to Stendhal here, seems to point to a passage in his _Life of Napoleon_ (Preface, p. xv) of which Nietzsche had made a note in another place, and which reads: "Une croyance presque instinctive chez moi c'est que tout homme puissant ment quand il parle et à plus forte raison quand il écrit."]

_(h)_ Against Causality.

545.

I believe in absolute space as the basis of force, and I believe the latter to be limited and formed. Time, eternal. But space and time as things in themselves do not exist. "Changes" are only appearances (or mere processes of our senses to us); if we set recurrence, however regular, between them, nothing is proved beyond the fact that it has always happened so. The feeling that _post hoc_ is _propter hoc,_ is easily explained as the result of a misunderstanding, it is comprehensible. But appearances cannot be "causes"!

546.

The interpretation of a phenomenon, _either_ as an action _or_ as the endurance of an action (that is to say, every action involves the suffering of it), amounts to this: every change, every differentiation, presupposes the existence of an agent and somebody acted upon, _who_ is "altered."

547.

Psychological history of the concept _subject._ The body, the thing, the "whole," which is visualised by the eye, awakens the thought of distinguishing between an action and an agent; the idea that the agent is the cause of the action, after having been repeatedly refined, at length left the "subject" over.

548.

Our absurd habit of regarding a mere mnemonic sign or abbreviated formula as an independent being, and ultimately as a _cause_; as, for instance, when we say of lightning that it flashes, even the little word "I." A sort of double-sight in seeing which makes sight a _cause of seeing in itself_: this was the feat in the invention of the "subject" of the "ego."

549.

"Subject," "object," "attribute"--these distinctions have been _made,_ and are now used like schemes to cover all apparent facts. The false fundamental observation is this, that I believe it is I who does something, who suffers something, who "has" something, who "has" a quality.

550.

In every judgment lies the whole faith in subject, attribute, or cause and effect (in the form of an assumption that every effect is the result of activity, and that all activity presupposes an agent), and even this last belief is only an isolated case of the first, so that faith remains as the most fundamental belief! there are such things as subjects, everything that happens is related attributively to a subject of some sort.

I notice something, and try to discover the reason of it: originally this was, I look for an _intention_ behind it, and, above all, I look for one who has an intention, for a subject, an agent: every phenomenon is an action, formerly intentions were seen behind _all_ phenomena, this is our oldest habit. Has the animal also this habit? As a living organism, is it not also compelled to interpret things through itself. The question why? is always a question concerning the _causa finalis,_ and the general "purpose" of things. We have no sign of the "sense of the efficient cause"; in this respect Hume is quite right, habit (but not only that of the individual) allows us to expect that a certain process, frequently observed, will follow upon another, but nothing more! That which gives us such an extraordinarily firm faith in causality, is not the rough habit of observing the sequence of processes, but our _inability_ to _interpret_ a phenomenon otherwise than as the result of _design._ It is the _belief in_ living and thinking things, as the only agents of _causation_; it is the belief in will, in design--the belief that all phenomena are actions, and that all actions presuppose an agent; it is the belief in the "subject." Is not this belief in the concepts subject and object an arrant absurdity?

Question: Is the design the cause of a phenomenon? Or is that also illusion? Is it not the phenomenon itself?

551.

_A criticism of the concept "cause."_--We have absolutely no experience concerning _cause_, viewed psychologically we derive the whole concept from the subjective conviction, that _we_ ourselves are causes--that is to say, that the arm moves.... _But that is an error._ We distinguish ourselves, the agents, from the action, and everywhere we make use of this scheme--we try to discover an agent behind every phenomenon. What have we done? We have _misunderstood_ a feeling of power, tension, resistance, a muscular feeling, which is already the beginning of the action, and posited it as a cause; or we have understood the will to do this or that, as a cause, because the action follows it. There is no such thing as "Cause," in those few cases in which it seemed to be given, and in which we projected it out of ourselves in_ order to understand a phenomenon,_ it has been shown to be an illusion. Our understanding of a phenomenon consisted in our inventing a subject who was responsible for something happening, and for the manner in which it happened. In our concept "cause" we have embraced our feeling of will, our feeling of "freedom," our feeling of responsibility and our design to do an action: _causa efficiens_ and _causa finalis_ are fundamentally one.

We believed that an effect was explained when we could point to a state in which it was inherent. As a matter of fact, we invent all causes according to the scheme of the effect: the latter is known to us.... On the other hand, we are not in a position to say of any particular thing how it will "act." The thing, the subject the will, the design--all inherent in the conception "cause." We try to discover things in order to explain why something has changed. Even the "atom" is one of these fanciful inventions like the "thing" and the "primitive subject."...

At last we understand that things--consequently also atoms--effect nothing: _because they are non-existent;_ and that the concept causality is quite! useless. Out of a necessary sequence of states, the latter's causal relationship does _not_ follow (that would be equivalent to extending their _active principle_ from 1 to 2, to 3, to 4, to 5). _There is no such thing as a cause or an effect._ From the standpoint of language we do not know how to rid ourselves of them. But that does not matter. If I imagine _muscle_ separated from its "effects," I have denied it....

In short: _a phenomenon is neither effected nor capable of effecting. Causa_ is a _faculty to effect something,_ superadded fancifully to what happens....

_The interpretation of causality is an illusion...._ A "thing" is the sum of its effects, synthetically united by means of a concept, an image. As a matter of fact, science has robbed the concept causality of all meaning, and has reserved it merely as an allegorical formula, which has made it a matter of indifference whether cause or effect be put on this side or on that. It is asserted that in two complex states (centres of force) the quantities of energy remain constant.

_The calculability of a phenomenon_ does not lie in the fact that a rule is observed, or that a necessity is obeyed, or that we have projected a law of causality into every phenomenon: it lies in the _recurrence of "identical cases."_

There is no such thing as a _sense of causality,_ as Kant would have us believe. We are aghast, we feel insecure, we will have something familiar, which can be relied upon.... As soon as we are shown the existence of something old in a new thing, we are pacified. The so-called instinct of causality is nothing more than the _fear of the unfamiliar_, and the attempt at finding something in it which is already _known._--It is not a search for causes, but for the familiar.

552.

_To combat determinism and teleology._--From the fact that something happens regularly, and that its occurrence may be reckoned upon, it does not follow that it happens _necessarily._ If a quantity of force determines and conducts itself in a certain way in every particular case, it does not prove that it has "no free will." "Mechanical necessity" is not an established fact: it was _we_ who first read into the nature of all phenomena. We interpreted the possibility of _formularising_ phenomena as a result of the dominion of necessary law over all existence. But it does not follow, because I do a determined thing, that I am bound to do it. _Compulsion_ cannot be demonstrated in things: all that the rule proves is this, that one and the same phenomenon is not another phenomenon. Owing to the very fact that we fancied the existence of subjects "_agents_" in things, the notion arose that all phenomena are the _consequence_ of a _compulsory force_ exercised over the subject--exercised by whom? once more by an "agent." The concept "Cause and Effect" is a dangerous one, so long as people believe in something that _causes,_ and a something that is _caused._

_(a)_ Necessity is not an established fact, but an interpretation.

***

_(b)_ When it is understood that the "subject" is nothing that _acts,_ but only a thing of fancy, there is much that follows.

Only with the subject as model we invented _thingness_ and read it into the pell-mell of sensations. If we cease from believing in the _acting_ subject, the belief in _acting_ things, in reciprocal action, in cause and effect between phenomena which we call things, also falls to pieces.

In this case the world of _acting atoms_ also disappears: for this world is always assumed to exist on the pre-determined grounds that subjects are necessary.

Ultimately, of course, _the "thing-in-itself"_ also disappears: for at bottom it is the conception of a "subject-in-itself." But we have seen that the subject is an imaginary thing. The antithesis "thing-in-itself" and "appearance" is untenable; but in this way the concept "_appearance_" also disappears.

***

_(c)_ If we abandon the idea of the acting _subject,_ we also abandon the _object_ acted upon. Duration, equality to self, Being, are inherent neither in what is called subject, nor in what is called object: they are complex phenomena, and in regard to other phenomena are apparently durable--they are distinguishable, for instance, by the different tempo with which they happen (repose--movement, fixed --loose: all antitheses which do not exist in themselves and by means of which _differences of degree_ only are expressed; from a certain limited point of view, though, they seem to be antitheses. There are no such things as antitheses; it is from logic that we derive our concept of contrasts--and starting out from its standpoint we spread the error over all things).

***

_(d)_ If we abandon the ideas "subject" and "object"; then we must also abandon the idea _"substance"_--and therefore its various modifications too; for instance: "matter," "spirit," and other hypothetical things, "eternity and the immutability of matter," etc. We are then rid of _materiality._

***

From a moral standpoint _the world is false._ But inasmuch as morality itself is a part of this world, morality also is false. The will to truth is a process of _establishing things_, it is a process of _making_ things true and lasting, a total elimination of that _false_ character, a transvaluation of it into _being._ Thus, "truth" is not something which is present and which has to be found and discovered; it is something _which has to be created_ and which _gives_ its name _to a process,_ or, better still, to the Will to overpower, which in itself has no purpose: to introduce truth is a _processus in infinitum,_ an _active determining_--it is not a process of becoming conscious of something, which in itself is fixed and determined. It is merely a word for "The Will to Power."

Life is based on the hypothesis of a belief in stable and regularly recurring things, the mightier it is, the more vast must be the world of knowledge and the world called being. Logicising, rationalising, and systematising are of assistance as means of existence.

Man projects his instinct of truth, his "aim," to a certain extent beyond himself, in the form of a metaphysical world of Being, a "thing-in-itself," a world already to hand. His requirements as a creator make him _invent_ the world in which he works in advance; he anticipates it: this anticipation (this faith in truth) is his mainstay.

***

All phenomena, movement, Becoming, regarded as the establishment of relations of degree and of force, as a contest....

***

As soon as we _fancy_ that some one is responsible for the fact that we are thus and thus, etc. (God, Nature), and that we ascribe our existence, our happiness, our misery, our _destiny,_ to that some one, we corrupt the _innocence of Becoming_ for ourselves. We then have some one who wishes to attain to something by means of us and with us.

***

The "welfare of the individual" is just as fanciful as the "welfare of the species": the first is _not_ sacrificed to the last; seen from afar, the species is just as fluid as the individual. "The _preservation_ of the species" is only a result of the _growth_ of the species--that is to say, _of the overcoming of the species_ on the road to a stronger kind.

***

Theses:--The apparent conformity of means to end ("the conformity of means to end which far surpasses the art of man) is merely the result of that "_Will to Power_" which manifests itself in all phenomena:--_To become stronger_ involves a process of ordering, which may well be mistaken for an attempted conformity of means to end:--The _ends_ which are apparent are not intended but, as soon as a superior power prevails over an inferior power, and the latter proceeds to work as a function of the former, an order of _rank_ is established, an organisation which must give rise to the idea that there is an arrangement of means and ends.

Against apparent "_necessity_":--

This is only an expression for the fact that a certain power is not also something else.

Against the apparent conformity of means to ends":--

The latter is only an _expression_ for the order among the spheres of power and their interplay.

_(i)_ The Thing-in-Itself and Appearance.

553.

The foul blemish on Kant's criticism has at last become visible even to the coarsest eyes: Kant had no right to his distinction "_appearance_" and "_thing-in-itself,_"--in his own writings he had deprived himself of the right of differentiating any longer in this old and hackneyed manner, seeing that he had condemned the practice of drawing any conclusions concerning the cause of an appearance from the appearance itself, as unallowable in accordance with his conception of the idea of causality and its _purely intraphenomenal_ validity, and this conception, on the other hand, already anticipates that _differentiation,_ as if the "thing in itself" were not only inferred but actually _given._

554.

It is obvious that neither things-in-themselves _nor_ appearances can be related to each other in the form of cause and effect: and from this it follows that the concept "cause and effect" is _not applicable_ in a philosophy which believes in things-in-themselves and in appearances. Kant's mistake--... As a matter of fact, from a psychological standpoint, the concept "cause and effect" is derived from an attitude of mind which believes it sees the action of will upon will everywhere, which believes only in living things, and at bottom only in souls (not in things). Within the mechanical view of the world (which is logic and its application to space and time) that concept is reduced to the mathematical formula with which--and this is a fact which cannot be sufficiently emphasised--nothing is ever understood, but rather _defined_--deformed.

555.

The greatest of all fables is the one relating to knowledge. People would like to know how things-in-themselves are constituted: but behold, there are no things-in-themselves! But even supposing there _were_ an "in-itself," an unconditional thing, it could on that very account _not be known_! Something unconditioned cannot be known: otherwise it would not be unconditioned! Knowing, however, is always a process of "coming into relation with something"; the knowledge-seeker, on this principle, wants the thing, which he would know, to be nothing to him, and to be nothing to anybody at all: and from this there results a contradiction,--in the first place, between this _will_ to know, and this desire that the thing to be known _should_ be nothing to him (wherefore know at all then?); and secondly, because something which is nothing to anybody, does not even _exist,_ and therefore cannot be known. Knowing means: "to place one's self in relation with something," to feel one's self conditioned by something and one's self conditioning it under all circumstances, then, it is a process of _making stable or fixed,_ of _defining,_ of _making conditions conscious_ (not a process of _sounding_ things, creatures, or objects in-themselves).

556.

A "thing-in-itself" is just as absurd as a "sense-in-itself," a "meaning-in-itself." There is no such thing as a "fact-in-itself," _for a meaning must always be given to it before it can become a fact._

The answer to the question, "What is that?" is a process of _fixing a meaning_ from a different standpoint. The "_essence_" the "_essential factor,_" is something which is only seen as a whole in perspective, and which presupposes a basis which is multifarious. Fundamentally the question is "What is that for me?" (for us, for everything that lives, etc. etc.).

A thing would be defined when all creatures had asked and answered this question, "What is that?" concerning it. Supposing that one single creature, with its own relations and standpoint in regard to all things, were lacking, that thing would still remain undefined.

In short: the essence of a thing is really only an _opinion_ concerning that "thing." Or, better still; "_it is worth_" is actually what is meant by _"it is"_ or by "that is."

One may not ask: "_Who_ interprets, then?" for the act of interpreting _itself_ as a form of the Will to Power, manifests itself (not as "Being," but as a _process,_ as _Becoming_) as a passion.

The origin of "things" is wholly the work of the idealising, thinking, willing, and feeling subject. The concept thing as well as all its attributes.--Even "the subject" is a creation of this order, a "thing" like all others: a simplification, aiming at a definition of the _power_ that fixes, invents, and thinks, as such, as distinct from all isolated fixing, inventing, and thinking. Thus a capacity defined or distinct from all other individual capacities; at bottom action conceived collectively in regard to all the action which has yet to come (action and the probability of similar action).

557.

The qualities of a thing are its effects upon other "things."

If one imagines other "things" to be non-existent, a thing has no qualities.

That is to say; _there is nothing without other things._

That is to say; there is no "thing-in-itself."

558.

The thing-in-itself is nonsense. If I think all the "relations," all the "qualities" all the "activities" of a thing, away, the thing itself does _not_ remain: for "thingness" was only _invented fancifully_ by us to meet certain logical needs--that is to say, for the purposes of definition and comprehension (in order to correlate that multitude of relations, qualities, and activities).

559.

"Things which have a nature _in themselves_"--a dogmatic idea, which must be absolutely abandoned.

560.

That things should have a _nature in themselves,_ quite apart from interpretation and subjectivity, _is a perfectly idle hypothesis_: it would presuppose that _interpretation_ and the _act of being subjective_ are not essential, that a thing divorced from all its relations can still be a thing.

Or, the other way round: the apparent _objective_ character of things; might it not be merely the result of a _difference of degree_ within the subject perceiving?--could not that which changes slowly strike us as being objective, lasting, Being, "in-itself"?--could not the objective view be only a false way of conceiving things and a contrast _within_ the perceiving subject?

561.

If all unity were only unity as organisation. But the "thing" in which we believe was _invented_ only as a substratum to the various attributes. If the thing "acts," it means: we regard _all the other_ qualities which are to hand, and which are momentarily latent, as the cause accounting for the fact that one individual quality steps forward--that is to say, _we take the sum of its qualities--x--_as the cause of the quality _x_; which is obviously _quite_ absurd and imbecile!

All unity is _only so_ in the form of _organisation_ and _collective action:_ in the same way as a human community is a unity--that is to say, _the reverse of_ atomic _anarchy_; thus it is a body politic, which _stands for_ one, yet _is_ not one.

562.

"At some time in the development of thought, a point must have been reached when man became conscious of the fact that what he called the _qualities of a thing_ were merely the sensations of the feeling subject: and thus the qualities ceased from belonging to the thing." The "thing-in-itself" remained over. 'The distinction between the thing-in-itself and the thing-for-us, is based upon that older and artless observation which would fain grant energy to things: but analysis revealed that even force was only ascribed to them by our fancy, as was also--substance. "The thing affects a subject?" Thus the root of the idea of substance is in language, not in things outside ourselves! The thing-in-itself is not a problem at all!

Being will have to be conceived as a sensation which is no longer based upon anything quite devoid of sensation.

In movement no new _meaning_ is given to feeling. That which is, cannot be the substance of movement: it is therefore a form of Being.

_N.B._--The explanation of life may be sought, in the first
place, through mental images of phenomena which _precede_ it
(purposes);

Secondly, through mental images of phenomena which follow
behind it (the mathematico-physical explanation).

The two should not be confounded. Thus: the physical explanation, which is the symbolisation of the world by means of feeling and thought, cannot in itself make feeling and thinking originate again and show its derivation: physics must rather construct the world of feeling, consistently _without feeling or purpose _ right up to the highest man. And teleology is only a _history of purposes,_ and is never physical.

563.

Our method of acquiring "knowledge" is limited to a process of establishing _quantities,_ but we can by no means help feeling the difference of quantity as differences of _quality._ Quality is merely a _relative_ truth for _us_; it is not a "thing-in-itself."

Our senses have a certain definite quantum as a mean, within the limits of which they perform their functions--that is to say, we become conscious of bigness and smallness in accordance with the conditions of our existence. If we sharpened or blunted our senses tenfold, we should perish--that is to say, we feel even _proportions_ as _qualities_ in regard to our possibilities of existence.

564.