No More Learning

666.
For ages we have always ascribed the value of an action, of a character, of an existence, to the intention, to the purpose for which it was done, acted, or lived: this primeval idiosyncrasy of taste
> ultimately takes a dangerous turn--provided the lack of intention and purpose in all phenomena comes ever more to the front in consciousness. With it a general depreciation of all values seems to be preparing: "All is without sense. "--This melancholy phrase means: " All sense lies in the intention, and if the intention is absolutely lacking, then sense must be lacking too. " In conformity with this valuation, people were forced to place the
value of life in a " life after death," or in the pro gressive development of ideas, or of mankind, or of the people, or of man to superman; but in this way the progressus in infinitum of purpose had been reached: it was ultimately necessary to find
one's self a place in the process of the world (perhaps with the disdaemonistic outlook, it was a process which led to nonentity). "
In regard to this point, "purpose needs a some what more severe criticism: it ought to be recog
nised that an action is never caused by a purpose ; that an object and the means thereto are inter pretations, by means of which certain points in a phenomena are selected and accentuated, at the cost of other, more numerous, points; that every
138
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
I39
time something done for
fundamentally different, and yet other things happen that in regard to the action done with purpose, the case the same as with the so-called purposefulness of the heat which radiated from the sun: the greater part of the total sum squan dered; portion of which scarcely worth reckoning, has "purpose," has "sense"; that an " end " with its "means" an absurdly in
definite description, which indeed may be able to command as precept, as " will," but presupposes
system of obedient and trained instruments, which, in the place of the indefinite, puts forward
host of determined entities (ie. we imagine system of clever but narrow intellects who postu late end and means, in order to be able to grant our only known " end," the re? le of the "cause of an action,"--a proceeding to which we have no right: tantamount to solving problem by placing its solution in an inaccessible world which
we cannot observe).
Finally, why could not an "end" be merely an
accompanying feature in the series of changes among the active forces which bring about the
action--a pale stenographic symbol stretched in consciousness beforehand, and which serves as guide to what happens, even as symbol of what happens, not as its cause ? --But in this way we criticise will itself: not an illusion to regard that which enters consciousness as will-power. as
cause? Are not all conscious phenomena only final phenomena--the lost links in chain, but apparently conditioning one another in their
purpose, something
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sequence within the plane of consciousness? This might be an illusion.
667.
Science does not inquire what impels us to will: on the contrary, it denies that willing takes place at all, and supposes that something quite different has happened--in short, that the belief in " will" and "end" is an illusion. It does not in quire into the motives of an action, as if these had been present in consciousness previous to the action: but it first divides the action up into a group of phenomena, and then seeks the previous history of this mechanical movement--but not in the terms of feeling, perception, and thought ; from this quarter it can never accept the explanation: perception is precisely the matter of science, which has to be explained--The problem of science is precisely to explain the world, without taking perceptions as the cause: for that would mean
regarding perceptions themselves as the cause of perceptions. The task of science is by no means accomplished.
Thus: either there is no such thing as will,-- the hypothesis of science,--or the will is free. The latter assumption represents the prevailing feeling, of which we cannot rid ourselves, even if the hypo thesis of science were proved.
The popular belief in cause and effect is founded on the principle that free will is tlze cause of every efect: thereby alone do we arrive at the feeling of causation. And thereto belongs also the feeling that every cause is not an effect, but
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cause--if will the cause. "Our acts of will
are not necessary "--this lies in the very concept "will. " The effect necessarily comes after the cause ---that what we feel. It merely hypothesis that even our willing compulsory in every case.
668.
" To will " not "to desire," to strive, to aspire to; distinguishes itself from that through the
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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
141
? passion of commanding. " There no such thing as
willing," but only the willing of something: the aim must not be severed from the' state--as the epistemologists sever it.
" Willing," as they understand no more pos sible than "thinking": a pure invention.
It essential to willing that something should be commanded (but that does not mean that the will carried into effect). . -:.
The general state of tension, by virtue of which ' '
of
? force Seeks to discharge itself,
669.
not " willing. "';-_ so
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"Pain" and "pleasure" are the most absurd means of expressing judgments, which of course does not mean that the judgments which are enunciated in this way must necessarily be absurd. The elimination of all substantiation and logic, a yes or no in the reduction to passionate desire to have or to reject, an imperative abbreviation, the utility of which irrefutable: that pain
and pleasure. Its origin in the central sphere
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THE WILL TO POWER.
of the intellect; its pre-requisite is an infinitely accelerated process of perceiving, ordering, co ordinating, calculating, concluding: pleasure and pain are always final phenomena, they are never " causes. "
As to deciding what provokes pain and pleasure, that is a question which depends upon the degree ofpower: the same thing, when confronted with a small quantity of power, may seem a danger and may suggest the need of speedy defence, and when confronted with the consciousness of greater power, may be a voluptuous stimulus and may be followed by a feeling of pleasure.
All feelings of pleasure and pain presuppose a measuring of collective utility and collective harm
? ? consequently a sphere where there is the willing of an object (of a condition) and the selec
tion of the means thereto. Pleasure and pain are never "original facts. "
The feelings of pleasure and pain are reactions of the will (emotions) in which the intellectual centre fixes the value of certain supervening changes as a collective value, and also as an in troduction of contrary actions.
670.
The belief in " emotions. " --- Emotions are a ' fabrication of the intellect, an invention of causes
which do not exist. All general bodily sensations which we do not understand are interpreted intel lectually--that is to say, a reason is sought why we feel thus or thus among certain people or in certain
fulness:
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a n d ver
experiences. Thus something disadvantageous dangerous, and strange taken for granted, as were the cause of our being indisposed; as
matter of fact, gets added to the indisposition, so as to make our condition thinkable. --Mighty rushes of blood to the brain, accompanied by feeling of suffocation, are interpreted as " anger ": the people and things which provoke our anger are means of relieving our physiological con dition. Subsequently, after long habituation, certain processes and general feelings are so regularly correlated that the sight of certain pro cesses provokes that condition of general feeling, and induces vascular engorgements, the ejection of seminal fluid, etc. : we then say that the "emotion
provoked by propinquity. "
judgments already inhere in pleasure and pain
stimuli become differentiated, according as to whether they increase or reduce the feeling of power.
THE \VILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
I43
? ? The belief in willing.
may be the cause of
to believe in miracles.
demands that once we have made the world think
able for ourselves by means of pictures, we should also make the emotions, the desires, the will, etc. , thinhable--that to say, we should deny them and treat them as errors of the intellect.
671.
Free will or no free will ? --There no such thing as " Will ": that only simplified con
To believe that thought mechanical movement The consistency of science
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on the part of the understanding, like "matter. "
All actions must first be prepared and made pos sible mechanically " before they can be willed. Or, in most cases the object" of an action enters the brain only after everything is prepared for its accomplishment. The Object is an inner "stimulus" --nothing more.
672.
The most proximate prelude to an action relates to that action : but further back still there lies a preparatory history which covers a far wider field : the individual action is only a factor in a much more extensive and subsequent fact. The shorter and the longer processes are not reported.
673.
The theory of chance: the soul is a selecting and self-nourishing being, which is persistently extremely clever and creative (this creative power is commonly overlooked! it is taken to be merely passive).
I recognised the active and creative power with in the accidental. ---Accident is in itself nothing more than the clashing of creative impulses.
674.
Among the enormous multiplicity of pheno mena to be observed in an organic being, that part which becomes conscious is a mere means: and the particle of "virtue," "self-abnegation,"
I44
ception
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
I45
and other fanciful inventions, are denied in most thoroughgoing manner by the whole of the re maining phenomena. We would do well to study our organism in all its immorality. . .
The animal functions are, as matter of fact, million times more important than all beautiful states of the soul and heights of consciousness: the latter are an overflow, in so far as they are not needed as instruments in the service of the
animal functions. The whole of conscious life: the spirit together with the soul, the heart, good ness, and virtue; in whose service does work
In the greatest possible perfection of the means (for acquiring nourishment and advancement) serving the fundamental animal functions: above all, the ascent of the line of Life.
That which called " flesh" and "body" of such incalculably greater importance, that the rest
nothing more than small appurtenance. To continue the chain of life so that heconzes ever more powerful--that the task.
But now observe how the heart, the soul, virtue, and spirit together conspire formally to thwart this purpose: as they were the object of every endeavour! The degeneration of lie es sentially determined by the extraordinary falli bility of consciousness, which held at bay least of all by the instincts, and thus commits the gravest and profoundest errors.
Now could any more insane extravagance of vanity be imagined than to measure the value of existence according to the pleasant or unpleasant
feelings of this consciousness? It obviously only VOL. 11. K
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a means: and pleasant or unpleasant feelings are also no more than means.
According to what standard is the objective value measured? According to the quantity of increased and more oiganisedpower alone.
675.
The value of all valuing--My desire would be to see the agent once more identified with the action, after action has been deprived of all mean ing by having been separated in thought from the agent; I should like to see the notion of doing something, the idea of a "purpose," of an " inten tion," of an object, reintroduced into the action, after action has been made insignificant by having been artificially separated from these things.
All " objects," " purposes," " meanings," are only manners of expression and metamorphoses of the one will inherent in all phenomena: of the will to power. To have an object, a purpose, or an in tention, in fact to will generally, is equivalent to
the desire for greater strength, for fuller growth, and for the means thereto in addition.
The most general and fundamental instinct in all action and willing is precisely on that account the one which is least known and is most con cealed; for in practice we always follow its bid ding, for the simple reason that we are in ourselves
its bidding. . . .
All valuations are only the results of, and the
narrow points of view in serving, this one will: valuing in itself is nothing save this,--will to power.
146
? ? ? ? THE \VILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
criticise existence from the standpoint of . . y one of these values is utter nonsense and error. Even supposing that a process of annihilation
follows from such a value, even so this process is in the service of this will.
The valuation of existence itself! But existence
is this valuing itself l--and even when we "no," we still do what we are.
We ought now to perceive the absurdity of this pretence at judging existence; and we ought to try and discover what actually takes place there.
It is symptomatic.
6 76.
Concerning the Origin of our Valuations.
We are able to analyse our body, and by doing so we get the same idea of it as of the stellar system, and the differences between organic and inorganic lapses. Formerly the movements of the stars were explained as the effects of beings con sciously pursuing a purpose: this is no longer
and even in regard to the movements of the body and its changes, the belief has long since been abandoned that they can be explained by an appeal to a consciousness which has a deter mined purpose. By far the greater number of movements have nothing to do with consciousness at all: neither have they anything to do with sensa tion. Sensations and thoughts are extremely rare and insignificant things compared with the in numerable phenomena occurring every second.
On the other hand, we believe that a certain
I47
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'conformity of means to ends rules over the smallest phenomenon, which it is quite beyond 1. .
148
? science to understand: a sort of cautious
deepest
ness, selectiveness, co-ordination, and
process, etc. In short, we are in the presence of an activity to which it would be necessary to ascribe an incalculably higher and more extensive intellect
than the one we are acquainted with. We learn to think less of all that is conscious: we unlearn the habit of making ourselves responsible for ourselves, because, as conscious beings fixing purposes, we are but the smallest part of ourselves.
Of the numerous influences taking effect every second,---for instance, air, electricity,--we feel scarcely anything at all. There might be a number of forces, which, though they never make themselves felt by us, yet influence us continually.
Pleasure and pain are very rare and scanty phen omena, compared with the countless stimuli with which a cell or an organ operates upon another cell or organ.
It is the phase of the modesty of consciousness. Finally, we can grasp the conscious ego itself, merely as an instrument in the service of that higher and more extensive intellect: and then we may ask whether all conscious willing, all con scious purposes, all valuations, are not perhaps only means by virtue of which something essentially diferent is attained, from that which consciousness supposes. We mean: it is a question of our
pleasure and pain--but pleasure and pain might be the means whereby we had something to do which lies outside our consciousness.
repairing
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This is to show how very superficial all conscious phenomena really are ; how an action and the image of it differ ; how little we know about what precedes an action; how fantastic our feelings, " free will," and " cause and effect" are; how thoughts and images,
just like words, are only signs of thoughts; the impossibility of finding the grounds of any action ; the superficiality of all praise and blame; how essentially our conscious life is composed offancies and illusion; how all our words merely stand for fancies (our emotions too), and how the union of mankind depends upon the transmission and con tinuation of these fancies: whereas, at bottom, the real union of mankind by means of procreation pursues its unknown way. Does this belief in the common fancies of men really alter mankind ? Or is the whole body of ideas and valuations only an expression in itself of unknown changes? Are there really such things as will, purposes, thoughts, values? Is the whole of conscious life perhaps no more than mirage? Even when values seem to determine the actions of a man, they are, as a matter of fact, doing something quite different! In short, granting that a certain conformity of means to end might be demonstrated in the action of nature, without the assumption of a ruling ego: could not our notion of purposes, and our will, etc. , be only a symbolic language standing for something quite different--that is to say, something not willing and unconscious? only the thinnest sem blance of that natural conformity of means to end in the organic world, but not in any way different
therefrom ?
I49
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THE WILL TO POWER.
Briefly, perhaps the whole of mental develop ment is a matter of the body: it is the consciously recorded history of the fact that a higher body is
forming. The organic ascends to higher regions. Our longing to know Nature is a means by virtue of which the body would reach perfection. Or, better still, hundreds of thousands of experi ments are made to alter the nourishment and the mode of living of the body: the body's conscious ness and valuations, its kinds of pleasure and pain, are signs of these changes and experiments. In the end, it is not a question concerning man ; for he must
be surpassed.
677.
T0 what Extent are all Interpretations of the World Symptoms of a Ruling Instinct.
The artistic contemplation of the world: to sit before the world and to survey it. But here the analysis of aesthetical contemplation, its reduction to cruelty, its feeling of security, its judicial and detached attitude, etc. , are lacking. The artist himself must be taken, together with his, psycho logy (the criticism of the instinct of play, as a discharge of energy, the love of change, the love of bringing one's soul in touch with strange things, the absolute egoism of the artist, etc. ). What in stincts does he sublimate?
The scientific contemplation of the world: a criticism of the psychological longing for science, the desire to make everything comprehensible; the desire to make everything practical, useful, capable of being exploited--to what extent this is anti
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
aesthetic. Only that value counts, which may be reckoned in figures. How happens that mediocre type of man preponderates under the influence of science. would be terrible even history were to be taken possession of in this way -the realm Of the superior, of the judicial. What instincts are here sublimated!
The religious contemplation of the world: criticism of the religious man. not necessary to take the moral man as the type, but the man who has extreme feelings of exaltation and of deep depression, and who interprets the former with thankfulnsss or suspicion --- without, however, seeking their origin in himself (nor the latter
either). .
151
? The man who essentially feels anything but free, who sublimates his conditions and states of submission.
The moral contemplation of the world. The feelings peculiar to certain social ranks are pro
jected into the universe: stability, law, the making of things orderly, and the making of things alike, are sought in the highest spheres, because they are valued most highly,--above everything or behind everything.
What common to all: the ruling instincts wish to be regarded as the highest values in general,
even as the creative and rulingpowers. It understood that these instincts either oppose or overcome each other (join up synthetically, or alternate in power). Their profound antagonism
however, so great, that in those cases in which they all insist upon being gratified, man of very thorough mediocrity the outcome.
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678.
It is a question whether the origin of our apparent " knowledge " is not also a mere ofl'shoot of our older valuations, which are so completely assimilated that they belong to the very basis of our nature. In this way only the more recent needs engage in battle with results of the oldest needs.
The world is seen, felt, and interpreted thus and thus, in order that organic life may be preserved with this particular manner of interpretation. Man is not only an individual, but the continuation of collective organic life in one definite line. The fact that man survives, proves that a certain species of interpretations (even though it still be added to) has also survived; that, as a system, this method of interpreting has not changed. " Adaptation. "
Our "dissatisfaction," our "ideal," etc. , may possibly be the result of this incorporated piece of interpretation, of our particular point of view: the organic world may ultimately perish owing to it-- just as the division of labour in organisms may be the means of bringing about the ruin of the whole, if one part happen to wither or weaken. The destruction of organic life, and even of the highest form thereof, must follow the same prin ciples as the destruction of the individual.
679.
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descent, individuation shows the continuous break
Judged from the standpoint of the theory of
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53
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ing up of one into two, and the equally continuous annihilation of individuals for the sake of a few individuals, which evolution bears onwards; the greater mass always perishes the body
The fundamental phenomena: innumerable in dividuals are sacrificed for the sake of a few, in order to make the few possible--One must not allow one's self to be deceived the case the same with peoples and races: they produce the "body" for the generation of isolated and valuable indi viduals, who continue the great process
680.
am opposed to the theory that the individual studies the interests of the species, or of posterity, at the cost of his own advantage all this only apparent.
The excessive importance which he attaches to the sexual instinct not the result of the latter's
? to the species; for procreation the actual performance of the individual, his
importance
interest, and therefore his highest expression of power (not judged from'the stand point of consciousness, but from the very centre of
the individual).
681.
The fundamental errors of the biologists who have lived hitherto: not matter of the
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but of rearing stronger individuals many are only a means).
species,
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relations to external relations, but will to power, which, proceeding from inside, subjugates and incorporates an ever-increasing quantity of " external " phenomena.
These biologists continue the moral valuations ("the absolutely higher worth of Altruism," the antagonism towards the lust of dominion, towards war, towards all that which is not useful, and towards all order of rank and of class).
682.
In natural science, the moral depreciation of the ego still goes hand in hand with the overestimation of the species. But the species is quite as illusory as the ego: a false distinction has been made. The ego is a hundred times more than a mere unit in a chain of creatures; it is the chain itself, in every possible respect; and the species is merely
an abstraction suggested by the multiplicity and partial similarity of these chains. That the individual is sacrificed to the species, as people often say he not fact at all: rather only an example of false interpretation.
683.
The formula of the 'yfirogress"-superstition accord ing to famous physiologist of the cerebral regions :--
" L'animal ne fait jamais de progrels comme
e. spece. L'homme seulfait de progre's comme espe'ce. " No.
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684.
A nti-Darwin. --The domestication of man what definite value can have, or has domestication in itself definite value ? ---There are reasons for denying the latter proposition.
Darwin's school of thought certainly goes to great pains to convince us of the reverse: would fain prove that the influence of domestication may be profound and fundamental. For the time being, we stand firmly as we did before; up to the present no results save very superficial modification or degeneration have been shown to follow upon domestication. And everything
that escapes from the hand and discipline of man, returns almost immediately to its original natural condition. The type, remains constant, man can not " de'naturer la nature. "
Biologists reckon upon the struggle for existence, the death of the weaker creature and the survival of the most robust, most gifted combatant; on that account they imagine continuous increase in the perfection of all creatures. We, on the con trary, have convinced ourselves of the fact, that in the struggle for existence, accident serves the cause of the weak quite as much as that of the strong; that craftiness often supplements
strength with advantage; that the proli mess of species related in remarkable manner to that species' chances of destruction. .
Natural Selection also credited with the 'power of slowly effecting unlimited metamor
phoses: believed that every advantage
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transmitted by heredity, and strengthened in the course of generations (when heredity is known to be so capricious that . . the happy adaptations of certain creatures to very special conditions of life, are regarded as the result of surrounding influences.
Nowhere, however, are examples of unconscious selection to be found (absolutely nowhere). The most different individuals associate one with the other; the extremes become lost in the mass.
Each vies with the other to maintain his kind; those
creatures whose appearance shields them from certain dangers, do not alter this appearance when they are in an environment quite devoid
? If they live in places where their coats or their hides do not conceal them, they do not adapt themselves to their surroundings
in any way.
The selection qf the most beautiful has been so
exaggerated, that greatly exceeds the instincts for beauty in our own race! As matter of fact, the most beautiful creature often couples with the most debased, and the largest with the smallest. We almost always see males and females taking advantage . of their first chance meeting, and manifesting no taste or selectiveness at all. -- Modification through climate and nourishment--- but as matter of fact unimportant.
' There are no intermediate forms. --
The growing evolution of creatures assumed.
All groiinds for this assumption are entirely lacking. Every type has its limiiaiiansz beyond these evolution cannot carry it.
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My general point of view--First proposition: Man as species not progressing. Higher specimens are indeed attained; but they do not survive. The general level of the species not
raised.
Second proposition Man as species does not
represent any sort of progress compared with any other animal. The whole of the animal and plant world does not develop from the lower to the higher. but all simultaneously, haphazardly, confusedly, and at variance. The richest and most " complex forms--and the term "higher type means no more than this--perish more easily: only the lowest succeed in maintaining their apparent imperishableness. The former are seldom attained, and maintain their superior position with difficulty; the latter are compensated
fruitfulness. --In the human race, also, the superior specimens, the happy cases of evolution, are the first to perish amid the fluctuations of chances for and against them. They are exposed to every form of decadence: they are extreme, and, on that account alone, already decadents. . . The short duration of beauty, of genius, of the
sui generis: things are not heredi Caesar_,_ V such
wltary. ' The type inherited, there nothing extreme or particularly " happy " about type. . . not case of particular fate, or of the " evil will " Of Nature, but merely of the concept " superior
type " the higher type an example of an incom parably greater degree of complexity--a greater sum of co-ordinated elements but on this account
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disintegration
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threatening. " Genius " is the sublimest machine in existence--hence it is the most fragile.
Third proposition : The domestication (culture) of man does not sink very deep. When it does sink far below the skin it immediately becomes degeneration (type: the Christian). The " wild " man (or, in moral terminology, the evil
is a reversion to Nature--and, in a certain sense, he represents a recovery, a cure from the effects of
'
685.
"culture. " . . .
Anti-Darwin--What surprises me most on making a general survey of the great destinies of man, is that I invariably see the reverse of what to-day Darwin and his school sees or will
persist in seeing: selection in favour of the stronger, the better-constituted, and the progress of the species. Precisely the reverse of this stares one in the face: the suppression of the lucky cases, the uselessness of the more highly constituted types, the inevitable mastery of the mediocre, and even of those who are below mediocrity. Unless we are shown some reason
why man is an exception among living creatures, I incline to the belief that Darwin's school is everywhere at fault. That will to power, in which I perceive the ultimate reason and character of all change, explains why it is that selection is never in favour of the exceptions and of the lucky
cases: the strongest and happiest natures are weak when they are confronted with a majority ruled by organised gregarious instincts and the
man)
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