No More Learning

And there is again a new labour
which points out the erroneousness of all these
reasons, and determines the entire essence of the
moral judgments hitherto made. Supposing all these
labours to be accomplished, the most critical of all
questions would then come into the foreground:
whether science is in a position to furnish goals for
human action, after it has proved that it can take
them away and annihilate them—and then would be
the time for a process of experimenting in which
every kind of heroism could satisfy itself, an
experimenting for centuries, which would put into
the shade all the great labours and sacrifices of
previous history. Science has not hitherto built
its Cyclopic structures; for that also the time will
come.
8.
Unconscious Virtues. —All qualities in a man of
which he is conscious—and especially when he
presumes that they are visible and evident to his
environment also—are subject to quite other laws
of development than those qualities which are un-
known to him, or imperfectly known, which by
their subtlety can also conceal themselves from
the subtlest observer, and hide as it were behind
nothing,—as in the case of the delicate sculptures
on the scales of reptiles (it would be an error to
suppose them an adornment or a defence—for one
sees them only with the microscope; consequently,
with an eye artificially strengthened to an extent
of vision which similar animals, to which they
might perhaps have meant adornment or defence,


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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 45
do not possess ! ) Our visible moral qualities, and
especially our moral qualities believed to be visible,
follow their own course,—and our invisible qualities
of similar name, which in relation to others neither
serve for adornment nor defence, also follow their
own course: quite a different course probably, and
with lines and refinements, and sculptures, which
might perhaps give pleasure to a God with a divine
microscope. We have, for example, our diligence,
our ambition, our acuteness: all the world knows
about them,—and besides, we have probably once
more our diligence, our ambition, our acuteness;
but for these—our reptile scales—the microscope
has not yet been invented ! —And here the adherents
of instinctive morality will say, "Bravo! He at
least regards unconscious virtues as possible—that
suffices us ! "—Oh, ye unexacting creatures!
9-
Our Eruptions. — Numberless things which
humanity acquired in its earlier stages, but so
weakly and embryonically that it could not be
noticed that they were acquired, are thrust suddenly
into light long afterwards, perhaps after the lapse of
centuries: they have in the interval become strong
and mature. In some ages this or that talent, this
or that virtue seems to be entirely lacking, as it
is in some men; but let us wait only for the
grandchildren and grandchildren's children, if we
have time to wait,—they bring the interior of their
grandfathers into the sun, that interior of which
the grandfathers themselves were unconscious.
The son, indeed, is often the betrayer of his father;
.


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46 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
the latter understands himself better since he has
got his son. We have all hidden gardens and
plantations in us; and by another simile, we are
all growing volcanoes, which will have their hours
of eruption:—how near or how distant this is,
nobody of course knows, not even the good God.
10.
A Species of Atavism. — I like best to think of the
rare men of an age as suddenly emerging after-
shoots of past cultures, and of their persistent
strength: like the atavism of a people and its civili-
sation :—there is thus still something in them to
think of! They now seem strange, rare, and extra-
ordinary: and he who feels these forces in himself
has to foster them in face of a different, opposing
world; he has to defend them, honour them, and rear
them to maturity: and he either becomes a great man
thereby, or a deranged and eccentric person, unless
he should altogether break down betimes. Formerly
these rare qualities were usual, and were conse-
quently regarded as common: they did not dis-
tinguish people. Perhaps they were demanded and
presupposed; it was impossible to become great
with them, for indeed there was also no danger
of becoming insane and solitary with them. —
It is principally in the old-established families and
castes of a people that such after-effects of old
impulses present themselves, while there is no
probability of such atavism where races, habits,
and valuations change too rapidly. For the tempo
of the evolutional forces in peoples implies just
as much as in music; for our case an andante of


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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 47
evolution is absolutely necessary, as the tempo of a
passionate and slow spirit:—and the spirit of con-
serving families is certainly of that sort.
i1.
Consciousness. — Consciousness is the last and
latest development of the organic, and consequently
also the most unfinished and least powerful of these
developments. Innumerable mistakes originate out
of consciousness, which," in spite of fate," as Homer
says, cause an animal or a man to break down
earlier than might be necessary. If the conserv-
ing bond of the instincts were not very much
more powerful, it would not generally serve as a
regulator: by perverse judging and dreaming
with open eyes, by superficiality and credulity,
in short, just by consciousness, mankind would
necessarily have broken down: or rather, without
the former there would long ago have been nothing
more of the latter! Before a function is fully formed
and matured, it is a danger to the organism:
all the better if it be then thoroughly tyrannised
over! Consciousness is thus thoroughly tyrannised
over — and not least by the pride in it! It is
thought that here is the quintessence of man; that
which is enduring, eternal, ultimate, and most
original in him! Consciousness is regarded as a
fixed, given magnitude! Its growth and intermit-
tences are denied! It is accepted as the "unity of
the organism "! —This ludicrous overvaluation and
misconception of consciousness, has as its result the
great utility, that a too rapid maturing of it has
thereby been hindered. Because men believed that


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48 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
they already possessed consciousness, they gave
themselves very little trouble to acquire it—and
even now it is not otherwise! It is still an
entirely new problem just dawning on the human
eye and hardly yet plainly recognisable: to embody
knowledge in ourselves and make it instinctive,—a
problem which is only seen by those who have
grasped the fact that hitherto our errors alone have
been embodied in us, and that all our consciousness
is relative to errors!
12.
The Goal of Science. —What? The ultimate goal
of science is to create the most pleasure possible to
man, and the least possible pain? But what if
pleasure and pain should be so closely connected
that he who wants the greatest possible amount of
the one must also have the greatest possible amount
of the other,—that he who wants to experience the
"heavenly high jubilation," * must also be ready to
be "sorrowful unto death"? * And it is so, perhaps!
The Stoics at least believed it was so, and they
were consistent when they wished to have the least
possible pleasure, in order to have the least possible
pain from life. (When one uses the expression:
"The virtuous man is the happiest," it is as much
the sign-board of the school for the masses, as
a casuistic subtlety for the subtle. ) At present
also ye have still the choice: either the least
possible pain, in short painlessness—and after all,
* Allusions to the song of Clara in Goethe's "Egmont. "
—TR.


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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 49
socialists and politicians of all parties could not
honourably promise more to their people,—or the
greatest possible amount of pain, as the price of
the growth of a fullness of refined delights and
enjoyments rarely tasted hitherto! If ye decide
for the former, if ye therefore want to depress and
minimise man's capacity for pain, well, ye must
also depress and minimise his capacity for enjoy-
ment. In fact, one can further the one as well as
the other goal by science! Perhaps science is as
yet best known by its capacity for depriving man
of enjoyment, and making him colder, more
statuesque, and more Stoical. But it might also
turn out to be the great pain-bringer ! —And then,
perhaps, its counteracting force would be discovered
simultaneously, its immense capacity for making
new sidereal worlds of enjoyment beam forth!
13.
The Theory of the Sense of Power. —We exercise
our power over others by doing them good or
by doing them ill—that is all we care for!
Doing ill to those on whom we have to make our
power felt; for pain is a far more sensitive means
for that purpose than pleasure:—pain always asks
concerning the cause, while pleasure is inclined
to keep within itself and not look backward.
Doing good and being kind to those who are in
any way already dependent on us (that is, who
are accustomed to think of us ps their raison
tTitre); we want to increase their power, because
we thus increase our own; or we want to show
4


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50 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
them the advantage there is in being in our
power,—they thus become more contented with
their position, and more hostile to the enemies of
our power and readier to contend with them.
If we make sacrifices in doing good or in doing ill,
it does not alter the ultimate value of our actions;
even if we stake our life in the cause, as martyrs for
the sake of our church, it is a sacrifice to our
longing for power, or for the purpose of conserving
our sense of power. He who under these circum-
stances feels that he "is in possession of truth,"
how many possessions does he not let go, in order
to preserve this feeling! What does he not throw
overboard, in order to keep himself " up,"—that is
to say, above the others who lack the "truth"!
Certainly the condition we are in when we do ill
is seldom so pleasant, so purely pleasant, as that
in which we practise kindness,—it is an indication
that we still lack power, or it betrays ill-humour
at this defect in us; it brings with it new dangers
and uncertainties as to the power we already
possess, and clouds our horizon by the prospect of
revenge, scorn, punishment and failure. Perhaps
only those most susceptible to the sense of power,
and eager for it, will prefer to impress the seal of
power on the resisting individual,—those to whom
the sight of the already subjugated person as the
object of benevolence is a burden and a tedium.
It is a question how a person is accustomed to
season his life; it is a matter of taste whether a
person would rather have the slow or the sudden,
the safe or the dangerous and daring increase of
power,—he seeks this or that seasoning always



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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 51
according to his temperament. An easy booty
is something contemptible to proud natures; they
have an agreeable sensation only at the sight of
men of unbroken spirit who could be enemies to
them, and similarly, also, at the sight of all not easily
accessible possession; they are often hard toward
the sufferer, for he is not worthy of their effort or
their pride,—but they show themselves so much
the more courteous towards their equals, with whom
strife and struggle would in any case be full of
honour, if at any time an occasion for it should
present itself. It is under the agreeable feelings
of this perspective that the members of the
knightly caste have habituated themselves to ex-
quisite courtesy toward one another. —Pity is the
most pleasant feeling in those who have not much
pride, and have no prospect of great conquests: the
easy booty—and that is what every sufferer is—is
for them an enchanting thing. Pity is said to
be the virtue of the gay lady.
14.
What is called Love. —The lust of property and
love: what different associations each of these
ideas evoke! —and yet it might be the same im-
pulse twice named: on the one occasion disparaged
from the standpoint of those already possessing
(in whom the impulse has attained something of
repose, and who are now apprehensive for the
safety of their " possession "); on the other occa-
sion viewed from the standpoint of the unsatisfied
and thirsty, and therefore glorified as " good. " Our


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52 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
love of our neighbour,—is it not a striving after new
property? And similarly our love of knowledge, of
truth; and in general all the striving after novelties?
We gradually become satiated with the old, the
securely possessed, and again stretch out our hands;
even the finest landscape in which we live for three
months is no longer certain of our love, and any
kind of more distant coast excites our covetousness:
the possession for the most part becomes smaller
through possessing. Our pleasure in ourselves
seeks to maintain itself, by always transforming
something new into ourselves,—that is just possess-
ing. To become satiated with a possession, that is
to become satiated with ourselves. (One can also
suffer from excess,—even the desire to cast away,
to share out, can assume the honourable name of
"love. ") When we see any one suffering, we willingly
utilise the opportunity then afforded to take posses-
sion of him; the beneficent and sympathetic man,
for example, does this; he also calls the desire for
new possession awakened in him, by the name of
"love," and has enjoyment in it, as in a new
acquisition suggesting itself to him. The love of
the sexes, however, betrays itself most plainly as
the striving after possession: the lover wants the
unconditioned, sole possession of the person longed
for by him; he wants just as absolute power over
her soul as over her body; he wants to be loved
solely, and to dwell and rule in the other soul as
what is highest and most to be desired. When
one considers that this means precisely to ex-
clude all the world from a precious possession, a
happiness, and an enjoyment; when one considers


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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 53
that the lover has in view the impoverishment and
privation of all other rivals, and would like to
become the dragon of his golden hoard, as the
most inconsiderate and selfish of all "conquerors"
and exploiters; when one considers finally that to
the lover himself, the whole world besides appears
indifferent, colourless, and worthless, and that he
is ready to make every sacrifice, disturb every
arrangement, and put every other interest behind
his own,—one is verily surprised that this ferocious
lust of property and injustice of sexual love should
have been glorified and deified to such an extent at
all times; yea, that out of this love the conception
of love as the antithesis of egoism should have been
derived, when it is perhaps precisely the most un-
qualified expression of egoism. Here, evidently, the
non-possessors and desirers have determined the
usage of language,—there were, of course, always
too many of them. Those who have been favoured
with much possession and satiety, have, to be sure,
dropped a word now and then about the "raging
demon," as, for instance, the most lovable and most
beloved of all the Athenians—Sophocles; but Eros
always laughed at such revilers, — they were
always his greatest favourites. —There is, of course,
here and there on this terrestrial sphere a kind of
sequel to love, in which that covetous longing of
two persons for one another has yielded to a new
desire and covetousness, to a common, higher thirst
for a superior ideal standing above them: but who
knows this love? Who has experienced it? Its
right name is friendship.


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54 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
I
15-
Out of the Distance. —This mountain makes the
whole district which it dominates charming in
every way, and full of significance: after we have
said this to ourselves for the hundredth time, we
are so irrationally and so gratefully disposed to-
wards it, as the giver of this charm, that we
fancy it must itself be the most charming thing
in the district — and so we climb it, and are
undeceived. All of a sudden, it itself, and the
whole landscape around and under us, is as it were
disenchanted; we had forgotten that many a great-
ness, like many a goodness, wants only to be seen
at a certain distance, and entirely from below, not
from above,—it is thus only that it operates. Per-
haps you know men in your neighbourhood who
can only look at themselves from a certain distance
to find themselves at all endurable, or attractive
and enlivening; they are to be dissuaded from self-
knowledge.
16.
Across the Plank. —One must be able to dis-
simulate in intercourse with persons who are
ashamed of their feelings; they experience a
sudden aversion towards anyone who surprises
them in a state of tender, or enthusiastic and high-
running feeling, as if he had seen their secrets. If
one wants to be kind to them in such moments
one should make them laugh, or say some kind of
cold, playful wickedness :—their feeling thereby
congeals, and they are again self-possessed. But
I give the moral before the story. —We were once


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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 55
on a time so near one another in the course of our
lives, that nothing more seemed to hinder our
friendship and fraternity, and there was merely a
small plank between us. While you were just
about to step on it, I asked you: "Do you want
to come across the plank to me? " But then you
did not want to come any longer ; and when I again
entreated, you were silent. Since then mountains
and torrents, and whatever separates and alienates,
have interposed between us, and even if we wanted
to come to one another, we could no longer do so!
When, however, you now remember that small
plank, you have no longer words,—but merely sobs
and amazement.
17-
Motivation of Poverty. —We cannot, to be sure, by
any artifice make a rich and richly-flowing virtue
out of a poor one, but we can gracefully enough
reinterpret its poverty into necessity, so that its
aspect no longer gives pain to us, and we do not
make any reproachful faces at fate on account of it.
It is thus that the wise gardener does, who puts the
tiny streamlet of his garden into the arms of a
fountain-nymph, and thus motivates the poverty :—
and who would not like him need the nymphs!
18.
Ancient Pride. —The ancient savour of nobility
is lacking in us, because the ancient slave is lacking
in our sentiment. A Greek of noble descent found
such immense intermediate stages, and such a
distance betwixt his elevation and that ultimate


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56 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
baseness, that he could hardly even see the slave
plainly: even Plato no longer saw him entirely.
It is otherwise with us, accustomed as we are to
the doctrine of the equality of men, although not
to the equality itself. A being who has not the
free disposal of himself and has not got leisure,
—that is not regarded by us as anything con-
temptible; there is perhaps too much of this kind
of slavishness in each of us, in accordance with
the conditions of our social order and activity,
which are fundamentally different from those of
the ancients. —The Greek philosopher went through
life with the secret feeling that there were many
more slaves than people supposed — that is to
say, that every one was a slave who was not a
philosopher. His pride was puffed up when he
considered that even the mightiest of the earth
were thus to be looked upon as slaves. This
pride is also unfamiliar to us, and impossible; the
word " slave" has not its full force for us even in
simile.
19.
Evil. —Test the life of the best and most pro-
ductive men and nations, and ask yourselves
whether a tree which is to grow proudly heaven-
ward can dispense with bad weather and tempests:
whether disfavour and opposition from without,
whether every kind of hatred, jealousy, stubborn-
ness, distrust, severity, greed, and violence do not
belong to the favouring circumstances without
which a great growth even in virtue is hardly
possible? The poison by which the weaker nature



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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 57
is destroyed is strengthening to the strong indi-
vidual—and he does not call it poison.
20.
Dignity of Folly. —Several millenniums further
on in the path of the last century! —and in every-
thing that man does the highest prudence will be
exhibited: but just thereby prudence will have
lost all its dignity. It will then, sure enough, be
necessary to be prudent, but it will also be so
usual and common, that a more fastidious taste
will feel this necessity as vulgarity. And just as a
tyranny of truth and science would be in a position
to raise the value of falsehood, a tyranny of prudence
could force into prominence a new species of noble-
ness. To be noble—that might then mean, perhaps,
to be capable of follies.
21.
To the Teachers of Unselfishness. —The virtues of
a man are called good, not in respect of the results
they have for himself, but in respect of the results
which we expect therefrom for ourselves and for
society:—we have all along had very little unselfish-
ness, very little "non-egoism " in our praise of the
virtues! For otherwise it could not but have been
seen that the virtues (such as diligence, obedience,
chastity, piety, justice) are mostly injurious to
their possessors, as impulses which rule in them
too vehemently and ardently, and do not want
to be kept in co-ordination with the other im-
pulses by the reason. If you have a virtue, an
actual, perfect virtue (and not merely a kind of


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58 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
impulse towards virtue! )—you are its victim! But
your neighbour praises your virtue precisely on
that account! One praises the diligent man though
he injures his sight, or the originality and freshness
of his spirit, by his diligence; the youth is
honoured and regretted who has "worn himself
out by work," because one passes the judgment
that "for society as a whole the loss of the best
individual is only a small sacrifice! A pity that
this sacrifice should be necessary! A much greater
pity, it is true, if the individual should think differ-
ently, and regard his preservation and development
as more important than his work in the service of
society! " And so one regrets this youth, not on
his own account, but because a devoted instrument,
regardless of self—a so-called "good man," has
been lost to society by his death. Perhaps one
further considers the question, whether it would not
have been more advantageous for the interests of
society if he had laboured with less disregard of
himself, and had preserved himself longer,—indeed,
one readily admits an advantage therefrom, but
one esteems the other advantage, namely, that a
sacrifice has been made, and that the disposition
of the sacrificial animal has once more been obviously
endorsed—as higher and more enduring. It is
accordingly, on the one part, the instrumental
character in the virtues which is praised when
the virtues are praised, and on the other part, the
blind, ruling impulse in every virtue, which refuses
to let itself be kept within bounds by the general
advantage to the individual; in short, what is
praised is the unreason in the virtues, in conse-


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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 59
quence of which the individual allows himself to
be transformed into a function of the whole. The
praise of the virtues is the praise of something
which is privately injurious to the individual; it is
praise of impulses which deprive man of his noblest
self-love, and the power to take the best care of
himself. To be sure, for the teaching and embody-
ing of virtuous habits a series of effects of virtue
are displayed, which make it appear that virtue
and private advantage are closely related,—and
there is in fact such a relationship! Blindly
furious diligence, for example, the typical virtue of
an instrument, is represented as the way to riches
and honour, and as the most beneficial antidote to
tedium and passion: but people are silent concern-
ing its danger, its greatest dangerousness. Educa-
tion proceeds in this manner throughout: it
endeavours, by a series of enticements and advan-
tages, to determine the individual to a certain mode
of thinking and acting, which, when it has become
habit, impulse and passion, rules in him and
over him, in opposition to his ultimate advantage,
but "for the general good. " How often do I see
that blindly furious diligence does indeed create
riches and honours, but at the same time deprives
the organs of the refinement by virtue of which
alone an enjoyment of riches and honours is
possible; so that really the main expedient for
combating tedium and passion, simultaneously
blunts the senses and makes the spirit refractory
towards new stimuli! (The busiest of all ages—
our age—does not know how to make anything
out of its great diligence and wealth, except always


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60 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
more and more wealth, and more and more
diligence; there is even more genius needed for
laying out wealth than for acquiring it! —Well, we
shall have our "grandchildren "! ) If the educa-
tion succeeds, every virtue of the individual is a
public utility, and a private disadvantage in respect
to the highest private end,—probably some psycho-
aesthetic stunting, or even premature dissolution.
One should consider successively from the same
standpoint the virtues of obedience, chastity, piety,
and justice. The praise of the unselfish, self-
sacrificing, virtuous person—he, consequently, who
does not expend his whole energy and reason
for his own conservation, development, elevation,
furtherance and augmentation of power, but lives
as regards himself unassumingly and thoughtlessly,
perhaps even indifferently or ironically,—this praise
has in any case not originated out of the spirit of
unselfishness! The "neighbour" praises unselfish-
ness because he profits by it! If the neighbour
were "unselfishly" disposed himself, he would
reject that destruction of power, that injury for his
advantage, he would thwart such inclinations in
their origin, and above all he would manifest his
unselfishness just by not giving it a good name!
The fundamental contradiction in that morality
which at present stands in high honour is here
indicated: the motives to such a morality are in
antithesis to its principle! That with which this
morality wishes to prove itself, refutes it out of
its criterion of what is moral! The maxim, "Thou
shalt renounce thyself and offer thyself as a
sacrifice," in order not to be inconsistent with its


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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 6l
own morality, could only be decreed by a being
who himself renounced his own advantage thereby,
and who perhaps in the required self-sacrifice of
individuals brought about his own dissolution.
As soon, however, as the neighbour (or society)
recommended altruism on account of its utility, the
precisely antithetical proposition, "Thou shalt seek
thy advantage even at the expense of everybody
else," was brought into use: accordingly, "thou
shalt," and "thou shalt not," are preached in one
breath!
22.
L'Ordre du Jour pour le Roi. —The day com-
mences: let us begin to arrange for this day the
business and fetes of our most gracious lord, who
at present is still pleased to repose. His Majesty
has bad weather to-day: we shall be careful not
to call it bad; we shall not speak of the weather,—
but we shall go through to-day's business somewhat
more ceremoniously and make the fetes somewhat
more festive than would otherwise be necessary.
His Majesty may perhaps even be sick: we shall
give the last good news of the evening at breakfast,
the arrival of M. Montaigne, who knows how to joke
so pleasantly about his sickness,—he suffers from
stone. We shall receive several persons (persons! —
what would that old inflated frog, who will be
among them, say, if he heard this word ! " I am
no person," he would say, "but always the thing
itself")—and the reception will last longer than is
pleasant to anybody; a sufficient reason for telling
about the poet who wrote over his door, " He who


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60 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
more and more wealth, and more and more
diligence; there is even more genius needed for
laying out wealth than for acquiring it! —Well, we
shall have our "grandchildren"! ) If the educa-
tion succeeds, every virtue of the individual is a
public utility, and a private disadvantage in respect
to the highest private end,—probably some psycho-
aesthetic stunting, or even premature dissolution.
One should consider successively from the same
standpoint the virtues of obedience, chastity, piety,
and justice. The praise of the unselfish, self-
sacrificing, virtuous person—he, consequently, who
does not expend his whole energy and reason
for his own conservation, development, elevation,
furtherance and augmentation of power, but lives
as regards himself unassumingly and thoughtlessly,
perhaps even indifferently or ironically,—this praise
has in any case not originated out of the spirit of
unselfishness! The "neighbour" praises unselfish-
ness because he profits by it! If the neighbour
were "unselfishly" disposed himself, he would
reject that destruction of power, that injury for his
advantage, he would thwart such inclinations in
their origin, and above all he would manifest his
unselfishness just by not giving it a good name!
The fundamental contradiction in that morality
which at present stands in high honour is here
indicated: the motives to such a morality are in
antithesis to its principle! That with which this
morality wishes to prove itself, refutes it out of
its criterion of what is moral! The maxim, "Thou
shalt renounce thyself and offer thyself as a
sacrifice," in order not to be inconsistent with its


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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 6l
own morality, could only be decreed by a being
who himself renounced his own advantage thereby,
and who perhaps in the required self-sacrifice of
individuals brought about his own dissolution.
As soon, however, as the neighbour (or society)
recommended altruism on account of its utility, the
precisely antithetical proposition, "Thou shalt seek
thy advantage even at the expense of everybody
else," was brought into use: accordingly, "thou
shalt," and "thou shalt not," are preached in one
breath!
22.
L'Ordre du Jour pour le Roi. —The day com-
mences: let us begin to arrange for this day the
business and fetes of our most gracious lord, who
at present is still pleased to repose. His Majesty
has bad weather to-day: we shall be careful not
to call it bad; we shall not speak of the weather,—
but we shall go through to-day's business somewhat
more ceremoniously and make the fetes somewhat
more festive than would otherwise be necessary.
His Majesty may perhaps even be sick: we shall
give the last good news of the evening at breakfast,
the arrival of M. Montaigne, who knows how to joke
so pleasantly about his sickness,—he suffers from
stone. We shall receive several persons (persons! —
what would that old inflated frog, who will be
among them, say, if he heard this word !
" I am
no person," he would say, "but always the thing
itself")—and the reception will last longer than is
pleasant to anybody; a sufficient reason for telling
about the poet who wrote over his door, " He who


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62 THE JOYFUL WISDOM,
enters here will do me an honour; he who does
not—a favour. "—That is, forsooth, saying a discour-
teous thing in a courteous manner! And perhaps
this poet is quite justified on his part in being
discourteous; they say that the rhymes are better
than the rhymester. Well, let him still make many
of them, and withdraw himself as much as possible
from the world: and that is doubtless the signi-
ficance of his well-bred rudeness! A prince, on
the other hand, is always of more value than his
"verse," even when—but what are we about? We
gossip, and the whole court believes that we have
already been at work and racked our brains: there
is no light to be seen earlier than that which burns
in our window. —Hark! Was that not the bell?
The devil! The day and the dance commence,
and we do not know our rounds! We must then
improvise,—all the world improvises its day. To-
day, let us for once do like all the world! —And
therewith vanished my wonderful morning dream,
probably owing to the violent strokes of the tower-
clock, which just then announced the fifth hour
with all the importance which is peculiar to it. It
seems to me that, on this occasion, the God of
dreams wanted to make merry over my habits,—
it is my habit to commence the day by arranging
it properly, to make it endurable for myself, and
it is possible that I may often have done this too
formally, and too much like a prince.
23-
The Characteristics of Corruption. —Let us observe
the following characteristics in that condition of


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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 63
society from time to time necessary, which is desig-
nated by the word " corruption. " Immediately upon
the appearance of corruption anywhere, a motley
superstition gets the upper hand, and the hitherto
universal belief of a people becomes colourless and
impotent in comparison with it; for superstition is
freethinking of the second rank,—he who gives
himself over to it selects certain forms and formulae
which appeal to him, and permits himself a right
of choice. The superstitious man is always much
more of a " person," in comparison with the religious
man, and a superstitious society will be one in
which there are many individuals, and a delight in
individuality. Seen from this standpoint supersti-
tion always appears as a progress in comparison
with belief, and as a sign that the intellect becomes
more independent and claims to have its rights.
Those who reverence the old religion and the
religious disposition then complain of corruption,—
they have hitherto also determined the usage of
language, and have given a bad repute to supersti-
tion, even among the freest spirits. Let us learn
that it is a symptom of enlightenment. —Secondly,
a society in which corruption takes a hold is blamed
for effeminacy: for the appreciation of war, and
the delight in war perceptibly diminish in such a
society, and the conveniences of life are now just
as eagerly sought after as were military and
gymnastic honours formerly. But one is accus-
tomed to overlook the fact that the old national
energy and national passion, which acquired a
magnificent splendour in war and in the tourney,
has now transferred itself into innumerable private


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64 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
passions, and has merely become less visible;
indeed in periods of " corruption " the quantity and
quality of the expended energy of a people is prob-
ably greater than ever, and the individual spends
it lavishly, to such an extent as could not be done
formerly—he was not then rich enough to do so!
And thus it is precisely in times of " effeminacy"
that tragedy runs at large in and out of doors, it
is then that ardent love and ardent hatred are
born, and the flame of knowledge flashes heaven-
ward in full blaze. —Thirdly, as if in amends for the
reproach of superstition and effeminacy, it is cus-
tomary to say of such periods of corruption that
they are milder, and that cruelty has then greatly
diminished in comparison with the older, more
credulous, and stronger period. But to this praise
I am just as little able to assent as to that reproach:
I only grant so much—namely, that cruelty now
becomes more refined, and its older forms are
henceforth counter to the taste; but the wounding
and torturing by word and look reaches its highest
development in times of corruption,—it is now only
that wickedness is created, and the delight in wicked-
ness. The men of the period of corruption are
witty and calumnious; they know that there are
yet other ways of murdering than by the dagger
and the ambush—they know also that all that is
well said is believed in. —Fourthly, it is when
"morals decay" that those beings whom one calls
tyrants first make their appearance; they are the
forerunners of the individual, and as it were early
matured firstlings. Yet a little while, and this
fruit of fruits hangs ripe and yellow on the tree of


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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 65
a people,—and only for the sake of such fruit did
this tree exist! When the decay has reached its
worst, and likewise the conflict of all sorts of tyrants,
there always arises the Czesar, the final tyrant, who
puts an end to the exhausted struggle for sove-
reignty, by making the exhaustedness work for him.
In his time the individual is usually most mature,
and consequently the "culture" is highest and
most fruitful, but not on his account nor through
him: although the men of highest culture love to
flatter their Caesar by pretending that they are his
creation. The truth, however, is that they need
quietness externally, because internally they have
disquietude and labour. In these times bribery and
treason are at their height: for the love of the ego,
then first discovered, is much more powerful than
the love of the old, used-up, hackneyed "father-
land"; and the need to be secure in one way or other
against the frightful fluctuations of fortune, opens
even the nobler hands, as soon as a richer and more
powerful person shows himself ready to put gold
into them. There is then so little certainty with
regard to the future; people live only for the day:
a condition of mind which enables every deceiver
to play an easy game,—people of course only let
themselves be misled and bribed "for the present,"
and reserve for themselves futurity and virtue.
The individuals, as is well known, the men who
only live for themselves, provide for the moment
more than do their opposites, the gregarious men,
because they consider themselves just as incalcul-
able as the future; and similarly they attach them-
selves willingly to despots, because they believe
5


## p. 66 (#90) ##############################################

66 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
themselves capable of activities and expedients,
which can neither reckon on being understood by
the multitude, nor on finding favour with them,—
but the tyrant or the Caesar understands the rights
of the individual even in his excesses, and has an
interest in speaking on behalf of a bolder private
morality, and even in giving his hand to it. For
he thinks of himself, and wishes people to think of
him what Napoleon once uttered in his classical
style—" I have the right to answer by an eternal
* thus I am' to everything about which complaint
is brought against me. I am apart from all the
world, I accept conditions from nobody. I wish
people also to submit to my fancies, and to take
it quite as a simple matter, if I should indulge in
this or that diversion. " Thus spoke Napoleon
once to his wife, when she had reasons for calling
in question the fidelity of her husband. —The times
of corruption are the seasons when the apples fall
from the tree: I mean the individuals, the seed-
bearers of the future, the pioneers of the spiritual
colonisation and of a new construction of national
and social unions. Corruption is only an abusive
term for the harvest time of a people.
24.
Different Dissatisfactions. —The feeble and as it
were feminine dissatisfied people have ingenuity
for beautifying and deepening life; the strong
dissatisfied people—the masculine persons among
them, to continue the metaphor—have the ingenuity
for improving and safeguarding life. The former


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THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 67
show their weakness and feminine character by
willingly letting themselves be temporarily deceived,
and perhaps even by putting up with a little
ecstasy and enthusiasm on a time, but on the whole
they are never to be satisfied, and suffer from the
incurability of their dissatisfaction; moreover they
are the patrons of all those who manage to concoct
opiate and narcotic comforts, and just on that
account averse to those who value the physician
higher than the priest,—they thereby encourage
the continuance of actual distress! If there had
not been a surplus of dissatisfied persons of this
kind in Europe since the time of the Middle Ages,
the remarkable capacity of Europeans for constant
transformation would perhaps not have originated
at all; for the claims of the strong dissatisfied
persons are too gross, and really too modest to
resist being finally quieted down. China is an
instance of a country in which dissatisfaction on a
grand scale and the capacity for transformation
have died out for many centuries; and the Socialists
and state-idolaters of Europe could easily bring
things to Chinese conditions and to a Chinese
"happiness," with their measures for the ameliora-
tion and security of life, provided that they could
first of all root out the sicklier, tenderer, more
feminine dissatisfaction and Romanticism which
are still very abundant among us. Europe is an
invalid who owes her best thanks to her incurability
and the eternal transformations of her sufferings;
these constant new situations, these equally con-
stant new dangers, pains, and make-shifts, have at
last generated an intellectual sensitiveness which is


## p. 68 (#92) ##############################################

68 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
almost equal to genius, and is in any case the
mother of all genius.
25.
Not Pre-ordained to Knowledge. —There is a pur-
blind humility not at all rare, and when a person
is afflicted with it, he is once for all unqualified
for being a disciple of knowledge. It is this in
fact: the moment a man of this kind perceives
anything striking, he turns as it were on his heel,
and says to himself: "You have deceived yourself!
Where have your wits been! This cannot be
the truth ! "—and then, instead of looking at it and
listening to it with more attention, he runs out of
the way of the striking object as if intimidated,
and seeks to get it out of his head as quickly as
possible. For his fundamental rule runs thus: " I
want to see nothing that contradicts the usual
opinion concerning things! Am / created for the
purpose of discovering new truths? There are
already too many of the old ones. "
26.
What is Living! —Living—that is to continually
eliminate from ourselves what is about to die;
Living—that is to be cruel and inexorable towards
all that becomes weak and old in ourselves, and
not only in ourselves. Living—that means, there-
fore, to be without piety toward the dying, the
wretched and the old? To be continually a mur-
derer ? —And yet old Moses said: "Thou shalt not
kill! "


## p. 69 (#93) ##############################################

THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 69
27.
The Self-Renouncer. — What does the self-
renouncer do? He strives after a higher world,
he wants to fly longer and further and higher than
all men of affirmation—he throws away many things
that would burden his flight, and several things
among them that are not valueless, that are not
unpleasant to him: he sacrifices them to his desire
for elevation. Now this sacrificing, this casting
away, is the very thing which becomes visible in
him: on that account one calls him the self-
renouncer, and as such he stands before us,
enveloped in his cowl, and as the soul of a
hair-shirt. With this effect, however, which he
makes upon us he is well content: he wants to
keep concealed from us his desire, his pride, his
intention of flying above us. —Yes! He is wiser
than we thought, and so courteous towards us—
this affirmer! For that is what he is, like us,
even in his self-renunciation.
28.
Injuring with one's best Qualities. —Our strong
points sometimes drive us so far forward that we
cannot any longer endure our weaknesses, and we
perish by them: we also perhaps see this result
beforehand, but nevertheless do not want it to be
otherwise. We then become hard towards that
which would fain be spared in us, and our pitiless-
ness is also our greatness. Such an experience,
which must in the end cost us our life, is a symbol
S


## p. 70 (#94) ##############################################

70 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
of the collective effect of great men upon others
and upon their epoch:—it is just with their best
abilities, with that which only they can do, that they
destroy much that is weak, uncertain, evolving, and
willing, and are thereby injurious. Indeed, the
case may happen in which, taken on the whole,
they only do injury, because their best is accepted
and drunk up as it were solely by those who lose
their understanding and their egoism by it, as by
too strong a beverage; they become so intoxicated
that they go breaking their limbs on all the wrong
roads where their drunkenness drives them.
29.
Adventitious Liars. — When people began to
combat the unity of Aristotle in France, and con-
sequently also to defend it, there was once more
to be seen that which has been seen so often, but
seen so unwillingly:—people imposed false reasons
on themselves on account of which those laws ought
to exist, merely for the sake of not acknowledging
to themselves that they had accustomed themselves
to the authority of those laws, and did not want
any longer to have things otherwise. And people
do so in every prevailing morality and religion, and
have always done so: the reasons and intentions
behind the habit, are only added surreptitiously
when people begin to combat the habit, and ask for
reasons and intentions. It is here that the great
dishonesty of the conservatives of all times hides:
—they are adventitious liars.


## p. 71 (#95) ##############################################

THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
30.
The Comedy of Celebrated Men. —Celebrated men
who need their fame, as, for instance, all politicians,
no longer select their associates and friends without
after-thoughts: from the one they want a portion
of the splendour and reflection of his virtues; from
the other they want the fear-inspiring power of
certain dubious qualities in him, of which every-
body is aware; from another they steal his reputa-
tion for idleness and basking in the sun, because it
is advantageous for their own ends to be regarded
temporarily as heedless and lazy :—it conceals the
fact that they lie in ambush; they now use the
visionaries, now the experts, now the brooders, now
the pedants in their neighbourhood, as their actual
selves for the time, but very soon they do not
need them any longer! And thus while their en-
vironment and outside die off continually, every-
thing seems to crowd into this environment,
and wants to become a "character" of it; they
are like great cities in this respect. Their repute
is continually in process of mutation, like their
character, for their changing methods require this
change, and they show and exhibit sometimes this
and sometimes that actual or fictitious quality on
the stage; their friends and associates, as we have
said, belong to these stage properties. On the other
hand, that which they aim at must remain so much
the more steadfast, and burnished and resplendent
in the distance,—and this also sometimes needs its
comedy and its stage-play.


## p. 72 (#96) ##############################################

^2 "THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
31-
Commerce and Nobility. — Buying and selling is
now regarded as something ordinary, like the art
of reading and writing; everyone is now trained
to it even when he is not a tradesman, exercising
himself daily in the art; precisely as formerly in
the period of uncivilised humanity, everyone was a
hunter and exercised himself day by day in the
art of hunting. Hunting was then something
common: but just as this finally became a privilege
of the powerful and noble, and thereby lost the
character of the commonplace and the ordinary—
by ceasing to be necessary and by becoming an
affair of fancy and luxury:—so it might become the
same some day with buying and selling. Condi-
tions of society are imaginable in which there will
be no selling and buying, and in which the necessity
for this art will become quite lost; perhaps it may
then happen that individuals who are less subjected
to the law of the prevailing condition of things
will indulge in buying and selling as a luxury of
sentiment. It is then only that commerce would
acquire nobility, and the noble would then perhaps
occupy themselves just as readily with commerce
as they have done hitherto with war and politics:
while on the other hand the valuation of politics
might then have entirely altered. Already even
politics ceases to be the business of a gentleman;
and it is possible that one day it may be found
to be so vulgar as to be brought, like all party
literature and daily literature, under the rubric:
"Prostitution of the intellect. "


## p. 73 (#97) ##############################################

THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 73
32.
Undesirable Disciples. —What shall I do with
these two youths! called out a philosopher
dejectedly, who "corrupted" youths, as Socrates
had once corrupted them,—they are unwelcome
disciples to me. One of them cannot say " Nay,"
and the other says " Half and half" to everything.
Provided they grasped my doctrine, the former
would suffer too much, for my mode of thinking
requires a martial soul, willingness to cause pain,
delight in denying, and a hard skin,—he would
succumb by open wounds and internal injuries.
And the other will choose the mediocre in every-
thing he represents, and thus make a mediocrity
of the whole,—I should like my enemy to have such
a disciple.
33-
Outside the Lecture-room. —" In order to prove
that man after all belongs to the good-natured
animals, I would remind you how credulous he
has been for so long a time. It is now only,
quite late, and after an immense self-conquest, that
he has become a distrustful animal,—yes! man is
now more wicked than ever. "—I do not understand
this; why should man now be more distrustful and
more wicked ? —" Because he now has science,—
because he needs to have it! "—
34.
Historia abscondita. —Every great man has a
power which operates backward; all history is


## p. 73 (#98) ##############################################

^2 THE JOVFUL WISDOM, I
31-
Commerce and Nobility. —Buying and selling is
now regarded as something ordinary, like the art
of reading and writing; everyone is now trained
to it even when he is not a tradesman, exercising
himself daily in the art; precisely as formerly in
the period of uncivilised humanity, everyone was a
hunter and exercised himself day by day in the
art of hunting. Hunting was then something
common: but just as this finally became a privilege
of the powerful and noble, and thereby lost the
character of the commonplace and the ordinary—
by ceasing to be necessary and by becoming an
affair of fancy and luxury:—so it might become the
same some day with buying and selling. Condi-
tions of society are imaginable in which there will
be no selling and buying, and in which the necessity
for this art will become quite lost; perhaps it may
then happen that individuals who are less subjected
to the law of the prevailing condition of things
will indulge in buying and selling as a luxury of
sentiment. It is then only that commerce would
acquire nobility, and the noble would then perhaps
occupy themselves just as readily with commerce
as they have done hitherto with war and politics:
while on the other hand the valuation of politics
might then have entirely altered. Already even
politics ceases to be the business of a gentleman;
and it is possible that one day it may be found
to be so vulgar as to be brought, like all party
literature and daily literature, under the rubric:
"Prostitution of the intellect. "


## p. 73 (#99) ##############################################

THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 73
32.
Undesirable Disciples. —What shall I do with
these two youths! called out a philosopher
dejectedly, who "corrupted" youths, as Socrates
had once corrupted them,—they are unwelcome
disciples to me. One of them cannot say " Nay,"
and the other says " Half and half" to everything.
Provided they grasped my doctrine, the former
would suffer too much, for my mode of thinking
requires a martial soul, willingness to cause pain,
delight in denying, and a hard skin,—he would
succumb by open wounds and internal injuries.
And the other will choose the mediocre in every-
thing he represents, and thus make a mediocrity
of the whole,—I should like my enemy to have such
a disciple.
33-
Outside the Lecture-room. —" In order to prove
that man after all belongs to the good-natured
animals, I would remind you how credulous he
has been for so long a time. It is now only,
quite late, and after an immense self-conquest, that
he has become a distrustful animal,—yes! man is
now more wicked than ever. "—I do not understand
this; why should man now be more distrustful and
more wicked ? —" Because he now has science,—
because he needs to have it! "—
34-
Historia abscondita. —Every great man has a
power which operates backward; all history is


## p. 73 (#100) #############################################

^2 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
31-
Commerce and Nobility. — Buying and selling is
now regarded as something ordinary, like the art
of reading and writing; everyone is now trained
to it even when he is not a tradesman, exercising
himself daily in the art; precisely as formerly in
the period of uncivilised humanity, everyone was a
hunter and exercised himself day by day in the
art of hunting. Hunting was then something
common: but just as this finally became a privilege
of the powerful and noble, and thereby lost the
character of the commonplace and the ordinary—
by ceasing to be necessary and by becoming an
affair of fancy and luxury:—so it might become the
same some day with buying and selling. Condi-
tions of society are imaginable in which there will
be no selling and buying, and in which the necessity
for this art will become quite lost; perhaps it may
then happen that individuals who are less subjected
to the law of the prevailing condition of things
will indulge in buying and selling as a luxury of
sentiment. It is then only that commerce would
acquire nobility, and the noble would then perhaps
occupy themselves just as readily with commerce
as they have done hitherto with war and politics:
while on the other hand the valuation of politics
might then have entirely altered. Already even
politics ceases to be the business of a gentleman;
and it is possible that one day it may be found
to be so vulgar as to be brought, like all party
literature and daily literature, under the rubric:
'- Prostitution of the intellect. "


## p. 73 (#101) #############################################

THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 73
32.
Undesirable Disciples. —What shall I do with
these two youths! called out a philosopher
dejectedly, who "corrupted" youths, as Socrates
had once corrupted them,—they are unwelcome
disciples to me. One of them cannot say " Nay,"
and the other says " Half and half" to everything.
Provided they grasped my doctrine, the former
would suffer too much, for my mode of thinking
requires a martial soul, willingness to cause pain,
delight in denying, and a hard skin,—he would
succumb by open wounds and internal injuries.
And the other will choose the mediocre in every-
thing he represents, and thus make a mediocrity
of the whole,—I should like my enemy to have such
a disciple.
33-
Outside the Lecture-room. —" In order to prove
that man after all belongs to the good-natured
animals, I would remind you how credulous he
has been for so long a time. It is now only,
quite late, and after an immense self-conquest, that
he has become a distrustful animal,—yes! man is
now more wicked than ever. "—I do not understand
this; why should man now be more distrustful and
more wicked ? —" Because he now has science,—
because he needs to have it! "—
3+
Historia abscondita. —Every great man has a
power which operates backward; all history is


## p. 74 (#102) #############################################

74 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
again placed on the scales on his account, and a
thousand secrets of the past crawl out of their
lurking-places—into his sunlight. There is ab-
solutely no knowing what history may be some
day. The past is still perhaps undiscovered in
its essence! There are yet so many retroactive
powers needed!
35-
Heresy and Witchcraft. —To think otherwise
than is customary—that is by no means so much
the activity of a better intellect, as the activity of
strong, wicked inclinations,—severing, isolating,
refractory, mischief-loving, malicious inclinations.
Heresy is the counterpart of witchcraft, and is
certainly just as little a merely harmless affair,
or a thing worthy of honour in itself. Heretics
and sorcerers are two kinds of bad men; they
have it in common that they also feel themselves
wicked; their unconquerable delight is to attack
and injure whatever rules,—whether it be men or
opinions. The Reformation, a kind of duplication
of the spirit of the Middle Ages at a time when
it had no longer a good conscience, produced both
of these kinds of people in the greatest profusion.
36.
Last Words. —It will be recollected that the
Emperor Augustus, that terrible man, who had
himself as much in his own power, and who could
be silent as well as any wise Socrates, became
indiscreet about himself in his last words; for


## p. 75 (#103) #############################################

THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I 75
the first time he let his mask fall, when he gave to
understand that he had carried a mask and played
a comedy,—he had played the father of his country
and wisdom on the throne well, even to the point
of illusion! Plaudite amid, comoedia finita est! —
The thought of the dying Nero: qualis artifexpereo!
was also the thought of the dying Augustus:
histrionic conceit! histrionic loquacity! And the
very counterpart to the dying Socrates! —But
Tiberius died silently, that most tortured of all
self-torturers,—he was genuine and not a stage-
player! What may have passed through his
head in the end! Perhaps this: "Life — that
is a long death. I am a fool, who shortened the
lives of so many! Was / created for the purpose
of being a benefactor? I should have given them
eternal life: and then I could have seen them dying
eternally. I had such good eyes for that: qualis
spectator pereo! '" When he seemed once more
to regain his powers after a long death-struggle,
it was considered advisable to smother him with
pillows,—he died a double death.
37-
Owing to three Errors. —Science has been furthered
during recent centuries, partly because it was hoped
that God's goodness and wisdom would be best
understood therewith and thereby—the principal
motive in the soul of great Englishmen (like
Newton); partly because the absolute utility of
knowledge was believed in, and especially the most
intimate connection of morality, knowledge, and
happiness—the principal motive in the soul of great


## p. 76 (#104) #############################################

76 THE JOYFUL WISDOM, I
Frenchmen (like Voltaire); and partly because it
was thought that in science there was something
unselfish, harmless, self-sufficing, lovable, and truly
innocent to be had, in which the evil human
impulses did not at all participate—the principal
motive in the soul of Spinoza, who felt himself
divine, as a knowing being:—it is consequently
owing to three errors that science has been
furthered.
38.
Explosive People. —When one considers how
ready are the forces of young men for discharge,
one does not wonder at seeing them decide so
unfastidiously and with so little selection for this
or that cause: that which attracts them is the
sight of eagerness about any cause, as it were the
sight of the burning match—not the cause itself.
The more ingenious seducers on that account
operate by holding out the prospect of an explosion
to such persons, and do not urge their cause by
means of reasons; these powder-barrels are not
won over by means of reasons!