Why
philosophers
are slanderers.
Nietzsche - v14 - Will to Power - a
--He teaches that the qualities which he happens
to possess are the only qualities that exist, that
they are indispensable to those who wish to attain
to the “highest good” (for instance, dialectics with
Plato). He would have all men raise themselves,
gradatim, to his type as the highest. He de-
spises what is generally esteemed—by him a gulf
is cleft between the highest priestly values and the
values of the world. He knows what is true, who
God is, what every one's goal should be, and the
way thereto. . . . The typical philosopher is
thus an absolute dogmatist ;-if he requires scepti-
cism at all it is only in order to be able to speak
dogmatically of his principal purpose.
447.
When the philosopher is confronted with his
rival-science, for instance, he becomes a sceptic;
then he appropriates a form of knowledge which
he denies to the man of science; he goes hand in
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CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
369
hand with the priest so that he may not be sus-
pected of atheism or materialism; he considers
an attack made upon himself as an attack upon
morals, religion, virtue, and order-he knows how
to bring his opponents into ill repute by calling
them seducers and “underminers”: then he
marches shoulder to shoulder with power.
The philosopher at war with other philosophers:
-he does his best to compel them to appear like
anarchists, disbelievers, opponents of authority.
In short, when he fights, he fights exactly like a
priest and like the priesthood.
3. THE TRUTHS AND ERRORS OF
PHILOSOPHERS.
448.
Philosophy defined by Kant: “ The science of
the limitations of reason”! !
449.
According to Aristotle, Philosophy is the art
of discovering truth. On the other hand, the
Epicureans, who availed themselves of Aristotle's
sensual theory of knowledge, retorted in ironical
opposition to the search for truth : “Philosophy is
the art of Life. "
450.
The three great naïvetés :-
Knowledge as a means of happiness (as if .
. );
VOL. I.
2 A
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THE WILL TO POWER.
Knowledge as a means to virtue (as if . . . );
Knowledge as a means to the “ denial of Life"
-inasmuch as it leads to disappointment-(as
if . . . ).
451.
As if there were one“ truth" which one could
by some means approach!
452.
.
.
Error and ignorance are fatal. —The assump-
tion that truth has been found and that ignorance
and error are at an end, constitutes one of the
most seductive thoughts in the world. Granted
that it be generally accepted, it paralyses the will
to test, to investigate, to be cautious, and to
gather experience: it may even be regarded as
criminal-that is to say, as a doubt concerning
truth.
“ Truth” is therefore more fatal than error and
ignorance, because it paralyses the forces which
lead to enlightenment and knowledge. The
passion for idleness now stands up for “truth "
(“ Thought is pain and misery! "), as also do order,
rule, the joy of possession, the pride of wisdom-
in fact, vanity :-it is easier to obey than to
examine ; it is more gratifying to think “I possess
the truth," than to see only darkness in all direc-
tions; . . . but, above all, it is reassuring, it lends
confidence, and alleviates life-it" improves” the
character inasmuch as it reduces mistrust. “Spirit-
ual peace," "a quiet conscience"-these things
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CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY,
371
66
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are inventions which are only possible provided
“Truth be found. ”—“By their fruits ye shall know
*
them. " . . *Truth” is the truth because it
makes men better. The process goes on:
all goodness and all success is placed to the credit
of “truth. ”
This is the proof by success: the happiness,
contentment, and the welfare of a community or
of an individual, are now understood to be the
result of the belief in morality. . . . Conversely :
failure is ascribed to a lack of faith.
453.
-
The causes of error lie just as much in the good
as in the bad will of man:-in an incalculable
number of cases he conceals reality from himself,
he falsifies it, so that he may not suffer from his
good or bad will. God, for instance, is considered
the shaper of man's destiny; he interprets his
little lot as though everything were intentionally
sent to him for the salvation of his soul,--this
act of ignorance in “philology," which to a more
subtle intellect would seem unclean and false, is
done, in the majority of cases, with perfect good
faith. Goodwill, “noble feelings,” and “lofty
states of the soul” are just as underhand and
deceptive in the means they use as are the passions
love, hatred, and revenge, which morality has
repudiated and declared to be egotistic.
Errors are what mankind has had to pay for
most dearly: and taking them all in all, the errors
which have resulted from goodwill are those which
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THE WILL TO POWER.
have wrought the most harm. The illusion which
makes people happy is more harmful than the
illusion which is immediately followed by evil
results: the latter increases keenness and mistrust,
and purifies the understanding ; the former
merely narcoticises. . . .
Fine feelings and noble impulses ought, speak-
ing physiologically, to be classified with the
narcotics: their abuse is followed by precisely the
same results as the abuse of any other opiate-
weak nerves.
454.
Error is the most expensive luxury that man
can indulge in: and if the error happen to be a
physiological one, it is fatal to life. What has
mankind paid for most dearly hitherto ? For its
“ truths”: for every one of these were errors in
physiologicis.
455.
Psychological confusions: the desire for belief
is confounded with the “will to truth” (for instance,
in Carlyle). But the desire for disbelief has also
been confounded with the “will to truth" (a
need of ridding one's self of a belief for a hundred
reasons: in order to carry one's point against
certain "believers "). What is it that inspires
Sceptics? The hatred of dogmatists—or a need
of repose, weariness as in Pyrrho's case.
The advantages which were expected to come
from truth, were the advantages resulting from
a belief in it: for, in itself, truth could have been
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CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
373
thoroughly painful, harmful, and even fatal.
Likewise truth was combated only on account
of the advantages which a victory over it would
provide—for instance, emancipation from the
yoke of the ruling powers.
The method of truth was not based upon
motives of truthfulness, but upon motives of power,
upon the desire to be superior.
How is truth proved? By means of the feeling
of increased power,—by means of utility,—by
means of indispensability,-in short, by means of
its advantages (that is to say, hypotheses con-
cerning what truth should be like in order that
it may be embraced by us). But this involves
prejudice: it is a sign that truth does not enter the
question at all. . .
What is the meaning of the “will to truth,"
for instance in the Goncourts? and in the
naturalists ? -A criticism of “objectivity. "
Why should we know: why should we not
prefer to be deceived ? . . . But what
needed was always belief--and not truth.
Belief is created by means which are quite
opposed to the method of investigation: it even
depends upon the exclusion of the latter.
was
456.
A certain degree of faith suffices to-day to
give us an objection to what is believed—it does
more, it makes us question the spiritual healthi-
ness of the believer.
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THE WILL TO POWER.
.
.
457.
Martyrs. -To combat anything that is based
upon reverence, opponents must be possessed of
both daring and recklessness, and be hindered
by no scruples. . . . Now, if one considers that
for thousands of years man has sanctified as
truths only those things which were in reality
errors, and that he has branded any criticism of
them with the hall-mark of badness, one will
have to acknowledge, however reluctantly, that
a goodly amount of immoral deeds were necessary
in order to give the initiative to an attack-I
mean to reason. . . . That these immoralists have
always posed as the “martyrs of truth” should
be forgiven them : the truth of the matter is that
they did not stand up and deny owing to an
instinct for truth; but because of a love of dis-
solution, criminal scepticism, and the love of
adventure, In other cases it is personal rancour
which drives them into the province of problems
—they only combat certain points of view in
order to be able to carry their point against
certain people. But, above all, it is revenge
which has become scientifically useful — the
revenge of the oppressed, those who, thanks to
the truth that happens to be ruling, have been
pressed aside and even smothered. . .
Truth, that is to say the scientific method,
was grasped and favoured by such as recognised
that it was useful weapon of war-an instru-
ment of destruction.
In order to be honoured as opponents, they
.
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CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
375
use
>
“ truth
were moreover obliged to an apparatus
similar to that used by those whom they were
attacking: they therefore brandished the concept
as absolutely as their adversaries did-
they became fanatics at least in their poses,
because no other pose could be expected to be
taken seriously. What still remained to be done
was left to persecution, to passion, and the un-
certainty of the persecuted—hatred waxed great,
and the first impulse began to die away and to
leave the field entirely to science. Ultimately
all of them wanted to be right in the same absurd
way as their opponents. . . . The word “ con-
viction," "faith," the pride of martyrdom—these
things are most unfavourable to knowledge. The
adversaries of truth finally adopt the whole
subjective manner of deciding about truth, that
is to say, by means of poses, sacrifices, and heroic
resolutions,—and thus prolong the dominion of the
anti-scientific method, As martyrs they com-
promise their very own deed.
»
. السر -
458.
The dangerous distinction between " theoretical
and "practical,” in Kant for instance, but also
in the ancient philosophers :—they behave as if
pure intellectuality presented them with the prob-
lems of science and metaphysics ;-they behave
as if practice should be judged by a measure
of its own, whatever the judgment of theory
may be.
Against the first tendency I set up my
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THE WILL TO POWER.
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psychology of philosophers: their strangest calcula.
tions and “intellectuality” are still but the last
pallid impress of a physiological fact; spontaneity
is absolutely lacking in them, everything is instinct,
everything is intended to follow a certain direction
a
from the first.
Against the second tendency I put my question:
whether we know another method of acting
correctly, besides that of thinking correctly; the
last case is action, the first presupposes thought.
Are we possessed of a means whereby we can
judge of the value of a method of life differently
from the value of a theory: through induction or
comparison ? . . . Guileless people imagine that
in this respect we are better equipped, we know
what is "good"-and the philosophers are content
to repeat this view. We conclude that some sort
of faith is at work in this matter, and nothing
.
more.
.
.
“Men must act; consequently rules of conduct
are necessary”- this is what even the ancient
Sceptics thought. The urgent need of a definite
decision in this department of knowledge is used
as an argument in favour of regarding something
as true! . . .
“ Men must not act”-said their more con-
sistent brothers, the Buddhists, and then thought
out a mode of conduct which would deliver man
from the yoke of action.
To adapt one's self, to live as the "common man”
lives, and to regard as right and proper what
he regards as right: this is submission to the
gregarious instinct. One must carry one's courage
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CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
377
and severity so far as to learn to consider such
submission a disgrace. One should not live
according to two standards! . . . One should
not separate theory and practice! . . .
459.
Of all that which was formerly held to be true,
not one word is to be credited. Everything
which was formerly disdained as unholy, for-
bidden, contemptible, and fatal-all these
flowers now bloom on the most charming paths
of truth.
The whole of this old morality concerns us no
longer : it contains not one idea which is still
worthy of respect. We have outlived it-we
are no longer sufficiently coarse and guileless to
be forced to allow ourselves to be lied to in this
way. . . . In more polite language : we are too
virtuous for it. . . . And if truth in the old sense
true” only because the old morality said
"yea” to it, and had a right to say "yea” to it:
it follows that no truth of the past can any longer
be of use to us. . . . Our criterion of truth is
certainly not morality: we refute an assertion
when we show that it is dependent upon morality
and is inspired by noble feelings.
were
460.
All these values are empirical and conditioned,
But he who believes in them and who honours
them, refuses to acknowledge this aspect of them.
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THE WILL TO POWER.
All philosophers believe in these values, and one
form their reverence takes is the endeavour to
make a priori truths out of them. The falsifying
nature of reverence.
Reverence is the supreme test of intellectual
honesty: but in the whole history of philosophy
there is no such thing as intellectual honesty,—but
the “ love of goodness. .
On the one hand, there is an absolute lack of
method in testing the value of these values ;
secondly, there is a general disinclination either
to test them or to regard them as conditioned at
all. —All anti-scientific instincts assembled round
moral values in order to keep science out of this
department.
4. CONCLUDING REMARKS IN THE CRITICISM
OF PHILOSOPHY.
461.
Why philosophers are slanderers. The artful
and blind hostility of philosophers towards the
senses—what an amount of mob and middle-class
qualities lie in all this hatred !
The crowd always believes that an abuse of
which it feels the harmful results, constitutes an
objection to the thing which happens to be abused :
all insurrectionary movements against principles,
whether in politics or agriculture, always follow
a line of argument suggested by this ulterior
motive: the abuse must be shown to be necessary
to, and inherent in, the principle.
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CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
379
It is a woeful history: mankind looks for a
principle, from the standpoint of which he will be
able to contemn man-he invents a world in
order to be able to slander and throw mud at
this world : as a matter of fact, he snatches every
time at nothing, and construes this nothing as
“God," as “Truth," and, in any case, as judge
and detractor of this existence.
If one should require a proof of how deeply
and thoroughly the actually barbarous needs of
man, even in his present state of tameness and
“civilisation," still seek gratification, one should
contemplate the “leitmotifs ” of the whole of the
evolution of philosophy a sort of revenge upon
reality, a surreptitious process of destroying the
values by means of which men live, a dissatisfied
soul to which the conditions of discipline is one
of torture, and which takes a particular pleasure in
morbidly severing all the bonds that bind it to
such a condition.
The history of philosophy is the story of a secret
and mad hatred of the prerequisities of Life, of
the feelings which make for the real values of
Life, and of all partisanship in favour of Life.
Philosophers have never hesitated to affirm a
fanciful world, provided it contradicted this world,
and furnished them with a weapon wherewith
they could calumniate this world. Up to the
present, philosophy has been the grand school of
slander: and its power has been so great, that
even to-day our science, which pretends to be the
advocate of Life, has accepted the fundamental
position of slander, and treats this world
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appearance," and this chain of causes as though
it were only phenomenal. What is the hatred
which is active here?
I fear that it is still the Circe of philosophers-
Morality, which plays them the trick of compelling
them to be ever slanderers. . . . They believed in
moral “truths,” in these they thought they had
found the highest values; what alternative had
they left, save that of denying existence ever
more emphatically the more they got to know
about it? . . . For this life is immoral. . . .
And it is based upon immoral first principles :
and morality says nay to Life.
Let us suppress the real world : and in order
to do this, we must first suppress the highest
values current hitherto--morals
. .
It
is
enough to show that morality itself is immoral,
in the same sense as that in which immorality
has been condemned heretofore. If an end be
thus made to the tyranny of the former values,
if we have suppressed the “real world," a new
order of values must follow of its own accord.
The world of appearance and the world of lies:
this constitutes the contradiction. The latter
hitherto has been the "real world,” “ truth,” “God. ”
This is the one which we still have to suppress.
The logic of my conception :
(1) Morality as the highest value (it is
master of all the phases of philosophy, even of
the Sceptics). Result: this world is no good, it
is not the “real world. "
(2) What is it that determines the highest
value here? What, in sooth, is morality ? It is
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CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
381
.
.
the instinct of decadence; it is the means whereby
the exhausted and the degenerate revenge them-
selves. Historical proof: philosophers have
always been decadents in the service of
nihilistic religions.
(3) It is the instinct of decadence coming to
the fore as will to power. Proof: the absolute
immorality of the means employed by morality
throughout its history.
General aspect: the values which have been
highest hitherto constitute a specific case of the
will to power; morality itself is a specific case of
immorality.
462.
"
The principal innovations : Instead of “moral
values,” nothing but naturalistic values. Natural-
isation of morality.
In the place of “sociology," a doctrine of the
forms of dominion.
In the place of “society," the complex whole of
culture, which is my chief interest (whether in its
entirety or in parts).
In the place of the “ theory of knowledge,” a
doctrine which laid down the value of the passions
(to this a hierarchy of the passions would belong:
the passions transfigured: their superior rank,
their “spirituality ").
In the place of “metaphysics” and religion, the
doctrine of Eternal Recurrence (this being regarded
as a means to the breeding and selection of
men).
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THE WILL TO POWER.
463.
My precursors : Schopenhauer. To what extent
I deepened pessimism, and first brought its full
meaning within my grasp, by means of its most
extreme opposite.
Likewise: the higher Europeans, the pioneers
of great politics.
Likewise : the Greeks and their genesis.
464.
I have named those who were unconsciously
my workers and precursors.
But in what direc-
tion may I turn with any hope of finding my
particular kind of philosophers themselves, or at
least my yearning for new philosophers? In that
direction, alone, where a noble attitude of mind
prevails, an attitude of mind which believes in
slavery and in manifold orders of rank, as the pre-
requisites of any high degree of culture, In that
direction, alone, where a creative attitude of mind
prevails, an attitude of mind which does not re-
gard the world of happiness and repose, the
“Sabbath of Sabbaths" as an end to be desired,
and which, even in peace, honours the means which
lead to new wars; an attitude of mind which
would prescribe laws for the future, which for the
sake of the future would treat everything that
exists to-day with harshness and even tyranny;
a daring and “immoral” attitude of mind, which
would wish to see both the good and the evil
qualities in man developed to their fullest extent,
»
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CRITICISM OF PHILOSOPHY.
383
because it would feel itself able to put each in its
right place—that is to say, in that place in which
each would need the other. But what prospect
has he of finding what he seeks, who goes in
search of philosophers to-day? Is it not probable
that, even with the best Diogenes-lantern in his
hand, he will wander about by night and day in
vain ? This age is possessed of the opposite in-
stincts. What it wants, above all, is comfort;
secondly, it wants publicity and the deafening din
of actors' voices, the big drum which appeals to
its Bank-Holiday tastes; thirdly, that every one
should lie on his belly in utter subjection before
the greatest of all lies—which is "the equality of
"-and should honour only those virtues
which make men equal and place them in equal
positions. But in this way, the rise of the philo-
sopher, as I understand him, is made completely
impossible—despite the fact that many may re-
gard the present tendencies as rather favourable
to his advent. As a matter of fact, the whole
world mourns, to-day, the hard times that philo-
sophers used to have, hemmed in between the fear
of the stake, a guilty conscience, and the presump-
tuous wisdom of the Fathers of the Church: but
the truth is, that precisely these conditions were
ever so much more favourable to the education
of a mighty, extensive, subtle, rash, and daring
intellect than the conditions prevailing to-day.
At present another kind of intellect, the intellect
of the demagogue, of the actor, and perhaps of the
beaver- and ant-like scholar too, finds the best
possible conditions for its development. But even
>
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THE WILL TO POWER.
for artists of a superior calibre the conditions are
already far from favourable: for does not every
one of them, almost, perish owing to his want
of discipline? They are no longer tyrannised
over by an outside power-by the tables of
absolute values enforced by a Church or by a
monarch: and thus they no longer learn to de-
velop their “inner tyrant,” their will. And what
holds good of artists also holds good, to a greater
and more fatal degree, of philosophers. Where,
then, are free spirits to be found to-day? Let
any one show me a free spirit to-day!
465.
Under “ Spiritual freedom" I understand some-
thing very definite: it is a state in which one is a
hundred times superior to philosophers and other
disciples of “truth" in one's severity towards
one's self, in one's uprightness, in one's courage, and
in one's absolute will to say nay even when it is
dangerous to say nay. I regard the philosophers
that have appeared heretofore as contemptible
libertines hiding behind the petticoats of the
female “Truth. "
END OF VOL. I.
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