No More Learning

The degree of resistance and the degree of superior power--this the question around which all phenomena turn: we, for our own purposes and calculations, know how to express this in formulae and "laws," all the better for us! But that does not mean that we have introduced any "morality" into the world, just because we have fancied as obedient.
There are no laws: every power draws its last consequence at every moment. Things are calcul able precisely owing to the fact that there no possibility of their being otherwise than they are.
A quantum of power characterised by the
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118 THE WILL To POWER.
effect it produces and the influence it resists. The adiaphoric state which would be thinkable in itself, is entirely lacking. It is essentially a will to vio lence and a will to defend one's self againstviolence.
It is not self-preservation: every atom exercises its influence over the whole of existence--it is thought out of existence if one thinks this radia tion of will-power away. That is why I call it a quantum of " Will to Power " ; with this formula one can express the character which cannot be ab stracted in thought from mechanical order, without suppressing the latter itself in thought.
The translation of the world of effect into a visible world--a world for the eye--is the concept "movement. " Here it is always understood that
something has been moved,--whether it be the fiction of an atomic globule or even of the abstrac tion of the latter, the dynamic atom, something is always imagined that has an effect--that is to say, we have not yet rid ourselves of the habit into which our senses and speech inveigled us. Subject
and object, an agent to the action, the action and that which does it separated: we must not forget that all this signifies no more than semeiotics and-- nothing real. Mechanics as a teaching of movement is already a translation of phenomena into man's
language of the senses.
635.
We are in need of "unities" in order to be able to reckon: but this is no reason for supposing that "unities" actually exist. We borrowed the
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
119
concept " unity" from our concept " ego,"--our very oldest article of faith. If we did not believe our selves to be unities we should never have formed the concept "thing. " Now--that to say, some what late in the day, we are overwhelmingly convinced that our conception of the concept "ego" no'security whatever for real entity. In order to maintain the mechanical interpretation of the world theoretically, we must always make the reserve that with fictions that we do so: the concept of movement (derived from the language of our senses) and the concept of the atom (= entity, derived from our psychical experience) are based upon sense-prejudice and psychological prejudice.
Mechanics formulates consecutive phenomena, and does so semeiologically, in the terms of the senses and of the mind (that all influence move ment; that where there movement something
at work moving): does not touch the question of the causal force.
The mechanical world imagined as the eye and the sense of touch alone could imagine world (as "moved" ,---in such way as to be calculable,--as to simulate causal entities " things " (atoms) whose effect constant (the transfer of the false concept of subject to the concept atom).
The mixing together of the concept of numbers, of the concept'of thing (the idea of subject), of the concept of activity (the separation of that Which the cause, and the effect), of the concept of movement: all these things are phenomenal; our eye and our psychology are still in all.
If we, eliminate these adjuncts, nothing remains
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120 THE WILL TO POWER.
over but dynamic quanta, in a relation of tension to all other dynamic quanta: the essence of which resides in their relation to all other quanta, in their "influence" upon the latter. The will to power, not Being, not Becoming, but a pathos--is the
elementary fact, from these first results a Becoming, an influencing. . . .
636.
The physicists believe in a " true world " after their own kind; a fixed systematising of atoms to perform necessary movements, and holding good equally of all creatures,--so that, according to them, the " world of appearance " reduces itself to the side of general and generally-needed Being,
which is accessible to every one according to his kind (accessible and also adjusted,--made "sub
jective But here they are in error. The atom which they postulate arrived at by the logic of that perspective of consciousness; in itself therefore subjective fiction. This picture of the world which they project in no way essentially different from the subjective picture: the only difference that composed simply with more extended se'nses, but certainly with our senses. . . And in the end, without knowing they left something out of the constellation: precisely the necessary perspective factor, by means of which every centre of power--and not man alone--con structs the rest of the world from its point of view --that to say, measures feels and moulds
according to its degree of strength. . They forgot to reckon with this perspective-fixing power,
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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE. 121
? 'in "true being,"-----or, in school-terms, subject
They suppose that this was "evolved" and added ;--but even the chemical investigator needs it: it is indeed specific Being, which de termines action and reaction according to circum stances.
Perspectivity is only a complex form of specific ness. My idea is that every specific body strives to become master of all space, and to extend its power (its will to power), and to thrust back everything that resists it. But inasmuch as it is continually meeting the same endeavours on the
those)
637.
Even in the inorganic world all that concerns an atom of energy is its immediate neighbourhood : distant forces balance each other. Here is the root of perspectivity, and it explains'why a living organism is " egoistic" to the core.
638.
Granting that the world disposed of a quantum of force, it is obvious that any transposition of force to any place would affect the whole system-- thus, besides the causality of sequence, there would also be a dependence, contiguity, and coincidence.
being.
of other bodies, it concludes by coming to
part
terms with those (by "combining" with
which are sufficiently related to it--and thus they conspire together for power. And the process continues.
? ? ? 122 THE WILL TO POWER.
? 639.
The only possible way of upholding the sense of the concept "God" would be: to make Him not the motive force, but the condition of maximum
power, an epoch; a point in the further develop ment of the Will to Power; by means of which subsequent evolution just as much as former evolution--up to Him--could be explained.
Viewed mechanically, the energy of collective Becoming remains constant; regarded from the economical standpoint, it ascends to its zenith and then recedes therefrom in order to remain eternally rotatory. This " Will to Power " expresses itself
in the interpretation, in the manner in which the strength is used--The conversion of energy into life ; " life in its highest power " thenceforward appears as the goal. The same amount of energy, at different stages of development, means different things.
That which determines growth in Life is the economy which becomes ever more sparing and methodical, which achieves ever more and more with a steadily decreasing amount of energy. . . . The ideal is the principle of the least possible expense. . . .
The only thing that is proved is that the world is not striving towards a state of stability. Con sequently its zenith must not be conceived as a state of absolute equilibrium. . .
The dire necessity of the same things happening in the course of the world, as in all other things, is not an eternal determinism reigning over all phenomena, but merely the expression of the fact
t
? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
123
? that the impossible is not possible; that a given force cannot be different from that given force; that a given quantity of resisting force does not manifest itself otherwise than in conformity with its degree of strength ;---to speak of events as being necessary is tautological.
2. THE WILL TO POWER as LIFE.
The Organic Process.
640.
Man imagines that he was present at the generation of the organic world: what was there to be observed, with the eyes and the touch, in regard to these processes? How much of it can be put into round numbers? What rules are noticeable in the movements? Thus, man would fain arrange all phenomena as if they were for the eye and for the touch, as if they were forms of motion: he will discover formula wherewith to
simplify the unwieldy mass of these experiences. The reduction of all phenomena to the level of
men with senses and with mathematics. It is a , matter of making an inventory qf human experiences : granting that man, or rather the human eye and the ability to form concepts, have been the eternal witnesses of all things.
641.
A plurality of forces bound by a common nutritive process we call "Life. " To this nutritive
(a)
? ? ? 124
THE 'WILL TO POWER.
process all so-called feeling, thinking, and imagining belong as means--that is to say, (I) in the form of opposing other forces; (2) in the form of an adjustment of other forces according to mould and rhythm; (3) in the form of a valuation relative to assimilation and excretion.
64 2.
The bond between the inorganic and the organic world must lie in the repelling power exercised by every atom of energy. "Life" might be defined as a lasting form of force-estab lishing processes, in which the various contending forces, on their part, grow unequally. To what extent does counter-strife exist even in obedience?
Individual power is by no means surrendered through it. In the same way, there exists in the act of commanding, an acknowledgment Of the fact that the absolute power of the adversary has not been overcome, absorbed, or dissipated. "Obedience," and "command," are forms of the game of war.
643.
The Will to Power interprets (an organ in ' the process of formation has to be interpreted):
it defines, it determines gradations, differences of
Mere differences of power could not be aware of each other as such: something must be there which will grow, and which interprets all other things that would do the same, according to the value of the latter. In sooth, all interpreta
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tion is but a means in itself to become master of something. (Continual interpretation is the first principle of the organic process. )
644.
Greater complexity, sharp differentiation, the contiguity of the developed organs and functions, with the disappearance of intermediate members--- if that is perfection, then there is a Will to Power apparent in the organic process by means of whose dominating, shaping, and commanding forces it is continually increasing the sphere of its power, and persistently simplifying things within that sphere: it grows imperatively.
" Spirit " is only a means and an instrument in the service of higher life, in the service of the
elevation of life.
i 645.
"Heredity," as something quite incomprehens ible, cannot be used as an explanation, but only as a designation for the identification of a problem. And the same holds good of "adaptability. " As a matter of fact, the account of morphology, even supposing it were perfect, explains nothing; it merely describes an enormous fact. How a given
organ gets to be used for any particular purpose is not explained. There is just as little explained in regard to these things by the assumption of causa'finales as by the assumption of coma efiici entes. The concept "causa" is only a means of expression, no more; a means of designating a thing.
125
? ? ? ? 126 THE WILL To POWER
646.
There are analogies; for instance, our memory may suggest another kind of memory which makes itself felt in heredity, development, and forms. Our inventive and experimentative powers suggest
another kind of inventiveness in the application of instruments to new ends, etc.
That which we call our "consciousness," is quite guiltless of any of the essential processes of our preservation and growth; and no human brain could be so subtle as to construct anything more than a machine--to which
is infinitely superior.
647.
Against Darwinism--The use of an organ does not explain its origin, on the contrary! During the greater part of the time occupied in the forma tion of a certain quality, this quality does not help to preserve the individual; it is of no use to him, and particularly not in his struggle with external circumstances and foes.
What is ultimately " useful"? It is necessary to ask, " Useful for what? "
For instance, that which promotes the lasting powers of the individual might be unfavourable to
his strength or his beauty; that which preserves him might at the same time fix him and keep him stable throughout development. On the other hand, a deficiency, a state Of degeneration, may be of the greatest possible use, inasmuch as it acts as a stimulus to other organs. In the same way,
? every organic process
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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
state of need may be condition of existence, in asmuch as reduces an individual to that modicum of means which, though keeps him together, does not allow him to squander his strength--The in dividual himself the struggle of parts nourishment, space, etc. ) his development involves the triumph, the predominance, of isolated parts; the wasting away, or the "development into organs," of other parts.
The influence of "environment" nonsensically overrated in Darwin: the essential factor in the process of life precisely the tremendous inner
power
127
? to shape and to create forms, which merely uses, exploits "environment. "
The new forms built up by this inner power are not produced with view to any end; but, in the struggle between the parts, new form does not exist long without becoming related to some kind of semi-utility, and, according to its use, develops itself ever more and more perfectly.
648.
" Utility " in respect of the acceleration of the speed of evolution, different kind of " utility " from that which understood to mean the greatest possible stability and staying power of the evolved
creature.
649.
"Useful" in the sense of Darwinian biology means: that which favours thing in its struggle with others. But in my opinion the feeling of
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128 THE WILL TO POWER.
being surcharged, the feeling accompanying an increase in strength, quite apart from the utility of the struggle, is the actual progress: from these feelings the will to war is first derived.
650.
Physiologists should bethink themselves before putting down the instinct of self-preservation as the cardinal instinct of an organic being. A living thing seeks above all to discharge its strength: " self-preservation " is only one of the results thereof. --Let us beware of superfluous teleological principles l--one of'which is the whole concept of " self-preservation. "
65 I.
The most fundamental and most primeval activ ity of a protoplasm cannot be ascribed to a will to self-preservation, for it absorbs an amount of material which is absurdly out of proportion with the needs of its preservation: and what is more, it does not "preserve itself" in the process, but actually falls to pieces. . . . The instinct which rules here, must account for this total absence in the organism of a desire to preserve itself: "hunger" is already an interpretation based upon the observation of a more or less complex organ ism (hunger is a specialised and later form of the instinct; it is an expression of the system of divided labour, in the service of a higher instinct which rules the whole).
* See Beyond Good and Evil, in this edition, Aph. 13.
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652.
just as impossible to regard hunger as the primum mobile, as to take self-preservation to
be so.
Hunger, cOnsidered as the result of in sufficient nourishment, means hunger as the result of will to power which can no longer dominate.
It not a question of replacing loss,---it only later on, as the result of the division of labour, when the Will to Power has discovered other and quite different ways of gratifying itself, that the appropriating lust of the organism reduced to hunger--to the need of replacing what has been
lost.
653.
We can but laugh at the false "Altruism" of biologists: propagation among the amoebae ap
pears as process of jetsam, as an advantage to them. It an excretion of useless matter.
654.
The division of a protoplasm into two takes place when its power no longer suflicient to
subjugate the matter has appropriated: pro creation the result of impotence.
In the cases in which'the males seek the females and become one with them, procreation the re sult of hunger.
655.
The weaker vessel driven to the stronger from need of nourishment; desires to get under
VOL. II.
THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
129
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THE WILL TO POWER.
if possible to become one with it. The stronger, on the contrary, defends itself from others ; it refuses to perish in this way; it prefers rather to split itself into two or more parts in the process of growing. One may conclude that the greater the urgency seems to become one with something else, the more weakness in some form is present. The greater the tendency to variety, difference, inner decay, the more strength is actually to hand.
The instinct to cleave to something, and the instinct to repel something, are in the inorganic as in the organic world, the uniting bond. The whole distinction is a piece of hasty judgment.
The will to power in every combination of forces, defending itself against the stronger and coming down unmercifully upon the weaker, is more correct.
N. B. --Allprocesses may be regarded as " beings. "
656.
The will to power can manifest itself only
against obstacles; it therefore goes in search of what resists it--this is the primitive tendency of the protoplasm when it extends its pseudopodia and feels about it. The act of appropriation and assimilation above all, the result of desire to overpower, process of forming, of additional building and rebuilding, until at last the subjected creature has become completely part of the superior creature's sphere of power, and has in creased the latter. --If this process of incorporation
does not succeed, then the whole organism falls to
? ? and the separation occurs as the result of the will to power: in order to prevent the escape of that
pieces
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which has been subjected, the will to power falls into two wills (under some circumstances without even abandoning completely its relation to the two).
"Hunger" is only a more narrow adaptation, once the fundamental instinct of power has won power of a more abstract kind.
my
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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
13!
What is "passive"? To be hindered in the outward movement of grasping: it is thus an
What is " active "? .
act of resistance and
reaction.
To stretch out for power.
Is only a derived pheno menon; the primitive form of it was the will to stuff everything in
side one's own skin. Only derived; originally, in those cases in which one will was unable to organise the collective
mass it had appropri ated, an opposing will
came into power, which undertook to effect the separation and estab
lish a new centre of organisation, after a struggle with the ori ginal will.
" Nutrition " .
. .
? Procreation " . .
? ? 132 "Pleasure"
THE WILL TO POWER.
. . . Is a feeling of power (presupposing the ex
istence of pain).
658.
? (I) The organic functions shown to be but forms of the fundamental will, the will to power,--and buds thereof.
The will to power specialises itself as will to nutrition, to property, to tools, to servants (obedi ence), and to rulers: the body as an example. -- The stronger will directs the weaker. There is no other form of causality than that of will to will.
It is not to be explained mechanically.
(2)
? Thinking, feeling, willing, in all living organ isms. What is a desire if it be not: a provoca tion of the feeling of power by an obstacle (or, better still, by rhythmical obstacles and resisting
--so that it surges through it? Thus in all plea sure pain is understood--If the pleasure is to be very great, the pains preceding it must have been very long, and the whole bow of life must have been strained to the utmost.
(3)
forces)
The will to shaping,
With the body as clue--Granting that the "soul"
Intellectual functions. forming, and making like, etc.
Man.
659.
(4)
was only an attractive and
mysterious thought,
? ? '(b)
>Wel'
from which philosophers rightly, but reluctantly, separated themselves--that which they have since learnt to put in its place perhaps even more attractive and even more mysterious. The human body, in which the whole of the most distant and most recent past of all organic life once more
nd
this past and right over like huge and inaud ible torrent the body more wonderful thought than the old " soul. " In all ages the body, as our actual property, as our most certain being, in short, as our ego, has been more earnestly believed in than the spirit (or the "soul," or the subject, as the school jargon now calls it). has never occurred to any one to regard his stomach as strange or divine stomach; but that there tendency and predilection in man to regard all his thoughts as "inspired," all his values as " im parted to him by God," all his instincts as dawning activities--this proved by the evidence of every age in man's history. Even now, especi ally among artists, there may very often be noticed
sort of wonder, and deferential hesitation to decide, when the question occurs to them, by what means they achieved their happiest work, and from which world the creative thought came down to them: when they question in this way, they are possessed by feeling of guilelessness and childish shyness. They dare not say: " That came from me; was my hand which threw that die. " Conversely, even those philosophers and theolo
gians, who in their logic and piety found the most imperative reasons for regarding their body as
THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE. ,133
? ms becomes living and corporal, seems to flow through
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deception (and even as a deception overcome and disposed of), could not help recognising the foolish fact that the body still remained: and the most unexpected proofs of this are to be found partly in Pauline and partly in Vedantic philosophy. But what does strength of faith ultimately mean? Nothing l--A strong faith might also be a foolish faith l--There is food for reflection.
And supposing the faith in the body were ulti mately but the result of a conclusion; supposing it were a false conclusion, as idealists declare it would not then involve some doubt concerning the trustworthiness of the spirit itself whiqh thus
causes us to draw wrong conclusions?
Supposing the plurality of things, and space,
and time, and motion (and whatever the other first principles of belief in the body may be) were errors--what suspicions would not then be roused against the spirit which led us to form such first principles? Let suffice that the belief in the body at any rate for the present, a much stronger belief than the belief in the spirit, and he who would fain undermine assails the authority
of the spirit most thoroughly in so doing!
660.
The Body as an Empire.
The aristocracy in the body, the majority of the rulers (the fight between the cells and the tissues). Slavery and the division of labour: the higher type alone possible through the subjection of the
lower to function.
134
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THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
Pleasure and pain, not contraries. The feeling
"Procreation ": this is the decay which' super venes when the ruling cells are too weak to organ ise appropriated material.
It is the moulding force which will have a con tinual supply of new material (more " force The masterly construction of an organism out of an egg.
" The mechanical interpretation ": recognises only quantities: but the real energy in the quality. Mechanics can therefore only describe processes; cannot explain them.
" Purpose. " We should start out from the " sagacity" of plants.
The concept of " meliorism ": not only greater complexity, but greater power need not be only
greater masses).
Conclusion concerning the evolution of man:
the road to perfection lies in the bringing forth of the most powerful individuals, for whose use the great masses would be converted into mere tools
r35
? of power. " " Nutrition
only a result of the insatiable lust of appropriation in the Will to Power.
? to say, into the most intelligent and flex ible tools possible).
661.
Why all activity, even that of sense, associ ated with pleasure? Because, before the activity was possible, an obstacle or a burden was done away with. Or, rather, because all action process of overcoming, of becoming master of, and of increasing the feeling ofpawer ? --The pleasure
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I 36 THE WILL To POWER.
of thought--Ultimately it is not only the feeling of power, but also the pleasure of creating and of contemplating the creation: for all activity enters our consciousness in the form of " works. "
662.
Creating is an act of selecting and of finishing the thing selected. (In every act of the will, this
is the essential
All phenomena which are the result of intentions may be reduced to the intention Qf increasing power.
664.
When we do anything, we are conscious of a feeling qf strength; we often have this sensation before the act--that is to say, while imagining the thing to do (as, for instance, at the sight of an enemy, of an obstacle, which we feel equal to): it
is always an accompanying sensation. Instinc tively we think that this feeling of strength is the cause of the action, that it is the " motive force. " Our belief in causation is the belief in force and its effect; it is a transcript of our experience: in which we identify force and the feeling of force. -- Force, however, never moves things; the strength which is conscious " does not set the muscles mov ing. " "Of such a process we have no experience, no idea. " "We experience as little concerning
? element. )
663.
? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.
I37
force as a motive power, as concerning the necessity of a movement. " Force is said to be the con straining element! " All we know is that one thing follows another ;---we know nothing of either compulsion or arbitrariness in regard to the one following the other. " Causality is first in
vented by thinking compulsion into the sequence of processes. A certain "understanding" of the thing is the result--that is to_say, we humanise the process a little, we make it more "familiar"; the familiar is the known habitual fact of human compulsion associated with the feeling offorce.
665.
I have the intention of extending my arm; taking it for granted that I know as little of the physiology of the human body and of the mechani cal laws of its movements as the man in the street, what could there be more vague, more bloodless, more uncertain than this intention compared with what follows it? And supposing I were the astutest of mechanics, and especially conversant with the formula: which are applicable in this case,
I should not be able to extend my arm one whit the better. Our "knowledge " and our " action " in this case lie coldly apart: as though in two different regions--Again: Napoleon carries out a" plan of campaign--what does that mean ? In this case, everything concerning the consummation of the campaign is known, because everything must be done through words of command: but even here subordinates are taken for granted, who apply
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER.
and adapt the general plan to the particular emer gency, to the degree of strength, etc.
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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THE WILL TO POWER.
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
? ? always only
? ? 'his
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
'1
THE WILL TO POWER IN NATURE.