I do not reckon
the so-called “first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life.
the so-called “first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life.
Nietzsche - v17 - Ecce Homo
In the same way, two years previously,
I had one day become a philologist, in the sense
that my first philological work, my start in every
way, was expressly obtained by my master Ritschl
for publication in his Rheinisches Museum. * (Ritschl
—and I say it in all reverence—was the only
genial scholar that I have ever met. He possessed
that pleasant kind of depravity which distinguishes
us Thuringians, and which makes even a German
sympathetic-even in the pursuit of truth we pre-
fer to avail ourselves of roundabout ways. In
saying this I do not mean to underestimate in any
way my Thuringian brother, the intelligent Leopold
von Ranke, . . . )
10
You may be wondering why I should actually
have related all these trivial and, according to tra-
ditional accounts, insignificant details to you ; such
action can but tell against me, more particularly if
* See note on page 37.
## p. 52 (#80) ##############################################
52 ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters—diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love—are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, " God," " soul," " virtue,"
"sin," " Beyond," "truth," "eternal life. " . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its "divinity," was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious. I do not reckon
the so-called " first" men even as human beings—
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life. . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me: even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#81) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER 53
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he whc
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy—in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank—
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice—all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection—the only
thing I have always suffered from is " multitude. " *
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkcit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
"multitude "' should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. —Tr.
## p. 53 (#82) ##############################################
52
ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters—diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love—are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, “ God," "soul,” “ virtue,"
“sin," “ Beyond,” “truth,” “ eternal life. ” . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its “divinity,” was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious. I do not reckon
the so-called “first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life. . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me; even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#83) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he who
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy—in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank-
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice—all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection—the only
thing I have always suffered from is “multitude. ” *
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkeit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
“multitude" should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. -TR.
## p. 53 (#84) ##############################################
52
ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters—diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love—are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, “ God,”“soul,” “virtue,"
“sin,” “ Beyond,” “truth,” “ eternal life. ” . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its “ divinity," was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious. I do not reckon
the so-called “first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life, . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me; even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#85) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER
53
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he who
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy-in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank-
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice-all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection—the only
thing I have always suffered from is “multitude. "*
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkeit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
“multitude" should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. -TR.
## p. 53 (#86) ##############################################
52
ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters—diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love—are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, “God,"“soul,” “ virtue,"
“sin," “ Beyond," “ truth,” “ eternal life. ” . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its “ divinity," was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious. I do not reckon
the so-called “ first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life. . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me; even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#87) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER
53
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he who
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy-in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank—
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice—all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection—the only
thing I have always suffered from is “multitude. ” *
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkeit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
“multitude" should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. —TR.
## p. 53 (#88) ##############################################
52
ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters-diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love—are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, “ God," "soul,” “ virtue,"
“sin,” “ Beyond,” “truth,” “eternal life. " . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its “divinity," was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious.
I do not reckon
the so-called “first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life. . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me; even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#89) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER
53
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he who
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy-in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank—
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice-all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection—the only
thing I have always suffered from is “multitude. ” *
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkeit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
“multitude" should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. --TR.
## p. 53 (#90) ##############################################
52
ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters—diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love-are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, “God,” “soul,” “virtue,"
“sin,” “Beyond," "truth,” “eternal life. ” . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its “ divinity," was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious. I do not reckon
the so-called “first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life. . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me; even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#91) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER
53
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he who
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy—in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank-
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice—all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection-the only
thing I have always suffered from is “multitude. ”*
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkeit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
“multitude" should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. —TR.
## p. 54 (#92) ##############################################
54 ECCE HOMO
At an absurdly tender age, in fact when I was seven
years old, I already knew that no human speech
would ever reach me: did any one ever see me sad
on that account? At present I still possess the same
affability towards everybody, I am even full of con-
sideration for the lowest: in all this there is not an
atom of haughtiness or of secret contempt. He
whom I despise soon guesses that he is despised by
me: the very fact of my existence is enough to rouse
indignation in all those who have polluted blood in
their veins. My formula for greatness in man is
amor fati: the fact that a man wishes nothing to
be different, either in front of him or behind him,
or for all eternity. Not only must the necessary be
borne, and on no account concealed,—all idealism
is falsehood in the face of necessity,—but it must
also be loved. . . .
## p. 55 (#93) ##############################################
WHY I WRITE SUCH EXCELLENT BOOKS
I AM one thing, my creations are another. Here,
before I speak of the books themselves, I shall
touch upon the question of the understanding and
misunderstanding with which they have met. I
shall proceed to do this in as perfunctory a manner
as the occasion demands; for the time has by no
means come for this question. My time has not
yet come either; some are born posthumously. One
day institutions will be needed in which men will
live and teach, as I understand living and teaching;
maybe, also, that by that time, chairs will be
founded and endowed for the interpretation of
Zarathustra. But I should regard it as a complete
contradiction of myself, if I expected to find ears
and eyes for my truths to-day: the fact that no one
listens to me, that no one knows how to receive at
my hands to-day, is not only comprehensible, it
seems to me quite the proper thing. I do not wish
to be mistaken for another—and to this end I must
not mistake myself. To repeat what I have al-
ready said, I can point to but few instances of ill-
will in my life: and as for literary ill-will, I could
mention scarcely a single example of it. On the
other hand, I have met with far too much pure
foolery! . . . It seems to me that to take up one
## p. 56 (#94) ##############################################
56
ECCE HOMO
of my books is one of the rarest honours that a man
can pay himself—even supposing that he put his
shoes from off his feet beforehand, not to mention
boots. . . . When on one occasion Dr. Heinrich von
Stein honestly complained that he could not under-
stand a word of my Zarathustra, I said to him that
this was just as it should be: to have understood
six sentences in that book—that is to say, to have
lived them—raises a man to a higher level among
mortals than “modern ” men can attain. With
this feeling of distance how could I even wish to
be read by the “moderns” whom I know! My
triumph is just the opposite of what Schopenhauer's
was—I say “ Non legor, non legar. "—Not that I
should like to underestimate the pleasure I have
derived from the innocence with which my works
have frequently been contradicted. As late as last
summer, at a time when I was attempting, perhaps
by means of my weighty, all-too-weighty literature,
to throw the rest of literature off its balance, a
certain professor of Berlin University kindly gave
me to understand that I ought really to make use
of a different form: no one could read such stuff
as I wrote. —Finally, it was not Germany, but
Switzerland that presented me with the two most
extreme cases. An essay on Beyond Good and
Evil, by Dr. V. Widmann in the paper called the
Bund, under the heading “Nietzsche's Dangerous
Book," and a general account of all my works, from
the pen of Herr Karl Spitteler, also in the Bund,
constitute a maximum in my life-I shall not say
of what. . . . The latter treated my Zarathustra, for in-
stance, as "advanced exercises in style,"and expressed
## p. 57 (#95) ##############################################
WHY I WRITE SUCH EXCELLENT BOOKS 57
the wish that later on I might try and attend to
the question of substance as well; Dr. Widmann
assured me of his respect for the courage I showed
in endeavouring to abolish all decent feeling.
Thanks to a little trick of destiny, every sentence
in these criticisms seemed, with a consistency that
I could but admire, to be an inverted truth. In
fact it was most remarkable that all one had to do
was to "transvalue all values," in order to hit the
nail on the head with regard to me, instead of
striking my head with the nail. . . . I am more
particularly anxious therefore to discover an ex-
planation. After all, no one can draw more out of
things, books included, than he already knows. A
man has no ears for that to which experience has
given him no access. To take an extreme case,
suppose a book contains simply incidents which lie
quite outside the range of general or even rare ex-
perience—suppose it to be the first language to
express a whole series of experiences. In this case
nothing it contains will really be heard at all, and,
thanks to an acoustic delusion, people will believe
that where nothing is heard there is nothing to
hear. . . . This, at least, has been my usual experi-
ence, and proves, if you will, the originality of my
experience. He who thought he had understood
something in my work, had as a rule adjusted some-
thing in it to his own image—not infrequently the
very opposite of myself, an "idealist," for instance.
He who understood nothing in my work, would deny
that I was worth considering at all. —The word
"Superman," which designates a type of man that
would be one of nature's rarest and luckiest strokes,
## p. 58 (#96) ##############################################
58 ECCE HOMO
as opposed to "modern" men, to " good" men, to
Christians and other Nihilists,—a word which in the
mouth of Zarathustra, the annihilator of morality,
acquires a very profound meaning,—is understood
almost everywhere, and with perfect innocence, in
the light of those values to which a flat contradic-
tion was made manifest in the figure of Zarathustra
—that is to say, as an " ideal " type, a higher kind
of man, half " saint "and half "genius. " . . . Other
learned cattle have suspected me of Darwinism on
account of this word: even the " hero cult" of that
great unconscious and involuntary swindler, Carlyle,
—a cult which I repudiated with such roguish
malice,—was recognised in my doctrine. Once,
when I whispered to a man that he would do better
to seek for the Superman in a Caesar Borgia than in
a Parsifal, he could not believe his ears. The fact
that I am quite free from curiosity in regard to
criticisms of my books, more particularly when they
appear in newspapers, will have to be forgiven me.
My friends and my publishers know this, and never
speak to me of such things. In one particular case,
I once saw all the sins that had been committed
against a single book—it was Beyond Good and
Evil; I could tell you a nice story about it. Is it
possible that the National-Zeitung—a Prussian
paper (this comment is for the sake of my foreign
readers—for my own part, I beg to state, I read
only Le Journal des DSats)—really and seriously
regarded the book as a "sign of the times," or a
genuine and typical example of Tory philosophy,*
* Junker-Philosophie. The landed proprietors constitute
the dominating class in Prussia, and it is from this class that
## p. 59 (#97) ##############################################
WHY I WRITE SUCH EXCELLENT BOOKS 59
for which the Kreuz-Zeitung had not sufficient
courage? . . .
This was said for the benefit of Germans: for
everywhere else I have my readers—all of them
exceptionally intelligent men, characters that have
won their spurs and that have been reared in high
offices and superior duties ; I have even real geniuses
among my readers. In Vienna, in St. Petersburg,
in Stockholm, in Copenhagen, in Paris, and New
York—I have been discovered everywhere: I have
not yet been discovered in Europe's flatland—
Germany. . . . And, to make a confession, I re-
joice much more heartily over those who do not
read me, over those who have neither heard of my
name nor of the word philosophy. But whither-
soever I go, here in Turin, for instance, every
face brightens and softens at the sight of me.
A thing that has flattered me more than anything
else hitherto, is the fact that old market-women
cannot rest until they have picked out the sweetest
of their grapes for me. To this extent must a man
be a philosopher. . . . It is not in vain that the Poles
are considered as the French among the Slavs. A
charming Russian lady will not be mistaken for a
single moment concerning my origin. I am not
successful at being pompous, the most I can do is
to appear embarrassed. . . . I can think in German,
I can feel in German—I can do most things; but
this is beyond my powers. . . . My old master Ritschl
all officers and higher officials are drawn. The Kreuz-Zeitung
is the organ of the Junker party. —Tr.
## p. 60 (#98) ##############################################
60 ECCE HOMO
went so far as to declare that I planned even my
philological treatises after the manner of a Parisian
novelist—that I made them absurdly thrilling.
In Paris itself people are surprised at " toutes mes
audaces et finesses ";—- the words are Monsieur
Taine's;—I fear that even in the highestforms of the
dithyramb, that salt will be found pervading my
work which never becomes insipid, which never be-
comes " German "—and that is, wit. . . . I can do
nought else. God help me! Amen. —We all know,
some of us even from experience, what a " long-
ears" is. Well then, I venture to assert that I
have the smallest ears that have ever been seen.
This fact is not without interest to women—it
seems to me they feel that I understand them
better! . . . I am essentially the anti-ass, and on
this account alone a monster in the world's history
—in Greek, and not only in Greek, I am the Anti-
christ.
I am to a great extent aware of my privileges
as a writer: in one or two cases it has even been
brought home to me how very much the habitual
reading of my works " spoils " a man's taste. Other
books simply cannot be endured after mine, and
least of all philosophical ones. It is an incompar-
able distinction to cross the threshold of this noble
and subtle world—in order to do so one must
certainly not be a German ; it is, in short, a distinc-
tion which one must have deserved. He, however,
who is related to me through loftiness of will,
experiences genuine raptures of understanding in
## p. 61 (#99) ##############################################
WHY I WRITE SUCH EXCELLENT BOOKS 6l
my books: for I swoop down from heights into
which no bird has ever soared; I know abysses
into which no foot has ever slipped. People have
told me that it is impossible to lay down a book
of mine—that I disturb even the night's rest. . .
I had one day become a philologist, in the sense
that my first philological work, my start in every
way, was expressly obtained by my master Ritschl
for publication in his Rheinisches Museum. * (Ritschl
—and I say it in all reverence—was the only
genial scholar that I have ever met. He possessed
that pleasant kind of depravity which distinguishes
us Thuringians, and which makes even a German
sympathetic-even in the pursuit of truth we pre-
fer to avail ourselves of roundabout ways. In
saying this I do not mean to underestimate in any
way my Thuringian brother, the intelligent Leopold
von Ranke, . . . )
10
You may be wondering why I should actually
have related all these trivial and, according to tra-
ditional accounts, insignificant details to you ; such
action can but tell against me, more particularly if
* See note on page 37.
## p. 52 (#80) ##############################################
52 ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters—diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love—are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, " God," " soul," " virtue,"
"sin," " Beyond," "truth," "eternal life. " . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its "divinity," was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious. I do not reckon
the so-called " first" men even as human beings—
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life. . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me: even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#81) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER 53
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he whc
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy—in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank—
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice—all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection—the only
thing I have always suffered from is " multitude. " *
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkcit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
"multitude "' should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. —Tr.
## p. 53 (#82) ##############################################
52
ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters—diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love—are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, “ God," "soul,” “ virtue,"
“sin," “ Beyond,” “truth,” “ eternal life. ” . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its “divinity,” was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious. I do not reckon
the so-called “first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life. . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me; even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#83) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he who
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy—in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank-
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice—all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection—the only
thing I have always suffered from is “multitude. ” *
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkeit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
“multitude" should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. -TR.
## p. 53 (#84) ##############################################
52
ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters—diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love—are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, “ God,”“soul,” “virtue,"
“sin,” “ Beyond,” “truth,” “ eternal life. ” . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its “ divinity," was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious. I do not reckon
the so-called “first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life, . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me; even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#85) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER
53
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he who
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy-in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank-
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice-all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection—the only
thing I have always suffered from is “multitude. "*
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkeit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
“multitude" should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. -TR.
## p. 53 (#86) ##############################################
52
ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters—diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love—are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, “God,"“soul,” “ virtue,"
“sin," “ Beyond," “ truth,” “ eternal life. ” . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its “ divinity," was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious. I do not reckon
the so-called “ first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life. . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me; even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#87) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER
53
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he who
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy-in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank—
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice—all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection—the only
thing I have always suffered from is “multitude. ” *
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkeit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
“multitude" should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. —TR.
## p. 53 (#88) ##############################################
52
ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters-diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love—are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, “ God," "soul,” “ virtue,"
“sin,” “ Beyond,” “truth,” “eternal life. " . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its “divinity," was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious.
I do not reckon
the so-called “first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life. . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me; even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#89) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER
53
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he who
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy-in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank—
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice-all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection—the only
thing I have always suffered from is “multitude. ” *
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkeit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
“multitude" should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. --TR.
## p. 53 (#90) ##############################################
52
ECCE HOMO
I am fated to figure in great causes. To this I reply
that these trivial matters—diet, locality, climate,
and one's mode of recreation, the whole casuistry of
self-love-are inconceivably more important than
all that which has hitherto been held in high esteem.
It is precisely in this quarter that we must begin
to learn afresh. All those things which mankind
has valued with such earnestness heretofore are not
even real; they are mere creations of fancy, or,
more strictly speaking, lies born of the evil instincts
of diseased and, in the deepest sense, noxious
natures—all the concepts, “God,” “soul,” “virtue,"
“sin,” “Beyond," "truth,” “eternal life. ” . . . But
the greatness of human nature, its “ divinity," was
sought for in them. . . . All questions of politics,
of social order, of education, have been falsified, root
and branch, owing to the fact that the most noxious
men have been taken for great men, and that
people were taught to despise the small things, or
rather the fundamental things, of life. If I now
choose to compare myself with those creatures who
have hitherto been honoured as the first among men,
the difference becomes obvious. I do not reckon
the so-called “first” men even as human beings-
for me they are the excrements of mankind, the
products of disease and of the instinct of revenge:
they are so many monsters laden with rottenness,
so many hopeless incurables, who avenge them-
selves on life. . . . I wish to be the opposite of
these people: it is my privilege to have the very
sharpest discernment for every sign of healthy in-
stincts. There is no such thing as a morbid trait
in me; even in times of serious illness I have never
## p. 53 (#91) ##############################################
WHY I AM SO CLEVER
53
grown morbid, and you might seek in vain for a
trace of fanaticism in my nature. No one can point
to any moment of my life in which I have assumed
either an arrogant or a pathetic attitude. Pathetic
attitudes are not in keeping with greatness; he who
needs attitudes is false. . . . Beware of all pictur-
esque men! Life was easy—in fact easiest—to me,
in those periods when it exacted the heaviest duties
from me. Whoever could have seen me during the
seventy days of this autumn, when, without inter-
ruption, I did a host of things of the highest rank-
things that no man can do nowadays—with a sense
of responsibility for all the ages yet to come, would
have noticed no sign of tension in my condition, but
rather a state of overflowing freshness and good
cheer. Never have I eaten with more pleasant sen-
sations, never has my sleep been better. I know of
no other manner of dealing with great tasks, than
as play: this, as a sign of greatness, is an essential
prerequisite. The slightest constraint, a sombre
mien, any hard accent in the voice—all these things
are objections to a man, but how much more to his
work! . . . One must not have nerves. . . . Even
to suffer from solitude is an objection-the only
thing I have always suffered from is “multitude. ”*
* The German words are, Einsamkeit and Vielsamkeit.
The latter was coined by Nietzsche. The English word
“multitude" should, therefore, be understood as signifying
multifarious instincts and gifts, which in Nietzsche strove for
ascendancy and caused him more suffering than any solitude.
Complexity of this sort, held in check by a dominant instinct,
as in Nietzsche's case, is of course the only possible basis of
an artistic nature. —TR.
## p. 54 (#92) ##############################################
54 ECCE HOMO
At an absurdly tender age, in fact when I was seven
years old, I already knew that no human speech
would ever reach me: did any one ever see me sad
on that account? At present I still possess the same
affability towards everybody, I am even full of con-
sideration for the lowest: in all this there is not an
atom of haughtiness or of secret contempt. He
whom I despise soon guesses that he is despised by
me: the very fact of my existence is enough to rouse
indignation in all those who have polluted blood in
their veins. My formula for greatness in man is
amor fati: the fact that a man wishes nothing to
be different, either in front of him or behind him,
or for all eternity. Not only must the necessary be
borne, and on no account concealed,—all idealism
is falsehood in the face of necessity,—but it must
also be loved. . . .
## p. 55 (#93) ##############################################
WHY I WRITE SUCH EXCELLENT BOOKS
I AM one thing, my creations are another. Here,
before I speak of the books themselves, I shall
touch upon the question of the understanding and
misunderstanding with which they have met. I
shall proceed to do this in as perfunctory a manner
as the occasion demands; for the time has by no
means come for this question. My time has not
yet come either; some are born posthumously. One
day institutions will be needed in which men will
live and teach, as I understand living and teaching;
maybe, also, that by that time, chairs will be
founded and endowed for the interpretation of
Zarathustra. But I should regard it as a complete
contradiction of myself, if I expected to find ears
and eyes for my truths to-day: the fact that no one
listens to me, that no one knows how to receive at
my hands to-day, is not only comprehensible, it
seems to me quite the proper thing. I do not wish
to be mistaken for another—and to this end I must
not mistake myself. To repeat what I have al-
ready said, I can point to but few instances of ill-
will in my life: and as for literary ill-will, I could
mention scarcely a single example of it. On the
other hand, I have met with far too much pure
foolery! . . . It seems to me that to take up one
## p. 56 (#94) ##############################################
56
ECCE HOMO
of my books is one of the rarest honours that a man
can pay himself—even supposing that he put his
shoes from off his feet beforehand, not to mention
boots. . . . When on one occasion Dr. Heinrich von
Stein honestly complained that he could not under-
stand a word of my Zarathustra, I said to him that
this was just as it should be: to have understood
six sentences in that book—that is to say, to have
lived them—raises a man to a higher level among
mortals than “modern ” men can attain. With
this feeling of distance how could I even wish to
be read by the “moderns” whom I know! My
triumph is just the opposite of what Schopenhauer's
was—I say “ Non legor, non legar. "—Not that I
should like to underestimate the pleasure I have
derived from the innocence with which my works
have frequently been contradicted. As late as last
summer, at a time when I was attempting, perhaps
by means of my weighty, all-too-weighty literature,
to throw the rest of literature off its balance, a
certain professor of Berlin University kindly gave
me to understand that I ought really to make use
of a different form: no one could read such stuff
as I wrote. —Finally, it was not Germany, but
Switzerland that presented me with the two most
extreme cases. An essay on Beyond Good and
Evil, by Dr. V. Widmann in the paper called the
Bund, under the heading “Nietzsche's Dangerous
Book," and a general account of all my works, from
the pen of Herr Karl Spitteler, also in the Bund,
constitute a maximum in my life-I shall not say
of what. . . . The latter treated my Zarathustra, for in-
stance, as "advanced exercises in style,"and expressed
## p. 57 (#95) ##############################################
WHY I WRITE SUCH EXCELLENT BOOKS 57
the wish that later on I might try and attend to
the question of substance as well; Dr. Widmann
assured me of his respect for the courage I showed
in endeavouring to abolish all decent feeling.
Thanks to a little trick of destiny, every sentence
in these criticisms seemed, with a consistency that
I could but admire, to be an inverted truth. In
fact it was most remarkable that all one had to do
was to "transvalue all values," in order to hit the
nail on the head with regard to me, instead of
striking my head with the nail. . . . I am more
particularly anxious therefore to discover an ex-
planation. After all, no one can draw more out of
things, books included, than he already knows. A
man has no ears for that to which experience has
given him no access. To take an extreme case,
suppose a book contains simply incidents which lie
quite outside the range of general or even rare ex-
perience—suppose it to be the first language to
express a whole series of experiences. In this case
nothing it contains will really be heard at all, and,
thanks to an acoustic delusion, people will believe
that where nothing is heard there is nothing to
hear. . . . This, at least, has been my usual experi-
ence, and proves, if you will, the originality of my
experience. He who thought he had understood
something in my work, had as a rule adjusted some-
thing in it to his own image—not infrequently the
very opposite of myself, an "idealist," for instance.
He who understood nothing in my work, would deny
that I was worth considering at all. —The word
"Superman," which designates a type of man that
would be one of nature's rarest and luckiest strokes,
## p. 58 (#96) ##############################################
58 ECCE HOMO
as opposed to "modern" men, to " good" men, to
Christians and other Nihilists,—a word which in the
mouth of Zarathustra, the annihilator of morality,
acquires a very profound meaning,—is understood
almost everywhere, and with perfect innocence, in
the light of those values to which a flat contradic-
tion was made manifest in the figure of Zarathustra
—that is to say, as an " ideal " type, a higher kind
of man, half " saint "and half "genius. " . . . Other
learned cattle have suspected me of Darwinism on
account of this word: even the " hero cult" of that
great unconscious and involuntary swindler, Carlyle,
—a cult which I repudiated with such roguish
malice,—was recognised in my doctrine. Once,
when I whispered to a man that he would do better
to seek for the Superman in a Caesar Borgia than in
a Parsifal, he could not believe his ears. The fact
that I am quite free from curiosity in regard to
criticisms of my books, more particularly when they
appear in newspapers, will have to be forgiven me.
My friends and my publishers know this, and never
speak to me of such things. In one particular case,
I once saw all the sins that had been committed
against a single book—it was Beyond Good and
Evil; I could tell you a nice story about it. Is it
possible that the National-Zeitung—a Prussian
paper (this comment is for the sake of my foreign
readers—for my own part, I beg to state, I read
only Le Journal des DSats)—really and seriously
regarded the book as a "sign of the times," or a
genuine and typical example of Tory philosophy,*
* Junker-Philosophie. The landed proprietors constitute
the dominating class in Prussia, and it is from this class that
## p. 59 (#97) ##############################################
WHY I WRITE SUCH EXCELLENT BOOKS 59
for which the Kreuz-Zeitung had not sufficient
courage? . . .
This was said for the benefit of Germans: for
everywhere else I have my readers—all of them
exceptionally intelligent men, characters that have
won their spurs and that have been reared in high
offices and superior duties ; I have even real geniuses
among my readers. In Vienna, in St. Petersburg,
in Stockholm, in Copenhagen, in Paris, and New
York—I have been discovered everywhere: I have
not yet been discovered in Europe's flatland—
Germany. . . . And, to make a confession, I re-
joice much more heartily over those who do not
read me, over those who have neither heard of my
name nor of the word philosophy. But whither-
soever I go, here in Turin, for instance, every
face brightens and softens at the sight of me.
A thing that has flattered me more than anything
else hitherto, is the fact that old market-women
cannot rest until they have picked out the sweetest
of their grapes for me. To this extent must a man
be a philosopher. . . . It is not in vain that the Poles
are considered as the French among the Slavs. A
charming Russian lady will not be mistaken for a
single moment concerning my origin. I am not
successful at being pompous, the most I can do is
to appear embarrassed. . . . I can think in German,
I can feel in German—I can do most things; but
this is beyond my powers. . . . My old master Ritschl
all officers and higher officials are drawn. The Kreuz-Zeitung
is the organ of the Junker party. —Tr.
## p. 60 (#98) ##############################################
60 ECCE HOMO
went so far as to declare that I planned even my
philological treatises after the manner of a Parisian
novelist—that I made them absurdly thrilling.
In Paris itself people are surprised at " toutes mes
audaces et finesses ";—- the words are Monsieur
Taine's;—I fear that even in the highestforms of the
dithyramb, that salt will be found pervading my
work which never becomes insipid, which never be-
comes " German "—and that is, wit. . . . I can do
nought else. God help me! Amen. —We all know,
some of us even from experience, what a " long-
ears" is. Well then, I venture to assert that I
have the smallest ears that have ever been seen.
This fact is not without interest to women—it
seems to me they feel that I understand them
better! . . . I am essentially the anti-ass, and on
this account alone a monster in the world's history
—in Greek, and not only in Greek, I am the Anti-
christ.
I am to a great extent aware of my privileges
as a writer: in one or two cases it has even been
brought home to me how very much the habitual
reading of my works " spoils " a man's taste. Other
books simply cannot be endured after mine, and
least of all philosophical ones. It is an incompar-
able distinction to cross the threshold of this noble
and subtle world—in order to do so one must
certainly not be a German ; it is, in short, a distinc-
tion which one must have deserved. He, however,
who is related to me through loftiness of will,
experiences genuine raptures of understanding in
## p. 61 (#99) ##############################################
WHY I WRITE SUCH EXCELLENT BOOKS 6l
my books: for I swoop down from heights into
which no bird has ever soared; I know abysses
into which no foot has ever slipped. People have
told me that it is impossible to lay down a book
of mine—that I disturb even the night's rest. . .
