Chapter III: Eternal Recurrence (6)

Morality is essentially a shield, a means of defence; and, in so far, it is a sign of the imperfectly developed man (he is still in armour; he is still stoical).

The fully developed man is above all provided with _weapons:_ he is a man who _attacks._

The weapons of war are converted into weapons of peace (out of scales and carapaces grow feathers and hair).

728.

The very notion, "living organism", implies that there must be growth,--that there must be a striving after an extension of power, and therefore a process of absorption of other forces. Under the drowsiness brought on by moral narcotics, people speak of the right of the individual to _defend himself;_ on the same principle one might speak of his right to _attack_: for _both_--and the latter more than the former--are necessities where all living organisms are concerned: aggressive and defensive egoism are not questions of choice or even of "free will," but they are fatalities of life itself.

In this respect it is immaterial whether one have an individual, a living body, or "an advancing society" in view. The right to punish (or society's means of defence) has been arrived at only through a misuse of the word "right": a right is acquired only by contract, but self-defence and self-preservation do not stand upon the basis of a contract. A people ought at least, with quite as much justification, to be able to regard its lust of power, either in arms, commerce, trade, or colonisation, as a right the right of growth, perhaps.... When the instincts of a society ultimately make it give up war and renounce conquest, it is decadent: it is ripe for democracy and the rule of shopkeepers. In the majority of cases, it is true, assurances of peace are merely stupefying draughts.

729.

The maintenance of the military State is the last means of adhering to the great tradition of the past; or, where it has been lost, to revive it. By means of it the superior or strong type of man is preserved, and all institutions and ideas which perpetuate enmity and order of rank in States, such as national feeling, protective tariffs, etc., may on that account seem justified.

730.

In order that a thing may last longer than a person (that is to say, in order that a work may outlive the individual who has created it), all manner of limitations and prejudices must be imposed upon people. But how? By means of love, reverence, gratitude towards the person who created the work, or by means of the thought that our ancestors fought for it, or by virtue of the feeling that the safety of our descendants will be secured if we uphold the work--for instance, the _polis._ Morality is essentially the means of; making something survive the individual, because it makes him of necessity a slave. Obviously the aspect from above is different from the aspect from below, and will lead to quite different interpretations. How is organised power _maintained_?--By the fact that countless generations sacrifice themselves to its cause.

731.

Marriage, property, speech, tradition, race, family, people, and State, are each links in a chain--separate parts which have a more or less high or low origin. Economically they are justified by the surplus derived from the advantages of uninterrupted work and multiple production, as weighed against the disadvantages of greater expense in barter and the difficulty of making things last. (The working parts are multiplied, and yet remain largely idle. Hence the cost of producing them is greater, and the cost of maintaining them by no means inconsiderable.) The advantage consists in avoiding interruption and incident loss. Nothing is more expensive than a start. "The higher the standard of living, the greater will be the expense of maintenance, nourishment, and propagation, as also the risk and the probability of an utter fall on reaching the summit."

732.

In bourgeois marriages, naturally in the best sense of the word marriage, there is no question whatsoever of love any more than there is of money. For on love no institution can be founded. The whole matter consists in society giving leave to two persons to satisfy their sexual desires under conditions obviously designed to safeguard social order. Of course there must be a certain attraction between the parties and a vast amount of good nature, patience, compatibility, and charity in any such contract. But the word love should not be misused as regards such a union. For two lovers, in the real and strong meaning of the word, the satisfaction of sexual desire is unessential; it is a mere symbol. For the one side, as I have already said, it is a symbol of unqualified submission: for the other, a sign of condescension--a sign of the appropriation of property. Marriage, as understood by the real old nobility, meant the breeding forth of the race (but are there any nobles nowadays? _Quaeritur_),--that is to say, the maintenance of a fixed definite type of ruler, for which object husband and wife were sacrificed. Naturally the first consideration here had nothing to do with love; on the contrary! It did not even presuppose that mutual sympathy which is the _sine qua non_ of the bourgeois marriage. The prime consideration was the interest of the race, and in the second place came the interest of a particular class. But in the face of the coldness and rigour and calculating lucidity of such a noble concept of marriage as prevailed among every healthy aristocracy, like that of ancient Athens, and even of Europe during the eighteenth century, we warm-blooded animals, with our miserably oversensitive hearts, we "moderns," cannot restrain a slight shudder. That is why love as a passion, in the big meaning of this word, was invented for, and in, an aristocratic community--where convention and abstinence are most severe.

733.

_Concerning the future of marriage._ A super-tax on inherited property, a longer term of military service for bachelors of a certain minimum age within the community.

Privileges of all sorts for fathers who lavish boys upon the world, and perhaps plural votes as well.

A medical certificate as a condition of any marriage, endorsed by the parochial authorities, in which a series of questions addressed to the parties and the medical officers must be answered ("family histories").

As a counter-agent to prostitution, or as its ennoblement, I would recommend leasehold marriages (to last for a term of years or months), with adequate provision for the children.

Every marriage to be warranted and sanctioned by a certain number of good men and true, of the parish, as a parochial obligation.

734.

_Another commandment of philanthropy._--There are cases where to have a child would be a crime--for example, for chronic invalids and extreme neurasthenics. These people should be converted to chastity, and for this purpose the music of _Parsifal_ might at all events be tried. For Parsifal himself, that born fool, had ample reasons for not desiring to propagate. Unfortunately, however, one of the regular symptoms of exhausted stock is the inability to exercise any self-restraint in the presence of stimuli, and the tendency to respond to the smallest sexual attraction. It would be quite a mistake, for instance, to think of Leopardi as a chaste man. In such cases the priest and moralist play a hopeless game: it would be far better to send for the apothecary. Lastly, society here has a positive duty to fulfil, and of all the demands that are made on it, there are few more urgent and necessary than this one. Society as the trustee of life, is responsible to life for every botched life that comes into existence, and as it has to atone for such lives, it ought consequently to make it impossible for them ever to see the light of day: it should in many cases actually prevent the act of procreation, and may, without any regard for rank, descent, or intellect, hold in readiness the most rigorous forms of compulsion and restriction, and, under certain circumstances, have recourse to castration. The Mosaic law, "Thou shalt do no murder," is a piece of ingenuous puerility compared with the earnestness of this forbidding of life to decadents, "Thou shalt not beget"!!! ... For life itself recognises no solidarity or equality of rights between the healthy and unhealthy parts of an organism. The latter must at all cost be _eliminated,_ lest the whole fall to pieces. Compassion for decadents, equal rights for the physiologically botched--this would be the very pinnacle of immorality, it would be setting up Nature's most formidable opponent as morality itself!

735.

There are some delicate and morbid natures, the so-called idealists, who can never under any circumstances rise above a coarse, immature crime: yet it is the great justification of their anæmic little existence, it is the small requital for their lives of cowardice and falsehood to have been for one _instant_ at least--strong. But they generally collapse after such an act.

736.

In our civilised world we seldom hear of any but the bloodless, trembling criminal, overwhelmed by the curse and contempt of society, doubting even himself, and always belittling and belying his deeds--a misbegotten sort of criminal; that is why we are opposed to the idea that _all great men have been criminals_ (only in the grand style, and neither petty nor pitiful), that crime must be inherent in greatness (this at any rate is the unanimous verdict of all those students of human nature who have sounded the deepest waters of great souls). To feel one's self adrift from all questions of ancestry, conscience, and duty--this is the danger with which every great man is confronted. Yet this is precisely what he desires: he desires the great goal, and consequently the means thereto.

737.

In times when man is led by reward and punishment, the class of man which the legislator has in view is still of a low and primitive type: he is treated as one treats a child. In our latter-day culture, general degeneracy removes all sense from reward and punishment. This determination of action by the prospect of reward and punishment presupposes young, strong, and vigorous races. In effete races impulses are so irrepressible that a mere idea has no force whatever. Inability to offer any resistance to a stimulus, and the feeling that one must react to it: this excessive susceptibility of decadents makes all such systems of punishment and reform altogether senseless.

The idea "amelioration" presupposes a normal and strong creature whose action must in some way be balanced or cancelled if he is not to be lost and turned into an enemy of the community.

738.

_The effect of prohibition._ Every power which forbids and which knows how to excite fear in the person forbidden creates a guilty conscience. (That is to say, a person has a certain desire but is conscious of the danger of gratifying it, and is consequently forced to be secretive, underhand, and cautious.) Thus any prohibition deteriorates the character of those who do not willingly submit themselves to it, but are constrained thereto.

739.

_"Punishment and reward."_--These two things stand or fall together. Nowadays no one will accept a reward or acknowledge that any authority should have the power to punish. Warfare has been reformed. We have a desire: it meets with opposition: we then see that we shall most easily obtain it by coming to some agreement--by drawing up a contract. In modern society where every one has given his assent to a certain contract, the criminal is a man who breaks that contract. This at least is a clear concept. But in that case, anarchists and enemies of social order could not be tolerated.

740.

Crimes belong to the category of revolt against the social system, A rebel is not punished, he is simply suppressed. He _may_ be an utterly contemptible and pitiful creature; but there is nothing intrinsically despicable about rebellion in fact, in our particular society revolt is far from being disgraceful. There are cases in which a rebel deserves honour precisely because he is conscious of certain elements in society which cry aloud for hostility; for such a man rouses us from our slumbers. When a criminal commits but one crime against a particular person, it does not alter the fact that all his instincts urge him to make a stand against the whole social system. His isolated act is merely a symptom.

The idea of punishment ought to be reduced to the concept of the suppression of revolt, a weapon against the vanquished (by means of long or short terms of imprisonment). But punishment should not be associated in any way with contempt. A criminal is at all events a man who has set his life, his honour, his freedom at stake; he is therefore a man of courage. Neither should punishment be regarded as penance or retribution, as though there were some recognised rate of exchange between crime and punishment. Punishment does not purify, simply because crime does not sully.

A criminal should not be prevented from making his peace with society, provided he does not belong to the race of criminals. In the latter case, however, he should be opposed even before he has committed an act of hostility. (As soon as he gets into the clutches of society the first operation to be performed upon him should be that of castration.) A criminal's bad manners and his low degree of intelligence should not be reckoned against him. Nothing is more common than that he should misunderstand himself (more particularly when his rebellious instinct--the rancour of the _unclassed_--has not reached consciousness simply because he has not read enough). It is natural that he should deny and dishonour his deed while under the influence of fear at its failure. All this is quite distinct from those cases in which, psychologically speaking, the criminal yields to an incomprehensible impulse, and attributes a motive to his deed by associating it with a merely incidental and insignificant action (for example, robbing a man, when his real desire was to take his blood).

The worth of a man should not be measured by any one isolated act. Napoleon warned us against this. Deeds which are only skin-deep are more particularly insignificant. If we have no crime--let us say no murder--on our conscience; why is it? It simply means that a few favourable circumstances have been wanting in our lives. And supposing we were induced to commit such a crime would our worth be materially affected? As a matter of fact, we should only be despised, if we were not credited with possessing the power to kill a man under certain circumstances. In nearly every crime certain qualities come into play without which no one would be a true man. Dostoievsky was not far wrong when he said of the inmates of the penal colonies in Siberia, that they constituted the strongest and most valuable portion of the Russian people. The fact that in our society the criminal happens to be a badly nourished and stunted animal is simply a condemnation of our system. In the days of the Renaissance the criminal was a flourishing specimen of humanity, and acquired his own virtue for himself,--Virtue in the sense of the Renaissance--that is to say, _virtù;_ free from moralic acid.

It is only those whom we do not despise that we are able to elevate. Moral contempt is a far greater indignity and insult than any kind of crime.

741.

Shame was first introduced into punishment when certain penalties were inflicted on persons held in contempt, such as slaves. It was a despised class that was most frequently punished, and thus it came to pass that punishment and contempt were associated.

742.

In the ancient idea of punishment a religious concept was immanent, namely, the retributive power of chastisement. Penalties purified; in modern society, however, penalties degrade. Punishment is a form of paying off a debt: once it has been paid, one is freed from the deed for which one was so ready to suffer. Provided belief in the power of punishment exist, once the penalty is paid a feeling of relief and lightheartedness results, which is not so very far removed from a state of convalescence and health. One has made one's peace with society, and one appears to one's self more dignified pure.... To-day, however, punishment isolates even more than the crime; the fate behind the sin has become so formidable that it is almost hopeless. One rises from punishment still an enemy of society. Henceforward it reckons yet another enemy against it. The _jus talionis_ may spring from the spirit of retribution (that is to say, from a sort of modification of the instinct of revenge); but in the Book of Manu, for instance, it is the need of having some equivalent in order to do penance, or to become free in a religious sense.

743.

My pretty radical note of interrogation in the case of all more modern laws of punishment is this: should not the punishment fit the crime?--for in your heart of hearts thus would you have it. But then the susceptibility of the particular criminal to pain would have to be taken into account. In other words, there should be no such thing as a preconceived penalty for any crime--no fixed penal code. But as it would be no easy matter to ascertain the degree of sensitiveness of each individual criminal, punishment would have to be abolished in practice? What a sacrifice! Is it not? Consequently ...

744.

Ah! and the philosophy of jurisprudence! That is a science which, like all moral sciences, has not even been wrapped in swaddling-clothes yet. Even among jurists who consider themselves liberal, the oldest and most valuable significance of punishment is still misunderstood--it is not even known. So long as jurisprudence does not build upon a new foundation--on history and comparative anthropology--it will never cease to quarrel over the fundamentally false abstractions which are fondly imagined to be the "philosophy of law," and which have nothing whatever to do with modern man. The man of to-day, however, is such a complicated woof even in regard to his legal valuation that he allows of the most varied interpretation.

745.

An old Chinese sage once said he had heard that when mighty empires were doomed they began to have numberless laws.

746.

Schopenhauer would have all rapscallions castrated, and all geese shut up in convents. But from what point of view would this be desirable? The rascal has at least this advantage over other men--that he is not mediocre; and the fool is superior to us inasmuch as he does not suffer at the sight of mediocrity. It would be better to widen the gulf--that is to say, roguery and stupidity should be increased. In this way human nature would become broader ... but, after all, this is Fate, and it will happen, whether we desire it or not. Idiocy and roguery are increasing: this is part of modern progress.

747.

Society, to-day, is full of consideration, tact, and reticence, and of good-natured respect for other people's rights--even for the exactions of strangers. To an even greater degree is there a certain charitable and instinctive depreciation of the worth of man as shown by all manner of trustful habits. Respect for men, and not only for the most virtuous, is perhaps the real parting of the ways between us and the Christian mythologists also have our good share of irony even when listening to moral sermons. He who preaches morality to us debases himself in our eyes and becomes almost comical. Liberal-mindedness regarding morality is one of the best signs of our age. In cases where it is most distinctly wanting, we regard it as a sign of a morbid condition (the case of Carlyle in England, of Ibsen in Norway, and Schopenhauer's pessimism throughout Europe). If there is anything which can reconcile us to our own age, it is precisely the amount of immorality which it allows itself without falling in its own estimation--very much the reverse! In what, then, does the superiority of culture over the want of culture consist--of the Renaissance, for instance, over the Middle Ages? In this alone: the greater quantity of acknowledged immorality. From this it necessarily follows that the very _zenith_ of human development _must_ be regarded by the moral fanatic as the _non plus ultra_ of corruption (in this connection let us recall Savonarola's judgment of Florence, Plato's indictment of Athens under Pericles, Luther's condemnation of Rome, Rousseau's anathemas against the society of Voltaire, and Germany's hostility to Goethe).

A little more fresh air, for Heaven's sake! This ridiculous condition of Europe _must_ not last any longer. Is there a single idea behind this bovine nationalism? What possible value can there be in encouraging this arrogant self-conceit when everything to-day points to greater and more common interests?--at a moment when the spiritual dependence and denationalisation, which are obvious to all, are paving the way for the reciprocal _rapprochements_ and fertilisations which make up the real value and sense of present-day culture! ... And it is precisely now that "the new German Empire" has been founded upon the most thread-bare and discredited of ideas--universal suffrage and equal right for all.

Think of all this struggling for advantage among conditions which are in every way degenerate: of this culture of big cities, of newspapers, of hurry and scurry, and of "aimlessness"! The economic unity of Europe must necessarily come--and with it, as a reaction, the pacivist movement.

A pacivist party, free from all sentimentality, which forbids its children to wage war; which forbids recourse to courts of justice; which forswears all fighting, all contradiction, and all persecution: for a while the party of the oppressed, and later the powerful party:--this party would be opposed to everything in the shape of revenge and resentment.

There will also be a war party, exercising the same thoroughness and severity towards itself, which will proceed in precisely the opposite direction.

749.

The princes of Europe should really consider whether as a matter of fact they can dispense with our services--with us, the immoralists. We are to-day the only power which can win a victory without allies: and we are therefore far and away the strongest of the strong. We can even do without lying, and let me ask what other power can dispense with this weapon? A strong temptation fights for us; the strongest, perhaps, that exists--the temptation of truth.... Truth? How do I come by this word? I must withdraw it: I must repudiate this proud word. But no. We do not even want it--we shall be quite able to achieve our victory of power without its help. The real charm which fights for us, the eye of Venus which our opponents themselves deaden and blind--this charm is the magic of the extreme. The fascination which everything extreme exercises: we immoralists--we are in every way the extremists.

750.

The corrupted ruling classes have brought ruling into evil odour. The State administration of justice is a piece of cowardice, because the great man who can serve as a standard is lacking. At last the feeling of insecurity becomes so great that men fall in the dust before any sort of will-power that commands.

751.

"The will to power" is so loathed in democratic ages that the whole of the psychology of these ages seems directed towards its belittlement and slander. The types of men who sought the highest honours are said to have been Napoleon! Cæsar! and Alexander!--as if these had not been precisely the greatest _scorners_ of honour.

And Helvetius would fain show us that we strive after power in order to have those pleasures which are at the disposal of the mighty--that is to say, according to him, this striving after power is the will to pleasure--hedonism!

752.

According as to whether a people feels: "the rights, the keenness of vision, and the gifts of leading, etc., are with the few" or "with the many"--it constitutes En oligarchic or a democratic community.

Monarchy represents the belief in a man who is completely superior a leader, a saviour, a demigod.

Aristocracy represents the belief in a chosen few--in a higher caste.

Democracy represents the disbelief in all great men and in all elite societies: everybody is everybody else's equal, "At bottom we are all herd and mob."

753.

I am opposed to Socialism because it dreams ingenuously of goodness, truth, beauty, and equal rights (anarchy pursues the same ideal, but in a more brutal fashion).

I am opposed to parliamentary government and the power of the press, because they are the means whereby cattle become masters.

754.

The arming of the people means in the end the arming of the mob.

755.

Socialists are particularly ridiculous in my eyes, because of their absurd optimism concerning the "good man" who is supposed to be waiting in their cupboard, and who will come into being when the present order of society has been overturned and has made way for natural instincts. But the opposing party is quite as ludicrous, because it will not see the act of violence which lies beneath every law, the severity and egoism inherent in every kind of authority. "I and my kind will rule and prevail. Whoever degenerates will be either expelled or annihilated."--This was the fundamental feeling of all ancient legislation. The idea of a higher order of man is hated much more profoundly than monarchs themselves. Hatred of aristocracy always uses hatred of monarchy as a mask.

756.

How treacherous are all parties! They bring to light something concerning their leaders which the latter, perhaps, have hitherto kept hidden beneath a bushel with consummate art.

757.

Modern Socialism would fain create a profane counterpart to jesuitism: everybody a perfect instrument. But as to the object of it all, the purpose of it--this has not yet been ascertained.

758.

_The slavery of to-day_: a piece of barbarism. Where are the masters for whom these slaves work? One must not always expect the simultaneous appearance of the two complementary castes of society.

Utility and pleasure are slave theories of life.

"The blessing of work" is an ennobling phrase for slaves. Incapacity for leisure.

759.

There is no such thing as a right to live, a right to work, or a right to be happy: in this respect man is not different from the meanest worm.

760.

We must undoubtedly think of these things as uncompromisingly as Nature does: they preserve the species.

761.

We should look upon the needs of the masses with ironic compassion: they want something which we have got--Ah!

762.

European democracy is only in a very slight degree the manifestation of unfettered powers. It represents, above all, the unfettering of laziness, fatigue, and _weakness_.

753.

_Concerning the future of the workman_--Workmen men should learn to regard their duties as _soldiers_ do. They receive emoluments, incomes, but they do not get wages!

There is no relationship between _work done_ and money received; the individual should, _according to his kind,_ be so placed as to _perform_ the _highest_ that is compatible with his powers.

764.

Noblemen ought one day to live as the bourgeois do now--but above them, distinguishing themselves by the simplicity of their wants--the superior caste will then live in a poorer and simpler way and yet be in possession of power.

For lower orders of mankind the reverse valuations hold good: it is a matter of implanting "virtues" in them. Absolute commands, terrible compulsory methods, in order that they may rise above mere ease in life. The remainder may obey, but their vanity demands that they may feel themselves dependent, not upon great men, but upon principles.

765.

"_The Atonement of all Sin?_"

People speak of the profound injustice of the social arrangement, as it the fact that one man is born in favourable circumstances and that another is born in unfavourable ones--or that one should possess gifts the other has not, were on the face of it an injustice. Among the more honest of these opponents of society this is what is said: "We, with all the bad, morbid, criminal qualities which we acknowledge we possess, are only the inevitable result of the oppression for ages of the weak by the strong"; thus they insinuate their evil natures into the consciences of the ruling classes. They threaten and storm and curse. They become virtuous from sheer indignation--they don't want to have become bad men and _canaille_ for nothing. The name for this attitude, which is an invention of the last century, is, if I am not mistaken, pessimism; and even that pessimism which is the outcome of indignation. It is in this attitude of mind that history is judged, that it is deprived of its inevitable fatality, and that responsibility and even guilt is discovered in it. For the great desideratum is to find guilty people in it. The botched and the bungled, the decadents of all kinds, are revolted at themselves, and require sacrifices in order that they may not slake their thirst for destruction upon themselves (which might, indeed, be the most reasonable procedure). But for this purpose they at least require a semblance of justification, _i.e._ a theory according to which the fact of their existence, and of their character, may be expiated by a scapegoat. This scapegoat may be God,--in Russia such resentful atheists are not wanting,--or the order of society, or education and upbringing, or the Jews, or the nobles, or, finally, the well-constituted of every kind. "It is a sin for a man to have been born in decent circumstances, for by so doing he disinherits the others, he pushes them aside, he imposes upon them the curse of vice and of work.... How can I be made answerable for my misery; surely some one must be responsible for it, or I could not bear to live."...

In short, resentful pessimism discovers responsible parties in order to create a pleasurable sensation for itself--revenge.... "Sweeter than honey"--thus does even old Homer speak of revenge.

***

The fact that such a theory no longer meets with understanding--or rather, let us say, contempt is accounted for by that particle of Christianity which still circulates in the blood of every one of us; it makes us tolerant towards things simply because we scent a Christian savour about them.... The Socialists appeal to the Christian instincts; this is their really refined piece of cleverness.... Thanks to Christianity, we have now grown accustomed to the superstitious concept of a soul--of an immortal soul, of soul monads, which, as a matter of fact, hails from somewhere else, and which has only become inherent in certain cases--that is to say, become incarnate in them--by accident: but the nature of these cases is not altered, let alone determined by it. The circumstances of society, of relationship, and of history are only accidents for the soul, perhaps misadventures: in any case, the world is not their work. By means of the idea of soul the individual is made transcendental; thanks to it, a ridiculous amount of importance can be attributed to him.

As a matter of fact, it was Christianity which first induced the individual to take up this position of judge of all things. It made megalomania almost his duty: it has made everything temporary and limited subordinate to eternal rights! What is the State, what is society, what are historical laws, what is physiology to me? Thus speaks something from beyond Becoming, an immutable entity throughout history: thus speaks something immortal, something divine--it is the soul!

Another Christian, but no less insane, concept has percolated even deeper into the tissues of modern ideas: the concept of the equality of all souls before God. In this concept the prototype of all theories concerning equal rights is to be found. Man was first taught to stammer this proposition religiously: later, it was converted into a moral; no wonder he has ultimately begun to take it seriously, to take it _practically_!--that is to say, politically, socialistically, resento-pessimistically.

Wherever responsible circumstances or people have been looked for, it was the _instinct of revenge_ that sought them. This instinct of revenge obtained such an ascendancy over man in the course of centuries that the whole of metaphysics, psychology, ideas of society, and, above all, morality, are tainted with it. Man has nourished this idea of responsibility to such an extent that he has introduced the bacillus of vengeance into everything. By means of it he has made God Himself ill, and killed innocence in the universe, by tracing every condition of things to acts of will, to intentions, to responsible agents. The whole teaching of will, this most fatal fraud that has ever existed in psychology hitherto, was invented essentially for the purpose of punishment. It was the social utility of punishment that lent this concept its dignity, its power, and its truth. The originator of that psychology, that we shall call volitional psychology, must be sought in those classes which had the right of punishment in their hands; above all, therefore, among the priests who stood on the very pinnacle of ancient social systems: these people wanted to create for themselves the right to wreak revenge--they wanted to supply God with the privilege of vengeance. For this purpose; man was declared "free": to this end every action had to be regarded as voluntary, and the origin of every deed had to be considered as lying in consciousness. But by such propositions as these ancient psychology is refuted.

To-day, when Europe seems to have taken the contrary direction; when we halcyonians would fain withdraw, dissipate, and banish the concept of guilt and punishment with all our might from the world; when our most serious endeavours are concentrated upon purifying psychology, morality, history, nature, social institutions and privileges, and even God Himself, from this filth; in whom must we recognise our most mortal enemies? Precisely in those apostles of revenge and resentment, in those who are _par excellence_ pessimists from indignation, who make it their mission to sanctify their filth with the name of "righteous indignation."... We others, whose one desire is to reclaim innocence on behalf of Becoming, would fain be the missionaries of a purer thought, namely, that no one is responsible for man's qualities; neither God, nor society, nor his parents, nor his ancestors, nor himself--in fact, that no one is to blame for him ... The being who might be made responsible for a man's existence, for the fact that he is constituted in a particular way, or for his birth in certain circumstances and in a certain environment, is absolutely lacking.--_And it is a great blessing that such a being is non-existent ..._. We are _not_ the result of an eternal design, of a will, of a desire: there is no attempt being made with us to attain to an "ideal of perfection," to an "ideal of happiness," to an "ideal of virtue,"--and we are just as little the result of a mistake on God's part in the presence of which He ought to feel uneasy (a thought which is known to be at the very root of the Old Testament). There is not a place nor a purpose nor a sense to which we can attribute our existence or our kind of existence. In the first place, no one is in a position to do this: it is quite impossible to judge, to measure, or to compare, or even to deny the whole universe! And why?--For five reasons, all accessible to the man of average intelligence: for instance, _because there is no existence outside the universe ..._ and let us say it again, this is a great blessing, for therein lies the whole innocence of our lives.

2. The Individual.

766.

_Fundamental errors:_ to regard the _herd_ as an aim instead of the individual! The herd is only a means and nothing _more_! But nowadays people are trying to understand _the herd_ as they would an individual, and to confer higher rights upon it than upon isolated personalities. Terrible mistake!! In addition to this, all that makes for gregariousness, _e.g._ sympathy, is regarded as the _more valuable_ side of our natures.

767.

The individual is something quite _new,_ and capable of _creating new things._ He is something absolute, and all his actions are quite his own. The individual in the end has to seek the valuation for his actions in himself: because he has to give an individual meaning even to traditional words and notions. His interpretation of a formula is at least personal, even if he does not create the formula itself: at least as an interpreter he is creative.

768.

The "ego" oppresses and kills. It acts like an organic cell. It is predatory and violent. It would fain regenerate itself--pregnancy. It would fain give birth to its God and see all mankind at its feet.

769.

Every living organism gropes around as far as its power permits, and overcomes all that is weaker than itself: by this means it finds pleasure in its own existence. The _increasing "humanity"_ of this tendency consists in the fact that we are beginning to feel ever more subtly how difficult it is really to _absorb_ others: while we could show our power by injuring him, his will _estranges_ him from us, and thus makes him less susceptible of being overcome.

770.

The degree of resistance which has to be continually overcome in order to remain _at the top,_ is the measure of _freedom,_ whether for individuals or for societies: freedom being understood as positive power, as will to power. The highest form of individual freedom, of sovereignty, would, according to this, in all probability be found not five feet away from its opposite--that is to say, where the danger of slavery hangs over life, like a hundred swords of Damocles. Let any one go through the whole of history from this point of view: the ages when the individual reaches perfect maturity, _i.e._ the free ages, when the classical type, _sovereign man,_ is attained to--these were certainly not humane times!

There should be no choice: either one must be uppermost or nethermost--like a worm, despised, annihilated, trodden upon. One must have tyrants against one in order to become a tyrant, _i.e._ in order to be free. It is no small advantage to have a hundred swords of Damocles suspended over one: it is only thus that one learns to dance, it is only thus that one attains to any freedom in one's movements.

771.

Man more than any other animal was originally _altruistic_--hence his slow growth (child) and lofty development. Hence, too, his extraordinary and latest kind of egoism.--Beasts of prey are much more _individualistic._

772.

A criticism of _selfishness._ The involuntary ingenuousness of La Rochefoucauld, who believed that he was saying something bold, liberal, and paradoxical (in his days, of course, truth in psychological matters was something that astonished people) when he said. "_Les grandes âmes ne sont pas celles qui ont moins de passions et plus de vertus que les âmes communes, mais seulement celles qui ont de plus grands desseins._" Certainly, John Stuart Mill (who calls Chamfort the _noble_ and philosophical La Rochefoucauld of the eighteenth century) recognises in him merely an astute and keen-sighted observer of all that which is the result of habitual selfishness in the human breast, and he adds: "A noble spirit is unable to see the necessity of a constant observation of _baseness_ and _contemptibility_, unless it were to show against what corrupting influences a lofty spirit and a noble character were able to triumph."

773.

_The Morphology of the Feelings of Self._

_First standpoint_--To what extent are _sympathy_ or _communal feelings,_ the lower or preparatory states, at a time when personal self-esteem and initiative in valuation, on the part of individuals, are not yet possible?

_Second standpoint._--To what extent is the zenith of collective self-esteem, the pride in the distinction of the clan, the feeling of inequality and a certain abhorrence of mediation, of equal rights and of reconciliation, the school for individual self-esteem? It may be this in so far as it compels the individual to represent the pride of the community --he is obliged to speak and act with tremendous self-respect, because he stands for the community And the same holds good when the individual regards himself as the instrument or speaking-tube of a godhead.

_Third standpoint._--To what extent do these forms of impersonality invest the individual with enormous importance? In so far as higher powers are using him as an intermediary: religious shyness towards one's self is the condition of prophets and poets.

_Fourth standpoint._--To what extent does responsibility for a whole educate the individual in foresight, and give him a severe and terrible hand, a calculating and cold heart, majesty of bearing and of action--things which he would not allow himself if he stood only for his own rights?

In short, collective self-esteem is the great preparatory school for personal sovereignty. The noble caste is that which creates the heritage of this faculty.

774.

The disguised forms of will to power:--

(1) _The desire for freedom,_ for independence for equilibrium, for peace, for _co-ordination._ Also that of the anchorite, the "Free-Spirit." In its lowest form, the will to live at all costs--the instinct of self-preservation.

(2) Subordination, with the view of satisfying the will to power of a whole community; submissiveness, the making of one's self indispensable and useful to him who has the power; love, a secret path to the heart of the powerful, in order to become his master.

(3) The feeling of duty, conscience, the imaginary comfort of belonging to a higher order than those who actually hold the reins of power; the acknowledgment of an order of rank which allows of judging even the more powerful, self-depreciation; the discovery of new _codes of morality_ (of which the Jews are a classical example).

775.

_Praise and gratitude as forms of will to power.--_Praise and gratitude for harvests, for good weather, victories, marriages, and peace--all festivals need a subject on which feeling can be outpoured. The desire is to make all good things that happen to one appear as though they had been done to one: people will have a donor. The same holds good of the work of art: people are not satisfied with it alone, they must praise the artist.--What, then, is praise? It is a sort of compensation for benefits received, a sort of giving back, a manifestation of _our_ power--for the man who praises assents to, blesses, values, _judges_. he arrogates to himself the right to give his consent to a thing, to be able to confer honours. An increased feeling of happiness or of liveliness is also an increased feeling of power, and it is as a result of this feeling that a man _praises_ (it is as the outcome of this feeling that he invents a donor, a "subject"). Gratitude is thus revenge of a lofty kind: it is most severely exercised and demanded where equality and pride both require to be upheld--that is to say, where revenge is practised to its fullest extent.

776.

_Concerning the Machiavellism of Power._

The _will to power_ appears:--

_(a)_ Among the oppressed and slaves of all kinds, in the form of will to "_freedom_": the mere fact of breaking loose from something seems to be an end in itself (in a religio-moral sense: "One is only answerable to one's own conscience"; "evangelical freedom," etc. etc.),

_(b)_ In the case of a stronger species, ascending to power, in the form of the will to overpower. If this fails, then it shrinks to the "will to justice"--that is to say, to the will to the same measure of rights as the ruling caste possesses.

_(c)_ In the case of the strongest, richest, most independent, and most courageous, in the form of "love of humanity," of "love of the people," of the "gospel," of "truth" of "God," of "pity," of self sacrifice," etc. etc.; in the form of overpowering, of deeds of capture, of imposing service on some one, of an instinctive reckoning of one's self as part of a great mass of power to which one attempts to give a direction: the hero, the prophet, the Cæsar, the Saviour, the bell-wether. (The love of the sexes also belongs to this category, it will overpower something, possess it utterly, and it looks like self-abnegation. At bottom it is only the love of one's instrument, of one's "horse"--the conviction that things belong to one because one is in a position to use them.)

_"Freedom," "Justice," "Love"_!!!

777.

_Love._--Behold this love and pity of women--what could be more egoistic? ... And when they do sacrifice themselves and their honour or reputation, to whom do they sacrifice themselves? To the man? Is it not rather to an unbridled desire? These desires are quite as selfish, even though they may be beneficial to others and provoke gratitude. ... To what extent can such a hyperfœtation of one valuation sanctify everything else!!

778.

_"Senses," "Passions."._--When the fear of the senses and of the passions and of the desires becomes so great as to warn us against them, it is already a symptom of _weakness:_ extreme measures always characterise abnormal conditions. That which is lacking here, or more precisely that which is decaying, is the power to resist an impulse: when one feels instinctively that one must yield,--that is to say, that one must react,--then it is an excellent thing to avoid opportunities (temptations).

The stimulation of the senses is only a temptation in so far as those creatures are concerned whose systems are easily swayed and influenced: on the other hand, in the case of remarkable constitutional obtuseness and hardness, strong stimuli are necessary in order to set the functions in motion. Dissipation can only be objected to in the case of one who has no right to it; and almost all passions have fallen into disrepute thanks to those who were not strong enough to convert them to their own advantage.

One should understand that passions are open to the same objections as illnesses: yet we should not be justified in doing without illnesses, and still less without passions. We require the abnormal; we give life a tremendous shock by means of these great illnesses.

In detail the following should be distinguished:--

(1) The _dominating passion,_ which may even bring the supremest form of health with it: in this case the co-ordination of the internal system and its functions to perform one task is best attained,--but this is almost a definition of health.

(2) The antagonism of the passions the double, treble, and multiple soul in one breast:[6] this is very unhealthy; it is a sign of inner ruin and of disintegration, betraying and promoting an internal dualism and anarchy--unless, of course, one passion becomes master. _Return to health._

(3) The juxtaposition of passions without their being either opposed or united with one another. Very often transitory, and then, as soon as order is established, this condition may be a healthy one. A most interesting class of men belong to this order, the chameleons; they are not necessarily at loggerheads with themselves, they are both happy and secure, but they cannot develop--their moods lie side by side, even though they may seem to lie far apart. They change, but they become nothing.

[Footnote 6: This refers to Goethe's _Faust._ In Part I., Act I., Scene 11., we find Faust exclaiming in despair: "Two souls, alas! within my bosom throne!" See Theodore Martin's _Faust,_ translated into English verse.--Tr.]

779.

The quantitative estimate of aims and its influence upon the valuing standpoint, the _great_ and the _small_ criminal. The greatness or smallness of the aims will determine whether the doer feels respect for himself with it all, or whether he feels pusillanimous and miserable.

The degree of intellectuality manifested in the means employed may likewise influence our valuation. How differently the philosophical innovator, experimenter, and man of violence stands out against robbers, barbarians, adventurers!--There is a semblance of disinterestedness in the former.

Finally, noble manners, bearing, courage, self-confidence,--how they alter the value of that which is attained by means of them!

***

Concerning the optics of valuation:--

The influence of the greatness or smallness of the aims.

The influence of the intellectuality of the means. The influence of the behaviour in action. The influence of success or failure. The influence of opposing forces and their value. The influence of that which is permitted and that which is forbidden.

780.

The tricks by means of which actions, measures, and passions are legitimised, which from an individual standpoint are no longer good form or even in good taste.--

Art, which allows us to enter such strange worlds, makes them tasteful to us.

Historians prove its justification and reason; travels, exoticism, psychology, penal codes, the lunatic asylum, the criminal, sociology.

Impersonality (so that as media of a collective whole we allow ourselves these passions and action--the Bar, juries, the bourgeois, the soldier, the minister, the prince, society, "critics") makes us feel that we are _sacrificing something._

781.

Preoccupations concerning one's self and one's eternal salvation are not expressive either of a rich or of a self-confident nature, for the latter lets all questions of eternal bliss go to the devil,--it is not interested in such matters of happiness it is all power, deeds, desires; it imposes itself upon things; it even violates things. The Christian is a romantic hypochondriac who does not stand firmly on his legs.

Whenever hedonistic views come to the front, one can always presuppose the existence of pain and a certain ill-constitutedness.

782.

"The growing autonomy of the individual"--Parisian philosophers like M. Fouillée talk of such things: they would do well to study the _race moutonnière_ for a moment; for they belong to it. For Heaven's sake open your eyes, ye sociologists who deal with the future! The individual grew strong under quite opposite conditions: ye describe the extremest weakening and impoverishment of man; ye actually want this weakness and impoverishment, and ye apply the whole lying machinery of the old ideal in order to achieve your end. Ye are so constituted that ye actually regard your gregarious wants as an ideal! Here we are in the presence of an absolute lack of psychological honesty.

783.

The two traits which characterise the modern European are apparently antagonistic _individualism and the demand for equal rights_: this I am at last beginning to understand. The individual is an extremely vulnerable piece of vanity: this vanity, when it is conscious of its high degree of susceptibility to pain, demands that every one should be made equal; that the individual should only stand _inter pares_. But in this way a social race is depicted in which, as a matter of fact, gifts and powers are on the whole equally distributed. The pride which would have loneliness and but few appreciators is quite beyond comprehension: really "great" successes are only attained through the masses--indeed, we scarcely understand yet that a mob success is in reality only a small success; because _pulchrum est paucorum hominum._

No morality will countenance order of rank among men, and the jurists know nothing of a communal conscience. The principle of individualism rejects _really great_ men, and demands the most delicate vision for, and the speediest discovery of, a talent among people who are almost equal; and inasmuch as every one has some modicum of talent in such late and civilised cultures (and can, therefore, expect to receive his share of honour), there is a more general buttering-up of modest merits to-day than there has ever been. This gives the age the appearance of _unlimited justice._ Its want of justice is to be found not in its unbounded hatred of tyrants and demagogues, even in the arts; but in its detestation of noble natures who scorn the praise of the many. The demand for equal rights (that is to say, the privilege of sitting in judgment on everything and everybody) is anti-aristocratic.

This age knows just as little concerning the absorption of the individual, of his mergence into a great type of men who do not want to be personalities. It was this that formerly constituted the distinction and the zeal of many lofty natures (the greatest poets among them); or of the desire to be a _polis,_ as in Greece; or of Jesuitism, or of the Prussian Staff Corps, and bureaucracy; or of apprenticeship and a continuation of the tradition of great masters: to all of which things, non-social conditions and the absence of _petty vanity_ are necessary.

784.

_Individualism_ is a modest and still unconscious form of will to power; with it a single human unit seems to think it sufficient to free himself from the preponderating power of society (or of the State or Church). He does not set himself up in opposition as a _personality,_ but merely as a unit; he represents the rights of all other individuals as against the whole. That is to say, he instinctively places himself on a level with every other unit: what he combats he does not combat as a person, but as a representative of units against a mass.