No More Learning

For ages we have always ascribed the value of
an action, of a character, of an existence, to the
intention, to the purpose for which it was done,
acted, or lived: this primeval idiosyncrasy of taste
ultimately takes a dangerous turn-provided the
lack of intention and purpose in all phenomena
comes ever more to the front in consciousness.
With it a general depreciation of all values seems
to be preparing: “All is without sense. ”—This
melancholy phrase means: “All sense lies in the
intention, and if the intention is absolutely lacking,
then sense must be lacking too. " In conformity
with this valuation, people were forced to place the
value of life in a “ life after death,” or in the pro-
gressive development of ideas, or of mankind, or of
the people, or of man to superman; but in this
way the progressus in infinitum of purpose had
been reached : it was ultimately necessary to find
one's self a place in the process of the world
(perhaps with the disdæmonistic outlook, it was
a process which led to nonentity).
In regard to this point, “purpose" needs a some-
what more severe criticism : it ought to be recog-
nised that an action is never caused by a purpose;
that an object and the means thereto are inter-
pretations, by means of which certain points in a
phenomena are selected and accentuated, at the
cost of other, more numerous, points; that every


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
139
a
time something is done for a purpose, something
fundamentally different, and yet other things
happen; that in regard to the action done with a
purpose, the case is the same as with the so-called
purposefulness of the heat which is radiated from
the sun: the greater part of the total sum is squan-
dered; a portion of it, which is scarcely worth
reckoning, has a "purpose," has “sense"; that
an “ end" with its “means is an absurdly in-
definite description, which indeed may be able to
command as a precept, as “ will,” but presupposes
a system of obedient and trained instruments,
which, in the place of the indefinite, puts forward
a host of determined entities (i. e. we imagine a
system of clever but narrow intellects who postu-
late end and means, in order to be able to grant
our only known “end,” the role of the cause of
an action,”—a proceeding to which we have no
right: it is tantamount to solving a problem by
placing its solution in an inaccessible world which
we cannot observe).
Finally, why could not an "end" be merely an
accompanying feature in the series of changes
among the active forces which bring about the
action-a pale stenographic symbol stretched in
consciousness beforehand, and which serves as a
guide to what happens, even as a symbol of what
happens, not as its cause ? —But in this way we
criticise will itself: is it not an illusion to regard
that which enters consciousness as will-power. as
a cause ? Are not all conscious phenomena only
final phenomena—the lost links in a chain, but
apparently conditioning one another in their


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140
THE WILL TO POWER.
sequence within the plane of consciousness? This
might be an illusion.
6
667.
Science does not inquire what impels us to
will: on the contrary, it denies that willing takes
place at all, and supposes that something quite
different has happened-in short, that the belief in
« will ” and “end” is an illusion. It does not in-
quire into the motives of an action, as if these had
been present in consciousness previous to the
action : but it first divides the action up into a
group of phenomena, and then seeks the previous
history of this mechanical movement, but not in
the terms of feeling, perception, and thought; from
this quarter it can never accept the explanation:
perception is precisely the matter of science, which
has to be explained. The problem of science is
precisely to explain the world, without taking
perceptions as the cause: for that would mean
regarding perceptions themselves as the cause of
perceptions. The task of science is by no means
accomplished.
Thus: either there is no such thing as will,—
the hypothesis of science, or the will is free. The
latter assumption represents the prevailing feeling,
of which we cannot rid ourselves, even if the hypo-
thesis of science were proved.
The popular belief in cause and effect is founded
on the principle that free will is the cause of every
effect : thereby alone do we arrive at the feeling
of causation. And thereto belongs also the feeling
that every cause is not an effect, but always only


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
14L
a cause
-if will is the cause, “Our acts of will
are not necessary"—this lies in the very concept of
« will. " The effect necessarily comes after the
cause that is what we feel. It is merely a
hypothesis that even our willing is compulsory in
every case.
668.
“To will ” is not “to desire," to strive, to aspire
to; it distinguishes itself from that through the
passion of commanding.
There is no such thing as "willing," but only the
willing of something: the aion must not be severed
from the state—as the epistemologists sever it.
“Willing," as they understand it, is no more OS-
sible than " thinking": it is a pure invention.
It is essential to willing that something should
be commanded (but that does not mean that the
will is carried into effect).
The general state of tension, by virtue of which
a force seeks to discharge itself, is not “willing. ”.
>
669.
“Pain" and "pleasure” are the most absurd
means of expressing judgments, which of course
does not mean that the judgments which are
enunciated in this way must necessarily be absurd.
The elimination of all substantiation and logic, a
yes or no in the reduction to a passionate desire
to have or to reject, an imperative abbreviation,
the utility of which is irrefutable: that is pain
and pleasure. Its origin is in the central sphere


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142
THE WILL TO POWER.
(
of the intellect; its pre-requisite is an infinitely
accelerated process of perceiving, ordering, co-
ordinating, calculating, concluding: pleasure and
pain are always final phenomena, they are never
causes. ”
As to deciding what provokes pain and pleasure,
that is a question which depends upon the degree
of power: the same thing, when confronted with a
small quantity of power, may seem a danger and
may suggest the need of speedy defence, and when
confronted with the consciousness of greater power,
may be a voluptuous stimulus and may be followed
by a feeling of pleasure.
All feelings of pleasure and pain presuppose a
measuring of collective utility and collective harm-
fulness: consequently a sphere where there is the
willing of an object (of a condition) and the selec-
tion of the means thereto. Pleasure and pain are
never "original facts. ”
The feelings of pleasure and pain are reactions
of the will (emotions) in which the intellectual
centre fixes the value of certain supervening
changes as a collective value, and also as an in-
troduction of contrary actions.
670.
The belief in “ emotions. " Emotions are a
fabrication of the intellect, an invention of causes
which do not exist. All general bodily sensations
which we do not understand are interpreted intel-
lectually—that is to say, a reason is sought why we
feel thus or thus among certain people or in certain


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
143
experiences. Thus something disadvantageous
dangerous, and strange is taken for granted, as if
it were the cause of our being indisposed; as a
matter of fact, it gets added to the indisposition,
so as to make our condition thinkable. -- Mighty
rushes of blood to the brain, accompanied by a
feeling of suffocation, are interpreted as “anger”:
the people and things which provoke our anger
are a means of relieving our physiological con-
dition. Subsequently, after long habituation,
certain processes and general feelings are so
regularly correlated that the sight of certain pro-
cesses provokes that condition of general feeling,
and induces vascular engorgements, the ejection of
seminal fluid, etc. : we then say that the “emotion
is provoked by propinquity. "
Judgments already inhere in pleasure and pain:
stimuli become differentiated, according as to
whether they increase or reduce the feeling of
power.
The belief in willing. To believe that a thought
may be the cause of a mechanical movement is
to believe in miracles. The consistency of science
demands that once we have made the world think-
able for ourselves by means of pictures, we should
also make the emotions, the desires, the will, etc. ,
thinkable—that is to say, we should deny them
and treat them as errors of the intellect.
>
671.
Free will or no free will ? --There is no such
thing as “ Will”: that is only a simplified con-


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144
THE WILL TO POWER.
ception on the part of the understanding, like
" matter. "
All actions must first be prepared and made pos-
sible mechanically before they can be willed. Or,
in most cases the "object" of an action enters the
brain only after everything is prepared for its
accomplishment. The object is an inner "stimulus"
-nothing more.
672.
The most proximate prelude to an action
relates to that action : but further back still there
lies a preparatory history which covers a far
wider field: the individual action is only a factor
in a much more extensive and subsequent fact.
The shorter and the longer processes are not
reported.
673
The theory of chance : the soul is a selecting
and self-nourishing being, which is persistently
extremely clever and creative (this creative power
is commonly overlocked ! it is taken to be merely
passive).
I recognised the active and creative power with-
in the accidental. -Accident is in itself nothing
more than the clashing of creative impulses.
674.
Among the enormous multiplicity of pheno-
mena to be observed in an organic being, that
part which becomes conscious is a mere means :
and the particle of “virtue," "self-abnegation,"


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
145
"
and other fanciful inventions, are denied in a most
thoroughgoing manner by the whole of the re-
maining phenomena. We would do well to study
our organism in all its immorality.
The animal functions are, as a matter of fact, a
million times more important than all beautiful
states of the soul and heights of consciousness :
the latter are an overflow, in so far as they are
not needed as instruments in the service of the
animal functions. The whole of conscious life:
the spirit together with the soul, the heart, good-
ness, and virtue; in whose service does it work?
In the greatest possible perfection of the means
(for acquiring nourishment and advancement)
serving the fundamental animal functions: above
all, the ascent of the line of Life.
That which is called “flesh” and “body” is of
such incalculably greater importance, that the rest
is nothing more than a small appurtenance. To
continue the chain of life so that it becomes ever
more powerful—that is the task.
But now observe how the heart, the soul, virtue,
and spirit together conspire formally to thwart
this purpose: as if they were the object of every
endeavour! . . The degeneration of life is es-
sentially determined by the extraordinary falli-
bility of consciousness, which is held at bay least of
all by the instincts, and thus commits the gravest
and profoundest errors.
Now could any more insane extravagance of
vanity be imagined than to measure the value of
existence according to the pleasant or unpleasant
feelings of this consciousness? It is obviously only
K
VOL. 11.


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146
THE WILL TO POWER.
a means: and pleasant or unpleasant feelings are
also no more than means.
According to what standard is the objective
value measured ? According to the quantity of
increased and more organised power alone.
675.
6
")
»
»
The value of all valuing. --My desire would be
to see the agent once more identified with the
action, after action has been deprived of all mean-
ing by having been separated in thought from the
agent; I should like to see the notion of doing
something, the idea of a “purpose," of an "inten-
tion," of an object, reintroduced into the action,
after action has been made insignificant by having
been artificially separated from these things.
All “objects,” “purposes," “ meanings,” are only
manners of expression and metamorphoses of the
one will inherent in all phenomena: of the will to
power. To have an object, a purpose, or an in-
tention, in fact to will generally, is equivalent to
the desire for greater strength, for fuller growth,
and for the means thereto in addition.
The most general and fundamental instinct in
all action and willing is precisely on that account
the one which is least known and is most con-
cealed; for in practice we always follow its bid-
ding, for the simple reason that we are in ourselves
its bidding.
All valuations are only the results of, and the
narrow points of view in serving, this one will:
valuing in itself is nothing save this,-will to power.


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
147
criticise existence from the standpoint of
. . y one of these values is utter nonsense and error.
Even supposing that a process of annihilation
follows from such a value, even so this process is
in the service of this will.
The valuation of existence itself! But existence
is this valuing itself ! —and even when we say
“no," we still do what we are.
We ought now to perceive the absurdity of this
pretence at judging existence; and we ought to
try and discover what actually takes place there.
It is symptomatic.
676.
Concerning the Origin of our Valuations.
We are able to analyse our body, and by doing
so we get the same idea of it as of the stellar
system, and the differences between organic and
inorganic lapses. Formerly the movements of the
stars were explained as the effects of beings con-
sciously pursuing a purpose: this is no longer
required, and even in regard to the movements of
the body and its changes, the belief has long since
been abandoned that they can be explained by
an appeal to a consciousness which has a deter-
mined purpose. By far the greater number of
movements have nothing to do with consciousness
at all: neither have they anything to do with sensa-
tion. Sensations and thoughts are extremely rare
and insignificant things compared with the in-
numerable phenomena occurring every second.
On the other hand, we believe that a certain


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THE WILL TO POWER.
conformity of means to ends rules over the
smallest phenomenon, which it is quite beyond u.
deepest science to understand : a sort of cautious-
ness, selectiveness, co-ordination, and repairing
process, etc.
In short, we are in the presence of
an activity to which it would be necessary to ascribe
an incalculably higher and more extensive intellect
than the one we are acquainted with. We learn to
think less of all that is conscious: we unlearn the
habit of making ourselves responsible for ourselves,
because, as conscious beings fixing purposes, we
are but the smallest part of ourselves.
Of the numerous influences taking effect every
second, for instance, air, electricity, we feel
scarcely anything at all. There might be a
number of forces, which, though they never make
themselves felt by us, yet influence us continually.
Pleasure and pain are very rare and scanty phen-
omena, compared with the countless stimuli with
which a cell or an organ operates upon another
cell or organ.
It is the phase of the modesty of consciousness.
Finally, we can grasp the conscious ego itself,
merely as an instrument in the service of that
higher and more extensive intellect: and then we
may ask whether all conscious willing, all con-
scious purposes, all valuations, are not perhaps only
means by virtue of which something essentially
different is attained, from that which consciousness
supposes. We mean: it is a question of our
pleasure and pain—but pleasure and pain might
be the means whereby we had something to do
which lies outside our consciousness.


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
149
This is to show how very superficial all conscious
phenomena really are; how an action and the image
of it differ; how little we know about what precedes
an action; how fantastic our feelings, “ free will," and
"cause and effect" are ; how thoughts and images,
just like words, are only signs of thoughts; the
impossibility of finding the grounds of any action;
the superficiality of all praise and blame; how
essentially our conscious life is composed of fancies
and illusion; how all our words merely stand for
fancies (our emotions too), and how the union of
mankind depends upon the transmission and con-
tinuation of these fancies : whereas, at bottom, the
real union of mankind by means of procreation
pursues its unknown way. Does this belief in the
common fancies of men really alter mankind ? Or
is the whole body of ideas and valuations only an
expression in itself of unknown changes ? Are
there really such things as will, purposes, thoughts,
values ? Is the whole of conscious life perhaps no
more than mirage ? Even when values seem to
determine the actions of a man, they are, as a
matter of fact, doing something quite different!
In short, granting that a certain conformity of
means to end might be demonstrated in the action
of nature, without the assumption of a ruling ego:
could not our notion of purposes, and our will, etc. ,
be only a symbolic language standing for something
quite different-that is to say, something not-
willing and unconscious ? only the thinnest sem-
blance of that natural conformity of means to end
in the organic world, but not in any way different
therefrom?


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150
THE WILL TO POWER.
Briefly, perhaps the whole of mental develop-
ment is a matter of the body: it is the consciously
recorded history of the fact that a higher body is
forming. The organic ascends to higher regions.
Our longing to know Nature is a means by
virtue of which the body would reach perfection.
Or, better still, hundreds of thousands of experi-
ments are made to alter the nourishment and the
mode of living of the body: the body's conscious-
ness and valuations, its kinds of pleasure and pain,
are signs of these changes and experiments. In the
end, it is not a question concerning man; for he must
be surpassed.
677
To what Extent are all Interpretations of the
World Symptoms of a Ruling Instinct.
The artistic contemplation of the world: to sit
before the world and to survey it. But here the
analysis of æsthetical contemplation, its reduction
to cruelty, its feeling of security, its judicial and
detached attitude, etc. , are lacking. The artist
himself must be taken, together with his. psycho-
logy (the criticism of the instinct of play, as a
discharge of energy, the love of change, the love
of bringing one's soul in touch with strange things,
the absolute egoism of the artist, etc. ). What in-
stincts does he sublimate ?
The scientific contemplation of the world : a
criticism of the psychological longing for science,
the desire to make everything comprehensible; the
desire to make everything practical, useful, capable
of being exploited-to what extent this is anti-
a


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
151
æsthetic. Only that value counts, which may be
reckoned in figures. How it happens that a
mediocre type of man preponderates under the
influence of science. It would be terrible if even
history were to be taken possession of in this way
-the realm of the superior, of the judicial. What
instincts are here sublimated !
The religious contemplation of the world: a
criticism of the religious man. It is not necessary
to take the moral man as the type, but the man
who has extreme feelings of exaltation and of deep
depression, and who interprets the former with
thankfulnsss or suspicion - without, however,
seeking their origin in himself (nor the latter
either). The man who essentially feels anything
but free, who sublimates his conditions and states
of submission.
The moral contemplation of the world. The
feelings peculiar to certain social ranks are pro-
jected into the universe : stability, law, the making
of things orderly, and the making of things alike,
are sought in the highest spheres, because they are
valued most highly-above everything or behind
everything
What is common to all: the ruling instincts
wish to be regarded as the highest values in general,
even as the creative and ruling powers. It is
understood that these instincts either oppose or
overcome each other (join up synthetically, or
alternate in power). Their profound antagonism
is, however, so great, that in those cases in which
they all insist upon being gratified, a man of very
thorough mediocrity is the outcome.


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THE WILL TO POWER.
678.
It is a question whether the origin of our
apparent "knowledge" is not also a mere offshoot
of our older valuations, which are so completely
assimilated that they belong to the very basis of
our nature. In this way only the more recent
needs engage in battle with results of the oldest
needs.
The world is seen, felt, and interpreted thus and
thus, in order that organic life may be preserved
with this particular manner of interpretation.
Man is not only an individual, but the continuation
of collective organic life in one definite line. The
fact that man survives, proves that a certain species
of interpretations (even though it still be added to)
has also survived ; that, as a system, this method
of interpreting has not changed. “Adaptation. "
Our “dissatisfaction," our “ideal,” etc. , may
possibly be the result of this incorporated piece of
interpretation, of our particular point of view: the
organic world may ultimately perish owing to it-
just as the division of labour in organisms may
be the means of bringing about the ruin of the
whole, if one part happen to wither or weaken.
The destruction of organic life, and even of the
highest form thereof, must follow the same prin-
ciples as the destruction of the individual.
a
"
679
Judged from the standpoint of the theory of
descent, individuation shows the continuous break-


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
153
ing up of one into two, and the equally continuous
annihilation of individuals for the sake of a few
individuals, which evolution bears onwards; the
greater mass always perishes (“the body ").
The fundamental phenomena: innumerable in-
dividuals are sacrificed for the sake of a few, in
order to make the few possible. -One must not
allow one's self to be deceived; the case is the same
with peoples and races: they produce the “body”
for the generation of isolated and valuable indi-
viduals, who continue the great process
680.
I am opposed to the theory that the individual
studies the interests of the species, or of posterity,
at the cost of his own advantage : all this is only
apparent.
The excessive importance which he attaches to
the sexual instinct is not the result of the latter's
importance to the species; for procreation is the
actual performance of the individual, it is his
greatest interest, and therefore it is his highest
expression of power (not judged from the stand-
point of consciousness, but from the very centre of
the individual).
681.
The fundamental errors of the biologists who
have lived hitherto : it is not a matter of the
species, but of rearing stronger individuals (the
many are only a means).
Life is not the continuous adjustment of internal


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THE WILL TO POWER.
relations to external relations, but will to power,
which, proceeding from inside, subjugates and
incorporates an ever - increasing quantity of
“external” phenomena.
These biologists continue the moral valuations
(“ the absolutely higher worth of Altruism,” the
antagonism towards the lust of dominion, towards
war, towards all that which is not useful, and
towards all order of rank and of class).
682.
In natural science, the moral depreciation of the
ego still goes hand in hand with the overestimation
of the species. But the species is quite as illusory
as the ego: a false distinction has been made.
The
ego
is a hundred times more than a mere unit
in a chain of creatures; it is the chain itself, in
every possible respect; and the species is merely
an abstraction suggested by the multiplicity and
partial similarity of these chains. That the
individual is sacrificed to the species, as people
often say he is, is not a fact at all : it is rather
only an example of false interpretation.
683.
The formula of the "progress"-superstition accord-
ing to a famous physiologist of the cerebral
regions :-
“ L'animal ne fait jamais de progrès comme
espèce. L'homme seul fait de progrès comme espèce. "
No.


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155
684.
Anti-Darwin. —The domestication of man : what
definite value can it have, or has domestication in
itself a definite value ? —There are reasons for
denying the latter proposition.
Darwin's school of thought certainly goes to
great pains to convince us of the reverse : it would
fain prove that the influence of domestication
may be profound and fundamental. For the time
being, we stand firmly as we did before ; up to
the present no results save very superficial
modification or degeneration have been shown
to follow upon domestication. And everything
that escapes from the hand and discipline of man,
returns almost immediately to its original natural
condition. The type remains constant, man can-
not “ dénaturer la nature. "
Biologists reckon upon the struggle for existence,
the death of the weaker creature and the survival
of the most robust, most gifted combatant; on
that account they imagine a continuous increase in
the perfection of all creatures. We, on the con-
trary, have convinced ourselves of the fact, that in
the struggle for existence, accident serves the
cause of the weak quite as much as that of
the strong; that craftiness often supplements
strength with advantage; that the prolificness
of a species is related in a remarkable manner
to that species' chances of destruction. .
Natural Selection is also credited with the
power of slowly effecting unlimited metamor-
phoses : it is believed that every advantage is


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THE WILL TO POWER.
transmitted by heredity, and strengthened in the
course of generations (when heredity is known to
be so capricious that . . . ); the happy adaptations
of certain creatures to very special conditions of life,
are regarded as the result of surrounding influences.
Nowhere, however, are examples of unconscious
selection to be found absolutely nowhere). The
most different individuals associate one with the
other; the extremes become lost in the mass. Each
vies with the other to maintain his kind; those
creatures whose appearance shields them from
certain dangers, do not alter this appearance
when they are in an environment quite devoid
of danger. . . . If they live in places where
their coats or their hides do not conceal them,
they do not adapt themselves to their surroundings
in any way
The selection of the most beautiful has been so
exaggerated, that it greatly exceeds the instincts
for beauty in our own race! As a matter of fact,
the most beautiful creature often couples with the
most debased, and the largest with the smallest.
We almost always see males and females taking
advantage of their first chance meeting, and
manifesting no taste or selectiveness at all.
Modification through climate and nourishment-
but as a matter of fact unimportant.
There are no intermediate forms. -
The growing evolution of creatures is assumed.
All grounds for this assumption are entirely
lacking. Every type has its limitations : beyond
these evolution cannot carry it.


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
157
My general point of view. --First proposition :
Man as a species is not progressing. Higher
specimens are indeed attained; but they do not
survive. The general level of the species is not
raised.
Second proposition : Man as a species does not
represent any sort of progress compared with any
other animal. The whole of the animal and
plant world does not develop from the lower to
the higher. . . . but all simultaneously, haphazardly,
confusedly, and at variance. The richest and
most complex forms and the term “higher
type” means no more than this—perish more
easily : only the lowest succeed in maintaining
their apparent imperishableness. The former
are seldom attained, and maintain their superior
position with difficulty; the latter are compensated
by great fruitfulness. --In the human race, also,
the superior specimens, the happy cases of evolution,
are the first to perish amid the fluctuations of
chances for and against them. They are exposed
to every form of decadence: they are extreme,
and, on that account alone, already decadents. . .
The short duration of beauty, of genius, of the
Cæsar, is sui generis : such things are not heredi-
tary. The type is inherited, there is nothing
extreme or particularly “happy" about a type. . . .
It is not a case of a particular fate, or of the “evil
will ” of Nature, but merely of the concept" superior
type": the higher type is an example of an incom-
parably greater degree of complexity—a greater
sum of co-ordinated elements : but on this account
disintegration becomes a thousand times more
C
:


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158
THE WILL TO POWER.
threatening “ Genius " is the sublimest machine
in existence-hence it is the most fragile.
Third proposition : The domestication (culture)
of man does not sink very deep. When it does
sink far below the skin it immediately becomes
degeneration (type : the Christian). The “wild”
man (or, in moral terminology, the evil man)
is a reversion to Nature—and, in a certain sense,
he represents a recovery, a cure from the effects of
“ culture. ”
685.
Anti-Darwin. - What surprises me most on
making a general survey of the great destinies
of man, is that I invariably see the reverse of
what to-day Darwin and his school sees or will
persist in seeing : selection in favour of the
stronger, the better-constituted, and the progress
of the species. Precisely the reverse of this
stares one in the face : the suppression of the
lucky cases, the uselessness of the more highly
constituted types, the inevitable mastery of the
mediocre, and even of those who are below
inediocrity. Unless we are shown some reason
why man is an exception among living creatures,
I incline to the belief that Darwin's school is
everywhere at fault. That will to power, in
which I perceive the ultimate reason and character
of all change, explains why it is that selection is
never in favour of the exceptions and of the lucky
cases : the strongest and happiest natures are
weak when they are confronted with a majority
ruled by organised gregarious instincts and the


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
159
fear which possesses the weak. My general
view of the world of values shows that in the
highest values which now sway the destiny of
man, the happy cases among men, the select
specimens do not prevail : but rather the decadent
specimens,—perhaps there is nothing more in-
teresting in the world than this unpleasant
spectacle. . .
Strange as it may seem, the strong always have
to be upheld against the weak; and the well-
constituted against the ill-constituted, the healthy
against the sick and physiologically botched. If
we drew our morals from reality, they would read
thus: the mediocre are more valuable than the
exceptional creatures, and the decadent than the
mediocre ; the will to nonentity prevails over the
will to life—and the general aim now is, in
Christian, Buddhistic, Schopenhauerian phrase-
ology: “ It is better not to be than to be. "
I protest against this formulating of reality into
a moral: and I loathe Christianity with a deadly
loathing, because it created sublime words and at-
titudes in order to deck a revolting truth with all
the tawdriness of justice, virtue, and godliness.
I see all philosophers and the whole of science
on their knees before a reality which is the reverse
of “the struggle for life," as Darwin and his school
understood it—that is to say, wherever I look,
I see those prevailing and surviving, who throw
doubt and suspicion upon life and the value of
life. The error of the Darwinian school became
a problem to me: how can one be so blind as to
make this mistake ?


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160
THE WILL TO POWER.
That species show an ascending tendency, is the
most nonsensical assertion that has ever been made:
until now they have only manifested a dead level.
There is nothing whatever to prove that the higher
organisms have developed from the lower. I see
that the lower, owing to their numerical strength,
their craft, and ruse, now preponderate,—and I fail
to see an instance in which an accidental change
produces an advantage, at least not for a very long
period : for it would be necessary to find some
reason why an accidental change should become
so very strong.
I do indeed find the “cruelty of Nature” which
is so often referred to; but in a different place:
Nature is cruel, but against her lucky and well-
constituted children; she protects and shelters and
loves the lowly.
In short, the increase of a species' power, as
the result of the preponderance of its particularly
well-constituted and strong specimens, is perhaps
less of a certainty than that it is the result of the
preponderance of its mediocre and lower specimens
. . in the case of the latter, we find great fruit-
fulness and permanence: in the case of the former,
the besetting dangers are greater, waste is more
rapid, and decimation is more speedy.
686.
Man as he has appeared up to the present is
the embryo of the man of the future; all the
formative powers which are to produce the latter,
already lie in the former : and owing to the fact that


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
161
they are enormous, the more promising for the
future the modern individual happens to be, the
more suffering falls to his lot.
This is the pro-
foundest concept of suffering. The formative
powers clash. —The isolation of the individual
need not deceive one- as a matter of fact, some
uninterrupted current does actually flow through
all individuals, and does thus unite them. The
fact that they feel themselves isolated, is the most
powerful spur in the process of setting themselves
the loftiest of aims: their search for happiness is the
means which keeps together and moderates the for-
mative powers, and keeps them from being mutually
destructive.
687.
Excessive intellectual strength sets itself new
goals; it is not in the least satisfied by the com-
mand and the leadership of the inferior world, or
by the preservation of the organism, of the “in-
dividual. "
We are more than the individual: we are the
whole chain itself, with the tasks of all the possible
futures of that chain in us.
3. THEORY OF THE WILL TO POWER AND OF
VALUATIONS.
688.
. The unitary view of psychology. -We are accus-
tomed to regard the development of a vast number
of forms as compatible with one single origin.
My theory would be: that the will to power
L
VOL. II.


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162
THE WILL TO POWER.
is the primitive motive force out of which all other
motives have been derived ;
That it is exceedingly illuminating to sub-
stitute power for individual "happiness” (after
“
which every living organism is said to strive): “It
strives after power, after more power”;-happiness
is only a symptom of the feeling of power attained,
a consciousness of difference (it does not strive
after happiness: but happiness steps in when the
object is attained, after which the organism has
striven: happiness is an accompanying, not an
actuating factor);
That all motive force is the will to power; that
there is no other force, either physical, dynamic, or
psychic.
In our science, where the concept cause and
effect is reduced to a relationship of complete
equilibrium, and in which it seems desirable for
the same quantum of force to be found on either
side, all idea of a motive power is absent: we only
apprehend results, and we call these equal from
the point of view of their content of force. . .
It is a matter of mere experience that change
never ceases: at bottom we have not the smallest
grounds for assuming that any one particular
change must follow upon any other.
On the con-
trary, any state which has been attained would
seem almost forced to maintain itself intact if it
had not within itself a capacity for not desiring to
maintain itself. . . . Spinoza's proposition concern-
ing “self-preservation " ought as a matter of fact to
put a stop to change. But the proposition is false;
the contrary is true. In all living organisms it can
(


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
163
be clearly shown that they do everything not to
remain as they are, but to become greater.
«
689.
" Will to power” and causality. -From a psycho-
logical point of view the idea of “cause " is our feel-
ing of power in the act which is called willing-our
concept "effect" is the superstition that this feeling
of power is itself the force which moves things. . . .
. A state which accompanies an event and is
already an effect of that event is deemed "suffi-
cient cause ” of the latter; the tense relationship
of our feeling of power (pleasure as the feeling of
power) and of an obstacle being overcome—are
these things illusions ?
If we translate the notion cause back into
the only sphere which is known to us, and out of
which we have taken it, we cannot imagine any
change in which the will to power is not inherent.
We do not know how to account for any change
which is not a trespassing of one power on another.
- Mechanics only show us the results, and then
only in images (movement is a figure of speech);
gravitation itself has no mechanical cause, because
it is itself the first cause of mechanical results.
The will to accumulate force is confined to the
phenomenon of life, to nourishment, to procreation,
to inheritance, to society, states, customs, authority.
Should we not be allowed to assume that this will
is the motive power also of chemistry ? -and of
the cosmic order ?
Not only conservation of energy, but the mini-
mum amount of waste; so that the only reality is


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164
THE WILL TO POWER.
this: the will of every centre of power to become
stronger-not self-preservation, but the desire to
appropriate, to become master, to become more,
to become stronger.
Is the fact that science is possible a proof of the
principle of causation—"From like causes, like
effects”—“A permanent law of things "-" In-
variable order"? Because something is calculable,
is it therefore on that account necessary?
If something happens thus, and thus only, it is
not the manifestation of a “principle,” of a “law,"
of “order. " What happens is that certain quanta
of power begin to operate, and their essence is
to exercise their power over all other quanta of
power. Can we assume the existence of a striving
after power without a feeling of pleasure and pain,
i. e. without the sensation of an increase or a de-
crease of power? Is mechanism only a language
of signs for the concealed fact of a world of fight-
ing and conquering quanta of will-power ? All
mechanical first-principles, matter, atoms, weight,
pressure, and repulsion, are not facts in themselves,
but interpretations arrived at with the help of
psychical fictions.
Life, which is our best known form of being, is
altogether" will to the accumulation of strength
all the processes of life hinge on this: everything
aims, not at preservation, but at accretion and
accumulation. Life as an individual case (a
hypothesis which may be applied to existence in
general) strives after the maximum feeling of
power; life is essentially a striving after more power;
striving itself is only a straining after more power ;
"


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
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the most fundamental and innermost thing of all is
this will. (Mechanism is merely the semeiotics of
the results. )
690.
The thing which is the cause of the existence
of development cannot in the course of investiga-
tion be found above development; it should neither
be regarded as "evolving” nor as evolved .
the “ will to power" cannot have been evolved.
691.
What is the relation of the whole of the organic
process towards the rest of nature ? —Here the
fundamental will reveals itself.
692.
Is the “will to power” a kind of will, or is it
identical with the concept will ? Is it equivalent
to desiring or commanding; is it the will which
Schopenhauer says is the essence of things?
My proposition is that the will of psychologists
hitherto has been an unjustifiable generalisation,
and that there is no such thing as this sort of will,
that instead of the development of one will into
several forms being taken as a fact, the character
of will has been cancelled owing to the fact that
its content, its “whither," was subtracted from it:
in Schopenhauer this is so in the highest degree;
what he calls “ will ” is merely an empty word.
There is even less plausibility in the will to live :
for life is simply one of the manifestations of the
will to power; it is quite arbitrary and ridiculous


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166
THE WILL TO POWER.
to suggest that everything is striving to enter into
this particular form of the will to power.
693
If the innermost essence of existence is the will
to power; if happiness is every increase of power,
and unhappiness the feeling of not being able to
resist, of not being able to become master : may
we not then postulate happiness and pain as
cardinal facts ? Is will possible without these two
oscillations of yea and nay?
But who feels
happiness? . . . Who will have power? . . .
Nonsensical question. If the essence of all things
is itself will to power, and consequently the
ability to feel pleasure and pain! Albeit: con-
trasts and obstacles are necessary, therefore also,
relatively, units which trespass on one another.
694.
According to the obstacles which a force seeks
with a view of overcoming them, the measure of
the failure and the fatality thus provoked must
increase: and in so far as every force can only
manifest itself against some thing that opposes it,
an element of unhappiness is necessarily inherent
in every action.
But this pain acts as a greater
incitement to life, and increases the will to power.
695.
If pleasure and pain are related to the feeling
of power, life would have to represent such an
increase in power that the difference, the “plus,"


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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
167
.
.
would have to enter consciousness. A dead
level of power, if maintained, would have to
measure its happiness in relation to depreciations
of that level, i. e. in relation to states of unhappi-
ness and not of happiness. . .