The humbug of the scientific spirit--One should not affect the spirit of science, when the time to be scientific is not yet at hand; but even the genuine
investigator
has to abandon vanity, and has to affect a certain kind of method which is
not yet seasonable.
not yet seasonable.
Nietzsche - Works - v14 - Will to Power - a
.
.
.
4 I 2.
Owing to our habit of believing in uncondi tional authorities, we have grown to feel a profound need for them: indeed, this feeling is
so strong that, even in an age of criticism such as Kant's was, it showed itself to be superior to the need for criticism, and, in a certain sense, was able to subject the whole work of critical acumen,
? and to convert it to own use.
proved
? ? its
It its
? 33 I
superiority once more in the generation which followed, and which, owing to its historical
instincts, naturally felt itself drawn to a relative
view of all authority, when it converted even the Hegelian philosophy of evolution (history re
christened and called philosophy) to own use, and represented history being the self-revela
tion and self-surpassing moral ideas. Since
Plato, philosophy has lain under the dominion morality. Even Plato's predecessors, moral
interpretations play most important ro^le (Anaxi
mander declares that all things are made perish punishment for their departure from pure
being; Heraclitus thinks that the regularity phenomena proof the morally correct
CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
? character evolution
general).
The progress philosophy has been hindered
most seriously hitherto through the influence moral arrie`res-pense? es.
I4.
all ages, "fine feelings" have been regarded
arguments, "heaving
bellows godliness, convictions have been the
"criteria" truth, and the need opposition
has been the note interrogation affixed
wisdom. This falseness and fraud permeates the whole history philosophy. But for few
respected sceptics,
uprightness found anywhere. Finally,
breasts" have been the
no instinct for intellectual
? ? is to be
of of
of is
of
of
a of
a in
a
to
to
of of of
of
its
as
as a
In
4 4I3.
in of
of as
? THE WILL TO POWER.
332
Kant guilelessly sought to make this thinker's corruption scientific by means of his concept, "practical reason. " He expressly invented a reason which, in certain cases, would allow one
not to bother about reason--that is to say, in cases where the heart's desire, morality, or "duty" are
the motive power.
4 I5.
Hegel : his popular side, the doctrine of war
and of great men. Right is on the side of the
victorious: he (the victorious man) stands for the
progress of mankind. His is an attempt at
proving the dominion of morality by means of history.
Kant: a kingdom of moral values withdrawn from us, invisible, real.
Hegel: a demonstrable process of evolution,
the actualisation of the kingdom of morality.
We shall not allow ourselves to be deceived
either in Kant's or Hegel's way:--We no longer believe, as they did, in morality, and therefore have
no philosophies to found with the view of justify ing morality. Criticism and history have no
charm for us in this respect: what is their charm, then P
416.
The importance of German philosophy (Hegel),
the thinking out of a kind of pantheism which would not reckon evil, error, and suffering as
arguments against godliness. This grand initia tive was misused by the powers that were (State,
? ? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
333
etc. ) to sanction the rights of the people that happened to be paramount.
Schopenhauer appears as a stubborn opponent
of this idea; he is a moral man who, in order to keep in the right concerning his moral valuation,
finally becomes a denier of the world. Ultimately
he becomes a "mystic. "
I myself have sought an aesthetic justification
of the ugliness in this world. I regarded the
desire for beauty and for the persistence of certain forms as a temporary preservative and recupera tive measure: what seemed to me to be funda mentally associated with pain, however, was the
eternal lust of creating and the eternal compulsion to destroy.
We call things ugly when we look at them with the desire of attributing some sense, some new
to what has become senseless: it is the accumulated power of the creator which compels him to regard what has existed hitherto as no longer acceptable, botched, worthy of being sup pressed--ugly |
4 I 7.
My first solution of the problem : Dionysian
wisdom. The joy in the destruction of the most noble thing, and at the sight of its gradual undoing,
regarded as the joy over what is coming and what lies in the future, which triumphs over actual things, however good they may Dionysian:
temporary identification with the principle life (voluptuousness the martyr included).
My innovations. The Development Pessim
? sense,
? ? of
of
of
-
be.
? 334
THE WILL TO POWER.
ism: intellectual pessimism; moral criticism, the dissolution of the last comfort. Knowledge, a
sign of decay, veils by means of an illusion all strong action; culture isolates, is unfair and
therefore strong.
(1) My fight against decay and the increas
ing weakness of personality. I sought a new ce? ! ? ? /7/2.
(2) The impossibility of this endeavour is recognised.
(3) I therefore travelled farther along the road of dissolution--and along it I found new sources of strength for individuals. We must be destroyers | --I perceived that the state of dissolution is one in
which individual beings are able to arrive at a kind of perfection not possible hitherto, it is an image and
isolated example of life in general. To the para lysing feeling of general dissolution and imperfec
tion, I opposed the Eternal Recurrence.
418.
People naturally seek the picture of life in that
philosophy which makes them most cheerful-- that is to say, in that philosophy which gives the highest sense of freedom to their strongest instinct. This is probably the case with me.
419.
German philosophy, as a whole,--Leibnitz,
? Kant, Hegel, Schopenhauer,
greatest, -- is the most out-and-out form of
to mention the
? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY,
335
romanticism and home-sickness that has ever yet
existed : it is a yearning for the best that has ever been known on earth. One is at home no
where; that which is ultimately yearned after is a
place where one can somehow feel at home; be cause there alone one would like to be at home, and
that place is the Greek world ! But it is precisely in that direction that all bridges are broken down --save, of course, the rainbow of concepts | And
the latter lead everywhere, to all the homes and
"fatherlands" that ever existed for Greek souls | Certainly, one must be very light and thin in
order to cross these bridges! But what happiness lies even in this desire for spirituality, almost for
from North passage out
? ghostliness!
With how far one from the "press and bustle" and the mechanical boorish ness the natural sciences, how far from the vulgar din "modern ideas"! One wants get back the Greeks via the Fathers the Church,
South, from formulae forms; the antiquity--Christianity--is still
source joy means access antiquity,
portion
mosaic ancient concepts and ancient valuations.
the old world itself, glistening
Arabesques, scroll-work,
abstractions--always better, that say, finer and more slender, than the peasant and plebeian reality Northern Europe, and still protest on the part higher intellectuality against the
peasant war and insurrection the mob which have become master the intellectual taste Northern Europe, and which had its leader
man great and unintellectual Luther:--in
rococo scholastic
? ? as ofofoftoof
of as
is of as
to ato
to of
in
a of
a
of of
of as of to
it,
a
is to
as a
of a
of
? 336
THE WILL TO POWER.
this respect German philosophy belongs to the Counter-Reformation, it might even be looked
upon as related to the Renaissance, or at least to the will to Renaissance, the will to get ahead with
the discovery of antiquity, with the excavation of ancient philosophy, and above all of pre-Socratic
philosophy--the most thoroughly dilapidated of
all Greek temples! Possibly, in a few hundred years, people will be of the opinion that all
German philosophy derived its dignity from this fact, that step by step it attempted to reclaim the
soil of antiquity, and that therefore all demands for "originality" must appear both petty and foolish when compared with Germany's higher
claim to having refastened the bonds which seemed for ever rent--the bonds which bound us to
the Greeks, the highest type of "men" ever evolved hitherto. To-day we are once more approach ing all the fundamental principles of the cosmogony which the Greek mind in Anaximander, Hera clitus, Parmenides, Empedocles, Democritus, Anaxagoras, was responsible for. Day by day we are growing more Greek; at first, as is only natural, the change remains confined to concepts
and valuations, and we hover around like Grecis ing spirits: but it is to be hoped that some day
our body will also be involved ! Here lies (and has always lain) my hope for the German nation.
42O.
I do not wish to convert anybody to philosophy: it is both necessary and perhaps desirable that the
? and
? ? ? cause he
CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
337
philosopher should be a rare plant. Nothing is more repugnant to me than the scholarly praise
of philosophy which is to be found in Seneca and
Cicero. Philosophy has not much in common
with virtue. I trust I may be allowed to say that
even the scientific man is a fundamentally different
person from the philosopher. What I most desire that the genuine notion "philosopher" should
not completely perish Germany. There are many incomplete creatures Germany already
who would fain conceal their ineptitude beneath such noble names.
42
must set the highest ideal philosopher.
? Learning sheep
told do so, and because others have done so before him.
422.
The superstition concerning philosophers: They
are confounded with men of science. As the
value things were inherent them and required
only be held on tightly To what extent are their researches carried on under the influence
values which already prevail (their hatred appearance the body, etc. )? Schopenhauer
not everything! The scholar the
the kingdom learning; he studies be
concerning morality
(scorn Utilitarianism).
Ultimately the confusion goes far that Darwinism regarded philosophy, and thus
the present day power has gone over the men
science. Even Frenchmen like Taine prosecute VOL. Y
? ? ofof Iis,
I.
is
to of
in
to
as
of
in I.
at
of
so
so
of a
of
to
up to
in of
in
I
if
is
is
is
? 338
THE WILL TO POWER.
research, or mean to prosecute research, without
being already in possession of a standard of ? valuation. Prostration before "facts" of a kind
of cult. As a matter of fact, they destroy the existing valuations.
The explanation of this misunderstanding. The
man who is able to command is a rare phenomenon;
he misinterprets himself. What one wants to do,
above all, is to disclaim all authority and to
attribute it to circumstances. In Germany the
critic's estimations belong to the history of awakening manhood. Lessing, etc. (Napoleon
concerning Goethe). As a matter of fact, the movement is again made retrograde owing to
German romanticism: and the fame of German philosophy relies upon , it as if it dissipated the
danger of scepticism and could demonstrate faith. Both tendencies culminate in Hegel: at bottom, what he did was to generalise the fact of German criticism and the fact of German romanticism,-a kind of dialectical fatalism, but to the honour of intellectuality, with the actual submission of the philosopher to reality. The critic prepares the way: that is all !
With Schopenhauer the philosopher's mission dawns; it is felt that the object is to determine
? values;
The ideal of Pessimism.
still under the dominion of eudemonism.
423.
Theory and practice. --This is a pernicious dis tinction, as if there were an instinct of knowledge,
? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
339
which, without inquiring into the utility or harm fulness of a thing, blindly charged at the truth;
and then that, apart from this instinct, there were the whole world of practical interests.
In contradiction of this, I try to show what instincts are active behind all these pure theorists, --and how the latter, as a whole, under the dominion of their instincts, fatally make for some thing which to their minds is "truth," to their minds and only to their minds. The struggle between systems, together with the struggle between epistemological scruples, is one which
involves very special instincts (forms of vitality, of decline, of classes, of races, etc. ).
The so-called thirst for knowledge may be traced to the lust of appropriation and of conquest: in
obedience to this lust the senses, memory, and the instincts, etc. , were developed. The quickest
possible reduction of the phenomena, economy,
the accumulation of spoil from the world of know
ledge (i. e. that portion of the world which has been appropriated and made manageable). . . .
Morality is therefore such a curious science, because it is in the highest degree practical : the
purely scientific position, scientific uprightness, is thus immediately abandoned, as soon as morality calls for replies to its questions. Morality says: . I require certain answers--reasons, arguments; scruples may come afterwards, or they may not come at all.
"How must one act? " If one considers that one is dealing with a supremely evolved type--a type which has been "dealt with " for countless.
? ? ? ? 34O
THE WILL TO POWER.
thousands of years, and in which everything ! become instinct, expediency, automatism, fatali
the urgency of this moral question seems ratl funny.
"How must one act? " Morality has alwa been a subject of misunderstanding: as a mat
of fact, a certain species, which was constituted
act in a certain way, wished to justify itself making its norm paramount.
"How must one act? " this is not a cause, l
an effect. Morality follows, the ideal con attheend. . . .
On the other hand, the appearance of mo
scruples (or in other words, the coming to conscio
ness of the values which guide action) betray certain morbidness; strong ages and people
not ponder over their rights, nor over the princip
of action, over instinct or over reason. Conscio
ness is a sign that the real morality--that is to s
the certainty of instinct which leads to a defin
course of action--is going to the dogs. . . . Ev.
time a new world of consciousness is created, moralists are signs of a lesion, of impoverishm
and of disorganisation. Those who are dee instinctive fear bandying words over duties: amo them are found pyrrhonic opponents of dialect and of knowableness in general. . . . A virtue refuted with a "for. " . . .
Thesis : The appearance of moralists belo to periods when morality is declining.
Thesis : The moralist is a dissipator of ma
instincts, however much he may appear to be th restorer,
? ? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
34I
Thesis : That which really prompts the action of a moralist is not a moral instinct, but the instincts of decadence, translated into the forms of morality (he regards the growing uncertainty of the instincts as corruption).
T:hesis : The instincts of decadence which, thanks to moralists, wish to become master of the in stinctive morality of stronger races and ages, are
(1) The instincts of the weak and of the botched;
(2) The instincts of the exceptions, of the anchorites, of the unhinged, of the abortions of quality or of the reverse;
(3) The instincts of the habitually suffering, who require a noble interpretation of their condition,
and who therefore require to be as poor physi ologists as possible.
424.
The humbug of the scientific spirit--One should not affect the spirit of science, when the time to be scientific is not yet at hand; but even the genuine investigator has to abandon vanity, and has to affect a certain kind of method which is
not yet seasonable. Neither should we falsify
things and thoughts, which we have arrived at differently, by means of a false arrangement of deduction and dialectics. It is thus that Kant in
his "morality" falsifies his inner tendency to psychology; a more modern example of the same thing is Herbert Spencer's Ethics. A man should neither conceal nor misrepresent the facts con cerning the way in which he conceived his
? ? ? ? scientific
THE WILL TO POWER.
342
thoughts. The deepest and most inexhaustible books will certainly always have something of the
aphoristic and impetuous character of Pascal's Pense? es. The motive forces and valuations have
lain long below the surface; that which comes
uppermost is their effect.
I guard against all the humbug of a false
spirit:--
(1) In respect of the manner of demonstration,
if it does not correspond to the genesis of the thoughts;
(2) In respect of the demands for methods which, at a given period in science, may be quite
impossible;
(3) In respect of the demand for objectivity, for cold impersonal treatment, where, as in the case
of all valuations, we describe ourselves and our
intimate experiences in a couple of words. There
are ludicrous forms of vanity, as, for instance,
Sainte-Beuve's. He actually worried himself all his life because he had shown some warmth or
passion either "pro" or "con," and he would fain have lied that fact out of his life.
425.
"Objectivity" in the philosopher: moral in
difference in regard to one's self, blindness in regard to either favourable or fatal circumstances. Un
scrupulousness in the use of dangerous means;
perversity and complexity of character considered as an advantage and exploited.
My profound indifference to myself: I refuse
? ? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY,
343
to derive any advantage from my knowledge, nor
do I wish to escape any disadvantages which it
may entail. --I include among these disadvantages
that which is called the perversion of character;
this prospect is beside the point: I use my char
acter, but I try neither to understand it nor to
change it--the personal calculation of virtue has
not entered my head once. It strikes me that one
closes the doors of knowledge as soon as one
becomes interested in one's own personal case--or even in the "Salvation of one's soul"! . . . One
should not take one's morality too seriously, nor
should one forfeit a modest right to the opposite of morality. . . .
A sort of heritage of morality is perhaps pre
supposed
with it and fling a great deal of it out of the
window without materially reducing one's means.
One is never tempted to admire "beautiful souls,"
one always knows one's self to be their superior.
The monsters of virtue should be met with inner
scorn; de? miaiser la vertu--Oh, the joy of it !
One should revolve round one's self, have no
desire to be "better" or "anything else" at all than one is. One should be too interested to omit
throwing the tentacles or meshes of every mor ality out to things.
426.
Concerning the psychology of philosophers. They should be psychologists--this was possible
only from the nineteenth century onwards--and no longer little Jack Horners, who see three or
? here: one feels that one can be lavish
? ? ? 344
THE WILL TO POWER.
four feet in front of them, and are almost satisfied
to burrow inside themselves. We psychologists of
the future are not very intent on self-contempla tion: we regard it almost as a sign of degeneration when an instrument endeavours "to know itself": *
we are instruments of knowledge and we would fain possess all the precision and ingenuousness of an instrument--consequently we may not analyse
or "know" ourselves. The first sign of a great
psychologist's self-preservative
goes in search of himself, he has no eye, no interest,
no inquisitiveness where he himself is concerned. . . . The great egoism of our dominating will insists on our completely shutting our eyes to ourselves, and on our appearing "impersonal,"
"disinterested"! --Oh to what a ridiculous degree we are the reverse of this !
We are no Pascals, we are not particularly in
terested in the "Salvation of the soul," in our own
happiness, and in our own virtue. --We have neither enough time nor enough curiosity to be so con
cerned with ourselves. Regarded more deeply, the case is again different, we thoroughly mistrust all
men who thus contemplate their own navels: be cause introspection seems to us a degenerate form
of the psychologist's genius, as a note of interroga
tion affixed to the psychologist's instinct: just as a painter's eye is degenerate which is actuated by
the will to see for the sake of seeing.
instinct: he never
? invariably inveighed against the "yvo? 6 geavro? w" of the Socratic school; he was
*TRANSLATOR's NoTE. --Goethe
of the opinion that an animal which tries to see inner self must be sick.
? ? its
? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY,
345
The apparition of Greek philosophers since the
time of Socrates is a symptom of decadence; the anti-Hellenic instincts become paramount.
The "Sophist" is still quite Hellenic--as are also Anaxagoras, Democritus, and the great
Ionians; but only as transitional forms. The
Polis loses its faith in the unity of its culture, in
its rights of dominion over every other polis. . . . Cultures, that is to say, "the gods," are exchanged,
2. A CRITICISM OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY,
427.
? prerogative of the deus autochthonus is lost. Good and Evil of
and thus the belief in the exclusive
whatever origin get mixed: the boundaries separ
ating good from evil gradually vanish. . . . This is the "Sophist. " . . .
On the other hand, the "philosopher" is the
reactionary: he insists upon the old virtues. He
sees the reason of decay in the decay of institu
tions: he therefore wishes to revive old institutions;
--he sees decay in the decline of authority: he
therefore endeavours to find new authorities (he travels abroad, explores foreign literature and
exotic religions. . . . );--he will reinstate the ideal polis, after the concept "polis" has become super
annuated (just as the Jews kept themselves to gether as a "people" after they had fallen into slavery). They become interested in all tyrants:
their desire is to re-establish virtue with force majeure.
? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER.
346
Gradually everything genuinely Hellenic is hel
responsible for the state of decay (and Plato is jus as ungrateful to Pericles, Homer, tragedy, an
rhetoric as the prophets are to David and Saul The downfall of Greece is conceived as an objectio.
to the fundamental principles of Hellenic culture the profound error of philosophers. --Conclusion: th
Greek world perishes. The cause thereof: Home mythology, ancient morality, etc.
The anti-Hellenic development of philosopher:
valuations:--the Egyptian influence ("Life afte
death" made into law. . . . );--the Semitic influenc (the "dignity of the sage," the "Sheik");--th
? Pythagorean influence,
Silence, means of terrorisation consisting of appeal
to a "Beyond," mathematics: the religious valua
tion consisting of a sort of intimacy with a cosmi entity;--the sacerdotal, ascetic, and transcendenta influences;--the dialectical influence,--I am o opinion that even Plato already betrays revolting
and pedantic meticulousness in his concepts -- Decline of good intellectual taste: the hatefu noisiness of every kind of direct dialectics seem no longer to be felt.
The two decadent tendencies and extremes rul
side by side: (a) the luxuriant and more charming
kind of decadence which shows a love of pomp and art, and (b) the gloomy kind, with its religious and
moral pathos, its stoical self-hardening tendency
its Platonic denial of the senses, and its preparation of the soil for the coming of Christianity.
the subterranean cult:
? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY, 347
428.
To what extent psychologists have been cor rupted by the moral idiosyncrasy! --Not one of the ancient philosophers had the courage to
advance the theory of the non-free will (that is to say, the theory that denies morality);--not one had the courage to identify the typical feature of happiness, of every kind of happiness
("pleasure"), with the will to power: for the pleasure of power was considered immoral;--not
one had the courage to regard virtue as a result of immorality (as a result of a will to power) in the service of a species (or of a race, or of a polis); for the will to power was considered immoral.
In the whole of moral evolution, there is no
sign of truth: all the conceptual elements which come into play are fictions; all the psychological
tenets are false; all the forms of logic employed in this department of prevarication are sophisms.
The chief feature of all moral philosophers is their total lack of intellectual cleanliness and self-control:
they regard "fine feelings" as arguments: their
? heaving
godliness. . . . Moral philosophy is the most
breasts seem to them the bellows of
suspicious period in the history of the human intellect.
The first great example: in the name of morality and under its patronage, a great wrong
was committed, which as a matter of fact was in every respect an act of decadence. Sufficient
stress cannot be laid upon this fact, that the great Greek philosophers not only represented
? ? ? 348
THE WILL TO POWER.
the decadence of every kind of Greek ability, but
also made it contagious. . . . This "virtue" made wholly abstract was the highest form of seduction; to make oneself abstract means to turn one's back on the world.
The moment is a very remarkable one: the
Sophists are within sight of the first criticism of morality, the first knowledge of morality:--they
classify the majority of moral valuations (in view
of their dependence upon local conditions) together;
--they lead one to understand that every form of morality is capable of being upheld dialectically:
that is to say, they guessed that all the funda mental principles of a morality must be sophistical
--a proposition which was afterwards proved in the grandest possible style by the ancient philoso
phers from Plato onwards (up to Kant);--they
postulate the primary truth that there is no such thing as a "moral per se," a "good per se," and that it is madness to talk of "truth" in this respect.
Wherever was intellectual uprightness to be found in those days?
The Greek culture of the Sophists had grown
out of all the Greek instincts; it belongs to the
culture of the age of Pericles as necessarily as Plato does not: it has its predecessors in Hera clitus, Democritus, and in the scientific types of the old philosophy; it finds expression in the
elevated culture of Thucydides, for instance, And
--it has ultimately shown itself to be right: every step in the science of epistemology and morality
has confirmed the attitude of the Sophists. . . . Our
? ? ? - CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY,
349
? great extent, Heraclitean, Democritean, and Protagorean
modern attitude of mind
say that Protagorean even sufficient: because Protagoras was himself synthesis
the two men Heraclitus and Democritus.
(Plato: great Cagliostro-let think how Epicurus judged him; how Timon, Pyrrho's friend, judged him Plato's integrity by any chance
beyond question?
But we
least know absolute truth him not even
what he wished have taught --namely, things which were
relative truths: the separate and immortal life "souls. ")
429.
The Sophists are nothing more nor less than realists: they elevate all the values and practices which are common property the rank values --they have the courage, peculiar all strong
intellects, which consists knowing their im morality.
be supposed that these small Greek independent republics, filled with rage and envy
that they would fain have devoured each other, were led by principles humanity and honesty
Thucydides by any chance reproached with the words he puts into the mouths the Athenian ambassadors when they were treating with the Melii anent the question destruction sub mission? Only the most perfect Tartuffes could have been able speak virtue the midst
that dreadful strain--or not Tartuffes, least detached philosophers, anchorites, exiles, and fleers
? ? ? if of
in
at
or of
of
? ofof.
to
to
.
is Is
Is
to
of so
. .
Is it
to . . .
a
it
in to
inof to atusaa
of
is, is to
to as
of
.
.
? 350
* THE WILL TO POWER.
from reality. . . . All of them, people who denied things in order to be able to exist.
The Sophists were Greeks: when Socrates and
Plato adopted the cause of virtue and justice, they
were Jews or I know not what. Grote's tactics
in the defence of the Sophists are false: he would like to raise them to the rank of men of honour
and moralisers--but it was their honour not to indulge in any humbug with grand words and virtues.
43O.
The great reasonableness underlying all moral education lay in the fact that it always attempted to attain to the certainty of an instinct: so that neither good intentions nor good means, as such, first required to enter consciousness. Just as the soldier learns his exercises, so should man learn how to act in life. In truth this unconsciousness belongs to every kind of perfection: even the
mathematician carries out his calculations un
? consciously.
What, then, does Socrates' reaction mean, which
recommended dialectics as the way to virtue, and which was amused when morality was unable to justify itself logically? But this is precisely what proves its superiority--without unconsciousness it is worth nothing!
In reality it means the dissolution of Greek instincts, when demonstrability is posited as the
first condition of personal excellence in virtue. All these great "men of virtue" and of words are themselves types of dissolution.
. . .
? ? ? -
CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
351
In practice, it means that moral judgments have been torn from the conditions among which they grew and in which alone they had some sense, from their Greek and Graeco-political soil, in order to be denaturalised under the cover of being sub limated. The great concepts "good" and "just"
are divorced from the first principles of which they form a part, and, as "ideas" become free, degenerate
into subjects for discussion. A certain truth is sought behind them; they are regarded as entities
or as symbols of entities: a world is invented where
they are "at home," and from which they are supposed to hail.
In short: the scandal reaches its apotheosis in
Plato. . . . And then it was necessary to invent the abstract perfect man also:--good, just, wise,
and a dialectician to boot--in short, the scarecrow ofthe ancient philosopher: a plant without any
soil whatsoever; a human race devoid of all definite ruling instincts; a virtue which "justifies"
itself with reasons. The perfectly absurd "in
dividual" per se! the highest form of Artifici ality. . . . .
Briefly, the denaturalisation of moral values resulted in the creation of a degenerate type of man--"the good man," "the happy man," "the
wise man. "--Socrates represents a moment of the most profound perversity in the history of values.
43 I.
Socrates. --This veering round of Greek taste in favour of dialectics is a great question. What
?
4 I 2.
Owing to our habit of believing in uncondi tional authorities, we have grown to feel a profound need for them: indeed, this feeling is
so strong that, even in an age of criticism such as Kant's was, it showed itself to be superior to the need for criticism, and, in a certain sense, was able to subject the whole work of critical acumen,
? and to convert it to own use.
proved
? ? its
It its
? 33 I
superiority once more in the generation which followed, and which, owing to its historical
instincts, naturally felt itself drawn to a relative
view of all authority, when it converted even the Hegelian philosophy of evolution (history re
christened and called philosophy) to own use, and represented history being the self-revela
tion and self-surpassing moral ideas. Since
Plato, philosophy has lain under the dominion morality. Even Plato's predecessors, moral
interpretations play most important ro^le (Anaxi
mander declares that all things are made perish punishment for their departure from pure
being; Heraclitus thinks that the regularity phenomena proof the morally correct
CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
? character evolution
general).
The progress philosophy has been hindered
most seriously hitherto through the influence moral arrie`res-pense? es.
I4.
all ages, "fine feelings" have been regarded
arguments, "heaving
bellows godliness, convictions have been the
"criteria" truth, and the need opposition
has been the note interrogation affixed
wisdom. This falseness and fraud permeates the whole history philosophy. But for few
respected sceptics,
uprightness found anywhere. Finally,
breasts" have been the
no instinct for intellectual
? ? is to be
of of
of is
of
of
a of
a in
a
to
to
of of of
of
its
as
as a
In
4 4I3.
in of
of as
? THE WILL TO POWER.
332
Kant guilelessly sought to make this thinker's corruption scientific by means of his concept, "practical reason. " He expressly invented a reason which, in certain cases, would allow one
not to bother about reason--that is to say, in cases where the heart's desire, morality, or "duty" are
the motive power.
4 I5.
Hegel : his popular side, the doctrine of war
and of great men. Right is on the side of the
victorious: he (the victorious man) stands for the
progress of mankind. His is an attempt at
proving the dominion of morality by means of history.
Kant: a kingdom of moral values withdrawn from us, invisible, real.
Hegel: a demonstrable process of evolution,
the actualisation of the kingdom of morality.
We shall not allow ourselves to be deceived
either in Kant's or Hegel's way:--We no longer believe, as they did, in morality, and therefore have
no philosophies to found with the view of justify ing morality. Criticism and history have no
charm for us in this respect: what is their charm, then P
416.
The importance of German philosophy (Hegel),
the thinking out of a kind of pantheism which would not reckon evil, error, and suffering as
arguments against godliness. This grand initia tive was misused by the powers that were (State,
? ? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
333
etc. ) to sanction the rights of the people that happened to be paramount.
Schopenhauer appears as a stubborn opponent
of this idea; he is a moral man who, in order to keep in the right concerning his moral valuation,
finally becomes a denier of the world. Ultimately
he becomes a "mystic. "
I myself have sought an aesthetic justification
of the ugliness in this world. I regarded the
desire for beauty and for the persistence of certain forms as a temporary preservative and recupera tive measure: what seemed to me to be funda mentally associated with pain, however, was the
eternal lust of creating and the eternal compulsion to destroy.
We call things ugly when we look at them with the desire of attributing some sense, some new
to what has become senseless: it is the accumulated power of the creator which compels him to regard what has existed hitherto as no longer acceptable, botched, worthy of being sup pressed--ugly |
4 I 7.
My first solution of the problem : Dionysian
wisdom. The joy in the destruction of the most noble thing, and at the sight of its gradual undoing,
regarded as the joy over what is coming and what lies in the future, which triumphs over actual things, however good they may Dionysian:
temporary identification with the principle life (voluptuousness the martyr included).
My innovations. The Development Pessim
? sense,
? ? of
of
of
-
be.
? 334
THE WILL TO POWER.
ism: intellectual pessimism; moral criticism, the dissolution of the last comfort. Knowledge, a
sign of decay, veils by means of an illusion all strong action; culture isolates, is unfair and
therefore strong.
(1) My fight against decay and the increas
ing weakness of personality. I sought a new ce? ! ? ? /7/2.
(2) The impossibility of this endeavour is recognised.
(3) I therefore travelled farther along the road of dissolution--and along it I found new sources of strength for individuals. We must be destroyers | --I perceived that the state of dissolution is one in
which individual beings are able to arrive at a kind of perfection not possible hitherto, it is an image and
isolated example of life in general. To the para lysing feeling of general dissolution and imperfec
tion, I opposed the Eternal Recurrence.
418.
People naturally seek the picture of life in that
philosophy which makes them most cheerful-- that is to say, in that philosophy which gives the highest sense of freedom to their strongest instinct. This is probably the case with me.
419.
German philosophy, as a whole,--Leibnitz,
? Kant, Hegel, Schopenhauer,
greatest, -- is the most out-and-out form of
to mention the
? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY,
335
romanticism and home-sickness that has ever yet
existed : it is a yearning for the best that has ever been known on earth. One is at home no
where; that which is ultimately yearned after is a
place where one can somehow feel at home; be cause there alone one would like to be at home, and
that place is the Greek world ! But it is precisely in that direction that all bridges are broken down --save, of course, the rainbow of concepts | And
the latter lead everywhere, to all the homes and
"fatherlands" that ever existed for Greek souls | Certainly, one must be very light and thin in
order to cross these bridges! But what happiness lies even in this desire for spirituality, almost for
from North passage out
? ghostliness!
With how far one from the "press and bustle" and the mechanical boorish ness the natural sciences, how far from the vulgar din "modern ideas"! One wants get back the Greeks via the Fathers the Church,
South, from formulae forms; the antiquity--Christianity--is still
source joy means access antiquity,
portion
mosaic ancient concepts and ancient valuations.
the old world itself, glistening
Arabesques, scroll-work,
abstractions--always better, that say, finer and more slender, than the peasant and plebeian reality Northern Europe, and still protest on the part higher intellectuality against the
peasant war and insurrection the mob which have become master the intellectual taste Northern Europe, and which had its leader
man great and unintellectual Luther:--in
rococo scholastic
? ? as ofofoftoof
of as
is of as
to ato
to of
in
a of
a
of of
of as of to
it,
a
is to
as a
of a
of
? 336
THE WILL TO POWER.
this respect German philosophy belongs to the Counter-Reformation, it might even be looked
upon as related to the Renaissance, or at least to the will to Renaissance, the will to get ahead with
the discovery of antiquity, with the excavation of ancient philosophy, and above all of pre-Socratic
philosophy--the most thoroughly dilapidated of
all Greek temples! Possibly, in a few hundred years, people will be of the opinion that all
German philosophy derived its dignity from this fact, that step by step it attempted to reclaim the
soil of antiquity, and that therefore all demands for "originality" must appear both petty and foolish when compared with Germany's higher
claim to having refastened the bonds which seemed for ever rent--the bonds which bound us to
the Greeks, the highest type of "men" ever evolved hitherto. To-day we are once more approach ing all the fundamental principles of the cosmogony which the Greek mind in Anaximander, Hera clitus, Parmenides, Empedocles, Democritus, Anaxagoras, was responsible for. Day by day we are growing more Greek; at first, as is only natural, the change remains confined to concepts
and valuations, and we hover around like Grecis ing spirits: but it is to be hoped that some day
our body will also be involved ! Here lies (and has always lain) my hope for the German nation.
42O.
I do not wish to convert anybody to philosophy: it is both necessary and perhaps desirable that the
? and
? ? ? cause he
CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
337
philosopher should be a rare plant. Nothing is more repugnant to me than the scholarly praise
of philosophy which is to be found in Seneca and
Cicero. Philosophy has not much in common
with virtue. I trust I may be allowed to say that
even the scientific man is a fundamentally different
person from the philosopher. What I most desire that the genuine notion "philosopher" should
not completely perish Germany. There are many incomplete creatures Germany already
who would fain conceal their ineptitude beneath such noble names.
42
must set the highest ideal philosopher.
? Learning sheep
told do so, and because others have done so before him.
422.
The superstition concerning philosophers: They
are confounded with men of science. As the
value things were inherent them and required
only be held on tightly To what extent are their researches carried on under the influence
values which already prevail (their hatred appearance the body, etc. )? Schopenhauer
not everything! The scholar the
the kingdom learning; he studies be
concerning morality
(scorn Utilitarianism).
Ultimately the confusion goes far that Darwinism regarded philosophy, and thus
the present day power has gone over the men
science. Even Frenchmen like Taine prosecute VOL. Y
? ? ofof Iis,
I.
is
to of
in
to
as
of
in I.
at
of
so
so
of a
of
to
up to
in of
in
I
if
is
is
is
? 338
THE WILL TO POWER.
research, or mean to prosecute research, without
being already in possession of a standard of ? valuation. Prostration before "facts" of a kind
of cult. As a matter of fact, they destroy the existing valuations.
The explanation of this misunderstanding. The
man who is able to command is a rare phenomenon;
he misinterprets himself. What one wants to do,
above all, is to disclaim all authority and to
attribute it to circumstances. In Germany the
critic's estimations belong to the history of awakening manhood. Lessing, etc. (Napoleon
concerning Goethe). As a matter of fact, the movement is again made retrograde owing to
German romanticism: and the fame of German philosophy relies upon , it as if it dissipated the
danger of scepticism and could demonstrate faith. Both tendencies culminate in Hegel: at bottom, what he did was to generalise the fact of German criticism and the fact of German romanticism,-a kind of dialectical fatalism, but to the honour of intellectuality, with the actual submission of the philosopher to reality. The critic prepares the way: that is all !
With Schopenhauer the philosopher's mission dawns; it is felt that the object is to determine
? values;
The ideal of Pessimism.
still under the dominion of eudemonism.
423.
Theory and practice. --This is a pernicious dis tinction, as if there were an instinct of knowledge,
? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
339
which, without inquiring into the utility or harm fulness of a thing, blindly charged at the truth;
and then that, apart from this instinct, there were the whole world of practical interests.
In contradiction of this, I try to show what instincts are active behind all these pure theorists, --and how the latter, as a whole, under the dominion of their instincts, fatally make for some thing which to their minds is "truth," to their minds and only to their minds. The struggle between systems, together with the struggle between epistemological scruples, is one which
involves very special instincts (forms of vitality, of decline, of classes, of races, etc. ).
The so-called thirst for knowledge may be traced to the lust of appropriation and of conquest: in
obedience to this lust the senses, memory, and the instincts, etc. , were developed. The quickest
possible reduction of the phenomena, economy,
the accumulation of spoil from the world of know
ledge (i. e. that portion of the world which has been appropriated and made manageable). . . .
Morality is therefore such a curious science, because it is in the highest degree practical : the
purely scientific position, scientific uprightness, is thus immediately abandoned, as soon as morality calls for replies to its questions. Morality says: . I require certain answers--reasons, arguments; scruples may come afterwards, or they may not come at all.
"How must one act? " If one considers that one is dealing with a supremely evolved type--a type which has been "dealt with " for countless.
? ? ? ? 34O
THE WILL TO POWER.
thousands of years, and in which everything ! become instinct, expediency, automatism, fatali
the urgency of this moral question seems ratl funny.
"How must one act? " Morality has alwa been a subject of misunderstanding: as a mat
of fact, a certain species, which was constituted
act in a certain way, wished to justify itself making its norm paramount.
"How must one act? " this is not a cause, l
an effect. Morality follows, the ideal con attheend. . . .
On the other hand, the appearance of mo
scruples (or in other words, the coming to conscio
ness of the values which guide action) betray certain morbidness; strong ages and people
not ponder over their rights, nor over the princip
of action, over instinct or over reason. Conscio
ness is a sign that the real morality--that is to s
the certainty of instinct which leads to a defin
course of action--is going to the dogs. . . . Ev.
time a new world of consciousness is created, moralists are signs of a lesion, of impoverishm
and of disorganisation. Those who are dee instinctive fear bandying words over duties: amo them are found pyrrhonic opponents of dialect and of knowableness in general. . . . A virtue refuted with a "for. " . . .
Thesis : The appearance of moralists belo to periods when morality is declining.
Thesis : The moralist is a dissipator of ma
instincts, however much he may appear to be th restorer,
? ? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
34I
Thesis : That which really prompts the action of a moralist is not a moral instinct, but the instincts of decadence, translated into the forms of morality (he regards the growing uncertainty of the instincts as corruption).
T:hesis : The instincts of decadence which, thanks to moralists, wish to become master of the in stinctive morality of stronger races and ages, are
(1) The instincts of the weak and of the botched;
(2) The instincts of the exceptions, of the anchorites, of the unhinged, of the abortions of quality or of the reverse;
(3) The instincts of the habitually suffering, who require a noble interpretation of their condition,
and who therefore require to be as poor physi ologists as possible.
424.
The humbug of the scientific spirit--One should not affect the spirit of science, when the time to be scientific is not yet at hand; but even the genuine investigator has to abandon vanity, and has to affect a certain kind of method which is
not yet seasonable. Neither should we falsify
things and thoughts, which we have arrived at differently, by means of a false arrangement of deduction and dialectics. It is thus that Kant in
his "morality" falsifies his inner tendency to psychology; a more modern example of the same thing is Herbert Spencer's Ethics. A man should neither conceal nor misrepresent the facts con cerning the way in which he conceived his
? ? ? ? scientific
THE WILL TO POWER.
342
thoughts. The deepest and most inexhaustible books will certainly always have something of the
aphoristic and impetuous character of Pascal's Pense? es. The motive forces and valuations have
lain long below the surface; that which comes
uppermost is their effect.
I guard against all the humbug of a false
spirit:--
(1) In respect of the manner of demonstration,
if it does not correspond to the genesis of the thoughts;
(2) In respect of the demands for methods which, at a given period in science, may be quite
impossible;
(3) In respect of the demand for objectivity, for cold impersonal treatment, where, as in the case
of all valuations, we describe ourselves and our
intimate experiences in a couple of words. There
are ludicrous forms of vanity, as, for instance,
Sainte-Beuve's. He actually worried himself all his life because he had shown some warmth or
passion either "pro" or "con," and he would fain have lied that fact out of his life.
425.
"Objectivity" in the philosopher: moral in
difference in regard to one's self, blindness in regard to either favourable or fatal circumstances. Un
scrupulousness in the use of dangerous means;
perversity and complexity of character considered as an advantage and exploited.
My profound indifference to myself: I refuse
? ? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY,
343
to derive any advantage from my knowledge, nor
do I wish to escape any disadvantages which it
may entail. --I include among these disadvantages
that which is called the perversion of character;
this prospect is beside the point: I use my char
acter, but I try neither to understand it nor to
change it--the personal calculation of virtue has
not entered my head once. It strikes me that one
closes the doors of knowledge as soon as one
becomes interested in one's own personal case--or even in the "Salvation of one's soul"! . . . One
should not take one's morality too seriously, nor
should one forfeit a modest right to the opposite of morality. . . .
A sort of heritage of morality is perhaps pre
supposed
with it and fling a great deal of it out of the
window without materially reducing one's means.
One is never tempted to admire "beautiful souls,"
one always knows one's self to be their superior.
The monsters of virtue should be met with inner
scorn; de? miaiser la vertu--Oh, the joy of it !
One should revolve round one's self, have no
desire to be "better" or "anything else" at all than one is. One should be too interested to omit
throwing the tentacles or meshes of every mor ality out to things.
426.
Concerning the psychology of philosophers. They should be psychologists--this was possible
only from the nineteenth century onwards--and no longer little Jack Horners, who see three or
? here: one feels that one can be lavish
? ? ? 344
THE WILL TO POWER.
four feet in front of them, and are almost satisfied
to burrow inside themselves. We psychologists of
the future are not very intent on self-contempla tion: we regard it almost as a sign of degeneration when an instrument endeavours "to know itself": *
we are instruments of knowledge and we would fain possess all the precision and ingenuousness of an instrument--consequently we may not analyse
or "know" ourselves. The first sign of a great
psychologist's self-preservative
goes in search of himself, he has no eye, no interest,
no inquisitiveness where he himself is concerned. . . . The great egoism of our dominating will insists on our completely shutting our eyes to ourselves, and on our appearing "impersonal,"
"disinterested"! --Oh to what a ridiculous degree we are the reverse of this !
We are no Pascals, we are not particularly in
terested in the "Salvation of the soul," in our own
happiness, and in our own virtue. --We have neither enough time nor enough curiosity to be so con
cerned with ourselves. Regarded more deeply, the case is again different, we thoroughly mistrust all
men who thus contemplate their own navels: be cause introspection seems to us a degenerate form
of the psychologist's genius, as a note of interroga
tion affixed to the psychologist's instinct: just as a painter's eye is degenerate which is actuated by
the will to see for the sake of seeing.
instinct: he never
? invariably inveighed against the "yvo? 6 geavro? w" of the Socratic school; he was
*TRANSLATOR's NoTE. --Goethe
of the opinion that an animal which tries to see inner self must be sick.
? ? its
? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY,
345
The apparition of Greek philosophers since the
time of Socrates is a symptom of decadence; the anti-Hellenic instincts become paramount.
The "Sophist" is still quite Hellenic--as are also Anaxagoras, Democritus, and the great
Ionians; but only as transitional forms. The
Polis loses its faith in the unity of its culture, in
its rights of dominion over every other polis. . . . Cultures, that is to say, "the gods," are exchanged,
2. A CRITICISM OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY,
427.
? prerogative of the deus autochthonus is lost. Good and Evil of
and thus the belief in the exclusive
whatever origin get mixed: the boundaries separ
ating good from evil gradually vanish. . . . This is the "Sophist. " . . .
On the other hand, the "philosopher" is the
reactionary: he insists upon the old virtues. He
sees the reason of decay in the decay of institu
tions: he therefore wishes to revive old institutions;
--he sees decay in the decline of authority: he
therefore endeavours to find new authorities (he travels abroad, explores foreign literature and
exotic religions. . . . );--he will reinstate the ideal polis, after the concept "polis" has become super
annuated (just as the Jews kept themselves to gether as a "people" after they had fallen into slavery). They become interested in all tyrants:
their desire is to re-establish virtue with force majeure.
? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER.
346
Gradually everything genuinely Hellenic is hel
responsible for the state of decay (and Plato is jus as ungrateful to Pericles, Homer, tragedy, an
rhetoric as the prophets are to David and Saul The downfall of Greece is conceived as an objectio.
to the fundamental principles of Hellenic culture the profound error of philosophers. --Conclusion: th
Greek world perishes. The cause thereof: Home mythology, ancient morality, etc.
The anti-Hellenic development of philosopher:
valuations:--the Egyptian influence ("Life afte
death" made into law. . . . );--the Semitic influenc (the "dignity of the sage," the "Sheik");--th
? Pythagorean influence,
Silence, means of terrorisation consisting of appeal
to a "Beyond," mathematics: the religious valua
tion consisting of a sort of intimacy with a cosmi entity;--the sacerdotal, ascetic, and transcendenta influences;--the dialectical influence,--I am o opinion that even Plato already betrays revolting
and pedantic meticulousness in his concepts -- Decline of good intellectual taste: the hatefu noisiness of every kind of direct dialectics seem no longer to be felt.
The two decadent tendencies and extremes rul
side by side: (a) the luxuriant and more charming
kind of decadence which shows a love of pomp and art, and (b) the gloomy kind, with its religious and
moral pathos, its stoical self-hardening tendency
its Platonic denial of the senses, and its preparation of the soil for the coming of Christianity.
the subterranean cult:
? ? ? CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY, 347
428.
To what extent psychologists have been cor rupted by the moral idiosyncrasy! --Not one of the ancient philosophers had the courage to
advance the theory of the non-free will (that is to say, the theory that denies morality);--not one had the courage to identify the typical feature of happiness, of every kind of happiness
("pleasure"), with the will to power: for the pleasure of power was considered immoral;--not
one had the courage to regard virtue as a result of immorality (as a result of a will to power) in the service of a species (or of a race, or of a polis); for the will to power was considered immoral.
In the whole of moral evolution, there is no
sign of truth: all the conceptual elements which come into play are fictions; all the psychological
tenets are false; all the forms of logic employed in this department of prevarication are sophisms.
The chief feature of all moral philosophers is their total lack of intellectual cleanliness and self-control:
they regard "fine feelings" as arguments: their
? heaving
godliness. . . . Moral philosophy is the most
breasts seem to them the bellows of
suspicious period in the history of the human intellect.
The first great example: in the name of morality and under its patronage, a great wrong
was committed, which as a matter of fact was in every respect an act of decadence. Sufficient
stress cannot be laid upon this fact, that the great Greek philosophers not only represented
? ? ? 348
THE WILL TO POWER.
the decadence of every kind of Greek ability, but
also made it contagious. . . . This "virtue" made wholly abstract was the highest form of seduction; to make oneself abstract means to turn one's back on the world.
The moment is a very remarkable one: the
Sophists are within sight of the first criticism of morality, the first knowledge of morality:--they
classify the majority of moral valuations (in view
of their dependence upon local conditions) together;
--they lead one to understand that every form of morality is capable of being upheld dialectically:
that is to say, they guessed that all the funda mental principles of a morality must be sophistical
--a proposition which was afterwards proved in the grandest possible style by the ancient philoso
phers from Plato onwards (up to Kant);--they
postulate the primary truth that there is no such thing as a "moral per se," a "good per se," and that it is madness to talk of "truth" in this respect.
Wherever was intellectual uprightness to be found in those days?
The Greek culture of the Sophists had grown
out of all the Greek instincts; it belongs to the
culture of the age of Pericles as necessarily as Plato does not: it has its predecessors in Hera clitus, Democritus, and in the scientific types of the old philosophy; it finds expression in the
elevated culture of Thucydides, for instance, And
--it has ultimately shown itself to be right: every step in the science of epistemology and morality
has confirmed the attitude of the Sophists. . . . Our
? ? ? - CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY,
349
? great extent, Heraclitean, Democritean, and Protagorean
modern attitude of mind
say that Protagorean even sufficient: because Protagoras was himself synthesis
the two men Heraclitus and Democritus.
(Plato: great Cagliostro-let think how Epicurus judged him; how Timon, Pyrrho's friend, judged him Plato's integrity by any chance
beyond question?
But we
least know absolute truth him not even
what he wished have taught --namely, things which were
relative truths: the separate and immortal life "souls. ")
429.
The Sophists are nothing more nor less than realists: they elevate all the values and practices which are common property the rank values --they have the courage, peculiar all strong
intellects, which consists knowing their im morality.
be supposed that these small Greek independent republics, filled with rage and envy
that they would fain have devoured each other, were led by principles humanity and honesty
Thucydides by any chance reproached with the words he puts into the mouths the Athenian ambassadors when they were treating with the Melii anent the question destruction sub mission? Only the most perfect Tartuffes could have been able speak virtue the midst
that dreadful strain--or not Tartuffes, least detached philosophers, anchorites, exiles, and fleers
? ? ? if of
in
at
or of
of
? ofof.
to
to
.
is Is
Is
to
of so
. .
Is it
to . . .
a
it
in to
inof to atusaa
of
is, is to
to as
of
.
.
? 350
* THE WILL TO POWER.
from reality. . . . All of them, people who denied things in order to be able to exist.
The Sophists were Greeks: when Socrates and
Plato adopted the cause of virtue and justice, they
were Jews or I know not what. Grote's tactics
in the defence of the Sophists are false: he would like to raise them to the rank of men of honour
and moralisers--but it was their honour not to indulge in any humbug with grand words and virtues.
43O.
The great reasonableness underlying all moral education lay in the fact that it always attempted to attain to the certainty of an instinct: so that neither good intentions nor good means, as such, first required to enter consciousness. Just as the soldier learns his exercises, so should man learn how to act in life. In truth this unconsciousness belongs to every kind of perfection: even the
mathematician carries out his calculations un
? consciously.
What, then, does Socrates' reaction mean, which
recommended dialectics as the way to virtue, and which was amused when morality was unable to justify itself logically? But this is precisely what proves its superiority--without unconsciousness it is worth nothing!
In reality it means the dissolution of Greek instincts, when demonstrability is posited as the
first condition of personal excellence in virtue. All these great "men of virtue" and of words are themselves types of dissolution.
. . .
? ? ? -
CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
351
In practice, it means that moral judgments have been torn from the conditions among which they grew and in which alone they had some sense, from their Greek and Graeco-political soil, in order to be denaturalised under the cover of being sub limated. The great concepts "good" and "just"
are divorced from the first principles of which they form a part, and, as "ideas" become free, degenerate
into subjects for discussion. A certain truth is sought behind them; they are regarded as entities
or as symbols of entities: a world is invented where
they are "at home," and from which they are supposed to hail.
In short: the scandal reaches its apotheosis in
Plato. . . . And then it was necessary to invent the abstract perfect man also:--good, just, wise,
and a dialectician to boot--in short, the scarecrow ofthe ancient philosopher: a plant without any
soil whatsoever; a human race devoid of all definite ruling instincts; a virtue which "justifies"
itself with reasons. The perfectly absurd "in
dividual" per se! the highest form of Artifici ality. . . . .
Briefly, the denaturalisation of moral values resulted in the creation of a degenerate type of man--"the good man," "the happy man," "the
wise man. "--Socrates represents a moment of the most profound perversity in the history of values.
43 I.
Socrates. --This veering round of Greek taste in favour of dialectics is a great question. What
?
