Provided that they do not adapt themselves to the mob, and stand up for what
satisfies
the instincts of the disinherited, they will find it necessary to be "mediocre" and sound.
Nietzsche - Works - v15 - Will to Power - b
To be blind to many
things, to see many things falsely, to fancy many things: Oh, how clever man has been in those circumstances in which he believed he was anything but clever! Love, enthusiasm, " God "--are but subtle forms of ultimate self-deception; they are but seductions to life and to the belief in life! In those moments when man was deceived, when he had befooled
himself and when he believed in life: Oh, how his spirit swelled within him! Oh, what ecstasies he had! What power he felt! And what artistic triumphs in the feeling of power! . . . Man had once more become master of " matter,"--master of truth! . . . And whenever man rejoices it is always in the same way: he rejoices as an artist, his power
is his joy, he enjoys falsehood as his power. . . .
II.
Art and nothing else! Art is the great means of making life possible, the great seducer to life, the great stimulus of life.
Art is the only superior counteragent to all will to the denial of life; it is par excellence the anti Christian, the anti-Buddhistic, the anti-Nihilistic force.
_
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER IN ART.
Art is the alleviation of the seeker after know ledge,--of him who recognises the terrible and questionable character Of existence, and who will recognise it,--of the tragic seeker after know ledge.
Art is the alleviation of the man of action,--of him who not only sees the terrible and questionable character of existence, but also lives will live --of the tragic and warlike man, the hero.
Art the alleviation of the sgfferer,--as the way to states in which pain willed, trans figured, deified, where suffering form of great ecstasy.
III.
It clear that in this book pessimism, or, better still, Nihilism, stands for " truth. " But truth not postulated as the highest measure of value, and still less as the highest power. The will to to illusion, to deception, to becoming,
appearance,
and to change (to objective deception), here re
garded as more profound, as more primeval, as more metaphysical than the will to truth, to reality, toappearance: the latter merely form of the will to illusion. Happiness likewise conceived as more primeval than pain and pain considered as conditioned, as consequence Of the will to happiness (of the will to Becoming, to growth, to forming, i. e. to creating; in creating, however, de struction included). The highest state of Yea saying to existence conceived as one from which
the greatest pain may not be excluded the tragico Dionysian state.
291
? ? ? :
isa
is it, a
is
a
is
is
is
is
:
is
is
is
is
it,
is
is
? 292
THE WILL TO POWER.
IV.
In this way this book is even anti-pessimistic, namely, in the sense that it teaches something which is stronger than pessimism and which is more " divine " than truth: Art. Nobody, it would seem, would be more ready seriously to utter a radical denial of life, an actual denial of action even more
than a denial of life, than the author of this book. Except that he knows--for he has experienced and perhaps experienced little else l--that art of more value than truth. ,
Even in the preface, in which Richard Wagner is, as were, invited to join with him in conversa tion, the author expresses this article of faith, this gospel for artists: " Art the only task of life, art
the metaphysical activity of life. .
? ? ? is
it
. . "
is
is
it,
? ? FOURTH BOOK. DISCIPLINE AND BREEDING.
? ? ? THE ORDER OF RANK.
I. THE DOCTRINE or THE ORDER OF RANK.
854.
IN this age of universal suffrage, in which every body allowed to sit in judgment upon everything and everybody, feel compelled to re-establish the order of rank.
855.
Quanta of power alone determine rank and dis tinguish rank: nothing else does.
856.
The will to power. ---How must those men be constituted who would undertake this transvalua tion? The order of rank as the order of power: war and danger are the prerequisites which allow of rank maintaining its conditions. The pro digious example: man in Nature--the weakest and shrewdest creature making himself master, and
putting yoke upon all less intelligent forces. 395
? ? ? _____. . . _. . ___. -, _
a a
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I
I.
--. --? -q__, ,,
? ? 296
THE WILL To POWER.
857.
I distinguish between the type which represents ascending life and that which represents. decay, decomposition and weakness. Ought one to suppose that the question of rank between these two types can be at all doubtful? . .
858.
The modicum of power which you represent decides your rank; all the rest is cowardice.
859.
The advantages Of standing detached from one's age--Detached from the two movements, that of individualism and that of collectivist morality; for even the first does not recognise the order of rank, and would give one individual the same freedom as another. My thoughts are not concerned with the degree of freedom which should be granted to the one or to the other or to all, but with the degree of power which the one or the other should exercise over his neighbour or over all ;_ and more especially with the question to what extent a sacrifice of freedom, or even enslavement, may afford the basis for the cultivation of a superior type. In plain words: how could one sacrifice the
development of mankind in order to assist a higher species than man to come into being.
? ? ? ? THE ORDER OF RANK.
297
860.
Concerning rank--The terrible consequences of " equality "---in the end everybody thinks he has the right to every problem. All order of rank has vanished.
861.
It is necessary for higher men to declare war upon the masses! In all directions mediocre people are joining hands in order to make them selves masters. Everything that pampers, that softens, and that brings the " people " or " woman " to the front, operates in favour of universal suffrage --that is to say, the dominion of inferior men. But we must make reprisals, and draw the whole state? of affairs (which commenced in Europe with Christianity) to the light of day and to judgment.
862.
A teaching is needed which is strong enough
to work in a disciplinary manner; it should . operate in such a way as to strengthen the strong and to paralyse and smash up the world-weary.
The annihilation of declining races. The decay of Europe. The annihilation of slave tainted valuations. The dominion of the world as a means to the rearing of a higher type. The annihilation of the humbug which is called morality (Christianity as a hysterical kind of honesty in this regard: Augustine, Bunyan)
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER.
The annihilation of universal suffrage--that is to say, that system by means of which the lowest natures prescribe themselves as a law for
_ higher natures. The annihilation of mediocrity and its prevalence. (The one-sided, the indivi duals--peoples; constitutional plenitude should be aimed at by means of the coupling of opposites ; to this end race-combinations should be tried. ) The new kind of courage--no a priori truths (those who were accustomed to believe in some thing sought such truths but free submission to a ruling thought, which has its time; for instance, time conceived as the quality of space, etc.
2. THE STRONG AND THE WEAK.
863.
The notion, " strong and weak man," resolves itself into this, that in the first place much strength inherited--the man total sum in the other, not yet enough (inadequate inheritance, subdivision of the inherited qualities). Weakness may be
starting phenomenon: not yet enough; or final phenomenon: " no more. "
298
? The determining point
strength present, or where
strength can be discharged.
sum-total of the weak, reacts slowly; defends itself against much for which too weak,-- against that for which has no use; never creates, never takes step forward. This
there where great great amount of
The mass, as the
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? Tm} ORDER OF RANK. 299
opposed to the theory which denies the strong individual and would maintain that the " masses do everything. " The difference is similar to that which obtains between
separated generations: four or even five generations may lie between the masses and him who is the moving spirit--it is a
difference.
The value: of the weak are in the van, because
the strong have adopted them in order to lead with them.
864.
Why the weak triumph--On the whole, the sick and the weak have more sympathy and are more " humane ": the sick and the weak have more intellect, and are more changeable, more variegated,
more entertaining--more malicious ; the sick alone invented malice. (A morbid precocity is often to be observed among rickety, scrofulitic, and tuberculous people. ) Esprit: the property of older races ; Jews, Frenchmen, Chinese. (The anti-Semites do not forgive the Jews for having both intellect-- and money. Anti-Semites--another name for " bungled and botched")
The sick and the weak have always had fascina tion on their side; they are more interesting than the healthy: the fool and the saint--the two most interesting kinds of men. . . . Closely related thereto is the " genius. " The " great adventurers and criminals " and all great men, the most healthy in particular, have always been sick at certain periods of their lives--great disturbances of the
chronological
? ? ? ? 300
THE WILL TO POWER.
emotions, the passion for power, love, revenge, are all accompanied by very profound perturbations. And, as for decadence, every man who does not die prematurely manifests it in almost every respect--he therefore knows from experience the instincts which belong to it: for half his life nearly every man is decadent.
And finally, woman! One-half of mankind is weak, chronically sick, changeable, shifty--woman requires strength in order to cleave to it; she also requires a religion of the weak which glorifies weakness, love, and modesty as divine: or, better still, she makes the strong weak--she rules when she succeeds in overcoming the strong. Woman has always conspired with decadent types,--the priests, for instance,--against the" mighty," against the "strong," against men. Women avail them selves of children for the cult of piety, pity, and love :--the mother stands as the symbol of con vincing altruism.
Finally, the increase of civilisation with its necessary correlatives, the increase of morbid elements, of the neurotic and psychiatric and of the criminal. A sort of intermediary species arises, the artist. He is distinct from those who are
as the result of weak wills and of the fear of society, although they may not yet be ripe for the asylum; but he has antenna: which grope inquisitively into both spheres: this specific plant _of culture, the modern artist, painter, musician, and, above all, novelist, who designates his particular kind of attitude with the very indefinite word "naturalism. " . . . Lunatics, criminals, and
? criminals
? ? ? -
THE ORDER OF RANK.
3OI
realists' are on the increase: this the sign of growing culture plunging forward at headlong speed--that to say, its excrement, its refuse, the
rubbish that shot from
to acquire more importance,--the movement keeps pace with the advance.
Finally, the social mishmash, which the result of revolution, of the establishment of equal rights, and of the superstition, the "equality Of men. " Thus the possessors of the instincts of decline (of resentment, of discontent, of the lust of destruction,
of anarchy and Nihilism), as also the instincts of slavery, of cowardice, of craftiness, and of rascality, which are inherent among those classes of society which have long been suppressed, are beginning to get infused into the blood of all ranks. Two or three generations later, the race can no longer be
every day, beginning retrogressive
? -
recognised--everything
has become mob. And thus ,there results collective instinct against selection, against every kind of privilege; and this instinct operates with such power, certainty, hardness, and cruelty that, as matter of fact, in the end, even the privileged classes have to submit: all those who still wish to hold on to power flatter the mob, work with the mob, and must have the mob on their side--the " geniuses "
above all. The latter become the heralds of those feelings with which the mob can be inspired,---the
of pity, of honour, even for all that suffers, all that low and despised, and has lived
" *Tbe " German word "Naturalist," and really means realist bad sense--TR.
expression
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? THE WILL TO POWER.
under persecution, becomes predominant (types: Victor Hugo, Richard Wagner). --The rise of the mob signifies once more the rise of old values.
In the case of such an extreme movement, both in tempo and in means, as characterises our civil isation, man's ballast is shifted. Those men whose worth is greatest, and whose mission, as it were, is to compensate for the very great danger of such a morbid movement,-such men become dawdlers
par excellence ; they are slow to accept anything, and are tenacious ; they are creatures that are relatively lasting in the midst of this vast mingling and changing of elements. In such circumstances power is necessarily relegated to the mediocre: mediocrity, as the trustee and bearer of the future, consolidates itself against the rule of the mob and of eccentricities (both of which are, in most cases,
In this way a new antagonist is evolved for exceptional men--0r in certain cases a new temptation.
Provided that they do not adapt themselves to the mob, and stand up for what satisfies the instincts of the disinherited, they will find it necessary to be "mediocre" and sound. They know: mediocritas is also aurea,--it alone
has command of money and gold (of all that glitters . . . And, once more, old virtue and the whole superannuated world of ideals in general secures gifted host of special-pleaders. . . Result: mediocrity acquires intellect, wit, and genius,--it becomes entertaining, and even seductive.
Result--A high culture can only stand upon broad basis, upon strongly and soundly consoli
302
? united).
? ? a
*
.
a
a
.
. ). .
? THE ORDER OF RANK.
303
dated mediocrity. In its service and assisted by science and even art do their work. Science could not wish for better state of affairs: in its middle-class type of man,-- out of place,--there not
essence belongs to
among exceptions
anything aristocratic
anarchic in its instincts--The power of the middle classes then upheld by means of commerce, but, above all, by means of money-dealing: the instinct of great financiers opposed to everything extreme --on this account the Jews are, for the present, the most conservative power in the threatening and insecure conditions of modern Europe. They can have no use either for revolutions, for social ism, or for militarism: they would have power, and they should need even over the revolu tionary party, this only the result of what have already said, and in no way contradicts it. Against other extreme movements they may occasionally require to excite terror--by showing how much power in their hands. But their instinct itself inveterately conservative and " mediocre. " . . Wherever power exists, they know how to become mighty but the application
of their power always takes the same direction. The polite term for mediocre, as well known,
the word "Liberal. "
and still less anything
? all nonsense to suppose that this general conquest of values anti-biological.
In order to explain we ought to try and show that the result of certain interest of life to maintain the type "man," even by means of this
Reflection--It
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? 304
THE WILL TO POWER.
method which leads to the prevalence Of the weak and the physiologically botched--if things were otherwise, might man not cease to exist? Problem. . .
The enhancement of the type may prove fatal to the maintenance of the species. Why ? --The experience of history shows that strong races a'ecimate each other mutually, by means of war, lust for power, and venturousness; the strong emotions; wastefulness (strength is no longer capitalised, disturbed mental systems arise from excessive tension); their existence is a costly affair--in short, they persistently give rise to friction between themselves; periods of profound slackners and torpidity intervene: all great ages have to be paidfar. . . . The strong are, after all, weaker, less wilful, and more absurd than the average weak ones.
They are squandering' races. " Permanence," in itself, can have no value: that which ought to be preferred thereto would be a shorter life for the species, but a life richer in creations. It would remain to be proved that, even as things are, a richer sum of creations is attained than in the case of the shorter existence; i. e. that man, as a
storehouse of power, attains to a much higher
? of dominion over things under the con ditions which have existed hitherto. . . . We are here face to face with a problem of economics.
865.
The state of mind which calls itself "idealism," and which will neither allow mediocrity to be
degree
? ? ? THE ORDER OF RANK.
305
mediocre nor woman to be woman! Do not make everything uniform! We should have clear idea of how dearly we have to pay for the establishment of a virtue; and that virtue nothing generally desirable, but noble piece madness, beautiful exception, which gives us the privilege of feeling elated.
866.
It necessary to show that a counter-movement inevitably associated with any increasingly economical consumption of men and mankind, and
with an ever more closely involved " machinery " of interests and services. call this counter movement the separation of the luxurious surplus of mankind: by means of a stronger kind, higher type, must come to light, which has other conditions for its origin and for its maintenance than the average man. My concept, my metaphor for this type as you know, the word "Superman. " Along the first road, which can now be completely
arose adaptation, stultification, higher Chinese culture, modesty in the instincts, and satisfaction at the sight of the belittlement of man--a kind of stationary level of mankind. If ever we get that inevitable and imminent, general control of the economy of the earth, then man~ kind can be used as machinery and find its best purpose in the service of this economy--as an enormous piece of clock-work consisting of ever smaller and ever more subtly adapted wheels; then all the dominating and commanding elements
vor. n.
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? THE WILL To POWER.
will become ever more superfluous; and the whole gains enormous energy, while the individual factors which compose it represent but small modicums of strength and of value. To oppose this dwarfing and adaptation of man to a special ised kind of utility, a reverse movement is needed ---the procreation of the synthetic man who em bodies everything and justifies it; that man for whom the turning of mankind into a machine is a first condition of existence, for whom the rest of mankind is but soil on which he can devise his higher mode of existence.
He is in_need of the opposition of the masses, of those who are "levelled down"; he requires that feeling of distance from them; he stands upon them, he lives on them. This higher form of aristocracy is the form of the future. From the moral point of view, the collective machinery above described, that solidarity of all wheels,
represents the most extreme example in the exploitation of mankind: but it presupposes the existence of those for whom such an exploitation would have some meaning. "i OtherWise it would signify, as a matter of fact, merely the general depreciation of the type man,--a retrograde
phenomenon on a grand scale.
Readers are beginning to see what I am
combating--namely, economic optimism: as if
*This sentence for ever distinguishes Nietzsche's aristoc racy from our present plutocratic and industrial one, for which, at the present moment at any rate, it would be difficult to discover some meaning--TR.
306
? ? ? ? . _
peoples,
THE ORDER OF RANK.
307
the general welfare of everybody must necessarily increase with the growing self-sacrifice Of every body. The very reverse seems to me to be the case, the self-sacrifice of everybody amounts to a collective loss; man becomes inferior-50 that nobody knows what end this monstrous purpose has served. A wherefore? new wherefore ? -- this what mankind requires.
867
The recognition of the increase of collective
we should calculate to what extent the ruin of individuals, of castes, of ages, and of
power:
? included in this general increase.
The transposition of the ballast of culture.
The cost of every vast growth: who bears it? Why must be enormous at the present time
868.
General aspect of the future European: the latter regarded as the most intelligent servile animal, very industrious, at bottom very modest, inquisitive to excess, multifarious, pampered, weak of will,--a chaos of cosmopolitan pas sions and intelligences. How would be
for stronger race to be bred from him ? --Such race as would have classical taste? The classical taste: this the will to simplicity, to accentuation, and to happiness made visible, the will to the terrible, and the courage for psychological nakedness (simplification the
possible
? ? is
it
is
a
a ?
aa
is it
Lam-HM
is
a
? '
308
THE WILL 'ro POWER.
outcome of the will to accentuate; allowing
as well as nakedness to become visible is a consequence of the will to the terrible . .
In order to fight one's way out of that chaos, and up to this form, a certain disciplinary constraint is necessary: a man should have to choose between either going to the dogs or prevailing. A ruling race can only arise amid terrible and violent conditions. Problem: where are the barbarians of the twentieth century? Obviously they will only show themselves and consolidate themselves after enormous socialistic crises. They will con sist of those elements which are capable of the
greatest hardness towards themselves, and which can guarantee the most enduring will-power.
869.
The mightiest and most dangerous passions of man, by means of which he most easily goes to rack and ruin, have been so fundamentally banned that mighty men themselves have either become impossible or else must regard themselves as evil, " harmful and prohibited. " The losses are heavy, but up to the present they have been necessary. Now, however, that a whole host of counter-forces has been reared, by means of the temporary suppression of these passions (the passion for dominion, the love of change and deception), their liberation has once more become possible: they will no longer possess their old savagery. We can now allow ourselves this tame sort of bar barism : look at our artists and our statesmen!
happiness
? ? ? ? THE ORDER OF RANK.
309
870.
The root of all evil that the slave morality of modesty, chastity, selflessness, and absolute
obedience should have triumphed.
natures were thus condemned (I) to hypocrisy,
to qualms of conscience,---creative natures regarded themselves as rebels against God, un certain and hemmed in by eternal values.
The barbarians showed that the
keeping within the bounds qf maderation was not in the scope of their powers: they feared and slandered the passions and instincts of nature-- likewise the aspect of the ruling Cmsars and castes. On the other hand, there arose the sus picion that all restraint is a form of weakness or of incipient old age and fatigue (thus La Rochefou cauld suspects that " virtue " is only a euphemism in the mouths of those to whom vice no longer affords any pleasure). The capacity for restraint was represented as a matter of hardness, self control, asceticism, as a fight with the devil, etc.
etc. The natural delight of aesthetic natures, in measure; the pleasure derived from the beauty of measure, was overloahed and denied, because that which was desired was an anti-eudaemonistic morality. The belief in the pleasure which comes of restraint has been lacking hitherto --- this
(2)
Dominating
ability
of
? pleasure of a rider on a fiery steed !
tion of weak natures was confounded with the restraint of the strong!
In short, the best things have been blasphemed because weak or immoderate swine have thrown a
The modera
? ? ? 3X0
THE WILL TO POWER.
bad light upon them--the best men have remained concealed --and have often unsurzderstood' them~ selves.
87I.
Vicious and unbridled people: their depressing influence upon the value of the passions. It was the appalling barbarity of morality which was principally responsible in the Middle Ages for
the compulsory recourse to a veritable "league of virtue "--and this was coupled with an equally appalling exaggeration of all that which consti tutes the value of, man. Militant "civilisation" (taming) is in need of all kinds of irons and tortures in order to maintain itself against terrible and beast-of-prey natures.
In this case, confusion, although it may, have the most nefarious influences, is quite natural: that which men of power and will are able to demand of themselves gives them the standard for what they may also allow themselves. Such natures
are the very opposite of the vicious and the un bridled ; although under certain circumstances they may perpetrate deeds for which an inferior man
would be convicted of vice and intemperance.
In this respect the concept, "all men are equal
God," does an extraordinary amount of harm; actions and attitudes of mind were for bidden which belonged to the prerogative of the strong alone, just as if they were in themselves unworthy of man. All the tendencies of strong men were brought into disrepute by the fact that
the defensive weapons of the most weak (even of
? before
? ? ? THE ORDER OF RANK.
311
those who were weakest towards themselves) were established as a standard of valuation.
The confusion went so far that precisely the great virtuosos of life (whose self-control presents the sharpest contrast to the vicious and the un bridled) were branded with the most opprobrious names. Even to this day people feel themselves compelled to disparage a Caesar Borgia: it is simply ludicrous. The Church has anathematised German Kaisers owing to their vices: as if a monk
or a priest had the right to say a word as to what a Frederick II. should allow himself. Don Juan is sent to hell: this is very naif. Has anybody ever noticed that all interesting men are lacking in heaven? . . . This is only a hint to the girls, as to where they may best find salvation. If one
think at all logically, and also have a profound insight into that which makes a great man, there can be no doubt at all that the Church has dis patched all "great men" to Hades--its fight is against all "greatness in man. "
872.
The rights which a man arrogates to himself are relative to the duties which he sets himself, and to the tasks which he feels capable of per
forming. The great majority of men have no right to life, and are only a misfortune to their higher fellows.
873.
The misunderstanding of egoism: on the part of ignoble natures who know nothing of the lust of
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER.
conquest and the insatiability of great love, and who likewise know nothing of the overflowing feelings of power which make a man wish to overcome things, to force them over to himself, and to lay them on his heart, the power which impels an artist to his material. It often happens also that the active spirit looks for a field for its activity. In ordinary "egoism" it is precisely the "non-ego,"
the profoundly mediocre creature, the member of the Herd, who wishes to maintain himself--and when this is perceived by the rarer, more subtle, and less mediocre natures, it revolts them. For the judgment of the latter is this: "We are the noble! It is much more important to maintain us than that cattle ! "
874.
The degeneration of the ruler and of the ruling classes has been the cause of all the great dis orders in history! Without the Roman Caesars and Roman society, Christianity would never have prevailed.
When it occurs to inferior men to doubt whether higher men exist, then the danger is great! It is then that men finally discover that there are virtues even among inferior, suppressed, and poor-spirited men, and that everybody is equal before God: which is the non plus ultra of all confounded nonsense that has ever appeared on earth! 'For in the end higher men begin to measure themselves according to the standard of virtues upheld by the slaves--and discover that
312
? ? ? ? pleasure
THE ORDER OF RANK.
313
they are "proud," etc. , and that all their higher qualities should be condemned.
things, to see many things falsely, to fancy many things: Oh, how clever man has been in those circumstances in which he believed he was anything but clever! Love, enthusiasm, " God "--are but subtle forms of ultimate self-deception; they are but seductions to life and to the belief in life! In those moments when man was deceived, when he had befooled
himself and when he believed in life: Oh, how his spirit swelled within him! Oh, what ecstasies he had! What power he felt! And what artistic triumphs in the feeling of power! . . . Man had once more become master of " matter,"--master of truth! . . . And whenever man rejoices it is always in the same way: he rejoices as an artist, his power
is his joy, he enjoys falsehood as his power. . . .
II.
Art and nothing else! Art is the great means of making life possible, the great seducer to life, the great stimulus of life.
Art is the only superior counteragent to all will to the denial of life; it is par excellence the anti Christian, the anti-Buddhistic, the anti-Nihilistic force.
_
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER IN ART.
Art is the alleviation of the seeker after know ledge,--of him who recognises the terrible and questionable character Of existence, and who will recognise it,--of the tragic seeker after know ledge.
Art is the alleviation of the man of action,--of him who not only sees the terrible and questionable character of existence, but also lives will live --of the tragic and warlike man, the hero.
Art the alleviation of the sgfferer,--as the way to states in which pain willed, trans figured, deified, where suffering form of great ecstasy.
III.
It clear that in this book pessimism, or, better still, Nihilism, stands for " truth. " But truth not postulated as the highest measure of value, and still less as the highest power. The will to to illusion, to deception, to becoming,
appearance,
and to change (to objective deception), here re
garded as more profound, as more primeval, as more metaphysical than the will to truth, to reality, toappearance: the latter merely form of the will to illusion. Happiness likewise conceived as more primeval than pain and pain considered as conditioned, as consequence Of the will to happiness (of the will to Becoming, to growth, to forming, i. e. to creating; in creating, however, de struction included). The highest state of Yea saying to existence conceived as one from which
the greatest pain may not be excluded the tragico Dionysian state.
291
? ? ? :
isa
is it, a
is
a
is
is
is
is
:
is
is
is
is
it,
is
is
? 292
THE WILL TO POWER.
IV.
In this way this book is even anti-pessimistic, namely, in the sense that it teaches something which is stronger than pessimism and which is more " divine " than truth: Art. Nobody, it would seem, would be more ready seriously to utter a radical denial of life, an actual denial of action even more
than a denial of life, than the author of this book. Except that he knows--for he has experienced and perhaps experienced little else l--that art of more value than truth. ,
Even in the preface, in which Richard Wagner is, as were, invited to join with him in conversa tion, the author expresses this article of faith, this gospel for artists: " Art the only task of life, art
the metaphysical activity of life. .
? ? ? is
it
. . "
is
is
it,
? ? FOURTH BOOK. DISCIPLINE AND BREEDING.
? ? ? THE ORDER OF RANK.
I. THE DOCTRINE or THE ORDER OF RANK.
854.
IN this age of universal suffrage, in which every body allowed to sit in judgment upon everything and everybody, feel compelled to re-establish the order of rank.
855.
Quanta of power alone determine rank and dis tinguish rank: nothing else does.
856.
The will to power. ---How must those men be constituted who would undertake this transvalua tion? The order of rank as the order of power: war and danger are the prerequisites which allow of rank maintaining its conditions. The pro digious example: man in Nature--the weakest and shrewdest creature making himself master, and
putting yoke upon all less intelligent forces. 395
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THE WILL To POWER.
857.
I distinguish between the type which represents ascending life and that which represents. decay, decomposition and weakness. Ought one to suppose that the question of rank between these two types can be at all doubtful? . .
858.
The modicum of power which you represent decides your rank; all the rest is cowardice.
859.
The advantages Of standing detached from one's age--Detached from the two movements, that of individualism and that of collectivist morality; for even the first does not recognise the order of rank, and would give one individual the same freedom as another. My thoughts are not concerned with the degree of freedom which should be granted to the one or to the other or to all, but with the degree of power which the one or the other should exercise over his neighbour or over all ;_ and more especially with the question to what extent a sacrifice of freedom, or even enslavement, may afford the basis for the cultivation of a superior type. In plain words: how could one sacrifice the
development of mankind in order to assist a higher species than man to come into being.
? ? ? ? THE ORDER OF RANK.
297
860.
Concerning rank--The terrible consequences of " equality "---in the end everybody thinks he has the right to every problem. All order of rank has vanished.
861.
It is necessary for higher men to declare war upon the masses! In all directions mediocre people are joining hands in order to make them selves masters. Everything that pampers, that softens, and that brings the " people " or " woman " to the front, operates in favour of universal suffrage --that is to say, the dominion of inferior men. But we must make reprisals, and draw the whole state? of affairs (which commenced in Europe with Christianity) to the light of day and to judgment.
862.
A teaching is needed which is strong enough
to work in a disciplinary manner; it should . operate in such a way as to strengthen the strong and to paralyse and smash up the world-weary.
The annihilation of declining races. The decay of Europe. The annihilation of slave tainted valuations. The dominion of the world as a means to the rearing of a higher type. The annihilation of the humbug which is called morality (Christianity as a hysterical kind of honesty in this regard: Augustine, Bunyan)
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER.
The annihilation of universal suffrage--that is to say, that system by means of which the lowest natures prescribe themselves as a law for
_ higher natures. The annihilation of mediocrity and its prevalence. (The one-sided, the indivi duals--peoples; constitutional plenitude should be aimed at by means of the coupling of opposites ; to this end race-combinations should be tried. ) The new kind of courage--no a priori truths (those who were accustomed to believe in some thing sought such truths but free submission to a ruling thought, which has its time; for instance, time conceived as the quality of space, etc.
2. THE STRONG AND THE WEAK.
863.
The notion, " strong and weak man," resolves itself into this, that in the first place much strength inherited--the man total sum in the other, not yet enough (inadequate inheritance, subdivision of the inherited qualities). Weakness may be
starting phenomenon: not yet enough; or final phenomenon: " no more. "
298
? The determining point
strength present, or where
strength can be discharged.
sum-total of the weak, reacts slowly; defends itself against much for which too weak,-- against that for which has no use; never creates, never takes step forward. This
there where great great amount of
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opposed to the theory which denies the strong individual and would maintain that the " masses do everything. " The difference is similar to that which obtains between
separated generations: four or even five generations may lie between the masses and him who is the moving spirit--it is a
difference.
The value: of the weak are in the van, because
the strong have adopted them in order to lead with them.
864.
Why the weak triumph--On the whole, the sick and the weak have more sympathy and are more " humane ": the sick and the weak have more intellect, and are more changeable, more variegated,
more entertaining--more malicious ; the sick alone invented malice. (A morbid precocity is often to be observed among rickety, scrofulitic, and tuberculous people. ) Esprit: the property of older races ; Jews, Frenchmen, Chinese. (The anti-Semites do not forgive the Jews for having both intellect-- and money. Anti-Semites--another name for " bungled and botched")
The sick and the weak have always had fascina tion on their side; they are more interesting than the healthy: the fool and the saint--the two most interesting kinds of men. . . . Closely related thereto is the " genius. " The " great adventurers and criminals " and all great men, the most healthy in particular, have always been sick at certain periods of their lives--great disturbances of the
chronological
? ? ? ? 300
THE WILL TO POWER.
emotions, the passion for power, love, revenge, are all accompanied by very profound perturbations. And, as for decadence, every man who does not die prematurely manifests it in almost every respect--he therefore knows from experience the instincts which belong to it: for half his life nearly every man is decadent.
And finally, woman! One-half of mankind is weak, chronically sick, changeable, shifty--woman requires strength in order to cleave to it; she also requires a religion of the weak which glorifies weakness, love, and modesty as divine: or, better still, she makes the strong weak--she rules when she succeeds in overcoming the strong. Woman has always conspired with decadent types,--the priests, for instance,--against the" mighty," against the "strong," against men. Women avail them selves of children for the cult of piety, pity, and love :--the mother stands as the symbol of con vincing altruism.
Finally, the increase of civilisation with its necessary correlatives, the increase of morbid elements, of the neurotic and psychiatric and of the criminal. A sort of intermediary species arises, the artist. He is distinct from those who are
as the result of weak wills and of the fear of society, although they may not yet be ripe for the asylum; but he has antenna: which grope inquisitively into both spheres: this specific plant _of culture, the modern artist, painter, musician, and, above all, novelist, who designates his particular kind of attitude with the very indefinite word "naturalism. " . . . Lunatics, criminals, and
? criminals
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THE ORDER OF RANK.
3OI
realists' are on the increase: this the sign of growing culture plunging forward at headlong speed--that to say, its excrement, its refuse, the
rubbish that shot from
to acquire more importance,--the movement keeps pace with the advance.
Finally, the social mishmash, which the result of revolution, of the establishment of equal rights, and of the superstition, the "equality Of men. " Thus the possessors of the instincts of decline (of resentment, of discontent, of the lust of destruction,
of anarchy and Nihilism), as also the instincts of slavery, of cowardice, of craftiness, and of rascality, which are inherent among those classes of society which have long been suppressed, are beginning to get infused into the blood of all ranks. Two or three generations later, the race can no longer be
every day, beginning retrogressive
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has become mob. And thus ,there results collective instinct against selection, against every kind of privilege; and this instinct operates with such power, certainty, hardness, and cruelty that, as matter of fact, in the end, even the privileged classes have to submit: all those who still wish to hold on to power flatter the mob, work with the mob, and must have the mob on their side--the " geniuses "
above all. The latter become the heralds of those feelings with which the mob can be inspired,---the
of pity, of honour, even for all that suffers, all that low and despised, and has lived
" *Tbe " German word "Naturalist," and really means realist bad sense--TR.
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under persecution, becomes predominant (types: Victor Hugo, Richard Wagner). --The rise of the mob signifies once more the rise of old values.
In the case of such an extreme movement, both in tempo and in means, as characterises our civil isation, man's ballast is shifted. Those men whose worth is greatest, and whose mission, as it were, is to compensate for the very great danger of such a morbid movement,-such men become dawdlers
par excellence ; they are slow to accept anything, and are tenacious ; they are creatures that are relatively lasting in the midst of this vast mingling and changing of elements. In such circumstances power is necessarily relegated to the mediocre: mediocrity, as the trustee and bearer of the future, consolidates itself against the rule of the mob and of eccentricities (both of which are, in most cases,
In this way a new antagonist is evolved for exceptional men--0r in certain cases a new temptation.
Provided that they do not adapt themselves to the mob, and stand up for what satisfies the instincts of the disinherited, they will find it necessary to be "mediocre" and sound. They know: mediocritas is also aurea,--it alone
has command of money and gold (of all that glitters . . . And, once more, old virtue and the whole superannuated world of ideals in general secures gifted host of special-pleaders. . . Result: mediocrity acquires intellect, wit, and genius,--it becomes entertaining, and even seductive.
Result--A high culture can only stand upon broad basis, upon strongly and soundly consoli
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303
dated mediocrity. In its service and assisted by science and even art do their work. Science could not wish for better state of affairs: in its middle-class type of man,-- out of place,--there not
essence belongs to
among exceptions
anything aristocratic
anarchic in its instincts--The power of the middle classes then upheld by means of commerce, but, above all, by means of money-dealing: the instinct of great financiers opposed to everything extreme --on this account the Jews are, for the present, the most conservative power in the threatening and insecure conditions of modern Europe. They can have no use either for revolutions, for social ism, or for militarism: they would have power, and they should need even over the revolu tionary party, this only the result of what have already said, and in no way contradicts it. Against other extreme movements they may occasionally require to excite terror--by showing how much power in their hands. But their instinct itself inveterately conservative and " mediocre. " . . Wherever power exists, they know how to become mighty but the application
of their power always takes the same direction. The polite term for mediocre, as well known,
the word "Liberal. "
and still less anything
? all nonsense to suppose that this general conquest of values anti-biological.
In order to explain we ought to try and show that the result of certain interest of life to maintain the type "man," even by means of this
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THE WILL TO POWER.
method which leads to the prevalence Of the weak and the physiologically botched--if things were otherwise, might man not cease to exist? Problem. . .
The enhancement of the type may prove fatal to the maintenance of the species. Why ? --The experience of history shows that strong races a'ecimate each other mutually, by means of war, lust for power, and venturousness; the strong emotions; wastefulness (strength is no longer capitalised, disturbed mental systems arise from excessive tension); their existence is a costly affair--in short, they persistently give rise to friction between themselves; periods of profound slackners and torpidity intervene: all great ages have to be paidfar. . . . The strong are, after all, weaker, less wilful, and more absurd than the average weak ones.
They are squandering' races. " Permanence," in itself, can have no value: that which ought to be preferred thereto would be a shorter life for the species, but a life richer in creations. It would remain to be proved that, even as things are, a richer sum of creations is attained than in the case of the shorter existence; i. e. that man, as a
storehouse of power, attains to a much higher
? of dominion over things under the con ditions which have existed hitherto. . . . We are here face to face with a problem of economics.
865.
The state of mind which calls itself "idealism," and which will neither allow mediocrity to be
degree
? ? ? THE ORDER OF RANK.
305
mediocre nor woman to be woman! Do not make everything uniform! We should have clear idea of how dearly we have to pay for the establishment of a virtue; and that virtue nothing generally desirable, but noble piece madness, beautiful exception, which gives us the privilege of feeling elated.
866.
It necessary to show that a counter-movement inevitably associated with any increasingly economical consumption of men and mankind, and
with an ever more closely involved " machinery " of interests and services. call this counter movement the separation of the luxurious surplus of mankind: by means of a stronger kind, higher type, must come to light, which has other conditions for its origin and for its maintenance than the average man. My concept, my metaphor for this type as you know, the word "Superman. " Along the first road, which can now be completely
arose adaptation, stultification, higher Chinese culture, modesty in the instincts, and satisfaction at the sight of the belittlement of man--a kind of stationary level of mankind. If ever we get that inevitable and imminent, general control of the economy of the earth, then man~ kind can be used as machinery and find its best purpose in the service of this economy--as an enormous piece of clock-work consisting of ever smaller and ever more subtly adapted wheels; then all the dominating and commanding elements
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will become ever more superfluous; and the whole gains enormous energy, while the individual factors which compose it represent but small modicums of strength and of value. To oppose this dwarfing and adaptation of man to a special ised kind of utility, a reverse movement is needed ---the procreation of the synthetic man who em bodies everything and justifies it; that man for whom the turning of mankind into a machine is a first condition of existence, for whom the rest of mankind is but soil on which he can devise his higher mode of existence.
He is in_need of the opposition of the masses, of those who are "levelled down"; he requires that feeling of distance from them; he stands upon them, he lives on them. This higher form of aristocracy is the form of the future. From the moral point of view, the collective machinery above described, that solidarity of all wheels,
represents the most extreme example in the exploitation of mankind: but it presupposes the existence of those for whom such an exploitation would have some meaning. "i OtherWise it would signify, as a matter of fact, merely the general depreciation of the type man,--a retrograde
phenomenon on a grand scale.
Readers are beginning to see what I am
combating--namely, economic optimism: as if
*This sentence for ever distinguishes Nietzsche's aristoc racy from our present plutocratic and industrial one, for which, at the present moment at any rate, it would be difficult to discover some meaning--TR.
306
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peoples,
THE ORDER OF RANK.
307
the general welfare of everybody must necessarily increase with the growing self-sacrifice Of every body. The very reverse seems to me to be the case, the self-sacrifice of everybody amounts to a collective loss; man becomes inferior-50 that nobody knows what end this monstrous purpose has served. A wherefore? new wherefore ? -- this what mankind requires.
867
The recognition of the increase of collective
we should calculate to what extent the ruin of individuals, of castes, of ages, and of
power:
? included in this general increase.
The transposition of the ballast of culture.
The cost of every vast growth: who bears it? Why must be enormous at the present time
868.
General aspect of the future European: the latter regarded as the most intelligent servile animal, very industrious, at bottom very modest, inquisitive to excess, multifarious, pampered, weak of will,--a chaos of cosmopolitan pas sions and intelligences. How would be
for stronger race to be bred from him ? --Such race as would have classical taste? The classical taste: this the will to simplicity, to accentuation, and to happiness made visible, the will to the terrible, and the courage for psychological nakedness (simplification the
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308
THE WILL 'ro POWER.
outcome of the will to accentuate; allowing
as well as nakedness to become visible is a consequence of the will to the terrible . .
In order to fight one's way out of that chaos, and up to this form, a certain disciplinary constraint is necessary: a man should have to choose between either going to the dogs or prevailing. A ruling race can only arise amid terrible and violent conditions. Problem: where are the barbarians of the twentieth century? Obviously they will only show themselves and consolidate themselves after enormous socialistic crises. They will con sist of those elements which are capable of the
greatest hardness towards themselves, and which can guarantee the most enduring will-power.
869.
The mightiest and most dangerous passions of man, by means of which he most easily goes to rack and ruin, have been so fundamentally banned that mighty men themselves have either become impossible or else must regard themselves as evil, " harmful and prohibited. " The losses are heavy, but up to the present they have been necessary. Now, however, that a whole host of counter-forces has been reared, by means of the temporary suppression of these passions (the passion for dominion, the love of change and deception), their liberation has once more become possible: they will no longer possess their old savagery. We can now allow ourselves this tame sort of bar barism : look at our artists and our statesmen!
happiness
? ? ? ? THE ORDER OF RANK.
309
870.
The root of all evil that the slave morality of modesty, chastity, selflessness, and absolute
obedience should have triumphed.
natures were thus condemned (I) to hypocrisy,
to qualms of conscience,---creative natures regarded themselves as rebels against God, un certain and hemmed in by eternal values.
The barbarians showed that the
keeping within the bounds qf maderation was not in the scope of their powers: they feared and slandered the passions and instincts of nature-- likewise the aspect of the ruling Cmsars and castes. On the other hand, there arose the sus picion that all restraint is a form of weakness or of incipient old age and fatigue (thus La Rochefou cauld suspects that " virtue " is only a euphemism in the mouths of those to whom vice no longer affords any pleasure). The capacity for restraint was represented as a matter of hardness, self control, asceticism, as a fight with the devil, etc.
etc. The natural delight of aesthetic natures, in measure; the pleasure derived from the beauty of measure, was overloahed and denied, because that which was desired was an anti-eudaemonistic morality. The belief in the pleasure which comes of restraint has been lacking hitherto --- this
(2)
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ability
of
? pleasure of a rider on a fiery steed !
tion of weak natures was confounded with the restraint of the strong!
In short, the best things have been blasphemed because weak or immoderate swine have thrown a
The modera
? ? ? 3X0
THE WILL TO POWER.
bad light upon them--the best men have remained concealed --and have often unsurzderstood' them~ selves.
87I.
Vicious and unbridled people: their depressing influence upon the value of the passions. It was the appalling barbarity of morality which was principally responsible in the Middle Ages for
the compulsory recourse to a veritable "league of virtue "--and this was coupled with an equally appalling exaggeration of all that which consti tutes the value of, man. Militant "civilisation" (taming) is in need of all kinds of irons and tortures in order to maintain itself against terrible and beast-of-prey natures.
In this case, confusion, although it may, have the most nefarious influences, is quite natural: that which men of power and will are able to demand of themselves gives them the standard for what they may also allow themselves. Such natures
are the very opposite of the vicious and the un bridled ; although under certain circumstances they may perpetrate deeds for which an inferior man
would be convicted of vice and intemperance.
In this respect the concept, "all men are equal
God," does an extraordinary amount of harm; actions and attitudes of mind were for bidden which belonged to the prerogative of the strong alone, just as if they were in themselves unworthy of man. All the tendencies of strong men were brought into disrepute by the fact that
the defensive weapons of the most weak (even of
? before
? ? ? THE ORDER OF RANK.
311
those who were weakest towards themselves) were established as a standard of valuation.
The confusion went so far that precisely the great virtuosos of life (whose self-control presents the sharpest contrast to the vicious and the un bridled) were branded with the most opprobrious names. Even to this day people feel themselves compelled to disparage a Caesar Borgia: it is simply ludicrous. The Church has anathematised German Kaisers owing to their vices: as if a monk
or a priest had the right to say a word as to what a Frederick II. should allow himself. Don Juan is sent to hell: this is very naif. Has anybody ever noticed that all interesting men are lacking in heaven? . . . This is only a hint to the girls, as to where they may best find salvation. If one
think at all logically, and also have a profound insight into that which makes a great man, there can be no doubt at all that the Church has dis patched all "great men" to Hades--its fight is against all "greatness in man. "
872.
The rights which a man arrogates to himself are relative to the duties which he sets himself, and to the tasks which he feels capable of per
forming. The great majority of men have no right to life, and are only a misfortune to their higher fellows.
873.
The misunderstanding of egoism: on the part of ignoble natures who know nothing of the lust of
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER.
conquest and the insatiability of great love, and who likewise know nothing of the overflowing feelings of power which make a man wish to overcome things, to force them over to himself, and to lay them on his heart, the power which impels an artist to his material. It often happens also that the active spirit looks for a field for its activity. In ordinary "egoism" it is precisely the "non-ego,"
the profoundly mediocre creature, the member of the Herd, who wishes to maintain himself--and when this is perceived by the rarer, more subtle, and less mediocre natures, it revolts them. For the judgment of the latter is this: "We are the noble! It is much more important to maintain us than that cattle ! "
874.
The degeneration of the ruler and of the ruling classes has been the cause of all the great dis orders in history! Without the Roman Caesars and Roman society, Christianity would never have prevailed.
When it occurs to inferior men to doubt whether higher men exist, then the danger is great! It is then that men finally discover that there are virtues even among inferior, suppressed, and poor-spirited men, and that everybody is equal before God: which is the non plus ultra of all confounded nonsense that has ever appeared on earth! 'For in the end higher men begin to measure themselves according to the standard of virtues upheld by the slaves--and discover that
312
? ? ? ? pleasure
THE ORDER OF RANK.
313
they are "proud," etc. , and that all their higher qualities should be condemned.
