{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_37841/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_37841","id":"gutenberg_37841","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/37841","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Human beings"],"text":"Friedrich Nietzsche\n\n                                  Human\n\n                              All-Too-Human\n\n                         A Book For Free Spirits\n\n                                 Part II\n\n                              Translated By\n\n                            Paul V. Cohn, B.A.\n\n                                 New York\n\n                          The MacMillan Company\n\n                                   1913\n\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\nTranslator\u2019s Introduction.\nPreface.\nPart I. Miscellaneous Maxims And Opinions.\nPart II. The Wanderer And His Shadow.\nFootnotes\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTRANSLATOR\u2019S INTRODUCTION.\n\n\nThe publication of _Human, all-too-Human_ extends over the period\n1878-1880. Of the two divisions which constitute the Second Part,\n\u201cMiscellaneous Maxims and Opinions\u201d appeared in 1879, and \u201cThe Wanderer\nand his Shadow\u201d in 1880, Nietzsche being then in his thirty-sixth year.\nThe Preface was added in 1886. The whole book forms Nietzsche\u2019s first\nlengthy contribution to literature. His previous works comprise only the\nphilological treatises, _The Birth of Tragedy_, and the essays on Strauss,\nSchopenhauer, and Wagner in _Thoughts out of Season_.\n\nWith the volumes of _Human, all-too-Human_ Nietzsche appears for the first\ntime in his true colours as philosopher. His purely scholarly\npublications, his essays in literary and musical criticism\u2014especially the\nessay on Richard Wagner at Bayreuth\u2014had, of course, foreshadowed his work\nas a thinker.\n\nThese efforts, however, had been mere fragments, from which hardly any one\ncould observe that a new philosophical star had arisen on the horizon. But\nby 1878 the period of transition had definitely set in. Outwardly, the new\ndeparture is marked by Nietzsche\u2019s resignation in that year of his\nprofessorship at B\u00e2le\u2014a resignation due partly to ill-health, and partly\nto his conviction that his was a voice that should speak not merely to\nstudents of philology, but to all mankind.\n\nNietzsche himself characterises _Human, all-too-Human_ as \u201cthe monument of\na crisis.\u201d He might as fitly have called it the first-fruits of a new\nharvest. Now, for the first time, he practises the form which he was to\nmake so peculiarly his own. We are told\u2014and we may well believe\u2014that the\nbook came as a surprise even to his most intimate friends. Wagner had\nalready seen how matters stood at the publication of the first part, and\nthe gulf between the two probably widened on the appearance of the Second\nPart.\n\nSeveral aphorisms are here, varying in length as in subject, and ranging\nover the whole human province\u2014the emotions and aspirations, the religions\nand cultures and philosophies, the arts and literatures and politics of\nmankind. Equally varied is the range of style, the incisive epigram and\nthe passage of pure poetry jostling each other on the same page. In this\ncurious power of alternating between cynicism and lyricism, Nietzsche\nappears as the prose counterpart of Heine.\n\nOne or two of the aphorisms are of peculiar interest to English readers.\nThe essay (as it may almost be called) on Sterne (p. 60, No. 113) does\nample justice, if not more than justice, to that wayward genius. The\nallusion to Milton (p. 77, No. 150) will come as somewhat of a shock to\nEnglish readers, especially to those who hold that in Milton Art triumphed\nover Puritanism. It should be remembered, however, that Nietzsche\u2019s view\ncoincides with Goethe\u2019s. The dictum that Shakespeare\u2019s gold is to be\nvalued for its quantity rather than its quality (p. 81, No. 162) also\nbetrays a certain exclusiveness\u2014a legacy from that eighteenth-century\nFrance which appealed so strongly to Nietzsche on its intellectual side.\nTo Nietzsche, as to Voltaire, Shakespeare is after all \u201cthe great\nbarbarian.\u201d\n\nThe title of the book may be explained from a phrase in _Thus Spake\nZarathustra_: \u201cVerily, even the greatest I found\u2014all-too-human.\u201d The\nkeynote of these volumes is indeed disillusion and destruction. Nor is\nthis to be wondered at, for all men must sweep away the rubbish before\nthey can build. Hence we find here little of the constructive philosophy\nof Nietzsche\u2014so far as he had a constructive philosophy. The Superman\nappears but faintly, the doctrine of Eternal Recurrence not at all. For\nthis very reason, _Human, all-too-Human_ is perhaps the best\nstarting-point for the study of Nietzsche. The difficulties in style and\nthought of the later work\u2014difficulties that at times become well-nigh\ninsuperable in _Thus Spake Zarathustra_\u2014are here practically absent. The\nbook may, in fact, almost be described as \u201cpopular,\u201d bearing the same\nrelation to Nietzsche\u2019s later productions as Wagner\u2019s _Tannh\u00e4user_ and\n_Lohengrin_ bear to the _Ring_.\n\nThe translator\u2019s thanks are due to Mr. Thomas Common for his careful\nrevision of the manuscript and many valuable suggestions.\n\nP. V. C.\n\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE.\n\n\n\n\n1.\n\n\nOne should only speak where one cannot remain silent, and only speak of\nwhat one has _conquered_\u2014the rest is all chatter, \u201cliterature,\u201d bad\nbreeding. My writings speak only of my conquests, \u201cI\u201d am in them, with all\nthat is hostile to me, _ego ipsissimus_, or, if a more haughty expression\nbe permitted, _ego ipsissimum_. It may be guessed that I have many below\nme.... But first I always needed time, convalescence, distance,\nseparation, before I felt the stirrings of a desire to flay, despoil, lay\nbare, \u201crepresent\u201d (or whatever one likes to call it) for the additional\nknowledge of the world, something that I had lived through and outlived,\nsomething done or suffered. Hence all my writings,\u2014with one exception,\nimportant, it is true,\u2014must be _ante-dated_\u2014they always tell of a\n\u201cbehind-me.\u201d Some even, like the first three _Thoughts out of Season_,\nmust be thrown back before the period of creation and experience of a\npreviously published book (_The Birth of Tragedy_ in the case cited, as\nany one with subtle powers of observation and comparison could not fail to\nperceive). That wrathful outburst against the Germanism, smugness, and\nraggedness of speech of old David Strauss, the contents of the first\n_Thought out of Season_, gave a vent to feelings that had inspired me long\nbefore, as a student, in the midst of German culture and cultured\nPhilistinism (I claim the paternity of the now much used and misused\nphrase \u201ccultured Philistinism\u201d). What I said against the \u201chistorical\ndisease\u201d I said as one who had slowly and laboriously recovered from that\ndisease, and who was not at all disposed to renounce \u201chistory\u201d in the\nfuture because he had suffered from her in the past. When in the third\n_Thought out of Season_ I gave expression to my reverence for my first and\nonly teacher, the _great_ Arthur Schopenhauer\u2014I should now give it a far\nmore personal and emphatic voice\u2014I was for my part already in the throes\nof moral scepticism and dissolution, that is, as much concerned with the\ncriticism as with the study of all pessimism down to the present day. I\nalready did not believe in \u201ca blessed thing,\u201d as the people say, not even\nin Schopenhauer. It was at this very period that an unpublished essay of\nmine, \u201cOn Truth and Falsehood in an Extra-Moral Sense,\u201d came into being.\nEven my ceremonial oration in honour of Richard Wagner, on the occasion of\nhis triumphal celebration at Bayreuth in 1876\u2014Bayreuth signifies the\ngreatest triumph that an artist has ever won\u2014a work that bears the\nstrongest stamp of \u201cindividuality,\u201d was in the background an act of homage\nand gratitude to a bit of the past in me, to the fairest but most perilous\ncalm of my sea-voyage ... and as a matter of fact a severance and a\nfarewell. (Was Richard Wagner mistaken on this point? I do not think so.\nSo long as we still love, we do not paint such pictures, we do not yet\n\u201cexamine,\u201d we do not place ourselves so far away as is essential for one\nwho \u201cexamines.\u201d \u201cExamining needs at least a secret antagonism, that of an\nopposite point of view,\u201d it is said on page 46 of the above-named work\nitself, with an insidious, melancholy application that was perhaps\nunderstood by few.) The composure that gave me the _power_ to speak after\nmany intervening years of solitude and abstinence, first came with the\nbook, _Human, All-too Human_, to which this second preface and apologia(1)\nis dedicated. As a book for \u201cfree spirits\u201d it shows some trace of that\nalmost cheerful and inquisitive coldness of the psychologist, who has\n_behind_ him many painful things that he keeps _under_ him, and moreover\nestablishes them for himself and fixes them firmly as with a needle-point.\nIs it to be wondered at that at such sharp, ticklish work blood flows now\nand again, that indeed the psychologist has blood on his fingers and not\n_only_ on his fingers?\n\n\n\n\n2.\n\n\nThe _Miscellaneous Maxims and Opinions_ were in the first place, like _The\nWanderer and His Shadow_, published separately as continuations and\nappendices to the above-mentioned human, all-too human _Book for Free\nSpirits_: and at the same time, as a continuation and confirmation of an\nintellectual cure, consisting in a course of anti-romantic self-treatment,\nsuch as my instinct, which had always remained healthy, had itself\ndiscovered and prescribed against a temporary attack of the most dangerous\nform of romantics. After a convalescence of six years I may well be\npermitted to collect these same writings and publish them as a second\nvolume of _Human, All-too Human_. Perhaps, if surveyed together, they will\nmore clearly and effectively teach their lesson\u2014a lesson of health that\nmay be recommended as a _disciplina voluntatis_ to the more intellectual\nnatures of the rising generation. Here speaks a pessimist who has often\nleaped out of his skin but has always returned into it, thus, a pessimist\nwith goodwill towards pessimism\u2014at all events a romanticist no longer. And\nhas not a pessimist, who possesses this serpentine knack of changing his\nskin, the right to read a lecture to our pessimists of to-day, who are one\nand all still in the toils of romanticism? Or at least to show them how it\nis\u2014done?\n\n\n\n\n3.\n\n\nIt was then, in fact, high time to bid farewell, and I soon received\nproof. Richard Wagner, who seemed all-conquering, but was in reality only\na decayed and despairing romantic, suddenly collapsed, helpless and\nbroken, before the Christian Cross.... Was there not a single German with\neyes in his head and sympathy in his heart for this appalling spectacle?\nWas I the only one whom he caused\u2014suffering? In any case, the unexpected\nevent illumined for me in one lightning flash the place that I had\nabandoned, and also the horror that is felt by every one who is\nunconscious of a great danger until he has passed through it. As I went\nforward alone, I shuddered, and not long afterwards I was ill, or rather\nmore than ill\u2014weary: weary from my ceaseless disappointment about all that\nremained to make us modern men enthusiastic, at the thought of the power,\nwork, hope, youth, love, flung to all the winds: weary from disgust at the\neffeminacy and undisciplined rhapsody of this romanticism, at the whole\ntissue of idealistic lies and softening of conscience, which here again\nhad won the day over one of the bravest of men: last, and not least, weary\nfrom the bitterness of an inexorable suspicion\u2014that after this\ndisappointment I was doomed to mistrust more thoroughly, to despise more\nthoroughly, to be alone more thoroughly than ever before. My task\u2014whither\nhad it flown? Did it not look now as if my task were retreating from me\nand as if I should for a long future period have no more right to it? What\nwas I to do to endure this most terrible privation?\u2014I began by entirely\nforbidding myself all romantic music, that ambiguous, pompous, stifling\nart, which robs the mind of its sternness and its joyousness and provides\na fertile soil for every kind of vague yearning and spongy sensuality.\n\u201cCave musicam\u201d is even to-day my advice to all who are enough of men to\ncling to purity in matters of the intellect. Such music enervates,\nsoftens, feminises, its \u201ceternal feminine\u201d draws us\u2014_down_!(2) My first\nsuspicion, my most immediate precaution, was directed against romantic\nmusic. If I hoped for anything at all from music, it was in the\nexpectation of the coming of a musician bold, subtle, malignant, southern,\nhealthy enough to take an immortal revenge upon that other music.\n\n\n\n\n4.\n\n\nLonely now and miserably self-distrustful, I took sides, not without\nresentment, _against_ myself and _for_ everything that hurt me and was\nhard to me. Thus I once more found the way to that courageous pessimism\nthat is the antithesis of all romantic fraud, and, as it seems to me\nto-day, the way to \u201cmyself,\u201d to my task. That hidden masterful Something,\nfor which we long have no name until at last it shows itself as our\ntask\u2014that tyrant in us exacts a terrible price for every attempt that we\nmake to escape him or give him the slip, for every premature act of\nself-constraint, for every reconciliation with those to whom we do not\nbelong, for every activity, however reputable, which turns us aside from\nour main purpose, yes, even for every virtue that would fain protect us\nfrom the cruelty of our most individual responsibility. \u201cDisease\u201d is\nalways the answer when we wish to have doubts of our rights to our own\ntask, when we begin to make it easier for ourselves in any way. How\nstrange and how terrible! It is our very alleviations for which we have to\nmake the severest atonement! And if we want to return to health, we have\nno choice left\u2014we must load ourselves _more heavily_ than we were ever\nladen before.\n\n\n\n\n5.\n\n\nIt was then that I learnt the hermitical habit of speech acquired only by\nthe most silent and suffering. I spoke without witnesses, or rather\nindifferent to the presence of witnesses, so as not to suffer from\nsilence, I spoke of various things that did not concern me in a style that\ngave the impression that they did. Then, too, I learnt the art of showing\nmyself cheerful, objective, inquisitive in the presence of all that is\nhealthy and evil\u2014is this, in an invalid, as it seems to me, his \u201cgood\ntaste\u201d? Nevertheless, a more subtle eye and sympathy will not miss what\nperhaps gives a charm to these writings\u2014the fact that here speaks one who\nhas suffered and abstained in such a way as if he had never suffered or\nabstained. Here equipoise, composure, even gratitude towards life _shall_\nbe maintained, here rules a stern, proud, ever vigilant, ever susceptible\nwill, which has undertaken the task of defending life against pain and\nsnapping off all conclusions that are wont to grow like poisonous fungi\nfrom pain, disappointment, satiety, isolation and other morasses. Perhaps\nthis gives our pessimists a hint to self-examination? For it was then that\nI hit upon the aphorism, \u201ca sufferer has as yet no right to pessimism,\u201d\nand that I engaged in a tedious, patient campaign against the unscientific\nfirst principles of all romantic pessimism, which seeks to magnify and\ninterpret individual, personal experiences into \u201cgeneral judgments,\u201d\nuniversal condemnations\u2014it was then, in short, that I sighted a new world.\nOptimism for the sake of restitution, in order at some time to have the\nright to become a pessimist\u2014do you understand that? Just as a physician\ntransfers his patient to totally strange surroundings, in order to\ndisplace him from his entire \u201cpast,\u201d his troubles, friends, letters,\nduties, stupid mistakes and painful memories, and teaches him to stretch\nout hands and senses towards new nourishment, a new sun, a new future: so\nI, as physician and invalid in one, forced myself into an utterly\ndifferent and untried zone of the soul, and particularly into an absorbing\njourney to a strange land, a strange atmosphere, into a curiosity for all\nthat was strange. A long process of roaming, seeking, changing followed, a\ndistaste for fixity of any kind\u2014a dislike for clumsy affirmation and\nnegation: and at the same time a dietary and discipline which aimed at\nmaking it as easy as possible for the soul to fly high, and above all\nconstantly to fly away. In fact a minimum of life, an unfettering from all\ncoarser forms of sensuality, an independence in the midst of all marks of\noutward disfavour, together with the pride in being able to live in the\nmidst of all this disfavour: a little cynicism perhaps, a little of the\n\u201ctub of Diogenes,\u201d a good deal of whimsical happiness, whimsical gaiety,\nmuch calm, light, subtle folly, hidden enthusiasm\u2014all this produced in the\nend a great spiritual strengthening, a growing joy and exuberance of\nhealth. Life itself rewards us for our tenacious will to life, for such a\nlong war as I waged against the pessimistic weariness of life, even for\nevery observant glance of our gratitude, glances that do not miss the\nsmallest, most delicate, most fugitive gifts.... In the end we receive\nLife\u2019s great gifts, perhaps the greatest it can bestow\u2014we regain _our_\ntask.\n\n\n\n\n6.\n\n\nShould my experience\u2014the history of an illness and a convalescence, for it\nresulted in a convalescence\u2014be only my personal experience? and merely\njust my \u201cHuman, All-too-human\u201d? To-day I would fain believe the reverse,\nfor I am becoming more and more confident that my books of travel were not\npenned for my sole benefit, as appeared for a time to be the case. May I,\nafter six years of growing assurance, send them once more on a journey for\nan experiment?\u2014May I commend them particularly to the ears and hearts of\nthose who are afflicted with some sort of a \u201cpast,\u201d and have enough\nintellect left to suffer even intellectually from their past? But above\nall would I commend them to you whose burden is heaviest, you choice\nspirits, most encompassed with perils, most intellectual, most courageous,\nwho must be the _conscience_ of the modern soul and as such be versed in\nits _science_:(3) in whom is concentrated all of disease, poison or danger\nthat can exist to-day: whose lot decrees that you must be more sick than\nany individual because you are not \u201cmere individuals\u201d: whose consolation\nit is to know and, ah! to walk the path to a new health, a health of\nto-morrow and the day after: you men of destiny, triumphant, conquerors of\ntime, the healthiest and the strongest, you _good Europeans_!\n\n\n\n\n7.\n\n\nTo express finally in a single formula my opposition to the romantic\npessimism of the abstinent, the unfortunate, the conquered: there is a\nwill to the tragic and to pessimism, which is a sign as much of the\nseverity as of the strength of the intellect (taste, emotion, conscience).\nWith this will in our hearts we do not fear, but we investigate ourselves\nthe terrible and the problematical elements characteristic of all\nexistence. Behind such a will stand courage and pride and the desire for a\nreally great enemy. That was _my_ pessimistic outlook from the first\u2014a new\noutlook, methinks, an outlook that even at this day is new and strange? To\nthis moment I hold to it firmly and (if it will be believed) not only\n_for_ myself but occasionally _against_ myself.... You would prefer to\nhave that proved first? Well, what else does all this long preface\u2014prove?\n\nSILS-MARIA, UPPER ENGADINE,\n_September, 1886_.\n\n\n\n\n\nPART I. MISCELLANEOUS MAXIMS AND OPINIONS.\n\n\n\n\n1.\n\n\nTO THE DISILLUSIONED IN PHILOSOPHY.\u2014If you hitherto believed in the\nhighest value of life and now find yourselves disillusioned, must you\nimmediately get rid of life at the lowest possible price?\n\n\n\n\n2.\n\n\nOVERNICE.\u2014One can even become overnice as regards the clearness of\nconcepts. How disgusted one is then at having truck with the half-clear,\nthe hazy, the aspiring, the doubting! How ridiculous and yet not\nmirth-provoking is their eternal fluttering and straining without ever\nbeing able to fly or to grasp!\n\n\n\n\n3.\n\n\nTHE WOOERS OF REALITY.\u2014He who realises at last how long and how thoroughly\nhe has been befooled, embraces out of spite even the ugliest reality. So\nthat in the long run of the world\u2019s history the best men have always been\nwooers of reality, for the best have always been longest and most\nthoroughly deceived.\n\n\n\n\n4.\n\n\nADVANCE OF FREETHINKING.\u2014The difference between past and present\nfreethinking cannot better be characterised than by that aphorism for the\nrecognition and expression of which all the fearlessness of the eighteenth\ncentury was needed, and which even then, if measured by our modern view,\nsinks into an unconscious na\u00efvet\u00e9. I mean Voltaire\u2019s aphorism,\n\u201ccroyez-moi, mon ami, l\u2019erreur aussi a son m\u00e9rite.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n5.\n\n\nA HEREDITARY SIN OF PHILOSOPHERS.\u2014Philosophers have at all times\nappropriated and _corrupted_ the maxims of censors of men (moralists), by\ntaking them over without qualification and trying to prove as necessary\nwhat the moralists only meant as a rough indication or as a truth suited\nto their fellow-countrymen or fellow-townsmen for a single decade.\nMoreover, the philosophers thought that they were thereby raising\nthemselves above the moralists! Thus it will be found that the celebrated\nteachings of Schopenhauer as to the supremacy of the will over the\nintellect, of the immutability of character, the negativity of\npleasure\u2014all errors, in the sense in which he understands them\u2014rest upon\nprinciples of popular wisdom enunciated by the moralists. Take the very\nword \u201cwill,\u201d which Schopenhauer twisted so as to become a common\ndenotation of several human conditions and with which he filled a gap in\nthe language (to his own great advantage, in so far as he was a moralist,\nfor he became free to speak of the will as Pascal had spoken of it). In\nthe hands of its creator, Schopenhauer\u2019s \u201cwill,\u201d through the philosophic\ncraze for generalisation, already turned out to be a bane to knowledge.\nFor this will was made into a poetic metaphor, when it was held that all\nthings in nature possess will. Finally, that it might be applied to all\nkinds of disordered mysticism, the word was misused by a fraudulent\nconvention. So now all our fashionable philosophers repeat it and seem to\nbe perfectly certain that all things have a will and are in fact One Will.\nAccording to the description generally given of this All-One-Will, this is\nmuch as if one should positively try to have the stupid Devil for one\u2019s\nGod.\n\n\n\n\n6.\n\n\nAGAINST VISIONARIES.\u2014The visionary denies the truth to himself, the liar\nonly to others.\n\n\n\n\n7.\n\n\nENMITY TO LIGHT.\u2014If we make it clear to any one that, strictly, he can\nnever speak of truth, but only of probability and of its degrees, we\ngenerally discover, from the undisguised joy of our pupil, how greatly men\nprefer the uncertainty of their intellectual horizon, and how in their\nheart of hearts they hate truth because of its definiteness.\u2014Is this due\nto a secret fear felt by all that the light of truth may at some time be\nturned too brightly upon themselves? To their wish to be of some\nconsequence, and accordingly their concealment from the world of what they\nare? Or is it to be traced to their horror of the all-too brilliant light,\nto which their crepuscular, easily dazzled, bat-like souls are not\naccustomed, so that hate it they must?\n\n\n\n\n8.\n\n\nCHRISTIAN SCEPTICISM.\u2014Pilate, with his question, \u201cWhat is Truth?\u201d is now\ngleefully brought on the scene as an advocate of Christ, in order to cast\nsuspicion on all that is known or knowable as being mere appearance, and\nto erect the Cross on the appalling background of the Impossibility of\nKnowledge.\n\n\n\n\n9.\n\n\n\u201cNATURAL LAW,\u201d A PHRASE OF SUPERSTITION.\u2014When you talk so delightedly of\nNature acting according to law, you must either assume that all things in\nNature follow their law from a voluntary obedience imposed by\nthemselves\u2014in which case you admire the morality of Nature: or you are\nenchanted with the idea of a creative mechanician, who has made a most\ncunning watch with human beings as accessory ornaments.\u2014Necessity, through\nthe expression, \u201cconformity to law,\u201d then becomes more human and a coign\nof refuge in the last instance for mythological reveries.\n\n\n\n\n10.\n\n\nFALLEN FORFEIT TO HISTORY.\u2014All misty philosophers and obscurers of the\nworld, in other words all metaphysicians of coarse or refined texture are\nseized with eyeache, earache, and toothache when they begin to suspect\nthat there is truth in the saying: \u201cAll philosophy has from now fallen\nforfeit to history.\u201d In view of their aches and pains we may pardon them\nfor throwing stones and filth at him who talks like this, but this\nteaching may itself thereby become dirty and disreputable for a time and\nlose in effect.\n\n\n\n\n11.\n\n\nTHE PESSIMIST OF THE INTELLECT.\u2014He whose intellect is really free will\nthink freely about the intellect itself, and will not shut his eyes to\ncertain terrible aspects of its source and tendency. For this reason\nothers will perhaps designate him the bitterest opponent of free thought\nand give him that dreadful, abusive name of \u201cpessimist of the intellect\u201d:\naccustomed as they are to typify a man not by his strong point, his\npre-eminent virtue, but by the quality that is most foreign to his nature.\n\n\n\n\n12.\n\n\nTHE METAPHYSICIANS\u2019 KNAPSACK.\u2014To all who talk so boastfully of the\nscientific basis of their metaphysics it is best to make no reply. It is\nenough to tug at the bundle that they rather shyly keep hidden behind\ntheir backs. If one succeeds in lifting it, the results of that\n\u201cscientific basis\u201d come to light, to their great confusion: a dear little\n\u201cGod,\u201d a genteel immortality, perhaps a little spiritualism, and in any\ncase a complicated mass of poor-sinners\u2019-misery and pharisee-arrogance.\n\n\n\n\n13.\n\n\nOCCASIONAL HARMFULNESS OF KNOWLEDGE.\u2014The utility involved in the unchecked\ninvestigation of knowledge is so constantly proved in a hundred different\nways that one must remember to include in the bargain the subtler and\nrarer damage which individuals must suffer on that account. The chemist\ncannot avoid occasionally being poisoned or burnt at his experiments. What\napplies to the chemist, is true of the whole of our culture. This, it may\nbe added, clearly shows that knowledge should provide itself with healing\nbalsam against burns and should always have antidotes ready against\npoisons.\n\n\n\n\n14.\n\n\nTHE CRAVING OF THE PHILISTINE.\u2014The Philistine thinks that his most urgent\nneed is a purple patch or turban of metaphysics, nor will he let it slip.\nYet he would look less ridiculous without this adornment.\n\n\n\n\n15.\n\n\nENTHUSIASTS.\u2014With all that enthusiasts say in favour of their gospel or\ntheir master they are defending themselves, however much they comport\nthemselves as the judges and not the accused: because they are\ninvoluntarily reminded almost at every moment that they are exceptions and\nhave to assert their legitimacy.\n\n\n\n\n16.\n\n\nTHE GOOD SEDUCES TO LIFE.\u2014All good things, even all good books that are\nwritten against life, are strong means of attraction to life.\n\n\n\n\n17.\n\n\nTHE HAPPINESS OF THE HISTORIAN.\u2014\u201cWhen we hear the hair-splitting\nmetaphysicians and prophets of the after-world speak, we others feel\nindeed that we are the \u2018poor in spirit,\u2019 but that ours is the heavenly\nkingdom of change, with spring and autumn, summer and winter, and theirs\nthe after-world, with its grey, everlasting frosts and shadows.\u201d Thus\nsoliloquised a man as he walked in the morning sunshine, a man who in his\npursuit of history has constantly changed not only his mind but his heart.\nIn contrast to the metaphysicians, he is happy to harbour in himself not\nan \u201cimmortal soul\u201d but many _mortal_ souls.\n\n\n\n\n18.\n\n\nTHREE VARIETIES OF THINKERS.\u2014There are streaming, flowing, trickling\nmineral springs, and three corresponding varieties of thinkers. The layman\nvalues them by the volume of the water, the expert by the contents of the\nwater\u2014in other words, by the elements in them that are not water.\n\n\n\n\n19.\n\n\nTHE PICTURE OF LIFE.\u2014The task of painting the picture of life, often as it\nhas been attempted by poets and philosophers, is nevertheless irrational.\nEven in the hands of the greatest artist-thinkers, pictures and miniatures\nof one life only\u2014their own\u2014have come into being, and indeed no other\nresult is possible. While in the process of developing, a thing that\ndevelops, cannot mirror itself as fixed and permanent, as a _definite\nobject_.\n\n\n\n\n20.\n\n\nTRUTH WILL HAVE NO GODS BEFORE IT.\u2014The belief in truth begins with the\ndoubt of all truths in which one has previously believed.\n\n\n\n\n21.\n\n\nWHERE SILENCE IS REQUIRED.\u2014If we speak of freethinking as of a highly\ndangerous journey over glaciers and frozen seas, we find that those who do\nnot care to travel on this track are offended, as if they had been\nreproached with cowardice and weak knees. The difficult, which we find to\nbe beyond our powers, must not even be mentioned in our presence.\n\n\n\n\n22.\n\n\n_Historia in Nuce._\u2014The most serious parody I ever heard was this: \u201cIn the\nbeginning was the nonsense, and the nonsense was with God, and the\nnonsense was God.\u201d(4)\n\n\n\n\n23.\n\n\nINCURABLE.\u2014The idealist is incorrigible: if he be thrown out of his\nHeaven, he makes himself a suitable ideal out of Hell. Disillusion him,\nand lo! he will embrace disillusionment with no less ardour than he\nrecently embraced hope. In so far as his impulse belongs to the great\nincurable impulses of human nature, he can bring about tragic destinies\nand later become a subject for tragedy himself, for such tragedies as deal\nwith the incurable, implacable, inevitable in the lot and character of\nman.\n\n\n\n\n24.\n\n\nAPPLAUSE ITSELF AS THE CONTINUATION OF THE PLAY.\u2014Sparkling eyes and an\namiable smile are the tributes of applause paid to all the great comedy of\nworld and existence\u2014but this applause is a comedy within a comedy, meant\nto tempt the other spectators to a _plaudite amici_.\n\n\n\n\n25.\n\n\nCOURAGE FOR TEDIUM.\u2014He who has not the courage to allow himself and his\nwork to be considered tedious, is certainly no intellect of the first\nrank, whether in the arts or in the sciences.\u2014A scoffer, who happened for\nonce in a way to be a thinker, might add, with a glance at the world and\nat history: \u201cGod did not possess this courage, for he wanted to make and\nhe made all things so interesting.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n26.\n\n\nFROM THE MOST INTIMATE EXPERIENCE OF THE THINKER.\u2014Nothing is harder for a\nman than to conceive of an object impersonally, I mean to see in it an\nobject and not a person. One may even ask whether it is possible for him\nto dispense for a single moment with the machinery of his instinct to\ncreate and construct a personality. After all, he associates with his\nthoughts, however abstract they may be, as with individuals, against whom\nhe must fight or to whom he must attach himself, whom he must protect,\nsupport and nourish. Let us watch or listen to ourselves at the moment\nwhen we hear or discover a new idea. Perhaps it displeases us because it\nis so defiant and so autocratic, and we unconsciously ask ourselves\nwhether we cannot place a contradiction of it by its side as an enemy, or\nfasten on to it a \u201cperhaps\u201d or a \u201csometimes\u201d: the mere little word\n\u201cprobably\u201d gives us a feeling of satisfaction, for it shatters the\noppressive tyranny of the unconditional. If, on the other hand, the new\nidea enters in gentle shape, sweetly patient and humble, and falling at\nonce into the arms of contradiction, we put our autocracy to the test in\nanother way. Can we not come to the aid of this weak creature, stroke it\nand feed it, give it strength and fulness, and truth and even\nunconditionality? Is it possible for us to show ourselves parental or\nchivalrous or compassionate towards our idea?\u2014Then again, we see here a\njudgment and there a judgment, sundered from each other, never looking at\nor making any movement towards each other. So we are tickled by the\nthought, whether it be not here feasible to make a match, to draw a\n_conclusion_, with the anticipation that if a consequence follows this\nconclusion it is not only the two judgments united in wedlock but the\nmatchmakers that will gain honour. If, however, we cannot acquire a hold\nupon that thought either on the path of defiance and ill-will or on that\nof good-will (if we hold it to be true)\u2014then we submit to it and do homage\nto it as a leader and a prince, give it a chair of honour, and speak not\nof it without a flourish of trumpets: for we are bright in its brightness.\nWoe to him who tries to dim this brightness! Perhaps we ourselves one day\ngrow suspicious of our idea. Then we, the indefatigable \u201cking-makers\u201d of\nthe history of the intellect, cast it down from its throne and immediately\nexalt its adversary. Surely if this be considered and thought out a little\nfurther, no one will speak of an \u201cabsolute impulse to knowledge\u201d!\n\nWhy, then, does man prefer the true to the untrue, in this secret combat\nwith thought-personalities, in this generally clandestine match-making of\nthoughts, constitution-founding of thoughts, child-rearing of thoughts,\nnursing and almsgiving of thoughts? For the same reason that he practises\nhonesty in intercourse with real persons: _now_ from habit, heredity, and\ntraining, _originally_ because the true, like the fair and the just, is\nmore expedient and more reputable than the untrue. For in the realm of\nthought it is difficult to assume a power and glory that are built on\nerror or on falsehood. The feeling that such an edifice might at some time\ncollapse is humiliating to the self-esteem of the architect\u2014he is ashamed\nof the fragility of the material, and, as he considers himself more\nimportant than the rest of the world, he would fain construct nothing that\nis less durable than the rest of the world. In his longing for truth he\nembraces the belief in a personal immortality, the most arrogant and\ndefiant idea that exists, closely allied as it is to the underlying\nthought, _pereat mundus, dum ego salvus sim!_ His work has become his\n\u201cego,\u201d he transforms himself into the Imperishable with its universal\nchallenge. It is his immeasurable pride that will only employ the best and\nhardest stones for the work\u2014truths, or what he holds for such. Arrogance\nhas always been justly called the \u201cvice of the sage\u201d; yet without this\nvice, fruitful in impulses, Truth and her status on earth would be in a\nparlous plight. In our propensity to fear our thoughts, concepts and\nwords, and yet to honour ourselves in them, unconsciously to ascribe to\nthem the power of rewarding, despising, praising, and blaming us, and so\nto associate with them as with free intellectual personalities, as with\nindependent powers, as with our equals\u2014herein lie the roots of the\nremarkable phenomenon which I have called \u201cintellectual conscience.\u201d Thus\nsomething of the highest moral species has bloomed from a black root.\n\n\n\n\n27.\n\n\nTHE OBSCURANTISTS.\u2014The essential feature of the black art of obscurantism\nis not its intention of clouding the brain, but its attempt to darken the\npicture of the world and cloud our idea of existence. It often employs the\nmethod of thwarting all illumination of the intellect, but at times it\nuses the very opposite means, seeking by the highest refinement of the\nintellect to induce a satiety of the intellect\u2019s fruits. Hair-splitting\nmetaphysicians, who pave the way for scepticism and by their excessive\nacumen provoke a distrust of acumen, are excellent instruments of the more\nsubtle form of obscurantism.\u2014Is it possible that even Kant may be applied\nto this purpose? Did he even _intend_ something of the sort, for a time at\nleast, to judge from his own notorious exposition: \u201cto clear the way for\nbelief by setting limitations to knowledge\u201d?\u2014Certainly he did not succeed,\nnor did his followers, on the wolf and fox tracks of this highly refined\nand dangerous form of obscurantism\u2014the most dangerous of all, for the\nblack art here appears in the garb of light.\n\n\n\n\n28.\n\n\nBY WHAT KIND OF PHILOSOPHY ART IS CORRUPTED.\u2014When the mists of a\nmetaphysical-mystical philosophy succeed in making all \u00e6sthetic phenomena\n_opaque_, it follows that these phenomena cannot be comparatively valued,\ninasmuch as each becomes individually inexplicable. But when once they\ncannot be compared for the sake of valuation, there arises an entire\nabsence-of-criticism, a blind indulgence. From this source springs a\ncontinual diminution of the enjoyment of art (which is only distinguished\nfrom the crude satisfaction of a need by the highest refinement of taste\nand appreciation). The more taste diminishes, the more does the desire for\nart change and revert to a vulgar hunger, which the artist henceforth\nseeks to appease by ever coarser fare.\n\n\n\n\n29.\n\n\nON GETHSEMANE.\u2014The most painful thing a thinker can say to artists is:\n\u201cCould ye not _watch_ with me one hour?\u201d\n\n\n\n\n30.\n\n\nAT THE LOOM.\u2014There are many (artists and women, for instance) who work\nagainst the few that take a pleasure in untying the knot of things and\nunravelling their woof. The former always want to weave the woof together\nagain and entangle it and so turn the conceived into the unconceived and\nif possible inconceivable. Whatever the result may be, the woof and knot\nalways look rather untidy, because too many hands are working and tugging\nat them.\n\n\n\n\n31.\n\n\nIN THE DESERT OF SCIENCE.\u2014As the man of science proceeds on his modest and\ntoilsome wanderings, which must often enough be journeys in the desert, he\nis confronted with those brilliant mirages known as \u201cphilosophic systems.\u201d\nWith magic powers of deception they show him that the solution of all\nriddles and the most refreshing draught of true water of life are close at\nhand. His weary heart rejoices, and he well-nigh touches with his lips the\ngoal of all scientific endurance and hardship, so that almost\nunconsciously he presses forward. Other natures stand still, as if\nspellbound by the beautiful illusion: the desert swallows them up, they\nbecome lost to science. Other natures, again, that have often experienced\nthese subjective consolations, become very disheartened and curse the\nsalty taste which these mirages leave behind in the mouth and from which\nsprings a raging thirst\u2014without one\u2019s having come one step nearer to any\nsort of a spring.\n\n\n\n\n32.\n\n\nTHE SO-CALLED \u201cREAL REALITY.\u201d\u2014When the poet depicts the various\ncallings\u2014such as those of the warrior, the silk-weaver, the sailor\u2014he\nfeigns to know all these things thoroughly, to be an expert. Even in the\nexposition of human actions and destinies he behaves as if he had been\npresent at the spinning of the whole web of existence. In so far he is an\nimpostor. He practises his frauds on pure ignoramuses, and that is why he\nsucceeds. They praise him for his deep, genuine knowledge, and lead him\nfinally into the delusion that he really knows as much as the individual\nexperts and creators, yes, even as the great world-spinners themselves. In\nthe end, the impostor becomes honest, and actually believes in his own\nsincerity. Emotional people say to his very face that he has the \u201chigher\u201d\ntruth and sincerity\u2014for they are weary of reality for the time being, and\naccept the poetic dream as a pleasant relaxation and a night\u2019s rest for\nhead and heart. The visions of the dream now appear to them of more value,\nbecause, as has been said, they find them more beneficial, and mankind has\nalways held that what is apparently of more value is more true, more real.\nAll that is generally called reality, the poets, conscious of this power,\nproceed with intention to disparage and to distort into the uncertain, the\nillusory, the spurious, the impure, the sinful, sorrowful, and deceitful.\nThey make use of all doubts about the limits of knowledge, of all\nsceptical excesses, in order to spread over everything the rumpled veil of\nuncertainty. For they desire that when this darkening process is complete\ntheir wizardry and soul-magic may be accepted without hesitation as the\npath to \u201ctrue truth\u201d and \u201creal reality.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n33.\n\n\nTHE WISH TO BE JUST AND THE WISH TO BE A JUDGE.\u2014Schopenhauer, whose\nprofound understanding of what is human and all-too-human and original\nsense for facts was not a little impaired by the bright leopard-skin of\nhis metaphysic (the skin must first be pulled off him if one wants to find\nthe real moralist genius beneath)\u2014Schopenhauer makes this admirable\ndistinction, wherein he comes far nearer the mark than he would himself\ndare to admit: \u201cInsight into the stern necessity of human actions is the\nboundary line that divides philosophic from other brains.\u201d He worked\nagainst that wonderful insight of which he was sometimes capable by the\nprejudice that he had in common with the moral man (not the moralist), a\nprejudice that he expresses quite guilelessly and devoutly as follows:\n\u201cThe ultimate and true explanation of the inner being of the entirety of\nthings must of necessity be closely connected with that about the ethical\nsignificance of human actions.\u201d This connection is not \u201cnecessary\u201d at all:\nsuch a connection must rather be rejected by that principle of the stern\nnecessity of human actions, that is, the unconditioned non-freedom and\nnon-responsibility of the will. Philosophic brains will accordingly be\ndistinguished from others by their disbelief in the metaphysical\nsignificance of morality. This must create between the two kinds of brain\na gulf of a depth and unbridgeableness of which the much-deplored gulf\nbetween \u201ccultured\u201d and \u201cuncultured\u201d scarcely gives a conception. It is\ntrue that many back doors, which the \u201cphilosophic brains,\u201d like\nSchopenhauer\u2019s own, have left for themselves, must be recognised as\nuseless. None leads into the open, into the fresh air of the free will,\nbut every door through which people had slipped hitherto showed behind it\nonce more the gleaming brass wall of fate. For we are in a prison, and can\nonly dream of freedom, not make ourselves free. That the recognition of\nthis fact cannot be resisted much longer is shown by the despairing and\nincredible postures and grimaces of those who still press against it and\ncontinue their wrestling-bout with it. Their attitude at present is\nsomething like this: \u201cSo no one is responsible for his actions? And all is\nfull of guilt and the consciousness of guilt? But some one _must_ be the\nsinner. If it is no longer possible or permissible to accuse and sentence\nthe individual, the one poor wave in the inevitable rough-and-tumble of\nthe waves of development\u2014well, then, let this stormy sea, this development\nitself, be the sinner. Here is free will: this totality can be accused and\nsentenced, can atone and expiate. _So let God be the sinner and man his\nredeemer._ Let the world\u2019s history be guilt, expiation, and self-murder.\nLet the evil-doer be his own judge, the judge his own hangman.\u201d This\nChristianity strained to its limits\u2014for what else is it?\u2014is the last\nthrust in the fencing-match between the teaching of unconditioned morality\nand the teaching of unconditioned non-freedom. It would be quite horrible\nif it were anything more than a logical pose, a hideous grimace of the\nunderlying thought, perhaps the death-convulsion of the heart that seeks a\nremedy in its despair, the heart to which delirium whispers: \u201cBehold, thou\nart the lamb which taketh away the sin of God.\u201d This error lies not only\nin the feeling, \u201cI am responsible,\u201d but just as much in the contradiction,\n\u201cI am not responsible, but some one must be.\u201d That is simply not true.\nHence the philosopher must say, like Christ, \u201cJudge not,\u201d and the final\ndistinction between the philosophic brains and the others would be that\nthe former wish to be just and the latter wish to be judges.\n\n\n\n\n34.\n\n\n_Sacrifice._\u2014You hold that sacrifice is the hallmark of moral action?\u2014Just\nconsider whether in every action that is done with deliberation, in the\nbest as in the worst, there be not a sacrifice.\n\n\n\n\n35.\n\n\nAGAINST THE \u201cTRIERS OF THE REINS\u201d OF MORALITY.\u2014One must know the best and\nthe worst that a man is capable of in theory and in practice before one\ncan judge how strong his moral nature is and can be. But this is an\nexperiment that one can never carry out.\n\n\n\n\n36.\n\n\nSERPENT\u2019S TOOTH.\u2014Whether we have a serpent\u2019s tooth or not we cannot know\nbefore some one has set his heel upon our necks. A wife or a mother could\nsay: until some one has put his heel upon the neck of our darling, our\nchild.\u2014Our character is determined more by the absence of certain\nexperiences than by the experiences we have undergone.\n\n\n\n\n37.\n\n\nDECEPTION IN LOVE.\u2014We forget and purposely banish from our minds a good\ndeal of our past. In other words, we wish our picture, that beams at us\nfrom the past, to belie us, to flatter our vanity\u2014we are constantly\nengaged in this self-deception. And you who talk and boast so much of\n\u201cself-oblivion in love,\u201d of the \u201cabsorption of the ego in the other\nperson\u201d\u2014you hold that this is something different? So you break the\nmirror, throw yourselves into another personality that you admire, and\nenjoy the new portrait of your ego, though calling it by the other\nperson\u2019s name\u2014and this whole proceeding is not to be thought\nself-deception, self-seeking, you marvellous beings?\u2014It seems to me that\nthose who hide something of themselves from themselves, or hide their\nwhole selves from themselves, are alike committing a theft from the\ntreasury of knowledge. It is clear, then, against what transgression the\nmaxim \u201cKnow thyself\u201d is a warning.\n\n\n\n\n38.\n\n\nTO THE DENIER OF HIS VANITY.\u2014He who denies his own vanity usually\npossesses it in so brutal a form that he instinctively shuts his eyes to\navoid the necessity of despising himself.\n\n\n\n\n39.\n\n\nWHY THE STUPID SO OFTEN BECOME MALIGNANT.\u2014To those arguments of our\nadversary against which our head feels too weak our heart replies by\nthrowing suspicion on the motives of his arguments.\n\n\n\n\n40.\n\n\nTHE ART OF MORAL EXCEPTIONS.\u2014An art that points out and glorifies the\nexceptional cases of morality\u2014where the good becomes bad and the unjust\njust\u2014should rarely be given a hearing: just as now and again we buy\nsomething from gipsies, with the fear that they are diverting to their own\npockets much more than their mere profit from the purchase.\n\n\n\n\n41.\n\n\nENJOYMENT AND NON-ENJOYMENT OF POISONS.\u2014The only decisive argument that\nhas always deterred men from drinking a poison is not that it is deadly,\nbut that it has an unpleasant taste.\n\n\n\n\n42.\n\n\nTHE WORLD WITHOUT CONSCIOUSNESS OF SIN.\u2014If men only committed such deeds\nas do not give rise to a bad conscience, the human world would still look\nbad and rascally enough, but not so sickly and pitiable as at\npresent.\u2014Enough wicked men without conscience have existed at all times,\nand many good honest folk lack the feeling of pleasure in a good\nconscience.\n\n\n\n\n43.\n\n\nTHE CONSCIENTIOUS.\u2014It is more convenient to follow one\u2019s conscience than\none\u2019s intelligence, for at every failure conscience finds an excuse and an\nencouragement in itself. That is why there are so many conscientious and\nso few intelligent people.\n\n\n\n\n44.\n\n\nOPPOSITE MEANS OF AVOIDING BITTERNESS.\u2014One temperament finds it useful to\nbe able to give vent to its disgust in words, being made sweeter by\nspeech. Another reaches its full bitterness only by speaking out: it is\nmore advisable for it to have to gulp down something\u2014the restraint that\nmen of this stamp place upon themselves in the presence of enemies and\nsuperiors improves their character and prevents it from becoming too acrid\nand sour.\n\n\n\n\n45.\n\n\nNOT TO BE TOO DEJECTED.\u2014To get bed-sores is unpleasant, but no proof\nagainst the merits of the cure that prescribes that you should take to\nyour bed. Men who have long lived outside themselves, and have at last\ndevoted themselves to the inward philosophic life, know that one can also\nget sores of character and intellect. This, again, is on the whole no\nargument against the chosen way of life, but necessitates a few small\nexceptions and apparent relapses.\n\n\n\n\n46.\n\n\nTHE HUMAN \u201cTHING IN ITSELF.\u201d\u2014The most vulnerable and yet most\nunconquerable of things is human vanity: nay, through being wounded its\nstrength increases and can grow to giant proportions.\n\n\n\n\n47.\n\n\nTHE FARCE OF MANY INDUSTRIOUS PERSONS.\u2014By an excess of effort they win\nleisure for themselves, and then they can do nothing with it but count the\nhours until the tale is ended.\n\n\n\n\n48.\n\n\nTHE POSSESSION OF JOY ABOUNDING.\u2014He that has joy abounding must be a good\nman, but perhaps he is not the cleverest of men, although he has reached\nthe very goal towards which the cleverest man is striving with all his\ncleverness.\n\n\n\n\n49.\n\n\nIN THE MIRROR OF NATURE.\u2014Is not a man fairly well described, when we are\ntold that he likes to walk between tall fields of golden corn: that he\nprefers the forest and flower colours of sere and chilly autumn to all\nothers, because they point to something more beautiful than Nature has\never attained: that he feels as much at home under big broad-leaved walnut\ntrees as among his nearest kinsfolk: that in the mountains his greatest\njoy is to come across those tiny distant lakes from which the very eyes of\nsolitude seem to peer at him: that he loves that grey calm of the misty\ntwilight that steals along the windows on autumn and early winter evenings\nand shuts out all soulless sounds as with velvet curtains: that in unhewn\nstones he recognises the last remaining traces of the primeval age, eager\nfor speech, and honours them from childhood upwards: that, lastly, the sea\nwith its shifting serpent skin and wild-beast beauty is, and remains to\nhim, unfamiliar?\u2014Yes, something of the man is described herewith, but the\nmirror of Nature does not say that the same man, with (and not even \u201cin\nspite of\u201d) all his idyllic sensibilities, might be disagreeable, stingy,\nand conceited. Horace, who was a good judge of such matters, in his famous\n_beatus ille qui procul negotiis_ puts the tenderest feeling for country\nlife into the mouth of a Roman money-lender.\n\n\n\n\n50.\n\n\nPOWER WITHOUT VICTORY.\u2014The strongest cognition (that of the complete\nnon-freedom of the human will) is yet the poorest in results, for it has\nalways had the mightiest of opponents\u2014human vanity.\n\n\n\n\n51.\n\n\nPLEASURE AND ERROR.\u2014A beneficial influence on friends is exerted by one\nman unconsciously, through his nature; by another consciously, through\nisolated actions. Although the former nature is held to be the higher, the\nlatter alone is allied to good conscience and pleasure\u2014the pleasure in\njustification by good works, which rests upon a belief in the volitional\ncharacter of our good and evil doing\u2014that is to say, upon a mistake.\n\n\n\n\n52.\n\n\nTHE FOLLY OF COMMITTING INJUSTICE.\u2014The injustice we have inflicted\nourselves is far harder to bear than the injustice inflicted upon us by\nothers (not always from moral grounds, be it observed). After all, the\ndoer is always the sufferer\u2014that is, if he be capable of feeling the sting\nof conscience or of perceiving that by his action he has armed society\nagainst himself and cut himself off. For this reason we should beware\nstill more of doing than of suffering injustice, for the sake of our own\ninward happiness\u2014so as not to lose our feeling of well-being\u2014quite apart\nfrom any consideration of the precepts of religion and morality. For in\nsuffering injustice we have the consolation of a good conscience, of hope\nand of revenge, together with the sympathy and applause of the just, nay\nof the whole of society, which is afraid of the evil-doer. Not a few are\nskilled in the impure self-deception that enables them to transform every\ninjustice of their own into an injustice inflicted upon them from without,\nand to reserve for their own acts the exceptional right to the plea of\nself-defence. Their object, of course, is to make their own burden\nlighter.\n\n\n\n\n53.\n\n\nENVY WITH OR WITHOUT A MOUTHPIECE.\u2014Ordinary envy is wont to cackle when\nthe envied hen has laid an egg, thereby relieving itself and becoming\nmilder. But there is a yet deeper envy that in such a case becomes dead\nsilent, desiring that every mouth should be sealed and always more and\nmore angry because this desire is not gratified. Silent envy grows in\nsilence.\n\n\n\n\n54.\n\n\nANGER AS A SPY.\u2014Anger exhausts the soul and brings its very dregs to\nlight. Hence, if we know no other means of gaining certainty, we must\nunderstand how to arouse anger in our dependents and adversaries, in order\nto learn what is really done and thought to our detriment.\n\n\n\n\n55.\n\n\nDEFENCE MORALLY MORE DIFFICULT THAN ATTACK.\u2014The true heroic deed and\nmasterpiece of the good man does not lie in attacking opinions and\ncontinuing to love their propounders, but in the far harder task of\ndefending his own position without causing or intending to cause bitter\nheartburns to his opponent. The sword of attack is honest and broad, the\nsword of defence usually runs out to a needle point.\n\n\n\n\n56.\n\n\nHONEST TOWARDS HONESTY.\u2014One who is openly honest towards himself ends by\nbeing rather conceited about this honesty. He knows only too well why he\nis honest\u2014for the same reason that another man prefers outward show and\nhypocrisy.\n\n\n\n\n57.\n\n\nCOALS OF FIRE.\u2014The heaping of coals of fire on another\u2019s head is generally\nmisunderstood and falls flat, because the other knows himself to be just\nas much in the right, and on his side too has thought of collecting coals.\n\n\n\n\n58.\n\n\nDANGEROUS BOOKS.\u2014A man says: \u201cJudging from my own case, I find that this\nbook is harmful.\u201d Let him but wait, and perhaps one day he will confess\nthat the book did him a great service by thrusting forward and bringing to\nlight the hidden disease of his soul.\u2014Altered opinions alter not at all\n(or very little) the character of a man: but they illuminate individual\nfacets of his personality, which hitherto, in another constellation of\nopinions, had remained dark and unrecognisable.\n\n\n\n\n59.\n\n\nSIMULATED PITY.\u2014We simulate pity when we wish to show ourselves superior\nto the feeling of animosity, but generally in vain. This point is not\nnoticed without a considerable enhancement of that feeling of animosity.\n\n\n\n\n60.\n\n\nOPEN CONTRADICTION OFTEN CONCILIATORY.\u2014At the moment when a man openly\nmakes known his difference of opinion from a well-known party leader, the\nwhole world thinks that he must be angry with the latter. Sometimes,\nhowever, he is just on the point of ceasing to be angry with him. He\nventures to put himself on the same plane as his opponent, and is free\nfrom the tortures of suppressed envy.\n\n\n\n\n61.\n\n\nSEEING OUR LIGHT SHINING.\u2014In the darkest hour of depression, sickness, and\nguilt, we are still glad to see others taking a light from us and making\nuse of us as of the disk of the moon. By this roundabout route we derive\nsome light from our own illuminating faculty.\n\n\n\n\n62.\n\n\nFELLOWSHIP IN JOY.(5)\u2014The snake that stings us means to hurt us and\nrejoices in so doing: the lowest animal can picture to itself the _pain_\nof others. But to picture to oneself the _joy_ of others and to rejoice\nthereat is the highest privilege of the highest animals, and again,\namongst them, is the property only of the most select\nspecimens\u2014accordingly a rare \u201chuman thing.\u201d Hence there have been\nphilosophers who denied fellowship in joy.\n\n\n\n\n63.\n\n\n_Supplementary Pregnancy._\u2014Those who have arrived at works and deeds are\nin an obscure way, they know not how, all the more pregnant with them, as\nif to prove supplementarily that these are their children and not those of\nchance.\n\n\n\n\n64.\n\n\nHARD-HEARTED FROM VANITY.\u2014Just as justice is so often a cloak for\nweakness, so men who are fairly intelligent, but weak, sometimes attempt\ndissimulation from ambitious motives and purposely show themselves unjust\nand hard, in order to leave behind them the impression of strength.\n\n\n\n\n65.\n\n\nHUMILIATION.\u2014If in a large sack of profit we find a single grain of\nhumiliation we still make a wry face even at our good luck.\n\n\n\n\n66.\n\n\nEXTREME HEROSTRATISM.(6)\u2014There might be Herostratuses who set fire to\ntheir own temple, in which their images are honoured.\n\n\n\n\n67.\n\n\nA WORLD OF DIMINUTIVES.\u2014The fact that all that is weak and in need of help\nappeals to the heart induces in us the habit of designating by diminutive\nand softening terms all that appeals to our hearts\u2014and accordingly\n_making_ such things weak and clinging to our imaginations.\n\n\n\n\n68.\n\n\nTHE BAD CHARACTERISTIC OF SYMPATHY.\u2014Sympathy has a peculiar impudence for\nits companion. For, wishing to help at all costs, sympathy is in no\nperplexity either as to the means of assistance or as to the nature and\ncause of the disease, and goes on courageously administering all its quack\nmedicines to restore the health and reputation of the patient.\n\n\n\n\n69.\n\n\nIMPORTUNACY.\u2014There is even an importunacy in relation to works, and the\nact of associating oneself from early youth on an intimate footing with\nthe illustrious works of all times evinces an entire absence of\nshame.\u2014Others are only importunate from ignorance, not knowing with whom\nthey have to do\u2014for instance classical scholars young and old in relation\nto the works of the Greeks.\n\n\n\n\n70.\n\n\nTHE WILL IS ASHAMED OF THE INTELLECT.\u2014In all coolness we make reasonable\nplans against our passions. But we make the most serious mistake in this\nconnection in being often ashamed, when the design has to be carried out,\nof the coolness and calculation with which we conceived it. So we do just\nthe unreasonable thing, from that sort of defiant magnanimity that every\npassion involves.\n\n\n\n\n71.\n\n\nWHY THE SCEPTICS OFFEND MORALITY.\u2014He who takes his morality solemnly and\nseriously is enraged against the sceptics in the domain of morals. For\nwhere he lavishes all his force, he wishes others to marvel but not to\ninvestigate and doubt. Then there are natures whose last shred of morality\nis just the belief in morals. They behave in the same way towards\nsceptics, if possible still more passionately.\n\n\n\n\n72.\n\n\nSHYNESS.\u2014All moralists are shy, because they know they are confounded with\nspies and traitors, so soon as their penchant is noticed. Besides, they\nare generally conscious of being impotent in action, for in the midst of\nwork the motives of their activity almost withdraw their attention from\nthe work.\n\n\n\n\n73.\n\n\nA DANGER TO UNIVERSAL MORALITY.\u2014People who are at the same time noble and\nhonest come to deify every devilry that brings out their honesty, and to\nsuspend for a time the balance of their moral judgment.\n\n\n\n\n74.\n\n\nTHE SADDEST ERROR.\u2014It is an unpardonable offence when one discovers that\nwhere one was convinced of being loved, one is only regarded as a\nhousehold utensil and decoration, whereby the master of the house can find\nan outlet for his vanity before his guests.\n\n\n\n\n75.\n\n\nLOVE AND DUALITY.\u2014What else is love but understanding and rejoicing that\nanother lives, works, and feels in a different and opposite way to\nourselves? That love may be able to bridge over the contrasts by joys, we\nmust not remove or deny those contrasts. Even self-love presupposes an\nirreconcileable duality (or plurality) in one person.\n\n\n\n\n76.\n\n\nSIGNS FROM DREAMS.\u2014What one sometimes does not know and feel accurately in\nwaking hours\u2014whether one has a good or a bad conscience as regards some\nperson\u2014is revealed completely and unambiguously by dreams.\n\n\n\n\n77.\n\n\nDEBAUCHERY.\u2014Not joy but joylessness is the mother of debauchery.\n\n\n\n\n78.\n\n\nREWARD AND PUNISHMENT.\u2014No one accuses without an underlying notion of\npunishment and revenge, even when he accuses his fate or himself. All\ncomplaint is accusation, all self-congratulation is praise. Whether we do\none or the other, we always make some one responsible.\n\n\n\n\n79.\n\n\nDOUBLY UNJUST.\u2014We sometimes advance truth by a twofold injustice: when we\nsee and represent consecutively the two sides of a case which we are not\nin a position to see together, but in such a way that every time we\nmistake or deny the other side, fancying that what we see is the whole\ntruth.\n\n\n\n\n80.\n\n\nMISTRUST.\u2014Self-mistrust does not always proceed uncertainly and shyly, but\nsometimes in a furious rage, having worked itself into a frenzy in order\nnot to tremble.\n\n\n\n\n81.\n\n\nPHILOSOPHY OF PARVENUS.\u2014If you want to be a personality you must even hold\nyour shadow in honour.\n\n\n\n\n82.\n\n\nKNOWING HOW TO WASH ONESELF CLEAN.\u2014We must know how to emerge cleaner from\nunclean conditions, and, if necessary, how to wash ourselves even with\ndirty water.\n\n\n\n\n83.\n\n\nLETTING YOURSELF GO.\u2014The more you let yourself go, the less others let you\ngo.\n\n\n\n\n84.\n\n\nTHE INNOCENT ROGUE.\u2014There is a slow, gradual path to vice and rascality of\nevery description. In the end, the traveller is quite abandoned by the\ninsect-swarms of a bad conscience, and although a thorough scoundrel he\nwalks in innocence.\n\n\n\n\n85.\n\n\nMAKING PLANS.\u2014Making plans and conceiving projects involves many agreeable\nsentiments. He that had the strength to be nothing but a contriver of\nplans all his life would be a happy man. But one must occasionally have a\nrest from this activity by carrying a plan into execution, and then comes\nanger and sobriety.\n\n\n\n\n86.\n\n\nWHEREWITH WE SEE THE IDEAL.\u2014Every efficient man is blocked by his\nefficiency and cannot look out freely from its prison. Had he not also a\ngoodly share of imperfection, he could, by reason of his virtue, never\narrive at an intellectual or moral freedom. Our shortcomings are the eyes\nwith which we see the ideal.\n\n\n\n\n87.\n\n\nDISHONEST PRAISE.\u2014Dishonest praise causes many more twinges of conscience\nthan dishonest blame, probably only because we have exposed our capacity\nfor judgment far more completely through excessive praise than through\nexcessive and unjust blame.\n\n\n\n\n88.\n\n\nHOW ONE DIES IS INDIFFERENT.\u2014The whole way in which a man thinks of death\nduring the prime of his life and strength is very expressive and\nsignificant for what we call his character. But the hour of death itself,\nhis behaviour on the death-bed, is almost indifferent. The exhaustion of\nwaning life, especially when old people die, the irregular or insufficient\nnourishment of the brain during this last period, the occasionally violent\npain, the novel and untried nature of the whole position, and only too\noften the ebb and flow of superstitious impressions and fears, as if dying\nwere of much consequence and meant the crossing of bridges of the most\nterrible kind\u2014all this forbids our using death as a testimony concerning\nthe living. Nor is it true that the dying man is generally more honest\nthan the living. On the contrary, through the solemn attitude of the\nbystanders, the repressed or flowing streams of tears and emotions, every\none is inveigled into a comedy of vanity, now conscious, now unconscious.\nThe serious way in which every dying man is treated must have been to many\na poor despised devil the highest joy of his whole life and a sort of\ncompensation and repayment for many privations.\n\n\n\n\n89.\n\n\nMORALITY AND ITS SACRIFICE.\u2014The origin of morality may be traced to two\nideas: \u201cThe community is of more value than the individual,\u201d and \u201cThe\npermanent interest is to be preferred to the temporary.\u201d The conclusion\ndrawn is that the permanent interest of the community is unconditionally\nto be set above the temporary interest of the individual, especially his\nmomentary well-being, but also his permanent interest and even the\nprolongation of his existence. Even if the individual suffers by an\narrangement that suits the mass, even if he is depressed and ruined by it,\nmorality must be maintained and the victim brought to the sacrifice. Such\na trend of thought arises, however, only in those who are _not_ the\nvictims\u2014for in the victim\u2019s case it enforces the claim that the individual\nmight be worth more than the many, and that the present enjoyment, the\n\u201cmoment in paradise,\u201d(7) should perhaps be rated higher than a tame\nsuccession of untroubled or comfortable circumstances. But the philosophy\nof the sacrificial victim always finds voice too late, and so victory\nremains with morals and morality: which are really nothing more than the\nsentiment for the whole concept of morals under which one lives and has\nbeen reared\u2014and reared not as an individual but as a member of the whole,\nas a cipher in a majority. Hence it constantly happens that the individual\nmakes himself into a majority by means of his morality.\n\n\n\n\n90.\n\n\nTHE GOOD AND THE GOOD CONSCIENCE.\u2014You hold that all good things have at\nall times had a good conscience? Science, which is certainly a very good\nthing, has come into the world without such a conscience and quite free\nfrom all pathos, rather clandestinely, by roundabout ways, walking with\nshrouded or masked face like a sinner, and always with the feeling at\nleast of being a smuggler. Good conscience has bad conscience for its\nstepping-stone, not for its opposite. For all that is good has at one time\nbeen new and consequently strange, against morals, immoral, and has gnawed\nlike a worm at the heart of the fortunate discoverer.\n\n\n\n\n91.\n\n\nSUCCESS SANCTIFIES THE INTENTIONS.\u2014We should not shrink from treading the\nroad to a virtue, even when we see clearly that nothing but egotism, and\naccordingly utility, personal comfort, fear, considerations of health,\nreputation, or glory, are the impelling motives. These motives are styled\nignoble and selfish. Very well, but if they stimulate us to some\nvirtue\u2014for example, self-denial, dutifulness, order, thrift, measure, and\nmoderation\u2014let us listen to them, whatever their epithets may be! For if\nwe reach the goal to which they summon us, then the virtue we have\nattained, by means of the pure air it makes us breathe and the spiritual\nwell-being it communicates, ennobles the remoter impulses of our action,\nand afterwards we no longer perform those actions from the same coarse\nmotives that inspired us before.\u2014Education should therefore force the\nvirtues on the pupil, as far as possible, according to his disposition.\nThen virtue, the sunshine and summer atmosphere of the soul, can\ncontribute her own share of work and add mellowness and sweetness.\n\n\n\n\n92.\n\n\nDABBLERS IN CHRISTIANITY, NOT CHRISTIANS.\u2014So that is your Christianity!\u2014To\nannoy humanity you praise \u201cGod and His Saints,\u201d and again when you want to\npraise humanity you go so far that God and His Saints must be annoyed.\u2014I\nwish you would at least learn Christian manners, as you are so deficient\nin the civility of the Christian heart.\n\n\n\n\n93.\n\n\nTHE RELIGIOUS AND IRRELIGIOUS IMPRESSION OF NATURE.\u2014A true believer must\nbe to us an object of veneration, but the same holds good of a true,\nsincere, convinced unbeliever. With men of the latter stamp we are near to\nthe high mountains where mighty rivers have their source, and with\nbelievers we are under vigorous, shady, restful trees.\n\n\n\n\n94.\n\n\nJUDICIAL MURDER.\u2014The two greatest judicial murders(8) in the world\u2019s\nhistory are, to speak without exaggeration, concealed and well-concealed\nsuicide. In both cases a man _willed_ to die, and in both cases he let his\nbreast be pierced by the sword in the hand of human injustice.\n\n\n\n\n95.\n\n\n\u201cLOVE.\u201d\u2014The finest artistic conception wherein Christianity had the\nadvantage over other religious systems lay in one word\u2014Love. Hence it\nbecame the _lyric_ religion (whereas in its two other creations Semitism\nbestowed heroico-epical religions upon the world). In the word \u201clove\u201d\nthere is so much meaning, so much that stimulates and appeals to memory\nand hope, that even the meanest intelligence and the coldest heart feel\nsome glimmering of its sense. The cleverest woman and the lowest man think\nof the comparatively unselfish moments of their whole life, even if with\nthem Eros never soared high: and the vast number of beings who _miss_ love\nfrom their parents or children or sweethearts, especially those whose\nsexual instincts have been refined away, have found their heart\u2019s desire\nin Christianity.\n\n\n\n\n96.\n\n\nTHE FULFILMENT OF CHRISTIANITY.\u2014In Christianity there is also an Epicurean\ntrend of thought, starting from the idea that God can only demand of man,\nhis creation and his image, what it is possible for man to fulfil, and\naccordingly that Christian virtue and perfection are attainable and often\nattained. Now, for instance, the belief in loving one\u2019s enemies\u2014even if it\nis only a belief or fancy, and by no means a psychological reality (a real\nlove)\u2014gives unalloyed happiness, so long as it is genuinely believed. (As\nto the reason of this, psychologist and Christian might well differ.)\nHence earthly life, through the belief, I mean the fancy, that it\nsatisfies not only the injunction to love our enemies, but all the other\ninjunctions of Christianity, and that it has really assimilated and\nembodied in itself the Divine perfection according to the command, \u201cBe\nperfect as your Father in heaven is perfect,\u201d might actually become a holy\nlife. Thus error can make Christ\u2019s promise come true.\n\n\n\n\n97.\n\n\nOF THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY.\u2014We may be allowed to form a conjecture as\nto the disappearance of Christianity and as to the places where it will be\nthe slowest to retreat, if we consider where and for what reasons\nProtestantism spread with such startling rapidity. As is well known,\nProtestantism promised to do far more cheaply all that the old Church did,\nwithout costly masses, pilgrimages, and priestly pomp and circumstance. It\nspread particularly among the Northern nations, which were not so deeply\nrooted as those of the South in the old Church\u2019s symbolism and love of\nritual. In the South the more powerful pagan religion survived in\nChristianity, whereas in the North Christianity meant an opposition to and\na break with the old-time creed, and hence was from the first more\nthoughtful and less sensual, but for that very reason, in times of peril,\nmore fanatical and more obstinate. If from the standpoint of _thought_ we\nsucceed in uprooting Christianity, we can at once know the point where it\nwill begin to disappear\u2014the very point at which it will be most stubborn\nin defence. In other places it will bend but not break, lose its leaves\nbut burst into leaf afresh, because the senses, and not thought, have gone\nover to its side. But it is the senses that maintain the belief that with\nall its expensive outlay the Church is more cheaply and conveniently\nmanaged than under the stern conditions of work and wages. Yet what does\none hold leisure (or semi-idleness) to be worth, when once one has become\naccustomed to it? The senses plead against a dechristianised world, saying\nthat there would be too much work to do in it and an insufficient supply\nof leisure. They take the part of magic\u2014that is, they let God work himself\n(_oremus nos, Deus laboret_).\n\n\n\n\n98.\n\n\nTHEATRICALITY AND HONESTY OF UNBELIEVERS.\u2014There is no book that contains\nin such abundance or expresses so faithfully all that man occasionally\nfinds salutary\u2014ecstatic inward happiness, ready for sacrifice or death in\nthe belief in and contemplation of _his_ truth\u2014as the book that tells of\nChrist. From that book a clever man may learn all the means whereby a book\ncan be made into a world-book, a vade-mecum for all, and especially that\nmaster-means of representing everything as discovered, nothing as future\nand uncertain. All influential books try to leave the same impression, as\nif the widest intellectual horizon were circumscribed here and as if about\nthe sun that shines here every constellation visible at present or in the\nfuture must revolve.\u2014Must not then all purely scientific books be poor in\ninfluence on the same grounds as such books are rich in influence? Is not\nthe book fated to live humble and among humble folk, in order to be\ncrucified in the end and never resurrected? In relation to what the\nreligious inform us of their \u201cknowledge\u201d and their \u201choly spirit,\u201d are not\nall upright men of science \u201cpoor in spirit\u201d? Can any religion demand more\nself-denial and draw the selfish out of themselves more inexorably than\nscience?\u2014This and similar things we may say, in any case with a certain\ntheatricality, when we have to defend ourselves against believers, for it\nis impossible to conduct a defence without a certain amount of\ntheatricality. But between ourselves our language must be more honest, and\nwe employ a freedom that those believers are not even allowed, in their\nown interests, to understand. Away, then, with the monastic cowl of\nself-denial, with the appearance of humility! Much more and much better\u2014so\nrings our truth! If science were not linked with the pleasure of\nknowledge, the utility of the thing known, what should we care for\nscience? If a little faith, love, and hope did not lead our souls to\nknowledge, what would attract us to science? And if in science the ego\nmeans nothing, still the inventive, happy ego, every upright and\nindustrious ego, means a great deal in the republic of the men of science.\nThe homage of those who pay homage, the joy of those whom we wish well or\nhonour, in some cases glory and a fair share of immortality, is the\npersonal reward for every suppression of personality: to say nothing here\nof meaner views and rewards, although it is just on this account that the\nmajority have sworn and always continue to swear fidelity to the laws of\nthe republic and of science. If we had not remained in some degree\nunscientific, what would science matter to us? Taking everything together\nand speaking in plain language: \u201cTo a purely knowing being knowledge would\nbe indifferent.\u201d\u2014Not the quality but the quantity of faith and devoutness\ndistinguishes us from the pious, the believers. We are content with less.\nBut should one of them cry out to us: \u201cBe content and show yourselves\ncontented!\u201d we could easily answer: \u201cAs a matter of fact, we do not belong\nto the most discontented class. But you, if your faith makes you happy,\nshow yourselves to be happy. Your faces have always done more harm to your\nfaith than our reasons! If that glad message of your Bible were written in\nyour faces, you would not need to demand belief in the authority of that\nbook in such stiff-necked fashion. Your words, your actions should\ncontinually make the Bible superfluous\u2014in fact, through you a new Bible\nshould continually come into being. As it is, your apologia for\nChristianity is rooted in your unchristianity, and with your defence you\nwrite your own condemnation. If you, however, should wish to emerge from\nyour dissatisfaction with Christianity, you should ponder over the\nexperience of two thousand years, which, clothed in the modest form of a\nquestion, may be voiced as follows: \u2018If Christ really intended to redeem\nthe world, may he not be said to have failed?\u2019 \u201d\n\n\n\n\n99.\n\n\nTHE POET AS GUIDE TO THE FUTURE.\u2014All the surplus poetical force that still\nexists in modern humanity, but is not used under our conditions of life,\nshould (without any deduction) be devoted to a definite goal\u2014not to\ndepicting the present nor to reviving and summarising the past, but to\npointing the way to the future. Nor should this be so done as if the poet,\nlike an imaginative political economist, had to anticipate a more\nfavourable national and social state of things and picture their\nrealisation. Rather will he, just as the earlier poets portrayed the\nimages of the Gods, portray the fair images of men. He will divine those\ncases where, in the midst of our modern world and reality (which will not\nbe shirked or repudiated in the usual poetic fashion), a great, noble soul\nis still possible, where it may be embodied in harmonious, equable\nconditions, where it may become permanent, visible, and representative of\na type, and so, by the stimulus to imitation and envy, help to create the\nfuture. The poems of such a poet would be distinguished by appearing\nsecluded and protected from the heated atmosphere of the passions. The\nirremediable failure, the shattering of all the strings of the human\ninstrument, the scornful laughter and gnashing of teeth, and all tragedy\nand comedy in the usual old sense, would appear by the side of this new\nart as mere archaic lumber, a blurring of the outlines of the\nworld-picture. Strength, kindness, gentleness, purity, and an unsought,\ninnate moderation in the personalities and their action: a levelled soil,\ngiving rest and pleasure to the foot: a shining heaven mirrored in faces\nand events: science and art welded into a new unity: the mind living\ntogether with her sister, the soul, without arrogance or jealousy, and\nenticing from contrasts the grace of seriousness, not the impatience of\ndiscord\u2014all this would be the general environment, the background on which\nthe delicate differences of the embodied ideals would make the real\npicture, that of ever-growing human majesty. Many roads to this poetry of\nthe future start from Goethe, but the quest needs good pathfinders and\nabove all a far greater strength than is possessed by modern poets, who\nunscrupulously represent the half-animal and the immaturity and\nintemperance that are mistaken by them for power and naturalness.\n\n\n\n\n100.\n\n\nTHE MUSE AS PENTHESILEA.(9)\u2014\u201cBetter to rot than to be a woman without\ncharm.\u201d When once the Muse thinks thus, the end of her art is again at\nhand. But it can be a tragic and also a comic finale.\n\n\n\n\n101.\n\n\nTHE CIRCUITOUS PATH TO THE BEAUTIFUL.\u2014If the beautiful is to be identified\nwith that which gives pleasure\u2014and thus sang the Muses once\u2014the useful is\noften the necessary circuitous path to the beautiful, and has a perfect\nright to spurn the short-sighted censure of men who live for the moment,\nwho will not wait, and who think that they can reach all good things\nwithout ever taking a circuitous path.\n\n\n\n\n102.\n\n\nAN EXCUSE FOR MANY A TRANSGRESSION.\u2014The ceaseless desire to create, the\neternal looking outward of the artist, hinders him from becoming better\nand more beautiful as a personality: unless his craving for glory be great\nenough to compel him to exhibit in his relations with other men a growth\ncorresponding to the growing beauty and greatness of his works. In any\ncase he has but a limited measure of strength, and how could the\nproportion of strength that he spends on himself be of any benefit to his\nwork\u2014or _vice versa_?\n\n\n\n\n103.\n\n\nSATISFYING THE BEST PEOPLE.\u2014If we have satisfied the best people of our\ntime with our art, it is a sign that we shall not satisfy the best people\nof the succeeding period. We have indeed \u201clived for all time,\u201d and the\napplause of the best people ensures our fame.(10)\n\n\n\n\n104.\n\n\nOF ONE SUBSTANCE.\u2014If we are of one substance with a book or a work of art,\nwe think in our heart of hearts that it must be excellent, and are\noffended if others find it ugly, over-spiced, or pretentious.\n\n\n\n\n105.\n\n\nSPEECH AND EMOTION.\u2014That speech is not given to us to communicate our\nemotions may be seen from the fact that all simple men are ashamed to seek\nfor words to express their deeper feelings. These feelings are expressed\nonly in actions, and even here such men blush if others seem to divine\ntheir motives. After all, among poets, to whom God generally denies this\nshame, the more noble are more monosyllabic in the language of emotion,\nand evince a certain constraint: whereas the real poets of emotion are for\nthe most part shameless in practical life.\n\n\n\n\n106.\n\n\nA MISTAKE ABOUT A PRIVATION.\u2014He that has not for a long time been\ncompletely weaned from an art, and is still always at home in it, has no\nidea how small a privation it is to live without that art.\n\n\n\n\n107.\n\n\nTHREE-QUARTER STRENGTH.\u2014A work that is meant to give an impression of\nhealth should be produced with three-quarters, at the most, of the\nstrength of its creator. If he has gone to his farthest limit, the work\nexcites the observer and disconcerts him by its tension. All good things\nhave something lazy about them and lie like cows in the meadow.\n\n\n\n\n108.\n\n\nREFUSING TO HAVE HUNGER AS A GUEST.\u2014As refined fare serves a hungry man as\nwell as and no better than coarser food, the more pretentious artist will\nnot dream of inviting the hungry man to his meal.\n\n\n\n\n109.\n\n\nLIVING WITHOUT ART AND WINE.\u2014It is with works of art as with wine\u2014it is\nbetter if one can do without both and keep to water, and if from the inner\nfire and inner sweetness of the soul the water spontaneously changes again\ninto wine.\n\n\n\n\n110.\n\n\nTHE PIRATE-GENIUS.\u2014The pirate-genius in art, who even knows how to deceive\nsubtle minds, arises when some one unscrupulously and from youth upwards\nregards all good things, that are not protected by law, as the property of\na particular person, as his legitimate spoil. Now all the good things of\npast ages and masters lie free around us, hedged about and protected by\nthe reverential awe of the few who know them. To these few our\nrobber-genius, by the force of his impudence, bids defiance and\naccumulates for himself a wealth that once more calls forth homage and\nawe.\n\n\n\n\n111.\n\n\nTO THE POETS OF GREAT TOWNS.\u2014In the gardens of modern poetry it will\nclearly be observed that the sewers of great towns are too near. With the\nfragrance of flowers is mingled something that betrays abomination and\nputrescence. With pain I ask: \u201cMust you poets always request wit and dirt\nto stand godfather, when an innocent and beautiful sensation has to be\nchristened by you? Are you obliged to dress your noble goddess in a hood\nof devilry and caricature? But whence this necessity, this obligation?\u201d\nThe reason is\u2014because you live too near the sewers.\n\n\n\n\n112.\n\n\nOF THE SALT OF SPEECH.\u2014No one has ever explained why the Greek writers,\nhaving at command such an unparalleled wealth and power of language, made\nso sparing a use of their resources that every post-classical Greek book\nappears by comparison crude, over-coloured, and extravagant. It is said\nthat towards the North Polar ice and in the hottest countries salt is\nbecoming less and less used, whereas on the other hand the dwellers on the\nplains and by the coast in the more temperate zones use salt in great\nabundance. Is it possible that the Greeks from a twofold reason\u2014because\ntheir intellect was colder and clearer but their fundamental passionate\nnature far more tropical than ours\u2014did not need salt and spice to the same\nextent that we do?\n\n\n\n\n113.\n\n\nTHE FREEST WRITER.\u2014In a book for free spirits one cannot avoid mention of\nLaurence Sterne, the man whom Goethe honoured as the freest spirit of his\ncentury. May he be satisfied with the honour of being called the freest\nwriter of all times, in comparison with whom all others appear stiff,\nsquare-toed, intolerant, and downright boorish! In his case we should not\nspeak of the clear and rounded but of \u201cthe endless melody\u201d\u2014if by this\nphrase we arrive at a name for an artistic style in which the definite\nform is continually broken, thrust aside and transferred to the realm of\nthe indefinite, so that it signifies one and the other at the same time.\nSterne is the great master of _double entendre_, this phrase being\nnaturally used in a far wider sense than is commonly done when one applies\nit to sexual relations. We may give up for lost the reader who always\nwants to know exactly what Sterne thinks about a matter, and whether he be\nmaking a serious or a smiling face (for he can do both with one wrinkling\nof his features; he can be and even wishes to be right and wrong at the\nsame moment, to interweave profundity and farce). His digressions are at\nonce continuations and further developments of the story, his maxims\ncontain a satire on all that is sententious, his dislike of seriousness is\nbound up with a disposition to take no matter merely externally and on the\nsurface. So in the proper reader he arouses a feeling of uncertainty\nwhether he be walking, lying, or standing, a feeling most closely akin to\nthat of floating in the air. He, the most versatile of writers,\ncommunicates something of this versatility to his reader. Yes, Sterne\nunexpectedly changes the parts, and is often as much reader as author, his\nbook being like a play within a play, a theatre audience before another\ntheatre audience. We must surrender at discretion to the mood of Sterne,\nalthough we can always expect it to be gracious. It is strangely\ninstructive to see how so great a writer as Diderot has affected this\n_double entendre_ of Sterne\u2019s\u2014to be equally ambiguous throughout is just\nthe Sternian super-humour. Did Diderot imitate, admire, ridicule, or\nparody Sterne in his _Jacques le Fataliste_? One cannot be exactly\ncertain, and this uncertainty was perhaps intended by the author. This\nvery doubt makes the French unjust to the work of one of their first\nmasters, one who need not be ashamed of comparison with any of the\nancients or moderns. For humour (and especially for this humorous attitude\ntowards humour itself) the French are too serious. Is it necessary to add\nthat of all great authors Sterne is the worst model, in fact the\ninimitable author, and that even Diderot had to pay for his daring? What\nthe worthy Frenchmen and before them some Greeks and Romans aimed at and\nattained in prose is the very opposite of what Sterne aims at and attains.\nHe raises himself as a masterly exception above all that artists in\nwriting demand of themselves\u2014propriety, reserve, character, steadfastness\nof purpose, comprehensiveness, perspicuity, good deportment in gait and\nfeature. Unfortunately Sterne the man seems to have been only too closely\nrelated to Sterne the writer. His squirrel-soul sprang with insatiable\nunrest from branch to branch; he knew what lies between sublimity and\nrascality; he had sat on every seat, always with unabashed watery eyes and\nmobile play of feature. He was\u2014if language does not revolt from such a\ncombination\u2014of a hard-hearted kindness, and in the midst of the joys of a\ngrotesque and even corrupt imagination he showed the bashful grace of\ninnocence. Such a carnal and spiritual hermaphroditism, such untrammelled\nwit penetrating into every vein and muscle, was perhaps never possessed by\nany other man.\n\n\n\n\n114.\n\n\nA CHOICE REALITY.\u2014Just as the good prose writer only takes words that\nbelong to the language of daily intercourse, though not by a long way all\nits words\u2014whence arises a choice style\u2014so the good poet of the future will\nonly represent the real and turn his eyes away from all fantastic,\nsuperstitious, half-voiced, forgotten stories, to which earlier poets\ndevoted their powers. Only reality, though by a long way not every\nreality\u2014but a choice reality.\n\n\n\n\n115.\n\n\nDEGENERATE SPECIES OF ART.\u2014Side by side with the genuine species of art,\nthose of great repose and great movement, there are degenerate\nspecies\u2014weary, blas\u00e9 art and excited art. Both would have their weakness\ntaken for strength and wish to be confounded with the genuine species.\n\n\n\n\n116.\n\n\nA HERO IMPOSSIBLE FROM LACK OF COLOUR.\u2014The typical poets and artists of\nour age like to compose their pictures upon a background of shimmering\nred, green, grey, and gold, on the background of nervous sensuality\u2014a\ncondition well understood by the children of this century. The drawback\ncomes when we do _not_ look at these pictures with the eyes of our\ncentury. Then we see that the great figures painted by these artists have\nsomething flickering, tremulous, and dizzy about them, and accordingly we\ndo not ascribe to them heroic deeds, but at best mock-heroic, swaggering\n_mis_deeds.\n\n\n\n\n117.\n\n\nOVERLADEN STYLE.\u2014The overladen style is a consequence of the\nimpoverishment of the organising force together with a lavish stock of\nexpedients and intentions. At the beginnings of art the very reverse\nconditions sometimes appear.\n\n\n\n\n118.\n\n\n_PULCHRUM EST PAUCORUM HOMINUM._\u2014History and experience tell us that the\nsignificant grotesqueness that mysteriously excites the imagination and\ncarries one beyond everyday reality, is older and grows more luxuriantly\nthan the beautiful and reverence for the beautiful in art: and that it\nbegins to flourish exceedingly when the sense for beauty is on the wane.\nFor the vast majority of mankind this grotesque seems to be a higher need\nthan the beautiful, presumably because it contains a coarser narcotic.\n\n\n\n\n119.\n\n\nORIGINS OF TASTE IN WORKS OF ART.\u2014If we consider the primary germs of the\nartistic sense, and ask ourselves what are the various kinds of joy\nproduced by the firstlings of art\u2014as, for example, among savage tribes\u2014we\nfind first of all the joy of understanding what another means. Art in this\ncase is a sort of conundrum, which causes its solver pleasure in his own\nquick and keen perceptions.\u2014Then the roughest works of art remind us of\nthe pleasant things we have actually experienced, and so give joy\u2014as, for\nexample, when the artist alludes to a chase, a victory, a wedding.\u2014Again,\nthe representation may cause us to feel excited, touched, inflamed, as for\ninstance in the glorification of revenge and danger. Here the enjoyment\nlies in the excitement itself, in the victory over tedium.\u2014The memory,\ntoo, of unpleasant things, so far as they have been overcome or make us\nappear interesting to the listener as subjects for art (as when the singer\ndescribes the mishaps of a daring seaman), can inspire great joy, the\ncredit for which is given to art.\u2014A more subtle variety is the joy that\narises at the sight of all that is regular and symmetrical in lines,\npoints, and rhythms. For by a certain analogy is awakened the feeling for\nall that is orderly and regular in life, which one has to thank alone for\nall well-being. So in the cult of symmetry we unconsciously do homage to\nrule and proportion as the source of our previous happiness, and the joy\nin this case is a kind of hymn of thanksgiving. Only when a certain\nsatiety of the last-mentioned joy arises does a more subtle feeling step\nin, that enjoyment might even lie in a violation of the symmetrical and\nregular. This feeling, for example, impels us to seek reason in apparent\nunreason, and the sort of \u00e6sthetic riddle-guessing that results is in a\nway the higher species of the first-named artistic joy.\u2014He who pursues\nthis speculation still further will know what kind of hypotheses for the\nexplanation of \u00e6sthetic phenomena are hereby fundamentally rejected.\n\n\n\n\n120.\n\n\nNOT TOO NEAR.\u2014It is a disadvantage for good thoughts when they follow too\nclosely on one another, for they hide the view from each other. That is\nwhy great artists and writers have made an abundant use of the mediocre.\n\n\n\n\n121.\n\n\nROUGHNESS AND WEAKNESS.\u2014Artists of all periods have made the discovery\nthat in roughness lies a certain strength, and that not every one can be\nrough who wants to be: also that many varieties of weakness have a\npowerful effect on the emotions. From this source are derived many\nartistic substitutes, which not even the greatest and most conscientious\nartists can abstain from using.\n\n\n\n\n122.\n\n\nGOOD MEMORY.\u2014Many a man fails to become a thinker for the sole reason that\nhis memory is too good.\n\n\n\n\n123.\n\n\nAROUSING INSTEAD OF APPEASING HUNGER.\u2014Great artists fancy that they have\ntaken full possession of a soul. In reality, and often to their painful\ndisappointment, that soul has only been made more capacious and\ninsatiable, so that a dozen greater artists could plunge into its depths\nwithout filling it up.\n\n\n\n\n124.\n\n\nARTISTS\u2019 ANXIETY.\u2014The anxiety lest people may not believe that their\nfigures are _alive_ can mislead many artists of declining taste to portray\nthese figures so that they appear as if mad. From the same anxiety, on the\nother hand, Greek artists of the earliest ages gave even dead and sorely\nwounded men that smile which they knew as the most vivid sign of\nlife\u2014careless of the actual forms bestowed by nature on life at its last\ngasp.\n\n\n\n\n125.\n\n\nTHE CIRCLE MUST BE COMPLETED.\u2014He who follows a philosophy or a genre of\nart to the end of its career and beyond, understands from inner experience\nwhy the masters and disciples who come after have so often turned, with a\ndepreciatory gesture, into a new groove. The circle must be described\u2014but\nthe individual, even the greatest, sits firm on his point of the\ncircumference, with an inexorable look of obstinacy, as if the circle\nought never to be completed.\n\n\n\n\n126.\n\n\nTHE OLDER ART AND THE SOUL OF THE PRESENT.\u2014Since every art becomes more\nand more adapted to the expression of spiritual states, of the more\nlively, delicate, energetic, and passionate states, the later masters,\nspoilt by these means of expression, do not feel at their ease in the\npresence of the old-time works of art. They feel as if the ancients had\nmerely been lacking in the means of making their souls speak clearly, also\nperhaps in some necessary technical preliminaries. They think that they\nmust render some assistance in this quarter, for they believe in the\nsimilarity or even unity of all souls. In truth, however, measure,\nsymmetry, a contempt for graciousness and charm, an unconscious severity\nand morning chilliness, an evasion of passion, as if passion meant the\ndeath of art\u2014such are the constituents of sentiment and morality in all\nold masters, who selected and arranged their means of expression not at\nrandom but in a necessary connection with their morality. Knowing this,\nare we to deny those that come after the right to animate the older works\nwith their soul? No, for these works can only survive through our giving\nthem our soul, and our blood alone enables them to speak to _us_. The real\n\u201chistoric\u201d discourse would talk ghostly speech to ghosts. We honour the\ngreat artists less by that barren timidity that allows every word, every\nnote to remain intact than by energetic endeavours to aid them continually\nto a new life.\u2014True, if Beethoven were suddenly to come to life and hear\none of his works performed with that modern animation and nervous\nrefinement that bring glory to our masters of execution, he would probably\nbe silent for a long while, uncertain whether he should raise his hand to\ncurse or to bless, but perhaps say at last: \u201cWell, well! That is neither I\nnor not-I, but a third thing\u2014it seems to me, too, something right, if not\njust _the_ right thing. But you must know yourselves what to do, as in any\ncase it is you who have to listen. As our Schiller says, \u2018the living man\nis right.\u2019 So have it your own way, and let me go down again.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n127.\n\n\nAGAINST THE DISPARAGERS OF BREVITY.\u2014A brief dictum may be the fruit and\nharvest of long reflection. The reader, however, who is a novice in this\nfield and has never considered the case in point, sees something embryonic\nin all brief dicta, not without a reproachful hint to the author,\nrequesting him not to serve up such raw and ill-prepared food.\n\n\n\n\n128.\n\n\nAGAINST THE SHORT-SIGHTED.\u2014Do you think it is piece-work because it is\n(and must be) offered you in pieces?\n\n\n\n\n129.\n\n\nREADERS OF APHORISMS.\u2014The worst readers of aphorisms are the friends of\nthe author, if they make a point of referring the general to the\nparticular instance to which the aphorism owes its origin. This\nnamby-pamby attitude brings all the author\u2019s trouble to naught, and\ninstead of a philosophic lesson and a philosophic frame of mind, they\ndeservedly gain nothing but the satisfaction of a vulgar curiosity.\n\n\n\n\n130.\n\n\nREADERS\u2019 INSULTS.\u2014The reader offers a two-fold insult to the author by\npraising his second book at the expense of his first (or _vice versa_) and\nby expecting the author to be grateful to him on that account.\n\n\n\n\n131.\n\n\nTHE EXCITING ELEMENT IN THE HISTORY OF ART.\u2014We fall into a state of\nterrible tension when we follow the history of an art\u2014as, for example,\nthat of Greek oratory\u2014and, passing from master to master, observe their\nincreasing precautions to obey the old and the new laws and all these\nself-imposed limitations. We see that the bow _must_ snap, and that the\nso-called \u201cloose\u201d composition, with the wonderful means of expression\nsmothered and concealed (in this particular case the florid style of\nAsianism), was once necessary and almost _beneficial_.\n\n\n\n\n132.\n\n\nTO THE GREAT IN ART.\u2014That enthusiasm for some object which you, O great\nman, introduce into this world causes the intelligence of the many to be\nstunted. The knowledge of this fact spells humiliation. But the enthusiast\nwears his hump with pride and pleasure, and you have the consolation of\nfeeling that you have increased the world\u2019s happiness.\n\n\n\n\n133.\n\n\nCONSCIENCELESS \u00c6STHETES.\u2014The real fanatics of an artistic school are\nperhaps those utterly inartistic natures that are not even grounded in the\nelements of artistic study and creation, but are impressed with the\nstrongest of all the elementary influences of an art. For them there is no\n\u00e6sthetic conscience\u2014hence nothing to hold them back from fanaticism.\n\n\n\n\n134.\n\n\nHOW THE SOUL SHOULD BE MOVED BY THE NEW MUSIC.\u2014The artistic purpose\nfollowed by the new music, in what is now forcibly but none too lucidly\ntermed \u201cendless melody,\u201d can be understood by going into the sea,\ngradually losing one\u2019s firm tread on the bottom, and finally surrendering\nunconditionally to the fluid element. One has to _swim_. In the previous,\nolder music one was forced, with delicate or stately or impassioned\nmovement, to _dance_. The measure necessary for dancing, the observance of\na distinct balance of time and force in the soul of the hearer, imposed a\ncontinual self-control. Through the counteraction of the cooler draught of\nair which came from this caution and the warmer breath of musical\nenthusiasm, that music exercised its spell.\u2014Richard Wagner aimed at a\ndifferent excitation of the soul, allied, as above said, to swimming and\nfloating. This is perhaps the most essential of his innovations. His\nfamous method, originating from this aim and adapted to it\u2014the \u201cendless\nmelody\u201d\u2014strives to break and sometimes even to despise all mathematical\nequilibrium of time and force. He is only too rich in the invention of\nsuch effects, which sound to the old school like rhythmic paradoxes and\nblasphemies. He dreads petrifaction, crystallisation, the development of\nmusic into the architectural. He accordingly sets up a three-time rhythm\nin opposition to the double-time, not infrequently introduces five-time\nand seven-time, immediately repeats a phrase, but with a prolation, so\nthat its time is again doubled and trebled. From an easy-going imitation\nof such art may arise a great danger to music, for by the side of the\nsuperabundance of rhythmic emotion demoralisation and decadence lurk in\nambush. The danger will become very great if such music comes to associate\nitself more and more closely with a quite naturalistic art of acting and\npantomime, trained and dominated by no higher plastic models; an art that\nknows no measure in itself and can impart no measure to the kindred\nelement, the all-too-womanish nature of music.\n\n\n\n\n135.\n\n\nPOET AND REALITY.\u2014The Muse of the poet who is not in love with reality\nwill not be reality, and will bear him children with hollow eyes and all\ntoo tender bones.\n\n\n\n\n136.\n\n\nMEANS AND END.\u2014In art the end does not justify the means, but holy means\ncan justify the end.\n\n\n\n\n137.\n\n\nTHE WORST READERS.\u2014The worst readers are those who act like plundering\nsoldiers. They take out some things that they might use, cover the rest\nwith filth and confusion, and blaspheme about the whole.\n\n\n\n\n138.\n\n\nSIGNS OF A GOOD WRITER.\u2014Good writers have two things in common: they\nprefer being understood to being admired, and they do not write for the\ncritical and over-shrewd reader.\n\n\n\n\n139.\n\n\nTHE MIXED SPECIES.\u2014The mixed species in art bear witness to their authors\u2019\ndistrust of their own strength. They seek auxiliary powers, advocates,\nhiding-places\u2014such is the case with the poet who calls in philosophy, the\nmusician who calls in the drama, and the thinker who calls in rhetoric to\nhis aid.\n\n\n\n\n140.\n\n\nSHUTTING ONE\u2019S MOUTH.\u2014When his book opens its mouth, the author must shut\nhis.\n\n\n\n\n141.\n\n\nBADGES OF RANK.\u2014All poets and men of letters who are in love with the\nsuperlative want to do more than they can.\n\n\n\n\n142.\n\n\nCOLD BOOKS.\u2014The deep thinker reckons on readers who feel with him the\nhappiness that lies in deep thinking. Hence a book that looks cold and\nsober, if seen in the right light, may seem bathed in the sunshine of\nspiritual cheerfulness and become a genuine soul-comforter.\n\n\n\n\n143.\n\n\nA KNACK OF THE SLOW-WITTED.\u2014The slow-witted thinker generally allies\nhimself with loquacity and ceremoniousness. By the former he thinks he is\ngaining mobility and fluency, by the latter he gives his peculiarity the\nappearance of being a result of free will and artistic purpose, with a\nview to dignity, which needs slow movement.\n\n\n\n\n144.\n\n\n_LE STYLE BAROQUE._(11)\u2014He who as thinker and writer is not born or\ntrained to dialectic and the consecutive arrangement of ideas, will\nunconsciously turn to the rhetoric and dramatic forms. For, after all, his\nobject is to make himself understood and to carry the day by force, and he\nis indifferent whether, as shepherd, he honestly guides to himself the\nhearts of his fellow-men, or, as robber, he captures them by surprise.\nThis is true of the plastic arts as of music: where the feeling of\ninsufficient dialectic or a deficiency in expression or narration,\ntogether with an urgent, over-powerful impulse to form, gives birth to\nthat species of style known as \u201cbaroque.\u201d Only the ill-educated and the\narrogant will at once find a depreciatory force in this word. The baroque\nstyle always arises at the time of decay of a great art, when the demands\nof art in classical expression have become too great. It is a natural\nphenomenon which will be observed with melancholy\u2014for it is a forerunner\nof the night\u2014but at the same time with admiration for its peculiar\ncompensatory arts of expression and narration. To this style belongs\nalready a choice of material and subjects of the highest dramatic tension,\nat which the heart trembles even when there is no art, because heaven and\nhell are all too near the emotions: then, the oratory of strong passion\nand gestures, of ugly sublimity, of great masses, in fact of absolute\nquantity _per se_ (as is shown in Michael Angelo, the father or\ngrandfather of the Italian baroque stylists): the lights of dusk,\nillumination and conflagration playing upon those strongly moulded forms:\never-new ventures in means and aims, strongly underscored by artists for\nartists, while the layman must fancy he sees an unconscious overflowing of\nall the horns of plenty of an original nature-art: all these\ncharacteristics that constitute the greatness of that style are neither\npossible nor permitted in the earlier ante-classical and classical periods\nof a branch of art. Such luxuries hang long on the tree like forbidden\nfruit. Just now, when music is passing into this last phase, we may learn\nto know the phenomenon of the baroque style in peculiar splendour, and, by\ncomparison, find much that is instructive for earlier ages. For from Greek\ntimes onward there has often been a baroque style, in poetry, oratory,\nprose writing, sculpture, and, as is well known, in architecture. This\nstyle, though wanting in the highest nobility,\u2014the nobility of an\ninnocent, unconscious, triumphant perfection,\u2014has nevertheless given\npleasure to many of the best and most serious minds of their time. Hence,\nas aforesaid, it is presumptuous to depreciate it without reserve, however\nhappy we may feel because our taste for it has not made us insensible to\nthe purer and greater style.\n\n\n\n\n145.\n\n\nTHE VALUE OF HONEST BOOKS.\u2014Honest books make the reader honest, at least\nby exciting his hatred and aversion, which otherwise cunning cleverness\nknows so well how to conceal. Against a book, however, we let ourselves\ngo, however restrained we may be in our relations with men.\n\n\n\n\n146.\n\n\nHOW ART MAKES PARTISANS.\u2014Individual fine passages, an exciting general\ntenor, a moving and absorbing finale\u2014so much of a work of art is\naccessible even to most laymen. In an art period when it is desired to win\nover the great majority of the laymen to the side of the artists and to\nmake a party perhaps for the very preservation of art, the creative artist\nwill do well to offer nothing more than the above. Then he will not be a\nsquanderer of his strength, in spheres where no one is grateful to him.\nFor to perform the remaining functions, the imitation of Nature in her\norganic development and growth, would in that case be like sowing seeds in\nwater.\n\n\n\n\n147.\n\n\nBECOMING GREAT TO THE DETRIMENT OF HISTORY.\u2014Every later master who leads\nthe taste of art-lovers into his channel unconsciously gives rise to a\nselection and revaluation of the older masters and their works. Whatever\nin them is conformable and akin to him, and anticipates and foreshadows\nhim, appears henceforth as the only important element in them and their\nworks\u2014a fruit in which a great error usually lies hidden like a worm.\n\n\n\n\n148.\n\n\nHOW AN EPOCH BECOMES LURED TO ART.\u2014If we teach people by all the\nenchantments of artists and thinkers to feel reverence for their defects,\ntheir intellectual poverty, their absurd infatuations and passions (as it\nis quite possible to do); if we show them only the lofty side of crime and\nfolly, only the touching and appealing element in weakness and flabbiness\nand blind devotion (that too has often enough been done):\u2014we have employed\nthe means for inspiring even an unphilosophical and inartistic age with an\necstatic love of philosophy and art (especially of thinkers and artists as\npersonalities) and, in the worst case, perhaps with the only means of\ndefending the existence of such tender and fragile beings.\n\n\n\n\n149.\n\n\nCRITICISM AND JOY.\u2014Criticism, one-sided and unjust as well as intelligent\ncriticism, gives so much pleasure to him who exercises it that the world\nis indebted to every work and every action that inspires much criticism\nand many critics. For criticism draws after it a glittering train of\njoyousness, wit, self-admiration, pride, instruction, designs of\nimprovement.\u2014The God of joy created the bad and the mediocre for the same\nreason that he created the good.\n\n\n\n\n150.\n\n\nBEYOND HIS LIMITS.\u2014When an artist wants to be more than an artist\u2014for\nexample, the moral awakener of his people\u2014he at last falls in love, as a\npunishment, with a monster of moral substance. The Muse laughs, for,\nthough a kind-hearted Goddess, she can also be malignant from jealousy.\nMilton and Klopstock are cases in point.\n\n\n\n\n151.\n\n\nA GLASS EYE.\u2014The tendency of a talent towards moral subjects, characters,\nmotives, towards the \u201cbeautiful soul\u201d of the work of art, is often only a\nglass eye put on by the artist who lacks a beautiful soul. It may result,\nthough rarely, that his eye finally becomes living Nature, if indeed it be\nNature with a somewhat troubled look. But the ordinary result is that the\nwhole world thinks it sees Nature where there is only cold glass.\n\n\n\n\n152.\n\n\nWRITING AND DESIRE FOR VICTORY.\u2014Writing should always indicate a victory,\nindeed a conquest of oneself which must be communicated to others for\ntheir behoof. There are, however, dyspeptic authors who only write when\nthey cannot digest something, or when something has remained stuck in\ntheir teeth. Through their anger they try unconsciously to disgust the\nreader too, and to exercise violence upon him\u2014that is, they desire\nvictory, but victory over others.\n\n\n\n\n153.\n\n\nA GOOD BOOK NEEDS TIME.\u2014Every good book tastes bitter when it first comes\nout, for it has the defect of newness. Moreover, it suffers damage from\nits living author, if he is well known and much talked about. For all the\nworld is accustomed to confuse the author with his work. Whatever of\nprofundity, sweetness, and brilliance the work may contain must be\ndeveloped as the years go by, under the care of growing, then old, and\nlastly traditional reverence. Many hours must pass, many a spider must\nhave woven its web about the book. A book is made better by good readers\nand clearer by good opponents.\n\n\n\n\n154.\n\n\nEXTRAVAGANCE AS AN ARTISTIC MEANS.\u2014Artists well understand the idea of\nusing extravagance as an artistic means in order to convey an impression\nof wealth. This is one of those innocent wiles of soul-seduction that the\nartist must know, for in his world, which has only appearance in view, the\nmeans to appearance need not necessarily be genuine.\n\n\n\n\n155.\n\n\nTHE HIDDEN BARREL-ORGAN.\u2014Genius, by virtue of its more ample drapery,\nknows better than talent how to hide its barrel-organ. Yet after all it\ntoo can only play its seven old pieces over and over again.\n\n\n\n\n156.\n\n\nTHE NAME ON THE TITLE-PAGE.\u2014It is now a matter of custom and almost of\nduty for the author\u2019s name to appear on the book, and this is a main cause\nof the fact that books have so little influence. If they are good, they\nare worth more than the personalities of their authors, of which they are\nthe quintessences. But as soon as the author makes himself known on the\ntitle-page, the quintessence, from the reader\u2019s point of view, becomes\ndiluted with the personal, the most personal element, and the aim of the\nbook is frustrated. It is the ambition of the intellect no longer to\nappear individual.\n\n\n\n\n157.\n\n\nTHE MOST CUTTING CRITICISM.\u2014We make the most cutting criticism of a man or\na book when we indicate his or its ideal.\n\n\n\n\n158.\n\n\nLITTLE OR NO LOVE.\u2014Every good book is written for a particular reader and\nmen of his stamp, and for that very reason is looked upon unfavourably by\nall other readers, by the vast majority. Its reputation accordingly rests\non a narrow basis and must be built up by degrees.\u2014The mediocre and bad\nbook is mediocre and bad because it seeks to please, and does please, a\ngreat number.\n\n\n\n\n159.\n\n\nMUSIC AND DISEASE.\u2014The danger of the new music lies in the fact that it\nputs the cup of rapture and exaltation to the lips so invitingly, and with\nsuch a show of moral ecstasy, that even the noble and temperate man always\ndrinks a drop too much. This minimum of intemperance, constantly repeated,\ncan in the end bring about a deeper convulsion and destruction of mental\nhealth than any coarse excess could do. Hence nothing remains but some day\nto fly from the grotto of the nymph, and through perils and billowy seas\nto forge one\u2019s way to the smoke of Ithaca and the embraces of a simpler\nand more human spouse.\n\n\n\n\n160.\n\n\nADVANTAGE FOR OPPONENTS.\u2014A book full of intellect communicates something\nthereof even to its opponents.\n\n\n\n\n161.\n\n\nYOUTH AND CRITICISM.\u2014To criticise a book means, for the young, not to let\noneself be touched by a single productive thought therefrom, and to\nprotect one\u2019s skin with hands and feet. The youngster lives in opposition\nto all novelty that he cannot love in the lump, in a position of\nself-defence, and in this connection he commits, as often as he can, a\nsuperfluous sin.\n\n\n\n\n162.\n\n\nEFFECT OF QUANTITY.\u2014The greatest paradox in the history of poetic art lies\nin this: that in all that constitutes the greatness of the old poets a man\nmay be a barbarian, faulty and deformed from top to toe, and still remain\nthe greatest of poets. This is the case with Shakespeare, who, as compared\nwith Sophocles, is like a mine of immeasurable wealth in gold, lead, and\nrubble, whereas Sophocles is not merely gold, but gold in its noblest\nform, one that almost makes us forget the money-value of the metal. But\nquantity in its highest intensity has the same effect as quality. That is\na good thing for Shakespeare.\n\n\n\n\n163.\n\n\nALL BEGINNING IS DANGEROUS.\u2014The Poet can choose whether to raise emotion\nfrom one grade to another, and so finally to exalt it to a great height\u2014or\nto try a surprise attack, and from the start to pull the bell-rope with\nmight and main. Both processes have their danger\u2014in the first case his\nhearer may run away from him through boredom, in the second through\nterror.\n\n\n\n\n164.\n\n\nIN FAVOUR OF CRITICS.\u2014Insects sting, not from malice, but because they too\nwant to live. It is the same with our critics\u2014they desire our blood, not\nour pain.\n\n\n\n\n165.\n\n\nSUCCESS OF APHORISMS.\u2014The inexperienced, when an aphorism at once\nilluminates their minds with its naked truth, always think that it is old\nand well known. They look askance at the author, as if he had wanted to\nsteal the common property of all, whereas they enjoy highly spiced\nhalf-truths, and give the author to understand as much. He knows how to\nappreciate the hint, and easily guesses thereby where he has succeeded and\nfailed.\n\n\n\n\n166.\n\n\nTHE DESIRE FOR VICTORY.\u2014An artist who exceeds the limit of his strength in\nall that he undertakes will end by carrying the multitude along with him\nthrough the spectacle of violent wrestling that he affords. Success is not\nalways the accompaniment only of victory, but also of the desire for\nvictory.\n\n\n\n\n167.\n\n\n_SIBI SCRIBERE._\u2014The sensible author writes for no other posterity than\nhis own\u2014that is, for his age\u2014so as to be able even then to take pleasure\nin himself.\n\n\n\n\n168.\n\n\nPRAISE OF THE APHORISM.\u2014A good aphorism is too hard for the tooth of time,\nand is not worn away by all the centuries, although it serves as food for\nevery epoch. Hence it is the greatest paradox in literature, the\nimperishable in the midst of change, the nourishment which always remains\nhighly valued, as salt does, and never becomes stupid like salt.\n\n\n\n\n169.\n\n\nTHE ART-NEED OF THE SECOND ORDER.\u2014The people may have something of what\ncan be called art-need, but it is small, and can be cheaply satisfied. On\nthe whole, the remnant of art (it must be honestly confessed) suffices for\nthis need. Let us consider, for example, the kind of melodies and songs in\nwhich the most vigorous, unspoiled, and true-hearted classes of the\npopulation find genuine delight; let us live among shepherds, cowherds,\npeasants, huntsmen, soldiers, and sailors, and give ourselves the answer.\nAnd in the country town, just in the houses that are the homes of\ninherited civic virtue, is it not the worst music at present produced that\nis loved and, one might say, cherished? He who speaks of deeper needs and\nunsatisfied yearnings for art among the people, as it is, is a crank or an\nimpostor. Be honest! Only in exceptional men is there now an art-need in\nthe highest sense\u2014because art is once more on the down-grade, and human\npowers and hopes are for the time being directed to other matters.\u2014Apart\nfrom this, outside the populace, there exists indeed, in the higher and\nhighest strata of society, a broader and more comprehensive art-need, but\n_of the second order_. Here there is a sort of artistic commune, which\npossibly means to be sincere. But let us look at the elements! They are in\ngeneral the more refined malcontents, who attain no genuine pleasure in\nthemselves; the cultured, who have not become free enough to dispense with\nthe consolations of religion, and yet do not find its incense sufficiently\nfragrant; the half-aristocratic, who are too weak to combat by a heroic\nconversion or renunciation the one fundamental error of their lives or the\npernicious bent of their characters; the highly gifted, who think\nthemselves too dignified to be of service by modest activity, and are too\nlazy for real, self-sacrificing work; girls who cannot create for\nthemselves a satisfactory sphere of duties; women who have tied themselves\nby a light-hearted or nefarious marriage, and know that they are not tied\nsecurely enough; scholars, physicians, merchants, officials who\nspecialised too early and never gave their lives a free enough scope\u2014who\ndo their work efficiently, it is true, but with a worm gnawing at their\nhearts; finally, all imperfect artists\u2014these are nowadays the true needers\nof art! What do they really desire from art? Art is to drive away hours\nand moments of discomfort, boredom, half-bad conscience, and, if possible,\ntransform the faults of their lives and characters into faults of\nworld-destiny. Very different were the Greeks, who realised in their art\nthe outflow and overflow of their own sense of well-being and health, and\nloved to see their perfection once more from a standpoint outside\nthemselves. They were led to art by delight in themselves; our\ncontemporaries\u2014by disgust of themselves.\n\n\n\n\n170.\n\n\nTHE GERMANS IN THE THEATRE.\u2014The real theatrical talent of the Germans was\nKotzebue. He and his Germans, those of higher as well as those of\nmiddle-class society, were necessarily associated, and his contemporaries\nshould have said of him in all seriousness, \u201cin him we live and move and\nhave our being.\u201d Here was nothing\u2014no constraint, pretence, or\nhalf-enjoyment: what he could and would do was understood. Yes, until now\nthe honest theatrical success on the German stage has been in the hands of\nthe shamefaced or unashamed heirs of Kotzebue\u2019s methods and influence\u2014that\nis, as far as comedy still flourishes at all. The result is that much of\nthe Germanism of that age, sometimes far off from the great towns, still\nsurvives. Good-natured; incontinent in small pleasures; always ready for\ntears; with the desire, in the theatre at any rate, to be able to get rid\nof their innate sobriety and strict attention to duty and exercise; a\nsmiling, nay, a laughing indulgence; confusing goodness and sympathy and\nwelding them into one, as is the essential characteristic of German\nsentimentality; exceedingly happy at a noble, magnanimous action; for the\nrest, submissive towards superiors, envious of each other, and yet in\ntheir heart of hearts thoroughly self-satisfied\u2014such were they and such\nwas he.\u2014The second dramatic talent was Schiller. He discovered a class of\nhearers which had hitherto never been taken into consideration: among the\ncallow German youth of both sexes. His poetry responded to their higher,\nnobler, more violent if more confused emotions, their delight in the\njingle of moral words (a delight that begins to disappear when we reach\nthe thirties). Thus he won for himself, by virtue of the passionateness\nand partisanship of the young, a success which gradually reacted with\nadvantage upon those of riper years. Generally speaking, Schiller\nrejuvenated the Germans. Goethe stood and still stands above the Germans\nin every respect. To them he will never belong. How could a nation in\nwell-being and well-wishing come up to the intellectuality of Goethe?\nBeethoven composed and Schopenhauer philosophised above the heads of the\nGermans, and it was above their heads, in the same way, that Goethe wrote\nhis _Tasso_, his _Iphigenie_. He was followed by a small company of highly\ncultured persons, who were educated by antiquity, life, and travel, and\nhad grown out of German ways of thought. He himself did not wish it to be\notherwise.\u2014When the Romantics set up their well-conceived Goethe cult;\nwhen their amazing skill in appreciation was passed on to the disciples of\nHegel, the real educators of the Germans of this century; when the\nawakening national ambition turned out advantageous to the fame of the\nGerman poets; when the real standard of the nation, as to whether it could\nhonestly find enjoyment in anything, became inexorably subordinated to the\njudgment of individuals and to that national ambition,\u2014that is, when\npeople began to enjoy by compulsion,\u2014then arose that false, spurious\nGerman culture which was ashamed of Kotzebue; which brought Sophocles,\nCalderon, and even the Second Part of Goethe\u2019s _Faust_ on the stage; and\nwhich, on account of its foul tongue and congested stomach, no longer\nknows now what it likes and what it finds tedious.\u2014Happy are those who\nhave taste, even if it be a bad taste! Only by this characteristic can one\nbe wise as well as happy. Hence the Greeks, who were very refined in such\nmatters, designated the sage by a word that means \u201cman of taste,\u201d and\ncalled wisdom, artistic as well as scientific, \u201ctaste\u201d (_sophia_).\n\n\n\n\n171.\n\n\nMUSIC AS A LATE-COMER IN EVERY CULTURE.\u2014Among all the arts that are\naccustomed to grow on a definite culture-soil and under definite social\nand political conditions, music is the last plant to come up, arising in\nthe autumn and fading-season of the culture to which it belongs. At the\nsame time, the first signs and harbingers of a new spring are usually\nalready noticeable, and sometimes music, like the language of a forgotten\nage, rings out into a new, astonished world, and comes too late. In the\nart of the Dutch and Flemish musicians the soul of the Christian middle\nages at last found its fullest tone: their sound-architecture is the\nposthumous but legitimate and equal sister of Gothic. Not until Handel\u2019s\nmusic was heard the note of the best in the soul of Luther and his kin,\nthe great Jud\u00e6o-heroical impulse that created the whole Reformation\nmovement. Mozart first expressed in golden melody the age of Louis XIV.\nand the art of Racine and Claude Lorrain. The eighteenth century\u2014that\ncentury of rhapsody, of broken ideals and transitory happiness\u2014only sang\nitself out in the music of Beethoven and Rossini. A lover of sentimental\nsimiles might say that all really important music was a swan-song.\u2014Music\nis, in fact, not a universal language for all time, as is so often said in\nits praise, but responds exactly to a particular period and warmth of\nemotion which involves a quite definite, individual culture, determined by\ntime and place, as its inner law. The music of Palestrina would be quite\nunintelligible to a Greek; and again, what would the music of Rossini\nconvey to Palestrina?\u2014It may be that our most modern German music, with\nall its pre-eminence and desire of pre-eminence, will soon be no longer\nunderstood. For this music sprang from a culture that is undergoing a\nrapid decay, from the soil of that epoch of reaction and restoration in\nwhich a certain Catholicism of feeling, as well as a delight in all\nindigenous, national, primitive manners, burst into bloom and scattered a\nblended perfume over Europe. These two emotional tendencies, adopted in\ntheir greatest strength and carried to their farthest limits, found final\nexpression in the music of Wagner. Wagner\u2019s predilection for the old\nnative sagas, his free idealisation of their unfamiliar gods and\nheroes,\u2014who are really sovereign beasts of prey with occasional fits of\nthoughtfulness, magnanimity, and boredom,\u2014his re-animation of those\nfigures, to which he gave in addition the medi\u00e6val Christian thirst for\necstatic sensuality and spiritualisation\u2014all this Wagnerian give-and-take\nwith regard to materials, souls, figures, and words\u2014would clearly express\nthe spirit of his music, if it could not, like all music, speak quite\nunambiguously of itself. This spirit wages the last campaign of reaction\nagainst the spirit of illumination which passed into this century from the\nlast, and also against the super-national ideas of French revolutionary\nromanticism and of English and American insipidity in the reconstruction\nof state and society.\u2014But is it not evident that the spheres of thought\nand emotion apparently suppressed by Wagner and his school have long since\nacquired fresh strength, and that his late musical protest against them\ngenerally rings into ears that prefer to hear different and opposite\nnotes; so that one day that high and wonderful art will suddenly become\nunintelligible and will be covered by the spider\u2019s web of oblivion?\u2014In\nconsidering this state of affairs we must not let ourselves be led astray\nby those transitory fluctuations which arise like a reaction within a\nreaction, as a temporary sinking of the mountainous wave in the midst of\nthe general upheaval. Thus, this decade of national war, ultramontane\nmartyrdom, and socialistic unrest may, in its remoter after-effect, even\naid the Wagnerian art to acquire a sudden halo, without guaranteeing that\nit \u201chas a future\u201d or that it has _the_ future. It is in the very nature of\nmusic that the fruits of its great culture-vintage should lose their taste\nand wither earlier than the fruits of the plastic arts or those that grow\non the tree of knowledge. Among all the products of the human artistic\nsense ideas are the most solid and lasting.\n\n\n\n\n172.\n\n\nTHE POET NO LONGER A TEACHER.\u2014Strange as it may sound to our time, there\nwere once poets and artists whose soul was above the passions with their\ndelights and convulsions, and who therefore took their pleasure in purer\nmaterials, worthier men, more delicate complications and d\u00e9nouements. If\nthe artists of our day for the most part unfetter the will, and so are\nunder certain circumstances for that very reason emancipators of life,\nthose were tamers of the will, enchanters of animals, creators of men. In\nfact, they moulded, re-moulded, and new-moulded life, whereas the fame of\npoets of our day lies in unharnessing, unchaining, and shattering.\u2014The\nancient Greeks demanded of the poet that he should be the teacher of grown\nmen. How ashamed the poet would be now if this demand were made of him! He\nis not even a good student of himself, and so never himself becomes a good\npoem or a fine picture. Under the most favourable circumstances he remains\nthe shy, attractive ruin of a temple, but at the same time a cavern of\ncravings, overgrown like a ruin with flowers, nettles, and poisonous\nweeds, inhabited and haunted by snakes, worms, spiders, and birds; an\nobject for sad reflection as to why the noblest and most precious must\ngrow up at once like a ruin, without the past and future of perfection.\n\n\n\n\n173.\n\n\nLOOKING FORWARD AND BACKWARD.\u2014An art like that which streams out of Homer,\nSophocles, Theocritus, Calderon, Racine, Goethe, as the superabundance of\na wise and harmonious conduct of life\u2014that is the true art, at which we\ngrasp when we have ourselves become wiser and more harmonious. It is not\nthat barbaric, if ever so delightful, outpouring of hot and highly\ncoloured things from an undisciplined, chaotic soul, which is what we\nunderstood by \u201cart\u201d in our youth. It is obvious from the nature of the\ncase that for certain periods of life an art of overstrain, excitement,\nantipathy to the orderly, monotonous, simple, logical, is an inevitable\nneed, to which artists must respond, lest the soul of such periods should\nunburden itself in other ways, through all kinds of disorder and\nimpropriety. Hence youths as they generally are, full, fermenting,\ntortured above all things by boredom, and women who lack work that fully\noccupies their soul, require that art of delightful disorder. All the more\nviolently on that account are they inflamed with a desire for satisfaction\nwithout change, happiness without stupor and intoxication.\n\n\n\n\n174.\n\n\nAGAINST THE ART OF WORKS OF ART.\u2014Art is above all and first of all meant\nto embellish life, to make us ourselves endurable and if possible\nagreeable in the eyes of others. With this task in view, art moderates us\nand holds us in restraint, creates forms of intercourse, binds over the\nuneducated to laws of decency, cleanliness, politeness, well-timed speech\nand silence. Hence art must conceal or transfigure everything that is\nugly\u2014the painful, terrible, and disgusting elements which in spite of\nevery effort will always break out afresh in accordance with the very\norigin of human nature. Art has to perform this duty especially in regard\nto the passions and spiritual agonies and anxieties, and to cause the\nsignificant factor to shine through unavoidable or unconquerable ugliness.\nTo this great, super-great task the so-called art proper, that of works of\nart, is a mere accessary. A man who feels within himself a surplus of such\npowers of embellishment, concealment, and transfiguration will finally\nseek to unburden himself of this surplus in works of art. The same holds\ngood, under special circumstances, of a whole nation.\u2014But as a rule we\nnowadays begin art at the end, hang on to its tail, and think that works\nof art constitute art proper, and that life should be improved and\ntransformed by this means\u2014fools that we are! If we begin a dinner with\ndessert, and try sweet after sweet, small wonder that we ruin our\ndigestions and even our appetites for the good, hearty, nourishing meal to\nwhich art invites us!\n\n\n\n\n175.\n\n\nCONTINUED EXISTENCE OF ART.\u2014Why, really, does a creative art nowadays\ncontinue to exist? Because the majority who have hours of leisure (and\nsuch an art is for them only) think that they cannot fill up their time\nwithout music, theatres and picture-galleries, novels and poetry. Granted\nthat one could keep them from this indulgence, either they would strive\nless eagerly for leisure, and the invidious sight of the rich would be\nless common (a great gain for the stability of society), or they would\nhave leisure, but would learn to reflect on what can be learnt and\nunlearnt: on their work, for instance, their associations, the pleasure\nthey could bestow. All the world, with the exception of the artist, would\nin both cases reap the advantage.\u2014Certainly, there are many vigorous,\nsensible readers who could take objection to this. Still, it must be said\non behalf of the coarse and malignant that the author himself is concerned\nwith this protest, and that there is in his book much to be read that is\nnot actually written down therein.\n\n\n\n\n176.\n\n\nTHE MOUTHPIECE OF THE GODS.\u2014The poet expresses the universal higher\nopinions of the nation, he is its mouthpiece and flute; but by virtue of\nmetre and all other artistic means he so expresses them that the nation\nregards them as something quite new and wonderful, and believes in all\nseriousness that he is the mouthpiece of the Gods. Yes, under the clouds\nof creation the poet himself forgets whence he derives all his\nintellectual wisdom\u2014from father and mother, from teachers and books of all\nkinds, from the street and particularly from the priest. He is deceived by\nhis own art, and really believes, in a na\u00efve period, that a God is\nspeaking through him, that he is creating in a state of religious\ninspiration. As a matter of fact, he is only saying what he has learnt, a\nmedley of popular wisdom and popular foolishness. Hence, so far as a poet\nis really _vox populi_ he is held to be _vox dei_.\n\n\n\n\n177.\n\n\nWHAT ALL ART WANTS TO DO AND CANNOT.\u2014The last and hardest task of the\nartist is the presentment of what remains the same, reposes in itself, is\nlofty and simple and free from the bizarre. Hence the noblest forms of\nmoral perfection are rejected as inartistic by weaker artists, because the\nsight of these fruits is too painful for their ambition. The fruit gleams\nat them from the topmost branches of art, but they lack the ladder, the\ncourage, the grip to venture so high. In himself a Phidias is quite\npossible as a poet, but, if modern strength be taken into consideration,\nalmost solely in the sense that to God nothing is impossible. The desire\nfor a poetical Claude Lorrain is already an immodesty at present, however\nearnestly one man\u2019s heart may yearn for such a consummation.\u2014The\npresentment of the highest man, the most simple and at the same time the\nmost complete, has hitherto been beyond the scope of all artists. Perhaps,\nhowever, the Greeks, in the ideal of Athene, saw farther than any men did\nbefore or after their time.\n\n\n\n\n178.\n\n\nART AND RESTORATION.\u2014The retrograde movements in history, the so-called\nperiods of restoration, which try to revive intellectual and social\nconditions that existed before those immediately preceding,\u2014and seem\nreally to succeed in giving them a brief resurrection,\u2014have the charm of\nsentimental recollection, ardent longing for what is almost lost, hasty\nembracing of a transitory happiness. It is on account of this strange\ntrend towards seriousness that in such transient and almost dreamy periods\nart and poetry find a natural soil, just as the tenderest and rarest\nplants grow on mountain-slopes of steep declivity.\u2014Thus many a good artist\nis unwittingly impelled to a \u201crestoration\u201d way of thinking in politics and\nsociety, for which, on his own account, he prepares a quiet little corner\nand garden. Here he collects about himself the human remains of the\nhistorical epoch that appeals to him, and plays his lyre to many who are\ndead, half-dead, and weary to death, perhaps with the above-mentioned\nresult of a brief resurrection.\n\n\n\n\n179.\n\n\nHAPPINESS OF THE AGE.\u2014In two respects our age is to be accounted happy.\nWith respect to the _past_, we enjoy all cultures and their productions,\nand nurture ourselves on the noblest blood of all periods. We stand\nsufficiently near to the magic of the forces from whose womb these periods\nare born to be able in passing to submit to their spell with pleasure and\nterror; whereas earlier cultures could only enjoy themselves, and never\nlooked beyond themselves, but were rather overarched by a bell of broader\nor narrower dome, through which indeed light streamed down to them, but\nwhich their gaze could not pierce. With respect to the _future_, there\nopens out to us for the first time a mighty, comprehensive vista of human\nand economic purposes engirdling the whole inhabited globe. At the same\ntime, we feel conscious of a power ourselves to take this new task in hand\nwithout presumption, without requiring supernatural aids. Yes, whatever\nthe result of our enterprise, however much we may have overestimated our\nstrength, at any rate we need render account to no one but ourselves, and\nmankind can henceforth begin to do with itself what it will.\u2014There are, it\nis true, peculiar human bees, who only know how to suck the bitterest and\nworst elements from the chalice of every flower. It is true that all\nflowers contain something that is not honey, but these bees may be allowed\nto feel in their own way about the happiness of our time, and continue to\nbuild up their hive of discomfort.\n\n\n\n\n180.\n\n\nA VISION.\u2014Hours of instruction and meditation for adults, even the most\nmature, and such institutions visited without compulsion but in accordance\nwith the moral injunction of the whole community; the churches as the\nmeeting-places most worthy and rich in memories for the purpose; at the\nsame time daily festivals in honour of the reason that is attained and\nattainable by man; a newer and fuller budding and blooming of the ideal of\nthe teacher, in which the clergyman, the artist and the physician, the man\nof science and the sage are blended, and their individual virtues should\ncome to the fore as a collective virtue in their teaching itself, in their\ndiscourses, in their method\u2014this is my ever-recurring vision, of which I\nfirmly believe that it has raised a corner of the veil of the future.\n\n\n\n\n181.\n\n\nEDUCATION A DISTORTION.\u2014The extraordinary haphazardness of the whole\nsystem of education, which leads every adult to say nowadays that his sole\neducator was chance, and the weathercock-nature of educational methods and\naims, may be explained as follows. The oldest and the newest\nculture-powers, as in a turbulent mass-meeting, would rather be heard than\nunderstood, and wish to prove at all costs by their outcries and\nclamourings that they still exist or already exist. The poor teachers and\neducators are first dazed by this senseless noise, then become silent and\nfinally apathetic, allowing anything to be done to them just as they in\ntheir turn allow anything to be done to their pupils. They are not trained\nthemselves, so how are they to train others? They are themselves no\nstraight-growing, vigorous, succulent trees, and he who wishes to attach\nhimself to them must wind and bend himself and finally become distorted\nand deformed as they.\n\n\n\n\n182.\n\n\nPHILOSOPHERS AND ARTISTS OF THE AGE.\u2014Rhapsody and frigidity, burning\ndesires and waning of the heart\u2019s glow\u2014this wretched medley is to be found\nin the picture of the highest European society of the present day. There\nthe artist thinks that he is achieving a great deal when through his art\nhe lights the torch of the heart as well as the torch of desire. The\nphilosopher has the same notion, when in the chilliness of his heart,\nwhich he has in common with his age, he cools hot desires in himself and\nhis following by his world-denying judgments.\n\n\n\n\n183.\n\n\nNOT TO BE A SOLDIER OF CULTURE WITHOUT NECESSITY.\u2014At last people are\nlearning what it costs us so dear not to know in our youth\u2014that we must\nfirst do superior actions and secondly seek the superior wherever and\nunder whatever names it is to be found; that we must at once go out of the\nway of all badness and mediocrity _without fighting it_; and that even\ndoubt as to the excellence of a thing (such as quickly arises in one of\npractised taste) should rank as an argument against it and a reason for\ncompletely avoiding it. We must not shrink from the danger of occasionally\nmaking a mistake and confounding the less accessible good with the bad and\nimperfect. Only he who can do nothing better should attack the world\u2019s\nevils as the soldier of culture. But those who should support culture and\nspread its teachings ruin themselves if they go about armed, and by\nprecautions, night-watches, and bad dreams turn the peace of their\ndomestic and artistic life into sinister unrest.\n\n\n\n\n184.\n\n\nHOW NATURAL HISTORY SHOULD BE EXPOUNDED.\u2014Natural history, like the history\nof the war and victory of moral and intellectual forces in the campaign\nagainst anxiety, self-delusion, laziness, superstition, folly, should be\nso expounded that every reader or listener may be continually aroused to\nstrive after mental and physical health and soundness, after the feeling\nof joy, and be awakened to the desire to be the heir and continuator of\nmankind, to an ever nobler adventurous impulse. Hitherto natural history\nhas not found its true language, because the inventive and eloquent\nartists\u2014who are needed for this purpose\u2014never rid themselves of a secret\nmistrust of it, and above all never wish to learn from it a thorough\nlesson. Nevertheless it must be conceded to the English that their\nscientific manuals for the lower strata of the people have made admirable\nstrides towards that ideal. But then such books are written by their\nforemost men of learning, full, complete, and inspiring natures, and not,\nas among us, by mediocre investigators.\n\n\n\n\n185.\n\n\nGENIUS IN HUMANITY.\u2014If genius, according to Schopenhauer\u2019s observation,\nlies in the coherent and vivid recollection of our own experience, a\nstriving towards genius in humanity collectively might be deduced from the\nstriving towards knowledge of the whole historic past\u2014which is beginning\nto mark off the modern age more and more as compared with earlier ages and\nhas for the first time broken down the barriers between nature and spirit,\nmen and animals, morality and physics. A perfectly conceived history would\nbe cosmic self-consciousness.\n\n\n\n\n186.\n\n\nTHE CULT OF CULTURE.\u2014On great minds is bestowed the terrifying\nall-too-human of their natures, their blindnesses, deformities, and\nextravagances, so that their more powerful, easily all-too-powerful\ninfluence may be continually held within bounds through the distrust\naroused by such qualities. For the sum-total of all that humanity needs\nfor its continued existence is so comprehensive, and demands powers so\ndiverse and so numerous, that for every one-sided predilection, whether in\nscience or politics or art or commerce, to which such natures would\npersuade us, mankind as a whole has to pay a heavy price. It has always\nbeen a great disaster to culture when human beings are worshipped. In this\nsense we may understand the precept of Mosaic law which forbids us to have\nany other gods but God.\u2014Side by side with the cult of genius and violence\nwe must always place, as its complement and remedy, the cult of culture.\nThis cult can find an intelligent appreciation even for the material, the\ninferior, the mean, the misunderstood, the weak, the imperfect, the\none-sided, the incomplete, the untrue, the apparent, even the wicked and\nhorrible, and can grant them the concession that _all this is necessary_.\nFor the continued harmony of all things human, attained by amazing toil\nand strokes of luck, and just as much the work of Cyclopes and ants as of\ngeniuses, shall never be lost. How, indeed, could we dispense with that\ndeep, universal, and often uncanny bass, without which, after all, melody\ncannot be melody?\n\n\n\n\n187.\n\n\nTHE ANTIQUE WORLD AND PLEASURE.\u2014The man of the antique world understood\nbetter how to rejoice, we understand better how to grieve less. They\ncontinually found new motives for feeling happy, for celebrating\nfestivals, being inventive with all their wealth of shrewdness and\nreflection. We, on the other hand, concentrate our intellect rather on the\nsolving of problems which have in view painlessness and the removal of\nsources of discomfort. With regard to suffering existence, the ancients\nsought to forget or in some way to convert the sensation into a pleasant\none, thus trying to supply palliatives. We attack the causes of suffering,\nand on the whole prefer to use prophylactics.\u2014Perhaps we are only building\nupon a foundation whereon a later age will once more set up the temple of\njoy.\n\n\n\n\n188.\n\n\nTHE MUSES AS LIARS.\u2014\u201cWe know how to tell many lies,\u201d so sang the Muses\nonce, when they revealed themselves to Hesiod.\u2014The conception of the\nartist as deceiver, once grasped, leads to important discoveries.\n\n\n\n\n189.\n\n\nHOW PARADOXICAL HOMER CAN BE.\u2014Is there anything more desperate, more\nhorrible, more incredible, shining over human destiny like a winter sun,\nthan that idea of Homer\u2019s:\n\n\u201cSo the decree of the Gods willed it, and doomed man to perish, that it\nmight be a matter for song even to distant generations\u201d?\n\nIn other words, we suffer and perish so that poets may not lack material,\nand this is the dispensation of those very Gods of Homer who seem much\nconcerned about the joyousness of generations to come, but very little\nabout us men of the present. To think that such ideas should ever have\nentered the head of a Greek!\n\n\n\n\n190.\n\n\nSUPPLEMENTARY JUSTIFICATION OF EXISTENCE.\u2014Many ideas have come into the\nworld as errors and fancies but have turned out truths, because men have\nafterwards given them a genuine basis to rest upon.\n\n\n\n\n191.\n\n\nPRO AND CON NECESSARY.\u2014He who has not realised that every great man must\nnot only be encouraged but also, for the sake of the common welfare,\nopposed, is certainly still a great child\u2014or himself a great man.\n\n\n\n\n192.\n\n\nINJUSTICE OF GENIUS.\u2014Genius is most unjust towards geniuses, if they be\ncontemporary. Either it thinks it has no need of them and considers them\nsuperfluous (for it can do without them), or their influence crosses the\npath of its electric current, in which case it even calls them pernicious.\n\n\n\n\n193.\n\n\nTHE SADDEST DESTINY OF A PROPHET.\u2014He has worked twenty years to convince\nhis contemporaries, and succeeds at last, but in the meantime his\nadversaries have also succeeded\u2014he is no longer convinced of himself.\n\n\n\n\n194.\n\n\nTHREE THINKERS LIKE ONE SPIDER.\u2014In every philosophical school three\nthinkers follow one another in this relation: the first produces from\nhimself sap and seed, the second draws it out in threads and spins a\ncunning web, the third waits in this web for the victims who are caught in\nit\u2014and tries to live upon this philosophy.\n\n\n\n\n195.\n\n\nFROM ASSOCIATION WITH AUTHORS.\u2014It is as bad a habit to go about with an\nauthor grasping him by the nose as grasping him by the horn (and every\nauthor has his horn).\n\n\n\n\n196.\n\n\nA TEAM OF TWO.\u2014Vagueness of thought and outbursts of sentimentality are as\noften wedded to the reckless desire to have one\u2019s own way by hook or by\ncrook, to make oneself alone of any consequence, as a genuinely helpful,\ngracious, and kindly spirit is wedded to the impulse towards clearness and\npurity of thought and towards emotional moderation and self-restraint.\n\n\n\n\n197.\n\n\nBINDING AND SEPARATING FORCES.\u2014Surely it is in the heads of men that there\narises the force that binds them\u2014an understanding of their common interest\nor the reverse; and in their hearts the force that separates them\u2014a blind\nchoosing and groping in love and hate, a devotion to one at the expense of\nall, and a consequent contempt for the common utility.\n\n\n\n\n198.\n\n\nMARKSMEN AND THINKERS.\u2014There are curious marksmen who miss their mark, but\nleave the shooting-gallery with secret pride in the fact that their bullet\nat any rate flew very far (beyond the mark, it is true), or that it did\nnot hit the mark but hit something else. There are thinkers of the same\nstamp.\n\n\n\n\n199.\n\n\nATTACK FROM TWO SIDES.\u2014We act as enemies towards an intellectual tendency\nor movement when we are superior to it and disapprove of its aim, or when\nits aim is too high and unrecognisable to our eye\u2014in other words, when it\nis superior to us. So the same party may be attacked from two sides, from\nabove and from below. Not infrequently the assailants, from common hatred,\nform an alliance which is more repulsive than all that they hate.\n\n\n\n\n200.\n\n\nORIGINAL.\u2014Original minds are distinguished not by being the first to see a\nnew thing, but by seeing the old, well-known thing, which is seen and\noverlooked by every one, as something new. The first discoverer is usually\nthat quite ordinary and unintellectual visionary\u2014chance.\n\n\n\n\n201.\n\n\nERROR OF PHILOSOPHERS.\u2014The philosopher believes that the value of his\nphilosophy lies in the whole, in the structure. Posterity finds it in the\nstone with which he built and with which, from that time forth, men will\nbuild oftener and better\u2014in other words, in the fact that the structure\nmay be destroyed and yet have value as material.\n\n\n\n\n202.\n\n\nWIT.\u2014Wit is the epitaph of an emotion.\n\n\n\n\n203.\n\n\nTHE MOMENT BEFORE SOLUTION.\u2014In science it occurs every day and every hour\nthat a man, immediately before the solution, remains stuck, being\nconvinced that his efforts have been entirely in vain\u2014like one who, in\nuntying a noose, hesitates at the moment when it is nearest to coming\nloose, because at that very moment it looks most like a knot.\n\n\n\n\n204.\n\n\nAMONG THE VISIONARIES.\u2014The thoughtful man, and he who is sure of his\nintelligence, may profitably consort with visionaries for a decade and\nabandon himself in their torrid zone to a moderate insanity. He will thus\nhave travelled a good part of the road towards that cosmopolitanism of the\nintellect which can say without presumption, \u201cNothing intellectual is\nalien to me.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n205.\n\n\nKEEN AIR.\u2014The best and healthiest element in science as amid the mountains\nis the keen air that plays about it.\u2014Intellectual molly-coddles (such as\nartists) dread and abuse science on account of this atmosphere.\n\n\n\n\n206.\n\n\nWHY SAVANTS ARE NOBLER THAN ARTISTS.\u2014Science requires nobler natures than\ndoes poetry; natures that are more simple, less ambitious, more\nrestrained, calmer, that think less of posthumous fame and can bury\nthemselves in studies which, in the eye of the many, scarcely seem worthy\nof such a sacrifice of personality. There is another loss of which they\nare conscious. The nature of their occupation, its continual exaction of\nthe greatest sobriety, weakens their will; the fire is not kept up so\nvigorously as on the hearths of poetic minds. As such, they often lose\ntheir strength and prime earlier than artists do\u2014and, as has been said,\nthey are aware of their danger. Under all circumstances they seem less\ngifted because they shine less, and thus they will always be rated below\ntheir value.\n\n\n\n\n207.\n\n\nHOW FAR PIETY OBSCURES.\u2014In later centuries the great man is credited with\nall the great qualities and virtues of his century. Thus all that is best\nis continually obscured by piety, which treats the picture as a sacred\none, to be surrounded with all manner of votive offerings. In the end the\npicture is completely veiled and covered by the offerings, and thenceforth\nis more an object of faith than of contemplation.\n\n\n\n\n208.\n\n\nSTANDING ON ONE\u2019S HEAD.\u2014If we make truth stand on its head, we generally\nfail to notice that our own head, too, is not in its right position.\n\n\n\n\n209.\n\n\nORIGIN AND UTILITY OF FASHION.\u2014The obvious satisfaction of the individual\nwith his own form excites imitation and gradually creates the form of the\nmany\u2014that is, fashion. The many desire, and indeed attain, that same\ncomforting satisfaction with their own form. Consider how many reasons\nevery man has for anxiety and shy self-concealment, and how, on this\naccount, three-fourths of his energy and goodwill is crippled and may\nbecome unproductive! So we must be very grateful to fashion for\nunfettering that three-fourths and communicating self-confidence and the\npower of cheerful compromise to those who feel themselves bound to each\nother by its law. Even foolish laws give freedom and calm of the spirit,\nso long as many persons have submitted to their sway.\n\n\n\n\n210.\n\n\nLOOSENERS OF TONGUES.\u2014The value of many men and books rests solely on\ntheir faculty for compelling all to speak out the most hidden and intimate\nthings. They are looseners of tongues and crowbars to open the most\nstubborn teeth. Many events and misdeeds which are apparently only sent as\na curse to mankind possess this value and utility.\n\n\n\n\n211.\n\n\nINTELLECTUAL FREEDOM OF DOMICILE.(12)\u2014Who of us could dare to call himself\na \u201cfree spirit\u201d if he could not render homage after his fashion, by taking\non his own shoulders a portion of that burden of public dislike and abuse,\nto men to whom this name is attached as a reproach? We might as well call\nourselves in all seriousness \u201cspirits free of domicile\u201d (_Freiz\u00fcgig_) (and\nwithout that arrogant or high-spirited defiance) because we feel the\nimpulse to freedom (_Zug zur Freiheit_) as the strongest instinct of our\nminds and, in contrast to fixed and limited minds, practically see our\nideal in an intellectual nomadism\u2014to use a modest and almost depreciatory\nexpression.\n\n\n\n\n212.\n\n\nYES, THE FAVOUR OF THE MUSES!\u2014What Homer says on this point goes right to\nour heart, so true, so terrible is it:\n\n\u201cThe Muse loved him with all her heart and gave him good and evil, for she\ntook away his eyes and vouchsafed him sweet song.\u201d\n\nThis is an endless text for thinking men: she gives good and evil, that is\n_her_ manner of loving with all her heart and soul! And each man will\ninterpret specially for himself why we poets and thinkers have to give up\nour eyes in her service.(13)\n\n\n\n\n213.\n\n\nAGAINST THE CULTIVATION OF MUSIC.\u2014The artistic training of the eye from\nchildhood upwards by means of drawing, painting, landscape-sketching,\nfigures, scenes, involves an estimable gain in life, making the eyesight\nkeen, calm, and enduring in the observation of men and circumstances. No\nsimilar secondary advantage arises from the artistic cultivation of the\near, whence public schools will generally do well to give the art of the\neye a preference over that of the ear.\n\n\n\n\n214.\n\n\nTHE DISCOVERERS OF TRIVIALITIES.\u2014Subtle minds, from which nothing is\nfarther than trivialities, often discover a triviality after taking all\nmanner of circuitous routes and mountain paths, and, to the astonishment\nof the non-subtle, rejoice exceedingly.\n\n\n\n\n215.\n\n\nMORALS OF SAVANTS.\u2014A regular and rapid advance in the sciences is only\npossible when the individual is compelled to be not so distrustful as to\ntest every calculation and assertion of others, in fields which are remote\nfrom his own. A necessary condition, however, is that every man should\nhave competitors in his own sphere, who are extremely distrustful and keep\na sharp eye upon him. From this juxtaposition of \u201cnot too distrustful\u201d and\n\u201cextremely distrustful\u201d arises sincerity in the republic of learning.\n\n\n\n\n216.\n\n\nREASONS FOR STERILITY.\u2014There are highly gifted minds which are always\nsterile only because, from temperamental weakness, they are too impatient\nto wait for their pregnancy.\n\n\n\n\n217.\n\n\nTHE PERVERTED WORLD OF TEARS.\u2014The manifold discomforts which the demands\nof higher culture cause to man finally pervert his nature to such an\nextent that he usually keeps himself stoical and unbending. Thus he has\ntears in reserve only for rare occasions of happiness, so that many must\nweep even at the enjoyment of painlessness\u2014only when happy does his heart\nstill beat.\n\n\n\n\n218.\n\n\nTHE GREEKS AS INTERPRETERS.\u2014When we speak of the Greeks we unwittingly\nspeak of to-day and yesterday; their universally known history is a blank\nmirror, always reflecting something that is not in the mirror itself. We\nenjoy the freedom of speaking about them in order to have the right of\nbeing silent about others\u2014so that these Greeks themselves may whisper\nsomething in the ear of the reflective reader. Thus the Greeks facilitate\nto modern men the communication of much that is debatable and hard to\ncommunicate.\n\n\n\n\n219.\n\n\nOF THE ACQUIRED CHARACTER OF THE GREEKS.\u2014We are easily led astray by the\nrenowned Greek clearness, transparency, simplicity, and order, by their\ncrystal-like naturalness and crystal-like art, into believing that all\nthese gifts were bestowed on the Greeks\u2014for instance, that they could not\nbut write well, as Lichtenberg expressed it on one occasion. Yet no\nstatement could be more hasty and more untenable. The history of prose\nfrom Gorgias to Demosthenes shows a course of toiling and wrestling\ntowards light from the obscure, overloaded, and tasteless, reminding one\nof the labour of heroes who had to construct the first roads through\nforest and bog. The dialogue of tragedy was the real achievement of the\ndramatist, owing to its uncommon clearness and precision, whereas the\nnational tendency was to riot in symbolism and innuendo, a tendency\nexpressly fostered by the great choral lyric. Similarly it was the\nachievement of Homer to liberate the Greeks from Asiatic pomp and gloom,\nand to have attained the clearness of architecture in details great and\nsmall. Nor was it by any means thought easy to say anything in a pure and\nilluminating style. How else should we account for the great admiration\nfor the epigram of Simonides, which shows itself so simple, with no gilded\npoints or arabesques of wit, but says all that it has to say plainly and\nwith the calm of the sun, not with the straining after effect of the\nlightning. Since the struggle towards light from an almost native twilight\nis Greek, a thrill of jubilation runs through the people when they hear a\nlaconic sentence, the language of elegy or the maxims of the Seven Wise\nMen. Hence they were so fond of giving precepts in verse, a practice that\nwe find objectionable. This was the true Apolline task of the Hellenic\nspirit, with the aim of rising superior to the perils of metre and the\nobscurity which is otherwise characteristic of poetry. Simplicity,\nflexibility, and sobriety were wrestled for and not given by nature to\nthis people. The danger of a relapse into Asianism constantly hovered over\nthe Greeks, and really overtook them from time to time like a murky,\noverflowing tide of mystical impulses, primitive savagery and darkness. We\nsee them plunge in; we see Europe, as it were, flooded, washed away\u2014for\nEurope was very small then; but they always emerge once more to the light,\ngood swimmers and divers that they are, those fellow-countrymen of\nOdysseus.\n\n\n\n\n220.\n\n\nTHE PAGAN CHARACTERISTIC.\u2014Perhaps there is nothing more astonishing to the\nobserver of the Greek world than to discover that the Greeks from time to\ntime held festivals, as it were, for all their passions and evil\ntendencies alike, and in fact even established a kind of series of\nfestivals, by order of the State, for their \u201call-too-human.\u201d This is the\npagan characteristic of their world, which Christianity has never\nunderstood and never can understand, and has always combated and\ndespised.\u2014They accepted this all-too-human as unavoidable, and preferred,\ninstead of railing at it, to give it a kind of secondary right by grafting\nit on to the usages of society and religion. All in man that has power\nthey called divine, and wrote it on the walls of their heaven. They do not\ndeny this natural instinct that expresses itself in evil characteristics,\nbut regulate and limit it to definite cults and days, so as to turn those\nturbulent streams into as harmless a course as possible, after devising\nsufficient precautionary measures. That is the root of all the moral\nbroad-mindedness of antiquity. To the wicked, the dubious, the backward,\nthe animal element, as to the barbaric, pre-Hellenic and Asiatic, which\nstill lived in the depths of Greek nature, they allowed a moderate\noutflow, and did not strive to destroy it utterly. The whole system was\nunder the domain of the State, which was built up not on individuals or\ncastes, but on common human qualities. In the structure of the State the\nGreeks show that wonderful sense for typical facts which later on enabled\nthem to become investigators of Nature, historians, geographers, and\nphilosophers. It was not a limited moral law of priests or castes, which\nhad to decide about the constitution of the State and State worship, but\nthe most comprehensive view of the reality of all that is human. Whence do\nthe Greeks derive this freedom, this sense of reality? Perhaps from Homer\nand the poets who preceded him. For just those poets whose nature is\ngenerally not the most wise or just possess, in compensation, that delight\nin reality and activity of every kind, and prefer not to deny even evil.\nIt suffices for them if evil moderates itself, does not kill or inwardly\npoison everything\u2014in other words, they have similar ideas to those of the\nfounders of Greek constitutions, and were their teachers and forerunners.\n\n\n\n\n221.\n\n\nEXCEPTIONAL GREEKS.\u2014In Greece, deep, thorough, serious minds were the\nexception. The national instinct tended rather to regard the serious and\nthorough as a kind of grimace. To borrow forms from a foreign source, not\nto create but to transform into the fairest shapes\u2014that is Greek. To\nimitate, not for utility but for artistic illusion, ever and anon to gain\nthe mastery over forced seriousness, to arrange, beautify, simplify\u2014that\nis the continual task from Homer to the Sophists of the third and fourth\ncenturies of our era, who are all outward show, pompous speech,\ndeclamatory gestures, and address themselves to shallow souls that care\nonly for appearance, sound, and effect. And now let us estimate the\ngreatness of those exceptional Greeks, who created science! Whoever tells\nof them, tells the most heroic story of the human mind!\n\n\n\n\n222.\n\n\nSIMPLICITY NOT THE FIRST NOR THE LAST THING IN POINT OF TIME.\u2014In the\nhistory of religious ideas many errors about development and false\ngradations are made in matters which in reality are not consecutive\noutgrowths but contemporary yet separate phenomena. In particular,\nsimplicity has still far too much the reputation of being the oldest, the\ninitial thing. Much that is human arises by subtraction and division, and\nnot merely by doubling, addition, and unification.\u2014For instance, men still\nbelieve in a gradual development of the idea of God from those unwieldy\nstones and blocks of wood up to the highest forms of anthropomorphism. Yet\nthe fact is that so long as divinity was attributed to and felt in trees,\nlogs of wood, stones, and beasts, people shrank from humanising their\nforms as from an act of godlessness. First of all, poets, apart from all\nconsiderations of cult and the ban of religious shame, have had to make\nthe inner imagination of man accustomed and compliant to this notion.\nWherever more pious periods and phases of thought gained the upper hand,\nthis liberating influence of poets fell into the background, and sanctity\nremained, after as before, on the side of the monstrous, uncanny, quite\npeculiarly inhuman. And then, much of what the inner imagination ventures\nto picture to itself would exert a painful influence if externally and\ncorporeally represented. The inner eye is far bolder and more shameless\nthan the outer (whence the well-known difficulty and, to some extent,\nimpossibility, of working epic material into dramatic form). The religious\nimagination for a long time entirely refuses to believe in the identity of\nGod with an image: the image is meant to fix the _numen_ of the Deity,\nactually and specifically, although in a mysterious and not altogether\nintelligible way. The oldest image of the Gods is meant to shelter and at\nthe same time to hide(14) the God\u2014to indicate him but not to expose him to\nview. No Greek really looked upon his Apollo as a pointed pillar of wood,\nhis Eros as a lump of stone. These were symbols, which were intended to\ninspire dread of the manifestation of the God. It was the same with those\nblocks of wood out of which individual limbs, generally in excessive\nnumber, were fashioned with the scantiest of carving\u2014as, for instance, a\nLaconian Apollo with four hands and four ears. In the incomplete,\nsymbolical, or excessive lies a terrible sanctity, which is meant to\nprevent us from thinking of anything human or similar to humanity. It is\nnot an embryonic stage of art in which such things are made\u2014as if they\nwere not _able_ to speak more plainly and portray more sensibly in the age\nwhen such images were honoured! Rather, men are afraid of just one\nthing\u2014direct speaking out. Just as the cella hides and conceals in a\nmysterious twilight, yet not completely, the holy of holies, the real\n_numen_ of the Deity; just as, again, the peripteric temple hides the\ncella, protecting it from indiscreet eyes as with a screen and a veil, yet\nnot completely\u2014so it is with the image of the Deity, and at the same time\nthe concealment of the Deity.\u2014Only when outside the cult, in the profane\nworld of athletic contest, the joy in the victor had risen so high that\nthe ripples thus started reacted upon the lake of religious emotion, was\nthe statue of the victor set up before the temple. Then the pious pilgrim\nhad to accustom his eye and his soul, whether he would or no, to the\ninevitable sight of human beauty and super-strength, so that the worship\nof men and Gods melted into each other from physical and spiritual\ncontact. Then too for the first time the fear of really humanising the\nfigures of the Gods is lost, and the mighty arena for great plastic art is\nopened\u2014even now with the limitation that wherever there is to be adoration\nthe primitive form and ugliness are carefully preserved and copied. But\nthe Hellene, as he dedicates and makes offerings, may now with religious\nsanction indulge in his delight in making God become a man.\n\n\n\n\n223.\n\n\nWHITHER WE MUST TRAVEL.\u2014Immediate self-observation is not enough, by a\nlong way, to enable us to learn to know ourselves. We need history, for\nthe past continues to flow through us in a hundred channels. We ourselves\nare, after all, nothing but our own sensation at every moment of this\ncontinued flow. Even here, when we wish to step down into the stream of\nour apparently most peculiar and personal development, Heraclitus\u2019\naphorism, \u201cYou cannot step twice into the same river,\u201d holds good.\u2014This is\na piece of wisdom which has, indeed, gradually become trite, but\nnevertheless has remained as strong and true as it ever was. It is the\nsame with the saying that, in order to understand history, we must\nscrutinise the living remains of historical periods; that we must travel,\nas old Herodotus travelled, to other nations, especially to those\nso-called savage or half-savage races in regions where man has doffed or\nnot yet donned European garb. For they are ancient and firmly established\nsteps of culture on which we can stand. There is, however, a more subtle\nart and aim in travelling, which does not always necessitate our passing\nfrom place to place and going thousands of miles away. Very probably the\nlast three centuries, in all their colourings and refractions of culture,\nsurvive even in our vicinity, only they have to be discovered. In some\nfamilies, or even in individuals, the strata are still superimposed on\neach other, beautifully and perceptibly; in other places there are\ndispersions and displacements of the structure which are harder to\nunderstand. Certainly in remote districts, in less known mountain valleys,\ncircumscribed communities have been able more easily to maintain an\nadmirable pattern of a far older sentiment, a pattern that must here be\ninvestigated. On the other hand, it is improbable that such discoveries\nwill be made in Berlin, where man comes into the world washed-out and\nsapless. He who after long practice of this art of travel has become a\nhundred-eyed Argus will accompany his Io\u2014I mean his ego\u2014everywhere, and in\nEgypt and Greece, Byzantium and Rome, France and Germany, in the age of\nwandering or settled races, in Renaissance or Reformation, at home and\nabroad, in sea, forest, plant, and mountain, will again light upon the\ntravel-adventure of this ever-growing, ever-altered ego.\u2014Thus\nself-knowledge becomes universal knowledge as regards the entire past,\nand, by another chain of observation, which can only be indicated here,\nself-direction and self-training in the freest and most far-seeing spirits\nmight become universal direction as regards all future humanity.\n\n\n\n\n224.\n\n\nBALM AND POISON.\u2014We cannot ponder too deeply on this fact: Christianity is\nthe religion of antiquity grown old; it presupposes degenerate old\nculture-stocks, and on them it had, and still has, power to work like\nbalm. There are periods when ears and eyes are full of slime, so that they\ncan no longer hear the voice of reason and philosophy or see the wisdom\nthat walks in bodily shape, whether it bears the name of Epictetus or of\nEpicurus. Then, perhaps, the erection of the martyr\u2019s cross and the\n\u201ctrumpet of the last judgment\u201d may have the effect of still inspiring such\nraces to end their lives decently. If we think of Juvenal\u2019s Rome, of that\npoisonous toad with the eyes of Venus, we understand what it means to make\nthe sign of the Cross before the world, we honour the silent Christian\ncommunity and are grateful for its having stifled the Greco-Roman Empire.\nIf, indeed, most men were then born in spiritual slavery, with the\nsensuality of old men, what a pleasure to meet beings who were more soul\nthan body, and who seemed to realise the Greek idea of the shades of the\nunder-world\u2014shy, scurrying, chirping, kindly creatures, with a reversion\non the \u201cbetter life,\u201d and therefore so unassuming, so secretly scornful,\nso proudly patient!\u2014This Christianity, as the evening chime of the _good_\nantiquity, with cracked, weary and yet melodious bell, is balm in the ears\neven to one who only now traverses those centuries historically. What must\nit have been to those men themselves!\u2014To young and fresh barbarian\nnations, on the other hand, Christianity is a poison. For to implant the\nteaching of sinfulness and damnation in the heroic, childlike, and animal\nsoul of the old Germans is nothing but poisoning. An enormous chemical\nfermentation and decomposition, a medley of sentiments and judgments, a\nrank growth of adventurous legend, and hence in the long run a fundamental\nweakening of such barbarian peoples, was the inevitable result. True,\nwithout this weakening what should we have left of Greek culture, of the\nwhole cultured past of the human race? For the barbarians untouched by\nChristianity knew very well how to make a clean sweep of old cultures, as\nwas only too clearly shown by the heathen conquerors of Romanised Britain.\nThus Christianity, against its will, was compelled to aid in making \u201cthe\nantique world\u201d immortal.\u2014There remains, however, a counter-question and\nthe possibility of a counter-reckoning. Without this weakening through the\npoisoning referred to, would any of those fresh stocks\u2014the Germans, for\ninstance\u2014have been in a position gradually to find by themselves a higher,\na peculiar, a new culture, of which the most distant conception would\ntherefore have been lost to humanity?\u2014In this, as in every case, we do not\nknow, Christianly speaking, whether God owes the devil or the devil God\nmore thanks for everything having turned out as it has.\n\n\n\n\n225.\n\n\nFAITH MAKES HOLY AND CONDEMNS.\u2014A Christian who happened upon forbidden\npaths of thought might well ask himself on some occasion whether it is\nreally necessary that there should be a God, side by side with a\nrepresentative Lamb, if faith in the existence of these beings suffices to\nproduce the same influences? If they do exist after all, are they not\nsuperfluous beings? For all that is given by the Christian religion to the\nhuman soul, all that is beneficent, consoling, and edifying, just as much\nas all that depresses and crushes, emanates from that faith and not from\nthe objects of that faith. It is here as in another well-known case\u2014there\nwere indeed no witches, but the terrible effects of the belief in witches\nwere the same as if they really had existed. For all occasions where the\nChristian awaits the immediate intervention of a God, though in vain (for\nthere is no God), his religion is inventive enough to find subterfuges and\nreasons for tranquillity. In so far Christianity is an ingenious\nreligion.\u2014Faith, indeed, has up to the present not been able to move real\nmountains, although I do not know who assumed that it could. But it can\nput mountains where there are none.\n\n\n\n\n226.\n\n\nTHE TRAGI-COMEDY OF REGENSBURG.\u2014Here and there we see with terrible\nclearness the harlequinade of Fortune, how she fastens the rope, on which\nshe wills that succeeding centuries should dance, on to a few days, one\nplace, the condition and opinions of one brain. Thus the fate of modern\nGerman history lies in the days of that disputation at Regensburg: the\npeaceful settlement of ecclesiastical and moral affairs, without religious\nwars or a counter-reformation, and also the unity of the German nation,\nseemed assured: the deep, gentle spirit of Contarini hovered for one\nmoment over the theological squabble, victorious, as representative of the\nriper Italian piety, reflecting the morning glory of intellectual freedom.\nBut Luther\u2019s hard head, full of suspicions and strange misgivings, showed\nresistance. Because justification by grace appeared to him _his_ greatest\nmotto and discovery, he did not believe the phrase in the mouth of\nItalians; whereas, in point of fact, as is well known, they had invented\nit much earlier and spread it throughout Italy in deep silence. In this\napparent agreement Luther saw the tricks of the devil, and hindered the\nwork of peace as well as he could, thereby advancing to a great extent the\naims of the Empire\u2019s foes.\u2014And now, in order to have a still stronger idea\nof the dreadful farcicality of it all, let us add that none of the\nprinciples about which men then disputed in Regensburg\u2014neither that of\noriginal sin, nor that of redemption by proxy, nor that of justification\nby faith\u2014is in any way true or even has any connection with truth: that\nthey are now all recognised as incapable of being discussed. Yet on this\naccount the world was set on fire\u2014that is to say, by opinions which\ncorrespond to no things or realities; whereas as regards purely\nphilological questions\u2014as, for instance, that of the sacramental words in\nthe Eucharist\u2014discussion at any rate is permitted, because in this case\nthe truth can be said. But \u201cwhere nothing is, even truth has lost her\nright.\u201d(15)\u2014Lastly, it only remains to be said that it is true these\nprinciples give rise to sources of power so mighty that without them all\nthe mills of the modern world could not be driven with such force. And it\nis primarily a matter of force, only secondarily of truth (and perhaps not\neven secondarily)\u2014is it not so, my dear up-to-date friends?\n\n\n\n\n227.\n\n\nGOETHE\u2019S ERRORS.\u2014Goethe is a signal exception among great artists in that\nhe did not live within the limited confines of his real capacity, as if\nthat must be the essential, the distinctive, the unconditional, and the\nlast thing in him and for all the world. Twice he intended to possess\nsomething higher than he really possessed\u2014and went astray in the second\nhalf of his life, where he seems quite convinced that he is one of the\ngreat scientific discoverers and illuminators. So too in the first half of\nhis life he demanded of himself something higher than the poetic art\nseemed to him\u2014and here already he made a mistake. That nature wished to\nmake him a plastic artist,\u2014_this_ was his inwardly glowing and scorching\nsecret, which finally drove him to Italy, that he might give vent to his\nmania in this direction and make to it every possible sacrifice. At last,\nshrewd as he was, and honestly averse to any mental perversion in himself,\nhe discovered that a tricksy elf of desire had attracted him to the belief\nin this calling, and that he must free himself of the greatest passion of\nhis heart and bid it farewell. The painful conviction, tearing and gnawing\nat his vitals, that it was necessary to bid farewell, finds full\nexpression in the character of Tasso. Over Tasso, that Werther\nintensified, hovers the premonition of something worse than death, as when\none says: \u201cNow it is over, after this farewell: how shall I go on living\nwithout going mad?\u201d These two fundamental errors of his life gave Goethe,\nin face of a purely literary attitude towards poetry (the only attitude\nthen known to the world), such an unembarrassed and apparently almost\narbitrary position. Not to speak of the period when Schiller (poor\nSchiller, who had no time himself and left no time to others) drove away\nhis shy dread of poetry, his fear of all literary life and craftsmanship,\nGoethe appears like a Greek who now and then visits his beloved, doubting\nwhether she be not a Goddess to whom he can give no proper name. In all\nhis poetry one notices the inspiring neighbourhood of plastic art and\nNature. The features of these figures that floated before him\u2014and perhaps\nhe always thought he was on the track of the metamorphoses of one\nGoddess\u2014became, without his will or knowledge, the features of all the\nchildren of his art. Without the extravagances of error he would not have\nbeen Goethe\u2014that is, the only German artist in writing who has not yet\nbecome out of date\u2014just because he desired as little to be a writer as a\nGerman by vocation.\n\n\n\n\n228.\n\n\nTRAVELLERS AND THEIR GRADES.\u2014Among travellers we may distinguish five\ngrades. The first and lowest grade is of those who travel and are\nseen\u2014they become really travelled and are, as it were, blind. Next come\nthose who really see the world. The third class experience the results of\ntheir seeing. The fourth weave their experience into their life and carry\nit with them henceforth. Lastly, there are some men of the highest\nstrength who, as soon as they have returned home, must finally and\nnecessarily work out in their lives and productions all the things seen\nthat they have experienced and incorporated in themselves.\u2014Like these five\nspecies of travellers, all mankind goes through the whole pilgrimage of\nlife, the lowest as purely passive, the highest as those who act and live\nout their lives without keeping back any residue of inner experiences.\n\n\n\n\n229.\n\n\nIN CLIMBING HIGHER.\u2014So soon as we climb higher than those who hitherto\nadmired us, we appear to them as sunken and fallen. For they imagined that\nunder all circumstances they were on the heights in our company (maybe\nalso through our agency).\n\n\n\n\n230.\n\n\nMEASURE AND MODERATION.\u2014Of two quite lofty things, measure and moderation,\nit is best never to speak. A few know their force and significance, from\nthe mysterious paths of inner experiences and conversions: they honour in\nthem something quite godlike, and are afraid to speak aloud. All the rest\nhardly listen when they are spoken about, and think the subjects under\ndiscussion are tedium and mediocrity. We must perhaps except those who\nhave once heard a warning note from that realm but have stopped their ears\nagainst the sound. The recollection of it makes them angry and\nexasperated.\n\n\n\n\n231.\n\n\nHUMANITY OF FRIENDSHIP AND COMRADESHIP.\u2014\u201cIf thou wilt take the left hand,\nthen I will go to the right,\u201d(16) that feeling is the hall-mark of\nhumanity in intimate intercourse, and without that feeling every\nfriendship, every band of apostles or disciples, sooner or later becomes a\nfraud.\n\n\n\n\n232.\n\n\nTHE PROFOUND.\u2014Men of profound thought appear to themselves in intercourse\nwith others like comedians, for in order to be understood they must always\nsimulate superficiality.\n\n\n\n\n233.\n\n\nFOR THE SCORNERS OF \u201cHERD-HUMANITY.\u201d\u2014He who regards human beings as a\nherd, and flies from them as fast as he can, will certainly be caught up\nby them and gored upon their horns.\n\n\n\n\n234.\n\n\nTHE MAIN TRANSGRESSION AGAINST THE VAIN.\u2014In society, he who gives another\nan opportunity of favourably setting forth his knowledge, sentiments, and\nexperience sets himself above him. Unless he is felt by the other to be a\nsuperior being without limitation, he is guilty of an attack upon his\nvanity, while what he aimed at was the gratification of the other man\u2019s\nvanity.\n\n\n\n\n235.\n\n\nDISAPPOINTMENT.\u2014When a long life of action distinguished by speeches and\nwritings gives publicity to a man\u2019s personality, personal intercourse with\nhim is generally disappointing on two grounds. Firstly, one expects too\nmuch from a brief period of intercourse (namely, all that the thousand and\none opportunities of life can alone bring out). Secondly, no recognised\nperson gives himself the trouble to woo recognition in individual cases.\nHe is too careless, and we are at too high a tension.\n\n\n\n\n236.\n\n\nTWO SOURCES OF KINDNESS.\u2014To treat all men with equal good-humour, and to\nbe kind without distinction of persons, may arise as much from a profound\ncontempt for mankind as from an ingrained love of humanity.\n\n\n\n\n237.\n\n\nTHE WANDERER IN THE MOUNTAINS TO HIMSELF.\u2014There are certain signs that you\nhave gone farther and higher. There is a freer, wider prospect before you,\nthe air blows cooler yet milder in your face (you have unlearned the folly\nof confounding mildness with warmth), your gait is more firm and vigorous,\ncourage and discretion have waxed together. On all these grounds your\njourney may now be more lonely and in any case more perilous than\nheretofore, if indeed not to the extent believed by those who from the\nmisty valley see you, the roamer, striding on the mountains.\n\n\n\n\n238.\n\n\nWITH THE EXCEPTION OF OUR NEIGHBOUR.\u2014I admit that my head is set wrong on\nmy neck only, for every other man, as is well known, knows better than I\nwhat I should do or leave alone. The only one who cannot help me is\nmyself, poor beggar! Are we not all like statues on which false heads have\nbeen placed? Eh, dear neighbour?\u2014Ah no; you, just you, are the exception!\n\n\n\n\n239.\n\n\nCAUTION.\u2014We must either not go about at all with people who are lacking in\nthe reverence for personalities, or inexorably fetter them beforehand with\nthe manacles of convention.\n\n\n\n\n240.\n\n\nTHE WISH TO APPEAR VAIN.\u2014In conversation with strangers or little-known\nacquaintances, to express only selected thoughts, to speak of one\u2019s famous\nacquaintances, and important experiences and travels, is a sign that one\nis not proud, or at least would not like to appear proud. Vanity is the\npolite mask of pride.\n\n\n\n\n241.\n\n\nGOOD FRIENDSHIP.\u2014A good friendship arises when the one man deeply respects\nthe other, more even than himself; loves him also, though not so much as\nhimself; and finally, to facilitate intercourse, knows how to add the\ndelicate bloom and veneer of intimacy, but at the same time wisely\nrefrains from a true, real intimacy, from the confounding of _meum_ and\n_tuum_.\n\n\n\n\n242.\n\n\nFRIENDS AS GHOSTS.\u2014If we change ourselves vitally, our friends, who have\nnot changed, become ghosts of our own past: their voice sounds shadowy and\ndreadful to us, as if we heard our own voice speaking, but younger,\nharder, less mellow.\n\n\n\n\n243.\n\n\nONE EYE AND TWO GLANCES.\u2014The same people whose eyes naturally plead for\nfavours and indulgences are accustomed, from their frequent humiliations\nand cravings for revenge, to assume a shameless glance as well.\n\n\n\n\n244.\n\n\nTHE HAZE OF DISTANCE.\u2014A child throughout life\u2014that sounds very touching,\nbut is only the verdict from the distance. Seen and known close at hand,\nhe is always called \u201cpuerile throughout life.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n245.\n\n\nADVANTAGE AND DISADVANTAGE IN THE SAME MISUNDERSTANDING.\u2014The mute\nperplexity of the subtle brain is usually understood by the non-subtle as\na silent superiority, and is much dreaded whereas the perception of\nperplexity would produce good will.\n\n\n\n\n246.\n\n\nTHE SAGE GIVING HIMSELF OUT TO BE A FOOL.\u2014The philanthropy of the sage\nsometimes makes him decide to pretend to be excited, enraged, or\ndelighted, so that he may not hurt his surroundings by the coldness and\nrationality of his true nature.\n\n\n\n\n247.\n\n\nFORCING ONESELF TO ATTENTION.\u2014So soon as we note that any one in\nintercourse and conversation with us has to force himself to attention, we\nhave adequate evidence that he loves us not, or loves us no longer.\n\n\n\n\n248.\n\n\nTHE WAY TO A CHRISTIAN VIRTUE.\u2014Learning from one\u2019s enemies is the best way\nto love them, for it inspires us with a grateful mood towards them.\n\n\n\n\n249.\n\n\nSTRATAGEM OF THE IMPORTUNATE.\u2014The importunate man gives us gold coins as\nchange for our convention coins, and thereby tries to force us afterwards\nto treat our convention as an oversight and him as an exception.\n\n\n\n\n250.\n\n\nREASON FOR DISLIKE.\u2014We become hostile to many an artist or writer, not\nbecause we notice in the end that he has duped us, but because he did not\nfind more subtle means necessary to entrap us.\n\n\n\n\n251.\n\n\nIN PARTING.\u2014Not by the way one soul approaches another, but by the way it\nseparates, do I recognise its relationship and homogeneity with the other.\n\n\n\n\n252.\n\n\nSILENTIUM.\u2014We must not speak about our friends, or we renounce the\nsentiment of friendship.\n\n\n\n\n253.\n\n\nIMPOLITENESS.\u2014Impoliteness is often the sign of a clumsy modesty, which\nwhen taken by surprise loses its head and would fain hide the fact by\nmeans of rudeness.\n\n\n\n\n254.\n\n\nHONESTY\u2019S MISCALCULATION.\u2014Our newest acquaintances are sometimes the first\nto learn what we have hitherto kept dark. We have the foolish notion that\nour proof of confidence is the strongest fetter wherewith to hold them\nfast. But _they_ do not know enough about us to feel so strongly the\nsacrifice involved in our speaking out, and betray our secrets to others\nwithout any idea of betrayal. Hereby we possibly lose our old friends.\n\n\n\n\n255.\n\n\nIN THE ANTE-CHAMBER OF FAVOUR.\u2014All men whom we let stand long in the\nante-chamber of our favour get into a state of fermentation or become\nbitter.\n\n\n\n\n256.\n\n\nWARNING TO THE DESPISED.\u2014When we have sunk unmistakably in the estimation\nof mankind we should cling tooth and nail to modesty in intercourse, or we\nshall betray to others that we have sunk in our own estimation as well.\nCynicism in intercourse is a sign that a man, when alone, treats himself\ntoo as a dog.\n\n\n\n\n257.\n\n\nIGNORANCE OFTEN ENNOBLES.\u2014With regard to the respect of those who pay\nrespect, it is an advantage ostensibly not to understand certain things.\nIgnorance, too, confers privileges.\n\n\n\n\n258.\n\n\nTHE OPPONENT OF GRACE.\u2014The impatient and arrogant man does not care for\ngrace, feeling it to be a corporeal, visible reproach against himself. For\ngrace is heartfelt toleration in movement and gesture.\n\n\n\n\n259.\n\n\nON SEEING AGAIN.\u2014When old friends see each other again after a long\nseparation, it often happens that they affect an interest in matters to\nwhich they have long since become indifferent. Sometimes both remark this,\nbut dare not raise the veil\u2014from a mournful doubt. Hence arise\nconversations as in the realm of the dead.\n\n\n\n\n260.\n\n\nMAKING FRIENDS ONLY WITH THE INDUSTRIOUS.\u2014The man of leisure is dangerous\nto his friends, for, having nothing to do, he talks of what his friends\nare doing or not doing, interferes, and finally makes himself a nuisance.\nThe clever man will only make friends with the industrious.\n\n\n\n\n261.\n\n\nONE WEAPON TWICE AS MUCH AS TWO.\u2014It is an unequal combat when one man\ndefends his cause with head and heart, the other with head alone. The\nfirst has sun and wind against him, as it were, and his two weapons\ninterfere with each other: he loses the prize\u2014in the eyes of truth. True,\nthe victory of the second, with his one weapon, is seldom a victory after\nthe hearts of all the other spectators, and makes him unpopular.\n\n\n\n\n262.\n\n\nDEPTH AND TROUBLED WATERS.\u2014The public easily confounds him who fishes in\ntroubled waters with him who pumps up from the depths.\n\n\n\n\n263.\n\n\nDEMONSTRATING ONE\u2019S VANITY TO FRIEND AND FOE.\u2014Many a man, from vanity,\nmaltreats even his friends, when in the presence of witnesses to whom he\nwishes to make his own preponderance clear. Others exaggerate the merits\nof their enemies, in order to point proudly to the fact that they are\nworthy of such foes.\n\n\n\n\n264.\n\n\nCOOLING OFF.\u2014The over-heating of the heart is generally allied with\nillness of the head and judgment. He who is concerned for a time with the\nhealth of his head must know what he has to cool, careless of the future\nof his heart. For if we are capable at all of giving warmth, we are sure\nto become warm again and then have our summer.\n\n\n\n\n265.\n\n\nMINGLED FEELINGS.\u2014Towards science women and self-seeking artists entertain\na feeling that is composed of envy and sentimentality.\n\n\n\n\n266.\n\n\nWHERE DANGER IS GREATEST.\u2014We seldom break our leg so long as life\ncontinues a toilsome upward climb. The danger comes when we begin to take\nthings easily and choose the convenient paths.\n\n\n\n\n267.\n\n\nNOT TOO EARLY.\u2014We must beware of becoming sharp too early, or we shall\nalso become thin too early.\n\n\n\n\n268.\n\n\nJOY IN REFRACTORINESS.\u2014The good teacher knows cases where he is proud that\nhis pupil remains true to himself in opposition to him\u2014at times when the\nyouth must not understand the man or would be harmed by understanding him.\n\n\n\n\n269.\n\n\nTHE EXPERIMENT OF HONESTY.\u2014Young men, who wish to be more honest than they\nhave been, seek as victim some one acknowledged to be honest, attacking\nhim first with an attempt to reach his height by abuse\u2014with the underlying\nnotion that this first experiment at any rate is void of danger. For just\nsuch a one has no right to chastise the impudence of the honest man.\n\n\n\n\n270.\n\n\nTHE ETERNAL CHILD.\u2014We think, short-sighted that we are, that fairy-tales\nand games belong to childhood. As if at any age we should care to live\nwithout fairy-tales and games! Our words and sentiments are indeed\ndifferent, but the essential fact remains the same, as is proved by the\nchild himself looking on games as his work and fairy-tales as his truth.\nThe shortness of life ought to preserve us from a pedantic distinction\nbetween the different ages\u2014as if every age brought something new\u2014and a\npoet ought one day to portray a man of two hundred, who really lives\nwithout fairy-tales and games.\n\n\n\n\n271.\n\n\nEVERY PHILOSOPHY IS THE PHILOSOPHY OF A PERIOD OF LIFE.\u2014The period of life\nin which a philosopher finds his teaching is manifested by his teaching;\nhe cannot avoid that, however elevated above time and hour he may feel\nhimself. Thus, Schopenhauer\u2019s philosophy remains a mirror of his hot and\nmelancholy youth\u2014it is no mode of thought for older men. Plato\u2019s\nphilosophy reminds one of the middle thirties, when a warm and a cold\ncurrent generally rush together, so that spray and delicate clouds and,\nunder favourable circumstances and glimpses of sunshine, enchanting\nrainbow-pictures result.\n\n\n\n\n272.\n\n\nOF THE INTELLECT OF WOMEN.\u2014The intellectual strength of a woman is best\nproved by the fact that she offers her own intellect as a sacrifice out of\nlove for a man and his intellect, and that nevertheless in the new domain,\nwhich was previously foreign to her nature, a second intellect at once\narises as an aftergrowth, to which the man\u2019s mind impels her.\n\n\n\n\n273.\n\n\nRAISING AND LOWERING IN THE SEXUAL DOMAIN.\u2014The storm of desire will\nsometimes carry a man up to a height where all desire is silenced, where\nhe really loves and lives in a better state of being rather than in a\nbetter state of choice. On the other hand, a good woman, from true love,\noften climbs down to desire, and lowers herself in her own eyes. The\nlatter action in particular is one of the most pathetic sensations which\nthe idea of a good marriage can involve.\n\n\n\n\n274.\n\n\nMAN PROMISES, WOMAN FULFILS.\u2014By woman Nature shows how far she has\nhitherto achieved her task of fashioning humanity, by man she shows what\nshe has had to overcome and what she still proposes to do for\nhumanity.\u2014The most perfect woman of every age is the holiday-task of the\nCreator on every seventh day of culture, the recreation of the artist from\nhis work.\n\n\n\n\n275.\n\n\nTRANSPLANTING.\u2014If we have spent our intellect in order to gain mastery\nover the intemperance of the passions, the sad result often follows that\nwe transfer the intemperance to the intellect, and from that time forth\nare extravagant in thought and desire of knowledge.\n\n\n\n\n276.\n\n\nLAUGHTER AS TREACHERY.\u2014How and when a woman laughs is a sign of her\nculture, but in the ring of laughter her nature reveals itself, and in\nhighly cultured women perhaps even the last insoluble residue of their\nnature. Hence the psychologist will say with Horace, though from different\nreasons: \u201cRidete puellae.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n277.\n\n\nFROM THE YOUTHFUL SOUL.\u2014Youths varyingly show devotion and impudence\ntowards the same person, because at bottom they only despise or admire\nthemselves in that other person, and between the two feelings but stagger\nto and fro in themselves, so long as they have not found in experience the\nmeasure of their will and ability.\n\n\n\n\n278.\n\n\nFOR THE AMELIORATION OF THE WORLD.\u2014If we forbade the discontented, the\nsullen, and the atrabilious to propagate, we might transform the world\ninto a garden of happiness.\u2014This aphorism belongs to a practical\nphilosophy for the female sex.\n\n\n\n\n279.\n\n\nNOT TO DISTRUST YOUR EMOTIONS.\u2014The feminine phrase \u201cDo not distrust your\nemotions\u201d does not mean much more than \u201cEat what tastes good to you.\u201d This\nmay also, especially for moderate natures, be a good everyday rule. But\nother natures must live according to another maxim: \u201cYou must eat not only\nwith your mouth but also with your brain, in order that the greediness of\nyour mouth may not prove your undoing.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n280.\n\n\nA CRUEL FANCY OF LOVE.\u2014Every great love involves the cruel thought of\nkilling the object of love, so that it may be removed once for all from\nthe mischievous play of change. For love is more afraid of change than of\ndestruction.\n\n\n\n\n281.\n\n\nDOORS.\u2014In everything that is learnt or experienced, the child, just like\nthe man, sees doors; but for the former they are places to go _to_, for\nthe latter to go _through_.\n\n\n\n\n282.\n\n\nSYMPATHETIC WOMEN.\u2014The sympathy of women, which is talkative, takes the\nsick-bed to market.\n\n\n\n\n283.\n\n\nEARLY MERIT.\u2014He who acquires merit early in life tends to forget all\nreverence for age and old people, and accordingly, greatly to his\ndisadvantage, excludes himself from the society of the mature, those who\nconfer maturity. Thus in spite of his early merit he remains green,\nimportunate, and boyish longer than others.\n\n\n\n\n284.\n\n\nSOULS ALL OF A PIECE.\u2014Women and artists think that where we do not\ncontradict them we cannot. Reverence on ten counts and silent disapproval\non ten others appears to them an impossible combination, because their\nsouls are all of a piece.\n\n\n\n\n285.\n\n\nYOUNG TALENTS.\u2014With respect to young talents we must strictly follow\nGoethe\u2019s maxim, that we should often avoid harming error in order to avoid\nharming truth. Their condition is like the diseases of pregnancy, and\ninvolves strange appetites. These appetites should be satisfied and\nhumoured as far as possible, for the sake of the fruit they may be\nexpected to produce. It is true that, as nurse of these remarkable\ninvalids, one must learn the difficult art of voluntary self-abasement.\n\n\n\n\n286.\n\n\nDISGUST WITH TRUTH.\u2014Women are so constituted that all truth (in relation\nto men, love, children, society, aim of life) disgusts them\u2014and that they\ntry to be revenged on every one who opens their eyes.\n\n\n\n\n287.\n\n\nTHE SOURCE OF GREAT LOVE.\u2014Whence arises the sudden passion of a man for a\nwoman, a passion so deep, so vital? Least of all from sensuality only: but\nwhen a man finds weakness, need of help, and high spirits united in the\nsame creature, he suffers a sort of overflowing of soul, and is touched\nand offended at the same moment. At this point arises the source of great\nlove.\n\n\n\n\n288.\n\n\nCLEANLINESS.\u2014In the child, the sense for cleanliness should be fanned into\na passion, and then later on he will raise himself, in ever new phases, to\nalmost every virtue, and will finally appear, in compensation for all\ntalent, as a shining cloud of purity, temperance, gentleness, and\ncharacter, happy in himself and spreading happiness around.\n\n\n\n\n289.\n\n\nOF VAIN OLD MEN.\u2014Profundity of thought belongs to youth, clarity of\nthought to old age. When, in spite of this, old men sometimes speak and\nwrite in the manner of the profound, they do so from vanity, imagining\nthat they thereby assume the charm of juvenility, enthusiasm, growth,\napprehensiveness, hopefulness.\n\n\n\n\n290.\n\n\nENJOYMENT OF NOVELTY.\u2014Men use a new lesson or experience later on as a\nploughshare or perhaps also as a weapon, women at once make it into an\nornament.\n\n\n\n\n291.\n\n\nHOW BOTH SEXES BEHAVE WHEN IN THE RIGHT.\u2014If it is conceded to a woman that\nshe is right, she cannot deny herself the triumph of setting her heel on\nthe neck of the vanquished; she must taste her victory to the full. On the\nother hand, man towards man in such a case is ashamed of being right. But\nthen man is accustomed to victory; with woman it is an exception.\n\n\n\n\n292.\n\n\nABNEGATION IN THE WILL TO BEAUTY.\u2014In order to become beautiful, a woman\nmust not desire to be considered pretty. That is to say, in ninety-nine\nout of a hundred cases where she could please she must scorn and put aside\nall thoughts of pleasing. Only then can she ever reap the delight of him\nwhose soul\u2019s portal is wide enough to admit the great.\n\n\n\n\n293.\n\n\nUNINTELLIGIBLE, UNENDURABLE.\u2014A youth cannot understand that an old man has\nalso had his delights, his dawns of feeling, his changings and soarings of\nthought. It offends him to think that such things have existed before. But\nit makes him very bitter to hear that, to become fruitful, he must lose\nthose buds and dispense with their fragrance.\n\n\n\n\n294.\n\n\nTHE PARTY WITH THE AIR OF MARTYRDOM.\u2014Every party that can assume an air of\nmartyrdom wins good-natured souls over to its side and thereby itself\nacquires an air of good nature\u2014greatly to its advantage.\n\n\n\n\n295.\n\n\nASSERTIONS SURER THAN ARGUMENTS.\u2014An assertion has, with the majority of\nmen at any rate, more effect than an argument, for arguments provoke\nmistrust. Hence demagogues seek to strengthen the arguments of their party\nby assertions.\n\n\n\n\n296.\n\n\nTHE BEST CONCEALERS.\u2014All regularly successful men are profoundly cunning\nin making their faults and weaknesses look like manifestations of\nstrength. This proves that they must know their defects uncommonly well.\n\n\n\n\n297.\n\n\nFROM TIME TO TIME.\u2014He sat in the city gateway and said to one who passed\nthrough that this was the city gate. The latter replied that this was\ntrue, but that one must not be too much in the right if one expected to be\nthanked for it. \u201cOh,\u201d answered the other, \u201cI don\u2019t want thanks, but from\ntime to time it is very pleasant not merely to be in the right but to\nremain in the right.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n298.\n\n\nVIRTUE WAS NOT INVENTED BY THE GERMANS.\u2014Goethe\u2019s nobleness and freedom\nfrom envy, Beethoven\u2019s fine hermitical resignation, Mozart\u2019s cheerfulness\nand grace of heart, Handel\u2019s unbending manliness and freedom under the\nlaw, Bach\u2019s confident and luminous inner life, such as does not even need\nto renounce glamour and success\u2014are these qualities peculiarly German?\u2014If\nthey are not, they at least prove to what goal Germans should strive and\nto what they can attain.\n\n\n\n\n299.\n\n\n_PIA FRAUS_ OR SOMETHING ELSE.\u2014I hope I am mistaken, but I think that in\nGermany of to-day a twofold sort of hypocrisy is set up as the duty of the\nmoment for every one. From imperial-political misgivings Germanism is\ndemanded, and from social apprehensions Christianity\u2014but both only in\nwords and gestures, and particularly in ability to keep silent. It is the\nveneer that nowadays costs so much and is paid for so highly; and for the\nbenefit of the spectators the face of the nation assumes German and\nChristian wrinkles.\n\n\n\n\n300.\n\n\nHOW FAR EVEN IN THE GOOD THE HALF MAY BE MORE THAN THE WHOLE.\u2014In all\nthings that are constructed to last and demand the service of many hands,\nmuch that is less good must be made a rule, although the organiser knows\nwhat is better and harder very well. He will calculate that there will\nnever be a lack of persons who _can_ correspond to the rule, and he knows\nthat the middling good is the rule.\u2014The youth seldom sees this point, and\nas an innovator thinks how marvellously he is in the right and how strange\nis the blindness of others.\n\n\n\n\n301.\n\n\nTHE PARTISAN.\u2014The true partisan learns nothing more, he only experiences\nand judges. It is significant that Solon, who was never a partisan but\npursued his aims above and apart from parties or even against them, was\nthe father of that simple phrase wherein lies the secret of the health and\nvitality of Athens: \u201cI grow old, but I am always learning.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n302.\n\n\nWHAT IS GERMAN ACCORDING TO GOETHE.\u2014They are really intolerable people of\nwhom one cannot even accept the good, who have freedom of disposition but\ndo not remark that they are lacking in freedom of taste and spirit. Yet\njust this, according to Goethe\u2019s well-weighed judgment, is German.\u2014His\nvoice and his example indicate that the German should be more than a\nGerman if he wishes to be useful or even endurable to other nations\u2014and\nwhich direction his striving should take, in order that he may rise above\nand beyond himself.\n\n\n\n\n303.\n\n\nWHEN IT IS NECESSARY TO REMAIN STATIONARY.\u2014When the masses begin to rage,\nand reason is under a cloud, it is a good thing, if the health of one\u2019s\nsoul is not quite assured, to go under a doorway and look out to see what\nthe weather is like.\n\n\n\n\n304.\n\n\nTHE REVOLUTION-SPIRIT AND THE POSSESSION-SPIRIT.\u2014The only remedy against\nSocialism that still lies in your power is to avoid provoking Socialism\u2014in\nother words, to live in moderation and contentment, to prevent as far as\npossible all lavish display, and to aid the State as far as possible in\nits taxing of all superfluities and luxuries. You do not like this remedy?\nThen, you rich bourgeois who call yourselves \u201cLiberals,\u201d confess that it\nis your own inclination that you find so terrible and menacing in\nSocialists, but allow to prevail in yourselves as unavoidable, as if with\nyou it were something different. As you are constituted, if you had not\nyour fortune and the cares of maintaining it, this bent of yours would\nmake Socialists of you. Possession alone differentiates you from them. If\nyou wish to conquer the assailants of your prosperity, you must first\nconquer yourselves.\u2014And if that prosperity only meant well-being, it would\nnot be so external and provocative of envy; it would be more generous,\nmore benevolent, more compensatory, more helpful. But the spurious,\nhistrionic element in your pleasures, which lie more in the feeling of\ncontrast (because others have them not, and feel envious) than in feelings\nof realised and heightened power\u2014your houses, dresses, carriages, shops,\nthe demands of your palates and your tables, your noisy operatic and\nmusical enthusiasm; lastly your women, formed and fashioned but of base\nmetal, gilded but without the ring of gold, chosen by you for show and\nconsidering themselves meant for show\u2014these are the things that spread the\npoison of that national disease, which seizes the masses ever more and\nmore as a Socialistic heart-itch, but has its origin and breeding-place in\nyou. Who shall now arrest this epidemic?\n\n\n\n\n305.\n\n\nPARTY TACTICS.\u2014When a party observes that a previous member has changed\nfrom an unqualified to a qualified adherent, it endures it so ill that it\nirritates and mortifies him in every possible way with the object of\nforcing him to a decisive break and making him an opponent. For the party\nsuspects that the intention of finding a relative value in its faith, a\nvalue which admits of pro and con, of weighing and discarding, is more\ndangerous than downright opposition.\n\n\n\n\n306.\n\n\nFOR THE STRENGTHENING OF PARTIES.\u2014Whoever wishes to strengthen a party\ninternally should give it an opportunity of being forcibly treated with\nobvious injustice. The party thus acquires a capital of good conscience,\nwhich hitherto it perhaps lacked.\n\n\n\n\n307.\n\n\nTO PROVIDE FOR ONE\u2019S PAST.\u2014As men after all only respect the\nold-established and slowly developed, he who would survive after his death\nmust not only provide for posterity but still more for the past. Hence\ntyrants of every sort (including tyrannical artists and politicians) like\nto do violence to history, so that history may seem a preparation and a\nladder up to them.\n\n\n\n\n308.\n\n\nPARTY WRITERS.\u2014The beating of drums, which delights young writers who\nserve a party, sounds to him who does not belong to the party like a\nrattling of chains, and excites sympathy rather than admiration.\n\n\n\n\n309.\n\n\nTAKING SIDES AGAINST OURSELVES.\u2014Our followers never forgive us for taking\nsides against ourselves, for we seem in their eyes not only to be spurning\ntheir love but to be exposing them to the charge of lack of intelligence.\n\n\n\n\n310.\n\n\nDANGER IN WEALTH.\u2014Only a man of intellect should hold property: otherwise\nproperty is dangerous to the community. For the owner, not knowing how to\nmake use of the leisure which his possessions might secure to him, will\ncontinue to strive after more property. This strife will be his\noccupation, his strategy in the war with ennui. So in the end real wealth\nis produced from the moderate property that would be enough for an\nintellectual man. Such wealth, then, is the glittering outcrop of\nintellectual dependence and poverty, but it looks quite different from\nwhat its humble origin might lead one to expect, because it can mask\nitself with culture and art\u2014it can, in fact, purchase the mask. Hence it\nexcites envy in the poor and uncultured\u2014who at bottom always envy culture\nand see no mask in the mask\u2014and gradually paves the way for a social\nrevolution. For a gilded coarseness and a histrionic blowing of trumpets\nin the pretended enjoyment of culture inspires that class with the\nthought, \u201cIt is only a matter of money,\u201d whereas it is indeed to some\nextent a matter of money, but far more of intellect.\n\n\n\n\n311.\n\n\nJOY IN COMMANDING AND OBEYING.\u2014Commanding is a joy, like obeying; the\nformer when it has not yet become a habit, the latter just when it has\nbecome a habit. Old servants under new masters advance each other mutually\nin giving pleasure.\n\n\n\n\n312.\n\n\nAMBITION FOR A FORLORN HOPE.\u2014There is an ambition for a forlorn hope which\nforces a party to place itself at the post of extreme danger.\n\n\n\n\n313.\n\n\nWHEN ASSES ARE NEEDED.\u2014We shall not move the crowd to cry \u201cHosanna!\u201d until\nwe have ridden into the city upon an ass.\n\n\n\n\n314.\n\n\nPARTY USAGE.\u2014Every party attempts to represent the important elements that\nhave sprung up outside it as unimportant, and if it does not succeed, it\nattacks those elements the more bitterly, the more excellent they are.\n\n\n\n\n315.\n\n\nBECOMING EMPTY.\u2014Of him who abandons himself to the course of events, a\nsmaller and smaller residue is continually left. Great politicians may\ntherefore become quite empty men, although they were once full and rich.\n\n\n\n\n316.\n\n\nWELCOME ENEMIES.\u2014The Socialistic movements are nowadays becoming more and\nmore agreeable rather than terrifying to the dynastic governments, because\nby these movements they are provided with a right and a weapon for making\nexceptional rules, and can thus attack their real bogies, democrats and\nanti-dynasts.\u2014Towards all that such governments professedly detest they\nfeel a secret cordiality and inclination. But they are compelled to draw\nthe veil over their soul.\n\n\n\n\n317.\n\n\nPOSSESSION POSSESSES.\u2014Only up to a certain point does possession make men\nfeel freer and more independent; one step farther, and possession becomes\nlord, the possessor a slave. The latter must sacrifice his time, his\nthoughts to the former, and feels himself compelled to an intercourse,\nnailed to a spot, incorporated with the State\u2014perhaps quite in conflict\nwith his real and essential needs.\n\n\n\n\n318.\n\n\nOF THE MASTERY OF THEM THAT KNOW.\u2014It is easy, ridiculously easy, to set up\na model for the choice of a legislative body. First of all the honest and\nreliable men of the nation, who at the same time are masters and experts\nin some one branch, have to become prominent by mutual scenting-out and\nrecognition. From these, by a narrower process of selection, the learned\nand expert of the first rank in each individual branch must again be\nchosen, also by mutual recognition and guarantee. If the legislative body\nbe composed of these, it will finally be necessary, in each individual\ncase, that only the voices and judgments of the most specialised experts\nshould decide; the honesty of all the rest should have become so great\nthat it is simply a matter of decency to leave the voting also in the\nhands of these men. The result would be that the law, in the strictest\nsense, would emanate from the intelligence of the most intelligent.\u2014As\nthings now are, voting is done by parties, and at every division there\nmust be hundreds of uneasy consciences among the ill-taught, the incapable\nof judgment, among those who merely repeat, imitate, and go with the tide.\nNothing lowers the dignity of a new law so much as this inherent\nshamefaced feeling of insincerity that necessarily results at every party\ndivision. But, as has been said, it is easy, ridiculously easy, to set up\nsuch a model: no power on earth is at present strong enough to realise\nsuch an ideal\u2014unless the belief in the highest utility of knowledge, and\nof those that know, at last dawns even upon the most hostile minds and is\npreferred to the prevalent belief in majorities. In the sense of such a\nfuture may our watchword be: \u201cMore reverence for them that know, and down\nwith all parties!\u201d\n\n\n\n\n319.\n\n\nOF THE \u201cNATION OF THINKERS\u201d (OR OF BAD THINKING).\u2014The vague, vacillating,\npremonitory, elementary, intuitive elements\u2014to choose obscure names for\nobscure things\u2014that are attributed to the German nature would be, if they\nreally still existed, a proof that our culture has remained several stages\nbehind and is still surrounded by the spell and atmosphere of the Middle\nAges.\u2014It is true that in this backwardness there are certain advantages:\nby these qualities the Germans (if, as has been said before, they still\npossess them) would possess the capacity, which other nations have now\nlost, for doing certain things and particularly for understanding certain\nthings. Much undoubtedly is lost if the lack of sense\u2014which is just the\ncommon factor in all those qualities\u2014is lost. Here too, however, there are\nno losses without the highest compensatory gains, so that no reason is\nleft for lamenting, granting that we do not, like children, and gourmands,\nwish to enjoy at once the fruits of all seasons of the year.\n\n\n\n\n320.\n\n\nCARRYING COALS TO NEWCASTLE.\u2014The governments of the great States have two\ninstruments for keeping the people dependent, in fear and obedience: a\ncoarser, the army, and a more refined, the school. With the aid of the\nformer they win over to their side the ambition of the higher strata and\nthe strength of the lower, so far as both are characteristic of active and\nenergetic men of moderate or inferior gifts. With the aid of the latter\nthey win over gifted poverty, especially the intellectually pretentious\nsemi-poverty of the middle classes. Above all, they make teachers of all\ngrades into an intellectual court looking unconsciously \u201ctowards the\nheights.\u201d By putting obstacle after obstacle in the way of private schools\nand the wholly distasteful individual tuition they secure the disposal of\na considerable number of educational posts, towards which numerous hungry\nand submissive eyes are turned to an extent five times as great as can\never be satisfied. These posts, however, must support the holder but\nmeagrely, so that he maintains a feverish thirst for promotion and becomes\nstill more closely attached to the views of the government. For it is\nalways more advantageous to foster moderate discontent than contentment,\nthe mother of courage, the grandmother of free thought and exuberance. By\nmeans of this physically and mentally bridled body of teachers, the youth\nof the country is as far as possible raised to a certain level of culture\nthat is useful to the State and arranged on a suitable sliding-scale.\nAbove all, the immature and ambitious minds of all classes are almost\nimperceptibly imbued with the idea that only a career which is recognised\nand hall-marked by the State can lead immediately to social distinction.\nThe effect of this belief in government examinations and titles goes so\nfar that even men who have remained independent and have risen by trade or\nhandicraft still feel a pang of discontent in their hearts until their\nposition too is marked and acknowledged by a gracious bestowal of rank and\norders from above\u2014until one becomes a \u201csomebody.\u201d Finally the State\nconnects all these hundreds of offices and posts in its hands with the\nobligation of being trained and hallmarked in these State schools if one\never wishes to enter this charmed circle. Honour in society, daily bread,\nthe possibility of a family, protection from above, the feeling of\ncommunity in a common culture\u2014all this forms a network of hopes into which\nevery young man walks: how should he feel the slightest breath of\nmistrust? In the end, perhaps, the obligation of being a soldier for one\nyear has become with every one, after the lapse of a few generations, an\nunreflecting habit, an understood thing, with an eye to which we construct\nthe plan of our lives quite early. Then the State can venture on the\nmaster-stroke of weaving together school and army, talent, ambition and\nstrength by means of common advantages\u2014that is, by attracting the more\nhighly gifted on favourable terms to the army and inspiring them with the\nmilitary spirit of joyful obedience; so that finally, perhaps, they become\nattached permanently to the flag and endow it by their talents with an\never new and more brilliant lustre. Then nothing more is wanted but an\nopportunity for great wars. These are provided from professional reasons\n(and so in all innocence) by diplomats, aided by newspapers and Stock\nExchanges. For \u201cthe nation,\u201d as a nation of soldiers, need never be\nsupplied with a good conscience in war\u2014it has one already.\n\n\n\n\n321.\n\n\nTHE PRESS.\u2014If we consider how even to-day all great political transactions\nglide upon the stage secretly and stealthily; how they are hidden by\nunimportant events, and seem small when close at hand; how they only show\ntheir far-reaching effect, and leave the soil still quaking, long after\nthey have taken place;\u2014what significance can we attach to the Press in its\npresent position, with its daily expenditure of lung-power in order to\nbawl, to deafen, to excite, to terrify? Is it anything more than an\neverlasting false alarm, which tries to lead our ears and our wits into a\nfalse direction?\n\n\n\n\n322.\n\n\nAFTER A GREAT EVENT.\u2014A nation and a man whose soul has come to light\nthrough some great event generally feel the immediate need of some act of\nchildishness or coarseness, as much from shame as for purposes of\nrecreation.\n\n\n\n\n323.\n\n\nTO BE A GOOD GERMAN MEANS TO DE-GERMANISE ONESELF.\u2014National differences\nconsist, far more than has hitherto been observed, only in the differences\nof various grades of culture, and are only to a very small extent\npermanent (nor even that in a strict sense). For this reason all arguments\nbased on national character are so little binding on one who aims at the\nalteration of convictions\u2014in other words, at culture. If, for instance, we\nconsider all that has already been German, we shall improve upon the\nhypothetical question, \u201cWhat is German?\u201d by the counter-question, \u201cWhat is\n_now_ German?\u201d and every good German will answer it practically, by\novercoming his German characteristics. For when a nation advances and\ngrows, it bursts the girdle previously given to it by its national\noutlook. When it remains stationary or declines, its soul is surrounded by\na fresh girdle, and the crust, as it becomes harder and harder, builds a\nprison around, with walls growing ever higher. Hence if a nation has much\nthat is firmly established, this is a sign that it wishes to petrify and\nwould like to become nothing but a monument. This happened, from a\ndefinite date, in the case of Egypt. So he who is well-disposed towards\nthe Germans may for his part consider how he may more and more grow out of\nwhat is German. The tendency to be un-German has therefore always been a\nmark of efficient members of our nation.\n\n\n\n\n324.\n\n\nFOREIGNISMS.\u2014A foreigner who travelled in Germany found favour or the\nreverse by certain assertions of his, according to the districts in which\nhe stayed. All intelligent Suabians, he used to say, are coquettish.\u2014The\nother Suabians still believed that Uhland was a poet and Goethe\nimmoral.\u2014The best about German novels now in vogue was that one need not\nread them, for one knew already what they contained.\u2014The native of Berlin\nseemed more good-humoured than the South German, for he was all too fond\nof mocking, and so could endure mockery himself, which the South German\ncould not.\u2014The intellect of the Germans was kept down by their beer and\ntheir newspapers: he recommended them tea and pamphlets, of course as a\ncure.\u2014He advised us to contemplate the different nations of worn-out\nEurope and see how well each displayed some particular quality of old age,\nto the delight of those who sit before the great spectacle: how the French\nsuccessfully represent the cleverness and amiability of old age, the\nEnglish the experience and reserve, the Italians the innocence and\ncandour. Can the other masks of old age be wanting? Where is the proud old\nman, the domineering old man, the covetous old man?\u2014The most dangerous\nregion in Germany was Saxony and Thuringia: nowhere else was there more\nmental nimbleness, more knowledge of men, side by side with freedom of\nthought; and all this was so modestly veiled by the ugly dialect and the\nzealous officiousness of the inhabitants that one hardly noticed that one\nhere had to deal with the intellectual drill-sergeants of Germany, her\nteachers for good or evil.\u2014The arrogance of the North Germans was kept in\ncheck by their tendency to obey, that of the South Germans by their\ntendency\u2014to make themselves comfortable.\u2014It appeared to him that in their\nwomen German men possessed awkward but self-opinionated housewives, who\nbelauded themselves so perseveringly that they had almost persuaded the\nworld, and at any rate their husbands, of their peculiarly German\nhousewifely virtue.\u2014When the conversation turned on Germany\u2019s home and\nforeign policy, he used to say (he called it \u201cbetray the secret\u201d) that\nGermany\u2019s greatest statesman did not believe in great statesmen.\u2014The\nfuture of Germany he found menaced and menacing, for Germans had forgotten\nhow to enjoy themselves (an art that the Italians understood so well),\nbut, by the great games of chance called wars and dynastic revolutions,\nhad accustomed themselves to emotionalism, and consequently would one day\nhave an _\u00e9meute_. For that is the strongest emotion that a nation can\nprocure for itself.\u2014The German Socialist was all the more dangerous\nbecause impelled by no definite necessity: his trouble lay in not knowing\nwhat he wanted; so, even if he attained many of his objects, he would\nstill pine away from desire in the midst of delights, just like Faust, but\npresumably like a very vulgar Faust. \u201cFor the Faust-Devil,\u201d he finally\nexclaimed, \u201cby whom cultured Germans were so much plagued, was exorcised\nby Bismarck; but now the Devil has entered into the swine,(17) and is\nworse than ever!\u201d\n\n\n\n\n325.\n\n\nOPINIONS.\u2014Most men are nothing and count for nothing until they have\narrayed themselves in universal convictions and public opinions. This is\nin accordance with the tailors\u2019 philosophy, \u201cThe apparel makes the man.\u201d\nOf exceptional men, however, it must be said, \u201cThe wearer primarily makes\nthe apparel.\u201d Here opinions cease to be public, and become something else\nthan masks, ornament, and disguise.\n\n\n\n\n326.\n\n\nTWO KINDS OF SOBRIETY.\u2014In order not to confound the sobriety arising from\nmental exhaustion with that arising from moderation, one must remark that\nthe former is peevish, the latter cheerful.\n\n\n\n\n327.\n\n\nDEBASEMENT OF JOY.\u2014To call a thing good not a day longer than it appears\nto us good, and above all not a day earlier\u2014that is the only way to keep\njoy pure. Otherwise, joy all too easily becomes insipid and rotten to the\ntaste, and counts, for whole strata of the people, among the adulterated\nfoodstuffs.\n\n\n\n\n328.\n\n\nTHE SCAPEGOAT OF VIRTUE.\u2014When a man does his very best, those who mean\nwell towards him, but are not capable of appreciating him, speedily seek a\nscapegoat to immolate, thinking it is the scapegoat of sin\u2014but it is the\nscapegoat of virtue.\n\n\n\n\n329.\n\n\nSOVEREIGNTY.\u2014To honour and acknowledge even the bad, when it _pleases_\none, and to have no conception of how one could be ashamed of being\npleased thereat, is the mark of sovereignty in things great and small.\n\n\n\n\n330.\n\n\nINFLUENCE A PHANTOM, NOT A REALITY.\u2014The man of mark gradually learns that\nso far as he has influence he is a phantom in other brains, and perhaps he\nfalls into a state of subtle vexation of soul, in which he asks himself\nwhether he must not maintain this phantom of himself for the benefit of\nhis fellow-men.\n\n\n\n\n331.\n\n\nGIVING AND TAKING.\u2014When one takes away (or anticipates) the smallest thing\nthat another possesses, the latter is blind to the fact that he has been\ngiven something greater, nay, even the greatest thing.\n\n\n\n\n332.\n\n\nGOOD PLOUGHLAND.\u2014All rejection and negation betoken a deficiency in\nfertility. If we were good ploughland, we should allow nothing to be\nunused or lost, and in every thing, event, or person we should welcome\nmanure, rain, or sunshine.\n\n\n\n\n333.\n\n\nINTERCOURSE AS AN ENJOYMENT.\u2014If a man renounces the world and\nintentionally lives in solitude, he may come to regard intercourse with\nothers, which he enjoys but seldom, as a special delicacy.\n\n\n\n\n334.\n\n\nTO KNOW HOW TO SUFFER IN PUBLIC.\u2014We must advertise our misfortunes and\nfrom time to time heave audible sighs and show visible marks of\nimpatience. For if we could let others see how assured and happy we are in\nspite of pain and privation, how envious and ill-tempered they would\nbecome at the sight!\u2014But we must take care not to corrupt our fellow-men;\nbesides, if they knew the truth, they would levy a heavy toll upon us. At\nany rate our public misfortune is our private advantage.\n\n\n\n\n335.\n\n\nWARMTH ON THE HEIGHTS.\u2014On the heights it is warmer than people in the\nvalleys suppose, especially in winter. The thinker recognises the full\nimport of this simile.\n\n\n\n\n336.\n\n\nTO WILL THE GOOD AND BE CAPABLE OF THE BEAUTIFUL.\u2014It is not enough to\npractise the good one must have willed it, and, as the poet says, include\nthe Godhead in our will. But the beautiful we must not will, we must be\ncapable of it, in innocence and blindness, without any psychical\ncuriosity. He that lights his lantern to find perfect men should remember\nthe token by which to know them. They are the men who always act for the\nsake of the good and in so doing always attain to the beautiful without\nthinking of the beautiful. Many better and nobler men, from impotence or\nfrom want of beauty in their souls, remain unrefreshing and ugly to\nbehold, with all their good will and good works. They rebuff and injure\neven virtue through the repulsive garb in which their bad taste arrays\nher.\n\n\n\n\n337.\n\n\nDANGER OF RENUNCIATION.\u2014We must beware of basing our lives on too narrow a\nfoundation of appetite. For if we renounce all the joys involved in\npositions, honours, associations, revels, creature comforts, and arts, a\nday may come when we perceive that this repudiation has led us not to\nwisdom but to satiety of life.\n\n\n\n\n338.\n\n\nFINAL OPINION ON OPINIONS.\u2014Either we should hide our opinions or hide\nourselves behind our opinions. Whoever does otherwise, does not know the\nway of the world, or belongs to the order of pious fire-eaters.\n\n\n\n\n339.\n\n\n\u201c_GAUDEAMUS IGITUR._\u201d\u2014Joy must contain edifying and healing forces for the\nmoral nature of man. Otherwise, how comes it that our soul, as soon as it\nbasks in the sunshine of joy, unconsciously vows to itself, \u201cI will be\ngood!\u201d \u201cI will become perfect!\u201d and is at once seized by a premonition of\nperfection that is like a shudder of religious awe?\n\n\n\n\n340.\n\n\nTO ONE WHO IS PRAISED.\u2014So long as you are praised, believe that you are\nnot yet on your own course but on that of another.\n\n\n\n\n341.\n\n\nLOVING THE MASTER.\u2014The apprentice and the master love the master in\ndifferent ways.\n\n\n\n\n342.\n\n\nALL-TOO-BEAUTIFUL AND HUMAN.\u2014\u201cNature is too beautiful for thee, poor\nmortal,\u201d one often feels. But now and then, at a profound contemplation of\nall that is human, in its fulness, vigour, tenderness, and complexity, I\nhave felt as if I must say, in all humility, \u201cMan also is too beautiful\nfor the contemplation of man!\u201d Nor did I mean the moral man alone, but\nevery one.\n\n\n\n\n343.\n\n\nREAL AND PERSONAL ESTATE.\u2014When life has treated us in true robber fashion,\nand has taken away all that it could of honour, joys, connections, health,\nand property of every kind, we perhaps discover in the end, after the\nfirst shock, that we are richer than before. For now we know for the first\ntime what is so peculiarly ours that no robber hand can touch it, and\nperhaps, after all the plunder and devastation, we come forward with the\nairs of a mighty real estate owner.\n\n\n\n\n344.\n\n\nINVOLUNTARILY IDEALISED.\u2014The most painful feeling that exists is finding\nout that we are always taken for something higher than we really are. For\nwe must thereby confess to ourselves, \u201cThere is in you some element of\nfraud\u2014your speech, your expression, your bearing, your eye, your dealings;\nand this deceitful something is as necessary as your usual honesty, but\nconstantly destroys its effect and its value.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n345.\n\n\nIDEALIST AND LIAR.\u2014We must not let ourselves be tyrannised even by that\nfinest faculty of idealising things: otherwise, truth will one day part\ncompany from us with the insulting remark: \u201cThou arch-liar, what have I to\ndo with thee?\u201d\n\n\n\n\n346.\n\n\nBEING MISUNDERSTOOD.\u2014When one is misunderstood generally, it is impossible\nto remove a particular misunderstanding. This point must be recognised, to\nsave superfluous expenditure of energy in self-defence.\n\n\n\n\n347.\n\n\nTHE WATER-DRINKER SPEAKS.\u2014Go on drinking your wine, which has refreshed\nyou all your life\u2014what affair is it of yours if I have to be a\nwater-drinker? Are not wine and water peaceable, brotherly elements, that\ncan live side by side without mutual recriminations?\n\n\n\n\n348.\n\n\nFROM CANNIBAL COUNTRY.\u2014In solitude the lonely man is eaten up by himself,\namong crowds by the many. Choose which you prefer.\n\n\n\n\n349.\n\n\nTHE FREEZING-POINT OF THE WILL.\u2014\u201cSome time the hour will come at last, the\nhour that will envelop you in the golden cloud of painlessness; when the\nsoul enjoys its own weariness and, happy in patient playing with patience,\nresembles the waves of a lake, which on a quiet summer day, in the\nreflection of a many-hued evening sky, sip and sip at the shore and again\nare hushed\u2014without end, without purpose, without satiety, without need\u2014all\ncalm rejoicing in change, all ebb and flow of Nature\u2019s pulse.\u201d Such is the\nfeeling and talk of all invalids, but if they attain that hour, a brief\nperiod of enjoyment is followed by ennui. But this is the thawing-wind of\nthe frozen will, which awakes, stirs, and once more begets desire upon\ndesire.\u2014Desire is a sign of convalescence or recovery.\n\n\n\n\n350.\n\n\nTHE DISCLAIMED IDEAL.\u2014It happens sometimes by an exception that a man only\nreaches the highest when he disclaims his ideal. For this ideal previously\ndrove him onward too violently, so that in the middle of the track he\nregularly got out of breath and had to rest.\n\n\n\n\n351.\n\n\nA TREACHEROUS INCLINATION.\u2014It should be regarded as a sign of an envious\nbut aspiring man, when he feels himself attracted by the thought that with\nregard to the eminent there is but one salvation\u2014love.\n\n\n\n\n352.\n\n\nSTAIRCASE HAPPINESS.\u2014Just as the wit of many men does not keep pace with\nopportunity (so that opportunity has already passed through the door while\nwit still waits on the staircase outside), so others have a kind of\nstaircase happiness, which walks too slowly to keep pace with swift-footed\nTime. The best that it can enjoy of an experience, of a whole span of\nlife, falls to its share long afterwards, often only as a weak, spicy\nfragrance, giving rise to longing and sadness\u2014as if \u201cit might have been\npossible\u201d\u2014some time or other\u2014to drink one\u2019s fill of this element: but now\nit is too late.\n\n\n\n\n353.\n\n\nWORMS.\u2014The fact that an intellect contains a few worms does not detract\nfrom its ripeness.\n\n\n\n\n354.\n\n\nTHE SEAT OF VICTORY.\u2014A good seat on horseback robs an opponent of his\ncourage, the spectator of his heart\u2014why attack such a man? Sit like one\nwho has been victorious!\n\n\n\n\n355.\n\n\nDANGER IN ADMIRATION.\u2014From excessive admiration for the virtues of others\none can lose the sense of one\u2019s own, and finally, through lack of\npractice, lose these virtues themselves, without retaining the alien\nvirtues as compensation.\n\n\n\n\n356.\n\n\nUSES OF SICKLINESS.\u2014He who is often ill not only has a far greater\npleasure in health, on account of his so often getting well, but acquires\na very keen sense of what is healthy or sickly in actions and\nachievements, both his own and others\u2019. Thus, for example, it is just the\nwriters of uncertain health\u2014among whom, unfortunately, nearly all great\nwriters must be classed\u2014who are wont to have a far more even and assured\ntone of health in their writings, because they are better versed than are\nthe physically robust in the philosophy of psychical health and\nconvalescence and in their teachers\u2014morning, sunshine, forest, and\nfountain.\n\n\n\n\n357.\n\n\nDISLOYALTY A CONDITION OF MASTERY.\u2014It cannot be helped\u2014every master has\nbut one pupil, and _he_ becomes disloyal to him, for he also is destined\nfor mastery.\n\n\n\n\n358.\n\n\nNEVER IN VAIN.\u2014In the mountains of truth you never climb in vain. Either\nyou already reach a higher point to-day, or you exercise your strength in\norder to be able to climb higher to-morrow.\n\n\n\n\n359.\n\n\nTHROUGH GREY WINDOW-PANES.\u2014Is what you see through this window of the\nworld so beautiful that you do not wish to look through any other\nwindow\u2014ay, and even try to prevent others from so doing?\n\n\n\n\n360.\n\n\nA SIGN OF RADICAL CHANGES.\u2014When we dream of persons long forgotten or\ndead, it is a sign that we have suffered radical changes, and that the\nsoil on which we live has been completely undermined. The dead rise again,\nand our antiquity becomes modernity.\n\n\n\n\n361.\n\n\nMEDICINE OF THE SOUL.\u2014To lie still and think little is the cheapest\nmedicine for all diseases of the soul, and, with the aid of good-will,\nbecomes pleasanter every hour that it is used.\n\n\n\n\n362.\n\n\nINTELLECTUAL ORDER OF PRECEDENCE.\u2014You rank far below others when you try\nto establish the exception and they the rule.\n\n\n\n\n363.\n\n\nTHE FATALIST.\u2014You must believe in fate\u2014science can compel you thereto. All\nthat develops in you out of that belief\u2014cowardice, devotion or loftiness,\nand uprightness\u2014bears witness to the soil in which the grain was sown, but\nnot to the grain itself, for from that seed anything and everything can\ngrow.\n\n\n\n\n364.\n\n\nTHE REASON FOR MUCH FRETFULNESS.\u2014He that prefers the beautiful to the\nuseful in life will undoubtedly, like children who prefer sweetmeats to\nbread, destroy his digestion and acquire a very fretful outlook on the\nworld.\n\n\n\n\n365.\n\n\nEXCESS AS A REMEDY.\u2014We can make our own talent once more acceptable to\nourselves by honouring and enjoying the opposite talent for some time to\nexcess.\u2014Using excess as a remedy is one of the more refined devices in the\nart of life.\n\n\n\n\n366.\n\n\n\u201cWILL A SELF.\u201d\u2014Active, successful natures act, not according to the maxim,\n\u201cKnow thyself,\u201d but as if always confronted with the command, \u201cWill a\nself, so you will become a self.\u201d\u2014Fate seems always to have left them a\nchoice. Inactive, contemplative natures, on the other hand, reflect on how\nthey have chosen their self \u201conce for all\u201d at their entry into life.\n\n\n\n\n367.\n\n\nTO LIVE AS FAR AS POSSIBLE WITHOUT A FOLLOWING.\u2014How small is the\nimportance of followers we first grasp when we have ceased to be the\nfollowers of our followers.\n\n\n\n\n368.\n\n\nOBSCURING ONESELF.\u2014We must understand how to obscure ourselves in order to\nget rid of the gnat-swarms of pestering admirers.\n\n\n\n\n369.\n\n\nENNUI.\u2014There is an ennui of the most subtle and cultured brains, to which\nthe best that the world can offer has become stale. Accustomed to eat ever\nmore and more recherch\u00e9 fare and to feel disgust at coarser diet, they are\nin danger of dying of hunger. For the very best exists but in small\nquantities, and has sometimes become inaccessible or hard as stone, so\nthat even good teeth can no longer bite it.\n\n\n\n\n370.\n\n\nTHE DANGER IN ADMIRATION.\u2014The admiration of a quality or of an art may be\nso strong as to deter us from aspiring to possess that quality or art.\n\n\n\n\n371.\n\n\nWHAT IS REQUIRED OF ART.\u2014One man wants to enjoy himself by means of art,\nanother for a time to get out of or above himself.\u2014To meet both\nrequirements there exists a twofold species of artists.\n\n\n\n\n372.\n\n\nSECESSIONS.\u2014Whoever secedes from us offends not us, perhaps, but certainly\nour adherents.\n\n\n\n\n373.\n\n\nAFTER DEATH.\u2014It is only long after the death of a man that we find it\ninconceivable that he should be missed\u2014in the case of really great men,\nonly after decades. Those who are honest usually think when any one dies\nthat he is not much missed, and that the pompous funeral oration is a\npiece of hypocrisy. Necessity first teaches the necessariness of an\nindividual, and the proper epitaph is a belated sigh.\n\n\n\n\n374.\n\n\nLEAVING IN HADES.\u2014We must leave many things in the Hades of half-conscious\nfeeling, and not try to release them from their shadow-existence, or else\nthey will become, as thoughts and words, our demoniacal tyrants, with\ncruel lust after our blood.\n\n\n\n\n375.\n\n\nNEAR TO BEGGARY.\u2014Even the richest intellect sometimes mislays the key to\nthe room in which his hoarded treasures repose. He is then like the\npoorest of the poor, who must beg to get a living.\n\n\n\n\n376.\n\n\nCHAIN-THINKERS.\u2014To him who has thought a great deal, every new thought\nthat he hears or reads at once assumes the form of a chain.\n\n\n\n\n377.\n\n\nPITY.\u2014In the gilded sheath of pity is sometimes hidden the dagger of envy.\n\n\n\n\n378.\n\n\nWHAT IS GENIUS?\u2014To aspire to a lofty aim and to will the means to that\naim.\n\n\n\n\n379.\n\n\nVANITY OF COMBATANTS.\u2014He who has no hope of victory in a combat, or who is\nobviously worsted, is all the more desirous that his style of fighting\nshould be admired.\n\n\n\n\n380.\n\n\nTHE PHILOSOPHIC LIFE MISINTERPRETED.\u2014At the moment when one is beginning\nto take philosophy seriously, the whole world fancies that one is doing\nthe reverse.\n\n\n\n\n381.\n\n\nIMITATION.\u2014By imitation, the bad gains, the good loses credit\u2014especially\nin art.\n\n\n\n\n382.\n\n\nFINAL TEACHING OF HISTORY.\u2014\u201cOh that I had but lived in those times!\u201d is\nthe exclamation of foolish and frivolous men. At every period of history\nthat we seriously review, even if it be the most belauded era of the past,\nwe shall rather cry out at the end, \u201cAnything but a return to that! The\nspirit of that age would oppress you with the weight of a hundred\natmospheres, the good and beautiful in it you would not enjoy, its evil\nyou could not digest.\u201d Depend upon it, posterity will pass the same\nverdict on our own epoch, and say that it was unbearable, that life under\nsuch conditions was intolerable. \u201cAnd yet every one can endure his own\ntimes?\u201d Yes, because the spirit of his age not only lies _upon_ him but is\n_in_ him. The spirit of the age offers resistance to itself and can bear\nitself.\n\n\n\n\n383.\n\n\nGREATNESS AS A MASK.\u2014By greatness in our comportment we embitter our foes;\nby envy that we do not conceal we almost reconcile them to us. For envy\nlevels and makes equal; it is an unconscious, plaintive variety of\nmodesty.\u2014It may be indeed that here and there, for the sake of the\nabove-named advantage, envy has been assumed as a mask by those who are\nnot envious. Certainly, however, greatness in comportment is often used as\nthe mask of envy by ambitious men who would rather suffer drawbacks and\nembitter their foes than let it be seen that they place them on an equal\nfooting with themselves.\n\n\n\n\n384.\n\n\nUNPARDONABLE.\u2014You gave him an opportunity of displaying the greatness of\nhis character, and he did not make use of the opportunity. He will never\nforgive you for that.\n\n\n\n\n385.\n\n\nCONTRASTS.\u2014The most senile thought ever conceived about men lies in the\nfamous saying, \u201cThe ego is always hateful,\u201d the most childish in the still\nmore famous saying, \u201cLove thy neighbour as thyself.\u201d\u2014With the one\nknowledge of men has ceased, with the other it has not yet begun.\n\n\n\n\n386.\n\n\nA DEFECTIVE EAR.\u2014\u201cWe still belong to the mob so long as we always shift\nthe blame on to others; we are on the track of wisdom when we always make\nourselves alone responsible; but the wise man finds no one to blame,\nneither himself nor others.\u201d\u2014Who said that? Epictetus, eighteen hundred\nyears ago.\u2014The world has heard but forgotten the saying.\u2014No, the world has\nnot heard and not forgotten it: everything is not forgotten. But we had\nnot the necessary ear, the ear of Epictetus.\u2014So he whispered it into his\nown ear?\u2014Even so: wisdom is the whispering of the sage to himself in the\ncrowded market-place.\n\n\n\n\n387.\n\n\nA DEFECT OF STANDPOINT, NOT OF VISION.\u2014We always stand a few paces too\nnear ourselves and a few paces too far from our neighbour. Hence we judge\nhim too much in the lump, and ourselves too much by individual,\noccasional, insignificant features and circumstances.\n\n\n\n\n388.\n\n\nIGNORANCE ABOUT WEAPONS.\u2014How little we care whether another knows a\nsubject or not!\u2014whereas he perhaps sweats blood at the bare idea that he\nmay be considered ignorant on the point. Yes, there are exquisite fools,\nwho always go about with a quiverful of mighty, excommunicatory\nutterances, ready to shoot down any one who shows freely that there are\nmatters in which their judgment is not taken into account.\n\n\n\n\n389.\n\n\nAT THE DRINKING-TABLE OF EXPERIENCE.\u2014People whose innate moderation leads\nthem to drink but the half of every glass, will not admit that everything\nin the world has its lees and sediment.\n\n\n\n\n390.\n\n\nSINGING-BIRDS.\u2014The followers of a great man often put their own eyes out,\nso that they may be the better able to sing his praise.\n\n\n\n\n391.\n\n\nBEYOND OUR KEN.\u2014The good generally displeases us when it is beyond our\nken.\n\n\n\n\n392.\n\n\nRULE AS MOTHER OR AS CHILD.\u2014There is one condition that gives birth to\nrules, another to which rules give birth.\n\n\n\n\n393.\n\n\nCOMEDY.\u2014We sometimes earn honour or love for actions and achievements\nwhich we have long since sloughed as the snake sloughs his skin. We are\nhereby easily seduced into becoming the comic actors of our own past, and\ninto throwing the old skin once more about our shoulders\u2014and that not\nmerely from vanity, but from good-will towards our admirers.\n\n\n\n\n394.\n\n\nA MISTAKE OF BIOGRAPHERS.\u2014The small force that is required to launch a\nboat into the stream must not be confounded with the force of the stream\nthat carries the boat along. Yet this mistake is made in nearly all\nbiographies.\n\n\n\n\n395.\n\n\nNOT BUYING TOO DEAR.\u2014The things that we buy too dear we generally turn to\nbad use, because we have no love for them but only a painful recollection.\nThus they involve a twofold drawback.\n\n\n\n\n396.\n\n\nTHE PHILOSOPHY THAT SOCIETY ALWAYS NEEDS.\u2014The pillars of the social\nstructure rest upon the fundamental fact that every one cheerfully\ncontemplates all that he is, does, and attempts, his sickness or health,\nhis poverty or affluence, his honour or insignificance, and says to\nhimself, \u201cAfter all, I would not change places with any one!\u201d\u2014Whoever\nwishes to add a stone to the social structure should always try to implant\nin mankind this cheerful philosophy of contentment and refusal to change\nplaces.\n\n\n\n\n397.\n\n\nTHE MARK OF A NOBLE SOUL.\u2014A noble soul is not that which is capable of the\nhighest flights, but that which rises little and falls little, living\nalways in a free and bright atmosphere and altitude.\n\n\n\n\n398.\n\n\nGREATNESS AND ITS CONTEMPLATOR.\u2014The noblest effect of greatness is that it\ngives the contemplator a power of vision that magnifies and embellishes.\n\n\n\n\n399.\n\n\nBEING SATISFIED.\u2014We show that we have attained maturity of understanding\nwhen we no longer go where rare flowers lurk under the thorniest hedges of\nknowledge, but are satisfied with gardens, forests, meadows, and\nploughlands, remembering that life is too short for the rare and uncommon.\n\n\n\n\n400.\n\n\nADVANTAGE IN PRIVATION.\u2014He who always lives in the warmth and fulness of\nthe heart, and, as it were, in the summer air of the soul, cannot form an\nidea of that fearful delight which seizes more wintry natures, who for\nonce in a way are kissed by the rays of love and the milder breath of a\nsunny February day.\n\n\n\n\n401.\n\n\nRECIPE FOR THE SUFFERER.\u2014You find the burden of life too heavy? Then you\nmust increase the burden of your life. When the sufferer finally thirsts\nafter and seeks the river of Lethe, then he must become a _hero_ to be\ncertain of finding it.\n\n\n\n\n402.\n\n\nTHE JUDGE.\u2014He who has seen another\u2019s ideal becomes his inexorable judge,\nand as it were his evil conscience.\n\n\n\n\n403.\n\n\nTHE UTILITY OF GREAT RENUNCIATION.\u2014The useful thing about great\nrenunciation is that it invests us with that youthful pride through which\nwe can thenceforth easily demand of ourselves small renunciations.\n\n\n\n\n404.\n\n\nHOW DUTY ACQUIRES A GLAMOUR.\u2014You can change a brazen duty into gold in the\neyes of all by always performing something more than you have promised.\n\n\n\n\n405.\n\n\nPRAYER TO MANKIND.\u2014\u201cForgive us our virtues\u201d\u2014so should we pray to mankind.\n\n\n\n\n406.\n\n\nTHEY THAT CREATE AND THEY THAT ENJOY.\u2014Every one who enjoys thinks that the\nprincipal thing to the tree is the fruit, but in point of fact the\nprincipal thing to it is the seed.\u2014Herein lies the difference between them\nthat create and them that enjoy.\n\n\n\n\n407.\n\n\nTHE GLORY OF ALL GREAT MEN.\u2014What is the use of genius if it does not\ninvest him who contemplates and reveres it with such freedom and loftiness\nof feeling that he no longer has need of genius?\u2014To make themselves\nsuperfluous is the glory of all great men.\n\n\n\n\n408.\n\n\nTHE JOURNEY TO HADES.\u2014I too have been in the underworld, even as Odysseus,\nand I shall often be there again. Not sheep alone have I sacrificed, that\nI might be able to converse with a few dead souls, but not even my own\nblood have I spared. There were four pairs who responded to me in my\nsacrifice: Epicurus and Montaigne, Goethe and Spinoza, Plato and Rousseau,\nPascal and Schopenhauer. With them I have to come to terms. When I have\nlong wandered alone, I will let them prove me right or wrong; to them will\nI listen, if they prove each other right or wrong. In all that I say,\nconclude, or think out for myself and others, I fasten my eyes on those\neight and see their eyes fastened on mine.\u2014May the living forgive me if I\nlook upon them at times as shadows, so pale and fretful, so restless and,\nalas! so eager for life. Those eight, on the other hand, seem to me so\nliving that I feel as if even now, after their death, they could never\nbecome weary of life. But eternal vigour of life is the important point:\nwhat matters \u201ceternal life,\u201d or indeed life at all?\n\n\n\n\n\nPART II. THE WANDERER AND HIS SHADOW.\n\n\n_The Shadow_: It is so long since I heard you speak that I should like to\ngive you an opportunity of talking.\n\n_The Wanderer_: I hear a voice\u2014where? whose? I almost fancied that I heard\nmyself speaking, but with a voice yet weaker than my own.\n\n_The Shadow_ (after a pause): Are you not glad to have an opportunity of\nspeaking?\n\n_The Wanderer_: By God and everything else in which I disbelieve, it is my\nshadow that speaks. I hear it, but I do not believe it.\n\n_The Shadow_: Let us assume that it exists, and think no more about it. In\nanother hour all will be over.\n\n_The Wanderer_: That is just what I thought when in a forest near Pisa I\nsaw first two and then five camels.\n\n_The Shadow_: It is all the better if we are both equally forbearing\ntowards each other when for once our reason is silent. Thus we shall avoid\nlosing our tempers in conversation, and shall not at once apply mutual\nthumb-screws in the event of any word sounding for once unintelligible to\nus. If one does not know exactly how to answer, it is enough to say\n_something_. Those are the reasonable terms on which I hold conversation\nwith any person. During a long talk the wisest of men becomes a fool once\nand a simpleton thrice.\n\n_The Wanderer_: Your moderation is not flattering to those to whom you\nconfess it.\n\n_The Shadow_: Am I, then, to flatter?\n\n_The Wanderer_: I thought a man\u2019s shadow was his vanity. Surely vanity\nwould never say, \u201cAm I, then, to flatter?\u201d\n\n_The Shadow_: Nor does human vanity, so far as I am acquainted with it,\nask, as I have done twice, whether it may speak. It simply speaks.\n\n_The Wanderer_: Now I see for the first time how rude I am to you, my\nbeloved shadow. I have not said a word of my supreme _delight_ in hearing\nand not merely seeing you. You must know that I love shadows even as I\nlove light. For the existence of beauty of face, clearness of speech,\nkindliness and firmness of character, the shadow is as necessary as the\nlight. They are not opponents\u2014rather do they hold each other\u2019s hands like\ngood friends; and when the light vanishes, the shadow glides after it.\n\n_The Shadow_: Yes, and I hate the same thing that you hate\u2014night. I love\nmen because they are votaries of life. I rejoice in the gleam of their\neyes when they recognise and discover, they who never weary of recognising\nand discovering. That shadow which all things cast when the sunshine of\nknowledge falls upon them\u2014that shadow too am I.\n\n_The Wanderer_: I think I understand you, although you have expressed\nyourself in somewhat shadowy terms. You are right. Good friends give to\neach other here and there, as a sign of mutual understanding, an obscure\nphrase which to any third party is meant to be a riddle. And we are good\nfriends, you and I. So enough of preambles! Some few hundred questions\noppress my soul, and the time for you to answer them is perchance but\nshort. Let us see how we may come to an understanding as quickly and\npeaceably as possible.\n\n_The Shadow_: But shadows are more shy than men. You will not reveal to\nany man the manner of our conversation?\n\n_The Wanderer_: _The manner_ of our conversation? Heaven preserve me from\nwire-drawn, literary dialogues! If Plato had found less pleasure in\nspinning them out, his readers would have found more pleasure in Plato. A\ndialogue that in real life is a source of delight, when turned into\nwriting and read, is a picture with nothing but false perspectives.\nEverything is too long or too short.\u2014Yet perhaps I may reveal the _points\non which_ we have come to an understanding?\n\n_The Shadow_: With that I am content. For every one will only recognise\nyour views once more, and no one will think of the shadow.\n\n_The Wanderer_: Perhaps you are wrong, my friend! Hitherto they have\nobserved in my views more of the shadow than of me.\n\n_The Shadow_: More of the shadow than of the light? Is that possible?\n\n_The Wanderer_: Be serious, dear fool! My very first question demands\nseriousness.\n\n\n\n\n1.\n\n\nOF THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE.\u2014Probability, but no truth; the semblance of\nfreedom, but no freedom\u2014these are the two fruits by virtue of which the\ntree of knowledge cannot be confounded with the tree of life.\n\n\n\n\n2.\n\n\nTHE WORLD\u2019S REASON.\u2014That the world is _not_ the abstract essence of an\neternal reasonableness is sufficiently proved by the fact that that _bit\nof the world_ which we know\u2014I mean our human reason\u2014is none too\nreasonable. And if _this_ is not eternally and wholly wise and reasonable,\nthe rest of the world will not be so either. Here the conclusion _a minori\nad majus, a parte ad totum_ holds good, and that with decisive force.\n\n\n\n\n3.\n\n\n\u201cIN THE BEGINNING WAS.\u201d\u2014To glorify the origin\u2014that is the metaphysical\nafter-shoot which sprouts again at the contemplation of history, and\nabsolutely makes us imagine that _in the beginning_ of things lies all\nthat is most valuable and essential.\n\n\n\n\n4.\n\n\nSTANDARD FOR THE VALUE OF TRUTH.\u2014The difficulty of climbing mountains is\nno gauge of their height. Yet in the case of science it is different!\u2014we\nare told by certain persons who wish to be considered \u201cthe initiated,\u201d\u2014the\ndifficulty in finding truth is to determine the value of truth! This\ninsane morality originates in the idea that \u201ctruths\u201d are really nothing\nmore than gymnastic appliances, with which we have to exercise ourselves\nuntil we are thoroughly tired. It is a morality for the athletes and\ngymnasts of the intellect.\n\n\n\n\n5.\n\n\nUSE OF WORDS AND REALITY.\u2014There exists a simulated contempt for all the\nthings that mankind actually holds most important, for all everyday\nmatters. For instance, we say \u201cwe only eat to live\u201d\u2014an abominable _lie_,\nlike that which speaks of the procreation of children as the real purpose\nof all sexual pleasure. Conversely, the reverence for \u201cthe most important\nthings\u201d is hardly ever quite genuine. The priests and metaphysicians have\nindeed accustomed us to a hypocritically exaggerated _use of words_\nregarding these matters, but they have not altered the feeling that these\nmost important things are not so important as those despised \u201ceveryday\nmatters.\u201d A fatal consequence of this twofold hypocrisy is that we never\nmake these everyday matters (such as eating, housing, clothes, and\nintercourse) the object of a constant unprejudiced and _universal_\nreflection and revision, but, as such a process appears degrading, we\ndivert from them our serious intellectual and artistic side. Hence in such\nmatters habit and frivolity win an easy victory over the thoughtless,\nespecially over inexperienced youth. On the other hand, our continual\ntransgressions of the simplest laws of body and mind reduce us all, young\nand old, to a disgraceful state of dependence and servitude\u2014I mean to that\nfundamentally superfluous dependence upon physicians, teachers and\nclergymen, whose dead-weight still lies heavy upon the whole of society.\n\n\n\n\n6.\n\n\nEARTHLY INFIRMITIES AND THEIR MAIN CAUSE.\u2014If we look about us, we are\nalways coming across men who have eaten eggs all their lives without\nobserving that the oblong-shaped taste the best; who do not know that a\nthunder-storm is beneficial to the stomach; that perfumes are most\nfragrant in cold, clear air; that our sense of taste varies in different\nparts of our mouths; that every meal at which we talk well or listen well\ndoes harm to the digestion. If we are not satisfied with these examples of\ndefective powers of observation, we shall concede all the more readily\nthat the everyday matters are very imperfectly seen and rarely observed by\nthe majority. Is this a matter of indifference?\u2014Let us remember, after\nall, that from this defect are derived _nearly all the bodily and\nspiritual infirmities_ of the individual. Ignorance of what is good and\nbad for us, in the arrangement of our mode of life, the division of our\nday, the selection of our friends and the time we devote to them, in\nbusiness and leisure, commanding and obeying, our feeling for nature and\nfor art, our eating, sleeping, and meditation; ignorance and lack of keen\nperceptions _in the smallest and most ordinary details_\u2014this it is that\nmakes the world \u201ca vale of tears\u201d for so many. Let us not say that here as\neverywhere the fault lies with human _unreason_. Of reason there is enough\nand to spare, but it is _wrongly directed_ and _artificially diverted_\nfrom these little intimate things. Priests and teachers, and the sublime\nambition of all idealists, coarser and subtler, din it even into the\nchild\u2019s ears that the means of serving mankind at large depend upon\naltogether different _things_\u2014upon the salvation of the soul, the service\nof the State, the advancement of science, or even upon social position and\nproperty; whereas the needs of the individual, his requirements great and\nsmall during the twenty-four hours of the day, are quite paltry or\nindifferent.\u2014Even Socrates attacked with all his might this arrogant\nneglect of the human for the benefit of humanity, and loved to indicate by\na quotation from Homer the true sphere and conception of all anxiety and\nreflection: \u201cAll that really matters,\u201d he said, \u201cis the good and evil hap\nI find at home.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n7.\n\n\nTWO MEANS OF CONSOLATION.\u2014Epicurus, the soul-comforter of later antiquity,\nsaid, with that marvellous insight which to this very day is so rarely to\nbe found, that for the calming of the spirit the solution of the final and\nultimate theoretical problems is by no means necessary. Hence, instead of\nraising a barren and remote discussion of the final question, whether the\nGods existed, it sufficed him to say to those who were tormented by \u201cfear\nof the Gods\u201d: \u201cIf there are Gods, they do not concern themselves with us.\u201d\nThe latter position is far stronger and more favourable, for, by conceding\na few points to the other, one makes him readier to listen and to take to\nheart. But as soon as he sets about proving the opposite (that the Gods do\nconcern themselves with us), into what thorny jungles of error must the\npoor man fall, quite of his own accord, and without any cunning on the\npart of his interlocutor! The latter must only have enough subtlety and\nhumanity to conceal his sympathy with this tragedy. Finally, the other\ncomes to feel disgust\u2014the strongest argument against any\nproposition\u2014disgust with his own hypothesis. He becomes cold, and goes\naway in the same frame of mind as the pure atheist who says, \u201cWhat do the\nGods matter to me? The devil take them!\u201d\u2014In other cases, especially when a\nhalf-physical, half-moral assumption had cast a gloom over his spirit,\nEpicurus did not refute the assumption. He agreed that it might be true,\nbut that there was _a second assumption_ to explain the same phenomenon,\nand that it could perhaps be maintained in other ways. The plurality of\nhypotheses (for example, that concerning the origin of conscientious\nscruples) suffices even in our time to remove from the soul the shadows\nthat arise so easily from pondering over a hypothesis which is isolated,\nmerely visible, and hence overvalued a hundredfold.\u2014Thus whoever wishes to\nconsole the unfortunate, the criminal, the hypochondriac, the dying, may\ncall to mind the two soothing suggestions of Epicurus, which can be\napplied to a great number of problems. In their simplest form they would\nrun: firstly, granted the thing is so, it does not concern us; secondly,\nthe thing may be so, but it may also be otherwise.\n\n\n\n\n8.\n\n\nIN THE NIGHT.\u2014So soon as night begins to fall our sensations concerning\neveryday matters are altered. There is the wind, prowling as if on\nforbidden paths, whispering as if in search of something, fretting because\nhe cannot find it. There is the lamplight, with its dim red glow, its\nweary look, unwillingly fighting against night, a sullen slave to wakeful\nman. There are the breathings of the sleeper, with their terrible rhythm,\nto which an ever-recurring care seems to blow the trumpet-melody\u2014we do not\nhear it, but when the sleeper\u2019s bosom heaves we feel our heart-strings\ntighten; and when the breath sinks and almost dies away into a deathly\nstillness, we say to ourselves, \u201cRest awhile, poor troubled spirit!\u201d All\nliving creatures bear so great a burden that we wish them an eternal rest;\nnight invites to death.\u2014If human beings were deprived of the sun and\nresisted night by means of moonlight and oil-lamps, what a philosophy\nwould cast its veil over them! We already see only too plainly how a\nshadow is thrown over the spiritual and intellectual nature of man by that\nmoiety of darkness and sunlessness that envelops life.\n\n\n\n\n9.\n\n\nORIGIN OF THE DOCTRINE OF FREE WILL.\u2014Necessity sways one man in the shape\nof his passions, another as a habit of hearing and obeying, a third as a\nlogical conscience, a fourth as a caprice and a mischievous delight in\nevasions. These four, however, seek the freedom of their will at the very\npoint where they are most securely fettered. It is as if the silkworm\nsought freedom of will in spinning. What is the reason? Clearly this, that\nevery one thinks himself most free where his vitality is strongest; hence,\nas I have said, now in passion, now in duty, now in knowledge, now in\ncaprice. A man unconsciously imagines that where he is strong, where he\nfeels most thoroughly alive, the element of his freedom must lie. He\nthinks of dependence and apathy, independence and vivacity as forming\ninevitable pairs.\u2014Thus an experience that a man has undergone in the\nsocial and political sphere is wrongly transferred to the ultimate\nmetaphysical sphere. There the strong man is also the free man, there the\nvivid feeling of joy and sorrow, the high hopes, the keen desires, the\npowerful hates are the attributes of the ruling, independent natures,\nwhile the thrall and the slave live in a state of dazed oppression.\u2014The\ndoctrine of free will is an invention of the ruling classes.\n\n\n\n\n10.\n\n\nABSENCE OF FEELING OF NEW CHAINS.\u2014So long as we do not feel that we are in\nsome way dependent, we consider ourselves independent\u2014a false conclusion\nthat shows how proud man is, how eager for dominion. For he hereby assumes\nthat he would always be sure to observe and recognise dependence so soon\nas he suffered it, the preliminary hypothesis being that he generally\nlives in independence, and that, should he lose that independence for once\nin a way, he would immediately detect a contrary sensation.\u2014Suppose,\nhowever, the reverse to be true\u2014that he is always living in a complex\nstate of dependence, but thinks himself free where, through long habit, he\nno longer feels the weight of the chain? He only suffers from new chains,\nand \u201cfree will\u201d really means nothing more than an absence of feeling of\nnew chains.\n\n\n\n\n11.\n\n\nFREEDOM OF THE WILL AND THE ISOLATION OF FACTS.\u2014Our ordinary inaccurate\nobservation takes a group of phenomena as one and calls them a fact.\nBetween this fact and another we imagine a vacuum, we isolate each fact.\nIn reality, however, the sum of our actions and cognitions is no series of\nfacts and intervening vacua, but a continuous stream. Now the belief in\nfree will is incompatible with the idea of a continuous, uniform,\nundivided, indivisible flow. This belief presupposes that every single\naction is isolated and indivisible; it is an atomic theory as regards\nvolition and cognition.\u2014We misunderstand facts as we misunderstand\ncharacters, speaking of similar characters and similar facts, whereas both\nare non-existent. Further, we bestow praise and blame only on this false\nhypothesis, that there are similar facts, that a graduated order of\nspecies of facts exists, corresponding to a graduated order of values.\nThus we isolate not only the single fact, but the groups of apparently\nequal facts (good, evil, compassionate, envious actions, and so forth). In\nboth cases we are wrong.\u2014The word and the concept are the most obvious\nreason for our belief in this isolation of groups of actions. We do not\nmerely thereby designate the things; the thought at the back of our minds\nis that by the word and the concept we can grasp the essence of the\nactions. We are still constantly led astray by words and actions, and are\ninduced to think of things as simpler than they are, as separate,\nindivisible, existing in the absolute. Language contains a hidden\nphilosophical mythology, which, however careful we may be, breaks out\nafresh at every moment. The belief in free will\u2014that is to say, in similar\nfacts and isolated facts\u2014finds in language its continual apostle and\nadvocate.\n\n\n\n\n12.\n\n\nTHE FUNDAMENTAL ERRORS.\u2014A man cannot feel any psychical pleasure or pain\nunless he is swayed by one of two illusions. Either he believes in the\nidentity of certain facts, certain sensations, and in that case finds\nspiritual pleasure and pain in comparing present with past conditions and\nin noting their similarity or difference (as is invariably the case with\nrecollection); or he believes in the freedom of the will, perhaps when he\nreflects, \u201cI ought not to have done this,\u201d \u201cThis might have turned out\ndifferently,\u201d and from these reflections likewise he derives pleasure and\npain. Without the errors that are rife in every psychical pain and\npleasure, humanity would never have developed. For the root idea of\nhumanity is that man is free in a world of bondage\u2014man, the eternal\nwonder-worker, whether his deeds be good or evil\u2014man, the amazing\nexception, the super-beast, the quasi-God, the mind of creation, the\nindispensable, the key-word to the cosmic riddle, the mighty lord of\nnature and despiser of nature, the creature that calls _its_ history \u201cthe\nhistory of the world\u201d! _Vanitas vanitatum homo._\n\n\n\n\n13.\n\n\nREPETITION.\u2014It is an excellent thing to express a thing consecutively in\ntwo ways, and thus provide it with a right and a left foot. Truth can\nstand indeed on one leg, but with two she will walk and complete her\njourney.\n\n\n\n\n14.\n\n\nMAN AS THE COMIC ACTOR OF THE WORLD.\u2014It would require beings more\nintellectual than men to relish to the full the humorous side of man\u2019s\nview of himself as the goal of all existence and of his serious\npronouncement that he is satisfied only with the prospect of fulfilling a\nworld-mission. If a God created the world, he created man to be his ape,\nas a perpetual source of amusement in the midst of his rather tedious\neternities. The music of the spheres surrounding the world would then\npresumably be the mocking laughter of all the other creatures around\nmankind. God in his boredom uses pain for the tickling of his favourite\nanimal, in order to enjoy his proudly tragic gestures and expressions of\nsuffering, and, in general, the intellectual inventiveness of the vainest\nof his creatures\u2014as inventor of this inventor. For he who invented man as\na joke had more intellect and more joy in intellect than has man.\u2014Even\nhere, where our human nature is willing to humble itself, our vanity again\nplays us a trick, in that we men should like in this vanity at least to be\nquite marvellous and incomparable. Our uniqueness in the world! Oh, what\nan improbable thing it is! Astronomers, who occasionally acquire a horizon\noutside our world, give us to understand that the drop of life on the\nearth is without significance for the total character of the mighty ocean\nof birth and decay; that countless stars present conditions for the\ngeneration of life similar to those of the earth\u2014and yet these are but a\nhandful in comparison with the endless number that have never known, or\nhave long been cured, of the eruption of life; that life on each of these\nstars, measured by the period of its existence, has been but an instant, a\nflicker, with long, long intervals afterwards\u2014and thus in no way the aim\nand final purpose of their existence. Possibly the ant in the forest is\nquite as firmly convinced that it is the aim and purpose of the existence\nof the forest, as we are convinced in our imaginations (almost\nunconsciously) that the destruction of mankind involves the destruction of\nthe world. It is even modesty on our part to go no farther than this, and\nnot to arrange a universal twilight of the world and the Gods as the\nfuneral ceremony of the last man. Even to the eye of the most unbiassed\nastronomer a lifeless world can scarcely appear otherwise than as a\nshining and swinging star wherein man lies buried.\n\n\n\n\n15.\n\n\nTHE MODESTY OF MAN.\u2014How little pleasure is enough for the majority to make\nthem feel that life is good! How modest is man!\n\n\n\n\n16.\n\n\nWHERE INDIFFERENCE IS NECESSARY.\u2014Nothing would be more perverse than to\nwait for the truths that science will finally establish concerning the\nfirst and last things, and until then to think (and especially to believe)\nin the traditional way, as one is so often advised to do. The impulse that\nbids us seek nothing but _certainties_ in this domain is a religious\noffshoot, nothing better\u2014a hidden and only apparently sceptical variety of\nthe \u201cmetaphysical need,\u201d the underlying idea being that for a long time no\nview of these ultimate certainties will be obtainable, and that until then\nthe \u201cbeliever\u201d has the right not to trouble himself about the whole\nsubject. We have no need of these certainties about the farthermost\nhorizons in order to live a full and efficient human life, any more than\nthe ant needs them in order to be a good ant. Rather must we ascertain the\norigin of that troublesome significance that we have attached to these\nthings for so long. For this we require the history of ethical and\nreligious sentiments, since it is only under the influence of such\nsentiments that these most acute problems of knowledge have become so\nweighty and terrifying. Into the outermost regions to which the mental eye\ncan penetrate (without ever penetrating _into_ them), we have smuggled\nsuch concepts as guilt and punishment (everlasting punishment, too!). The\ndarker those regions, the more careless we have been. For ages men have\nlet their imaginations run riot where they could establish nothing, and\nhave induced posterity to accept these fantasies as something serious and\ntrue, with this abominable lie as their final trump-card: that faith is\nworth more than knowledge. What we need now in regard to these ultimate\nthings is not knowledge as against faith, but indifference as against\nfaith and pretended knowledge in these matters!\u2014Everything must lie nearer\nto us than what has hitherto been preached to us as the most important\nthing, I mean the questions: \u201cWhat end does man serve?\u201d \u201cWhat is his fate\nafter death?\u201d \u201cHow does he make his peace with God?\u201d and all the rest of\nthat bag of tricks. The problems of the dogmatic philosophers, be they\nidealists, materialists, or realists, concern us as little as do these\nreligious questions. They all have the same object in view\u2014to force us to\na decision in matters where neither faith nor knowledge is needed. It is\nbetter even for the most ardent lover of knowledge that the territory open\nto investigation and to reason should be encircled by a belt of fog-laden,\ntreacherous marshland, a strip of ever watery, impenetrable, and\nindeterminable country. It is just by the comparison with the realm of\ndarkness on the edge of the world of knowledge that the bright, accessible\nregion of that world rises in value.\u2014We must once more become good friends\nof the \u201ceveryday matters,\u201d and not, as hitherto, despise them and look\nbeyond them at clouds and monsters of the night. In forests and caverns,\nin marshy tracts and under dull skies, on the lowest rungs of the ladder\nof culture, man has lived for \u00e6ons, and lived in poverty. There he has\nlearnt to despise the present, his neighbours, his life, and himself, and\nwe, the inhabitants of the brighter fields of Nature and mind, still\ninherit in our blood some taint of this contempt for everyday matters.\n\n\n\n\n17.\n\n\nPROFOUND INTERPRETATIONS.\u2014He who has interpreted a passage in an author\n\u201cmore profoundly\u201d than was intended, has not interpreted the author but\nhas obscured him. Our metaphysicians are in the same relation, or even in\na worse relation, to the text of Nature. For, to apply their profound\ninterpretations, they often alter the text to suit their purpose\u2014or, in\nother words, corrupt the text. A curious example of the corruption and\nobscuration of an author\u2019s text is furnished by the ideas of Schopenhauer\non the pregnancy of women. \u201cThe sign of a continuous will to life in\ntime,\u201d he says, \u201cis copulation; the sign of the light of knowledge which\nis associated anew with this will and holds the possibility of a\ndeliverance, and that too in the highest degree of clearness, is the\nrenewed incarnation of the will to life. This incarnation is betokened by\npregnancy, which is therefore frank and open, and even proud, whereas\ncopulation hides itself like a criminal.\u201d He declares that every woman, if\nsurprised in the sexual act, would be likely to die of shame, but\n\u201cdisplays her pregnancy without a trace of shame, nay even with a sort of\npride.\u201d Now, firstly, this condition cannot easily be displayed more\naggressively than it displays itself, and when Schopenhauer gives\nprominence only to the intentional character of the display, he is\nfashioning his text to suit the interpretation. Moreover, his statement of\nthe universality of the phenomenon is not true. He speaks of \u201cevery\nwoman.\u201d Many women, especially the younger, often appear painfully ashamed\nof their condition, even in the presence of their nearest kinsfolk. And\nwhen women of riper years, especially in the humbler classes, do actually\nappear proud of their condition, it is because they would give us to\nunderstand that they are still desirable to their husbands. That a\nneighbour on seeing them or a passing stranger should say or think \u201cCan it\nbe possible?\u201d\u2014that is an alms always acceptable to the vanity of women of\nlow mental capacity. In the reverse instance, to conclude from\nSchopenhauer\u2019s proposition, the cleverest and most intelligent women would\ntend more than any to exult openly in their condition. For they have the\nbest prospect of giving birth to an intellectual prodigy, in whom \u201cthe\nwill\u201d can once more \u201cnegative\u201d itself for the universal good. Stupid\nwomen, on the other hand, would have every reason to hide their pregnancy\nmore modestly than anything they hide.\u2014It cannot be said that this view\ncorresponds to reality. Granted, however, that Schopenhauer was right on\nthe general principle that women show more self-satisfaction when pregnant\nthan at any other time, a better explanation than this lies to hand. One\nmight imagine the clucking of a hen even before she lays an egg, saying,\n\u201cLook! look! I shall lay an egg! I shall lay an egg!\u201d\n\n\n\n\n18.\n\n\nTHE MODERN DIOGENES.\u2014Before we look for man, we must have found the\nlantern.\u2014Will it have to be the Cynic\u2019s lantern?\n\n\n\n\n19.\n\n\nIMMORALISTS.\u2014Moralists must now put up with being rated as immoralists,\nbecause they dissect morals. He, however, who would dissect must kill, but\nonly in order that we may know more, judge better, live better, not in\norder that all the world may dissect. Unfortunately, men still think that\nevery moralist in his every action must be a pattern for others to\nimitate. They confound him with the preacher of morality. The older\nmoralists did not dissect enough and preached too often, whence that\nconfusion and the unpleasant consequences for our latter-day moralists are\nderived.\n\n\n\n\n20.\n\n\nA CAUTION AGAINST CONFUSION.\u2014There are moralists who treat the strong,\nnoble, self-denying attitude of such beings as the heroes of Plutarch, or\nthe pure, enlightened, warmth-giving state of soul peculiar to truly good\nmen and women, as difficult scientific problems. They investigate the\norigin of such phenomena, indicating the complex element in the apparent\nsimplicity, and directing their gaze to the tangled skein of motives, the\ndelicate web of conceptual illusions, and the sentiments of individuals or\nof groups, that are a legacy of ancient days gradually increased. Such\nmoralists are very different from those with whom they are most commonly\nconfounded, from those petty minds that do not believe at all in these\nmodes of thought and states of soul, and imagine their own poverty to be\nhidden somewhere behind the glamour of greatness and purity. The moralists\nsay, \u201cHere are problems,\u201d and these pitiable creatures say, \u201cHere are\nimpostors and deceptions.\u201d Thus the latter deny the existence of the very\nthings which the former are at pains to explain.\n\n\n\n\n21.\n\n\n_Man as the Measurer._\u2014Perhaps all human morality had its origin in the\ntremendous excitement that seized primitive man when he discovered measure\nand measuring, scales and weighing (for the word _Mensch_ [man] means \u201cthe\nmeasurer\u201d\u2014he wished to _name_ himself after his greatest discovery!). With\nthese ideas they mounted into regions that are quite beyond all measuring\nand weighing, but did not appear to be so in the beginning.\n\n\n\n\n22.\n\n\n_The Principle of Equilibrium._\u2014The robber and the man of power who\npromises to protect a community from robbers are perhaps at bottom beings\nof the same mould, save that the latter attains his ends by other means\nthan the former\u2014that is to say, through regular imposts paid to him by the\ncommunity, and no longer through forced contributions. (The same relation\nexists between merchant and pirate, who for a long period are one and the\nsame person: where the one function appears to them inadvisable, they\nexercise the other. Even to-day mercantile morality is really nothing but\na refinement on piratical morality\u2014buying in the cheapest market, at prime\ncost if possible, and selling in the dearest.) The essential point is that\nthe man of power promises to maintain the equilibrium against the robber,\nand herein the weak find a possibility of living. For either they must\ngroup themselves into an equivalent power, or they must subject themselves\nto some one of equivalent power (_i.e._ render service in return for his\nefforts). The latter course is generally preferred, because it really\nkeeps two dangerous beings in check\u2014the robber through the man of power,\nand the man of power through the standpoint of advantage; for the latter\nprofits by treating his subjects with graciousness and tolerance, in order\nthat they may support not only themselves but their ruler. As a matter of\nfact, conditions may still be hard and cruel enough, yet in comparison\nwith the complete annihilation that was formerly always a possibility, men\nbreathe freely.\u2014The community is at first the organisation of the weak to\ncounterbalance menacing forces. An organisation to outweigh those forces\nwould be more advisable, if its members grew strong enough to destroy the\nadverse power: and when it is a question of one mighty oppressor, the\n_attempt will_ certainly be made. But if the one man is the head of a\nclan, or if he has a large following, a rapid and decisive annihilation is\nimprobable, and a long or permanent feud is only to be expected. This\nfeud, however, involves the least desirable condition for the community,\nfor it thereby loses the time to provide for its means of subsistence with\nthe necessary regularity, and sees the product of all work hourly\nthreatened. Hence the community prefers to raise its power of attack and\ndefence to the exact plane on which the power of its dangerous neighbour\nstands, and to give him to understand that an equal weight now lies in its\nown side of the scales\u2014so why not be good friends?\u2014Thus equilibrium is a\nmost important conception for the understanding of the ancient doctrines\nof law and morals. Equilibrium is, in fact, the basis of justice. When\njustice in ruder ages says, \u201cAn eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,\u201d it\npresupposes the attainment of this equilibrium and tries to maintain it by\nmeans of this compensation; so that, when crime is committed, the injured\nparty will not take the revenge of blind anger. By means of the _jus\ntalionis_ the equilibrium of the disturbed relations of power is restored,\nfor in such primitive times an eye or an arm more means a bit more power,\nmore weight.\u2014In a community where all consider themselves equal, disgrace\nand punishment await crime\u2014that is, violations of the principle of\nequilibrium. Disgrace is thrown into the scale as a counter-weight against\nthe encroaching individual, who has gained profit by his encroachment, and\nnow suffers losses (through disgrace) which annul and outweigh the\nprevious profits. Punishment, in the same way, sets up a far greater\ncounter-weight against the preponderance which every criminal hopes to\nobtain\u2014imprisonment as against a deed of violence, restitution and fines\nas against theft. Thus the sinner is reminded that his action has excluded\nhim from the community and from its moral advantages, since the community\ntreats him as an inferior, a weaker brother, an outsider. For this reason\npunishment is not merely retaliation, but has something more, something of\nthe cruelty of the state of nature, and of this it would serve as a\nreminder.\n\n\n\n\n23.\n\n\nWHETHER THE ADHERENTS OF THE DOCTRINE OF FREE WILL HAVE A RIGHT TO\nPUNISH?\u2014Men whose vocation it is to judge and punish try to establish in\nevery case whether an evil-doer is really responsible for his act, whether\nhe was able to apply his reasoning powers, whether he acted with motives\nand not unconsciously or under constraint. If he is punished, it is\nbecause he preferred the worse to the better motives, which he must\nconsequently have known. Where this knowledge is wanting, man is,\naccording to the prevailing view, not responsible\u2014unless his ignorance,\n_e.g._ his _ignorantia legis_, be the consequence of an intentional\nneglect to learn what he ought: in that case he already preferred the\nworse to the better motives at the time when he refused to learn, and must\nnow pay the penalty of his unwise choice. If, on the other hand, perhaps\nthrough stupidity or shortsightedness, he has never seen the better\nmotives, he is generally not punished, for people say that he made a wrong\nchoice, he acted like a brute beast. The intentional rejection of the\nbetter reason is now needed before we treat the offender as fit to be\npunished. But how can any one be intentionally more unreasonable than he\nought to be? Whence comes the decision, if the scales are loaded with good\nand bad motives? So the origin is not error or blindness, not an internal\nor external constraint? (It should furthermore be remembered that every\nso-called \u201cexternal constraint\u201d is nothing more than the internal\nconstraint of fear and pain.) Whence? is the repeated question. So reason\nis not to be the cause of action, because reason cannot decide against the\nbetter motives? Thus we call \u201cfree will\u201d to our aid. Absolute discretion\nis to decide, and a moment is to intervene when no motive exercises an\ninfluence, when the deed is done as a miracle, resulting from nothing.\nThis assumed discretion is punished in a case where no discretion should\nrule. Reason, which knows law, prohibition, and command, should have left\nno choice, they say, and should have acted as a constraint and a higher\npower. Hence the offender is punished because he makes use of \u201cfree\nwill\u201d\u2014in other words, has acted without motive where he should have been\nguided by motives. But why did he do it? This question must not even be\nasked; the deed was done without a \u201cWhy?\u201d without motive, without origin,\nbeing a thing purposeless, unreasoned.\u2014However, according to the\nabove-named preliminary condition of punishability, such a deed should not\nbe punished at all! Moreover, even this reason for punishing should not\nhold good, that in this case something had _not_ been done, had been\nomitted, that reason had not been used at all: for at any rate the\nomission was unintentional, and only intentional omission is considered\npunishable. The offender has indeed preferred the worse to the better\nmotives, but without motive and purpose: he has indeed failed to apply his\nreason, but not exactly with the object of not applying it. The very\nassumption made in the case of punishable crime, that the criminal\nintentionally renounced his reason, is removed by the hypothesis of \u201cfree\nwill.\u201d According to your own principles, you must not punish, you\nadherents of the doctrine of free will!\u2014These principles are, however,\nnothing but a very marvellous conceptual mythology, and the hen that\nhatched them has brooded on her eggs far away from all reality.\n\n\n\n\n24.\n\n\nJUDGING THE CRIMINAL AND HIS JUDGE.\u2014The criminal, who knows the whole\nconcatenation of circumstances, does not consider his act so far beyond\nthe bounds of order and comprehension as does his judge. His punishment,\nhowever, is measured by the degree of astonishment that seizes the judge\nwhen he finds the crime incomprehensible.\u2014If the defending counsel\u2019s\nknowledge of the case and its previous history extends far enough, the\nso-called extenuating circumstances which he duly pleads must end by\nabsolving his client from all guilt. Or, to put it more plainly, the\nadvocate will, step by step, tone down and finally remove the astonishment\nof the judge, by forcing every honest listener to the tacit avowal, \u201cHe\nwas bound to act as he did, and if we punished, we should be punishing\neternal Necessity.\u201d\u2014Measuring the punishment by the degree of knowledge we\npossess or can obtain of the previous history of the crime\u2014is that not in\nconflict with all equity?\n\n\n\n\n25.\n\n\nEXCHANGE AND EQUITY.\u2014In an exchange, the only just and honest course would\nbe for either party to demand only so much as he considers his commodity\nto be worth, allowance being made for trouble in acquisition, scarcity,\ntime spent and so forth, besides the subjective value. As soon as you make\nyour price bear a relation to the other\u2019s need, you become a refined sort\nof robber and extortioner.\u2014If money is the sole medium of exchange, we\nmust remember that a shilling is by no means the same thing in the hands\nof a rich heir, a farm labourer, a merchant, and a university student. It\nwould be equitable for every one to receive much or little for his money,\naccording as he has done much or little to earn it. In practice, as we all\nknow, the reverse is the case. In the world of high finance the shilling\nof the idle rich man can buy more than that of the poor, industrious man.\n\n\n\n\n26.\n\n\nLEGAL CONDITIONS AS MEANS.\u2014Law, where it rests upon contracts between\nequals, holds good so long as the power of the parties to the contract\nremains equal or similar. Wisdom created law to end all feuds and useless\nexpenditure among men on an equal footing. Quite as definite an end is put\nto this waste, however, when one party has become decidedly weaker than\nthe other. Subjection enters and law ceases, but the result is the same as\nthat attained by law. For now it is the wisdom of the superior which\nadvises to spare the inferior and not uselessly to squander his strength.\nThus the position of the inferior is often more favourable than that of\nthe equal.\u2014Hence legal conditions are temporary _means_ counselled by\nwisdom, and not ends.\n\n\n\n\n27.\n\n\nEXPLANATION OF MALICIOUS JOY.\u2014Malicious joy arises when a man consciously\nfinds himself in evil plight and feels anxiety or remorse or pain. The\nmisfortune that overtakes B. makes him equal to A., and A. is reconciled\nand no longer envious.\u2014If A. is prosperous, he still hoards up in his\nmemory B.\u2019s misfortune as a capital, so as to throw it in the scale as a\ncounter-weight when he himself suffers adversity. In this case too he\nfeels \u201cmalicious joy\u201d (_Schadenfreude_). The sentiment of equality thus\napplies its standard to the domain of luck and chance. Malicious joy is\nthe commonest expression of victory and restoration of equality, even in a\nhigher state of civilisation. This emotion has only been in existence\nsince the time when man learnt to look upon another as his equal\u2014in other\nwords, since the foundation of society.\n\n\n\n\n28.\n\n\nTHE ARBITRARY ELEMENT IN THE AWARD OF PUNISHMENT.\u2014To most criminals\npunishment comes just as illegitimate children come to women. They have\ndone the same thing a hundred times without any bad consequences. Suddenly\ncomes discovery, and with discovery punishment. Yet habit should make the\ndeed for which the criminal is punished appear more excusable, for he has\ndeveloped a propensity that is hard to resist. Instead of this, the\ncriminal is punished more severely if the suspicion of habitual crime\nrests on him, and habit is made a valid reason against all extenuation. On\nthe other hand, a model life, wherein crime shows up in more terrible\ncontrast, should make the guilt appear more heavy! But here the custom is\nto soften the punishment. Everything is measured not from the standpoint\nof the criminal but from that of society and its losses and dangers. The\nprevious utility of an individual is weighed against his one nefarious\naction, his previous criminality is added to that recently discovered, and\npunishment is thus meted out as highly as possible. But if we thus punish\nor reward a man\u2019s past (for in the former case the diminution of\npunishment is a reward) we ought to go farther back and punish and reward\nthe cause of his past\u2014I mean parents, teachers, society. In many instances\nwe shall then find the _judges_ somehow or other sharing in the guilt. It\nis arbitrary to stop at the criminal himself when we punish his past: if\nwe will not grant the absolute excusability of every crime, we should stop\nat each individual case and probe no farther into the past\u2014in other words,\nisolate guilt and not connect it with previous actions. Otherwise we sin\nagainst logic. The teachers of free will should draw the inevitable\nconclusion from their doctrine of \u201cfree will\u201d and boldly decree: \u201cNo\naction has a past.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n29.\n\n\nENVY AND HER NOBLER SISTER.\u2014Where equality is really recognised and\npermanently established, we see the rise of that propensity that is\ngenerally considered immoral, and would scarcely be conceivable in a state\nof nature\u2014envy. The envious man is susceptible to every sign of individual\nsuperiority to the common herd, and wishes to depress every one once more\nto the level\u2014or raise himself to the superior plane. Hence arise two\ndifferent modes of action, which Hesiod designated good and bad Eris. In\nthe same way, in a condition of equality there arises indignation if A. is\nprosperous above and B. unfortunate beneath their deserts and equality.\nThese latter, however, are emotions of nobler natures. They feel the want\nof justice and equity in things that are independent of the arbitrary\nchoice of men\u2014or, in other words, they desire the equality recognised by\nman to be recognised as well by Nature and chance. They are angry that men\nof equal merits should not have equal fortune.\n\n\n\n\n30.\n\n\nTHE ENVY OF THE GODS.\u2014\u201cThe envy of the Gods\u201d arises when a despised person\nsets himself on an equality with his superior (like Ajax), or is made\nequal with him by the favour of fortune (like Niobe, the too favoured\nmother). In the social class system this envy demands that no one shall\nhave merits above his station, that his prosperity shall be on a level\nwith his position, and especially that his self-consciousness shall not\noutgrow the limits of his rank. Often the victorious general, or the pupil\nwho achieves a masterpiece, has experienced \u201cthe envy of the gods.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n31.\n\n\nVANITY AS AN ANTI-SOCIAL AFTERGROWTH.\u2014As men, for the sake of security,\nhave made themselves equal in order to found communities, but as also this\nconception is imposed by a sort of constraint and is entirely opposed to\nthe instincts of the individual, so, the more universal security is\nguaranteed, the more do new offshoots of the old instinct for predominance\nappear. Such offshoots appear in the setting-up of class distinctions, in\nthe demand for professional dignities and privileges, and, generally\nspeaking, in vanity (manners, dress, speech, and so forth). So soon as\ndanger to the community is apparent, the majority, who were unable to\nassert their preponderance in a time of universal peace, once more bring\nabout the condition of equality, and for the time being the absurd\nprivileges and vanities disappear. If the community, however, collapses\nutterly and anarchy reigns supreme, there arises the state of nature: an\nabsolutely ruthless inequality as recounted by Thucydides in the case of\nCorcyra. Neither a natural justice nor a natural injustice exists.\n\n\n\n\n32.\n\n\nEQUITY.\u2014Equity is a development of justice, and arises among such as do\nnot come into conflict with the communal equality. This more subtle\nrecognition of the principle of equilibrium is applied to cases where\nnothing is prescribed by law. Equity looks forwards and backwards, its\nmaxim being, \u201cDo unto others as you would that they should do unto you.\u201d\n_Aequum_ means: \u201cThis principle is conformable to our equality; it tones\ndown even our small differences to an appearance of equality, and expects\nus to be indulgent in cases where we are not compelled to pardon.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n33.\n\n\nELEMENTS OF REVENGE.\u2014The word \u201crevenge\u201d is spoken so quickly that it\nalmost seems as if it could not contain more than one conceptual and\nemotional root. Hence we are still at pains to find this root. Our\neconomists, in the same way, have never wearied of scenting a similar\nunity in the word \u201cvalue,\u201d and of hunting after the primitive root idea of\nvalue. As if all words were not pockets, into which this or that or\nseveral things have been stuffed at once! So \u201crevenge\u201d is now one thing,\nnow another, and sometimes more composite. Let us first distinguish that\ndefensive counter-blow, which we strike, almost unconsciously, even at\ninanimate objects (such as machinery in motion) that have hurt us. The\nnotion is to set a check to the object that has hurt us, by bringing the\nmachine to a stop. Sometimes the force of this counter-blow, in order to\nattain its object, will have to be strong enough to shatter the machine.\nIf the machine be too strong to be disorganised by one man, the latter\nwill all the same strike the most violent blow he can\u2014as a sort of last\nattempt. We behave similarly towards persons who hurt us, at the immediate\nsensation of the hurt. If we like to call this an act of revenge, well and\ngood: but we must remember that here self-preservation alone has set its\ncog-wheels of reason in motion, and that after all we do not think of the\ndoer of the injury but only of ourselves. We act without any idea of doing\ninjury in return, only with a view to getting away safe and sound.\u2014It\nneeds time to pass in thought from oneself to one\u2019s adversary and ask\noneself at what point he is most vulnerable. This is done in the second\nvariety of revenge, the preliminary idea of which is to consider the\nvulnerability and susceptibility of the other. The intention then is to\ngive pain. On the other hand, the idea of securing himself against further\ninjury is in this case so entirely outside the avenger\u2019s horizon, that he\nalmost regularly brings about his own further injury and often foresees it\nin cold blood. If in the first sort of revenge it was the fear of a second\nblow that made the counter-blow as strong as possible, in this case there\nis an almost complete indifference to what one\u2019s adversary will do: the\nstrength of the counter-blow is only determined by what he has _already_\ndone to us. Then what has he done? What profit is it to us if he is now\nsuffering, after we have suffered through him? This is a case of\nreadjustment, whereas the first act of revenge only serves the purpose of\nself-preservation. It may be that through our adversary we have lost\nproperty, rank, friends, children\u2014these losses are not recovered by\nrevenge, the readjustment only concerns a subsidiary loss which is added\nto all the other losses. The revenge of readjustment does not preserve one\nfrom further injury, it does not make good the injury already\nsuffered\u2014except in one case. If our honour has suffered through our\nadversary, revenge can restore it. But in any case honour _has_ suffered\nan injury if intentional harm has been done us, because our adversary\nproved thereby that he was not afraid of us. By revenge we prove that we\nare not afraid of him either, and herein lies the settlement, the\nreadjustment. (The intention of showing their complete lack of fear goes\nso far in some people that the dangers of revenge\u2014loss of health or life\nor other losses\u2014are in their eyes an indispensable condition of every\nvengeful act. Hence they practise the duel, although the law also offers\nthem aid in obtaining satisfaction for what they have suffered. They are\nnot satisfied with a safe means of recovering their honour, because this\nwould not prove their fearlessness.)\u2014In the first-named variety of revenge\nit is just fear that strikes the counter-blow; in the second case it is\nthe absence of fear, which, as has been said, wishes to manifest itself in\nthe counter-blow.\u2014Thus nothing appears more different than the motives of\nthe two courses of action which are designated by the one word \u201crevenge.\u201d\nYet it often happens that the avenger is not precisely certain as to what\nreally prompted his deed: perhaps he struck the counterblow from fear and\nthe instinct of self-preservation, but in the background, when he has time\nto reflect upon the standpoint of wounded honour, he imagines that he has\navenged himself for the sake of his honour\u2014this motive is in any case more\n_reputable_ than the other. An essential point is whether he sees his\nhonour injured in the eyes of others (the world) or only in the eyes of\nhis offenders: in the latter case he will prefer secret, in the former\nopen revenge. Accordingly, as he enters strongly or feebly into the soul\nof the doer and the spectator, his revenge will be more bitter or more\ntame. If he is entirely lacking in this sort of imagination, he will not\nthink at all of revenge, as the feeling of \u201chonour\u201d is not present in him,\nand accordingly cannot be wounded. In the same way, he will not think of\nrevenge if he despises the offender and the spectator; because as objects\nof his contempt they cannot give him honour, and accordingly cannot rob\nhim of honour. Finally, he will forego revenge in the not uncommon case of\nhis loving the offender. It is true that he then suffers loss of honour in\nthe other\u2019s eyes, and will perhaps become less worthy of having his love\nreturned. But even to renounce all requital of love is a sacrifice that\nlove is ready to make when its only object is to avoid hurting the beloved\nobject: this would mean hurting oneself more than one is hurt by the\nsacrifice.\u2014Accordingly, every one will avenge himself, unless he be bereft\nof honour or inspired by contempt or by love for the offender. Even if he\nturns to the law-courts, he desires revenge as a private individual; but\nalso, as a thoughtful, prudent man of society, he desires the revenge of\nsociety upon one who does not respect it. Thus by legal punishment private\nhonour as well as that of society is restored\u2014that is to say, punishment\nis revenge. Punishment undoubtedly contains the first-mentioned element of\nrevenge, in as far as by its means society helps to preserve itself, and\nstrikes a counter-blow in self-defence. Punishment desires to prevent\nfurther injury, to scare other offenders. In this way the two elements of\nrevenge, different as they are, are united in punishment, and this may\nperhaps tend most of all to maintain the above-mentioned confusion of\nideas, thanks to which the individual avenger generally does not know what\nhe really wants.\n\n\n\n\n34.\n\n\nTHE VIRTUES THAT DAMAGE US.\u2014As members of communities we think we have no\nright to exercise certain virtues which afford us great honour and some\npleasure as private individuals (for example, indulgence and favour\ntowards miscreants of all kinds)\u2014in short, every mode of action whereby\nthe advantage of society would suffer through our virtue. No bench of\njudges, face to face with its conscience, may permit itself to be\ngracious. This privilege is reserved for the king as an individual, and we\nare glad when he makes use of it, proving that we should like to be\ngracious individually, but not collectively. Society recognises only the\nvirtues profitable to her, or at least not injurious to her\u2014virtues like\njustice, which are exercised without loss, or, in fact, at compound\ninterest. The virtues that damage us cannot have originated in society,\nbecause even now opposition to them arises in every small society that is\nin the making. Such virtues are therefore those of men of unequal\nstanding, invented by the superior individuals; they are the virtues of\nrulers, and the idea underlying them is: \u201cI am mighty enough to put up\nwith an obvious loss; that is a proof of my power.\u201d Thus they are virtues\nclosely akin to pride.\n\n\n\n\n35.\n\n\nTHE CASUISTRY OF ADVANTAGE.\u2014There would be no moral casuistry if there\nwere no casuistry of advantage. The most free and refined intelligence is\noften incapable of choosing between two alternatives in such a way that\nhis choice necessarily involves the greater advantage. In such cases we\nchoose because we must, and afterwards often feel a kind of emotional\nsea-sickness.\n\n\n\n\n36.\n\n\nTURNING HYPOCRITE.\u2014Every beggar turns hypocrite, like every one who makes\nhis living out of indigence, be it personal or public.\u2014The beggar does not\nfeel want nearly so keenly as he must make others feel it, if he wishes to\nmake a living by mendicancy.\n\n\n\n\n37.\n\n\nA SORT OF CULT OF THE PASSIONS.\u2014You hypochondriacs, you philosophic\nblind-worms talk of the formidable nature of human passions, in order to\ninveigh against the dreadsomeness of the whole world-structure. As if the\npassions were always and everywhere formidable! As if this sort of terror\nmust always exist in the world!\u2014Through a carelessness in small matters,\nthrough a deficiency in observation of self and of the rising generation,\nyou have yourselves allowed your passions to develop into such unruly\nmonsters that you are frightened now at the mere mention of the word\n\u201cpassion\u201d! It rests with you and it rests with us to divest the passions\nof their formidable features and so to dam them that they do not become\ndevastating floods.\u2014We must not exalt our errors into eternal fatalities.\nRather shall we honestly endeavour to convert all the passions of humanity\ninto sources of joy.(18)\n\n\n\n\n38.\n\n\nTHE STING OF CONSCIENCE.\u2014The sting of conscience, like the gnawing of a\ndog at a stone, is mere foolishness.\n\n\n\n\n39.\n\n\nORIGIN OF RIGHTS.\u2014Rights may be traced to traditions, traditions to\nmomentary agreements. At some time or other men were mutually content with\nthe consequences of making an agreement, and, again, too indolent formally\nto renew it. Thus they went on living as if it had constantly been\nrenewed, and gradually, when oblivion cast its veil over the origin, they\nthought they possessed a sacred, unalterable foundation on which every\ngeneration would be compelled to build. Tradition was now a constraint,\neven if it no more involved the profit originally derived from making the\nagreement.\u2014Here the weak have always found their strong fortress. They are\ninclined to immortalise the momentary agreement, the single act of favour\nshown towards them.\n\n\n\n\n40.\n\n\nTHE SIGNIFICANCE OF OBLIVION IN MORAL SENTIMENT.\u2014The same actions that in\nprimitive society first aimed at the common advantage were later on\nperformed from other motives: from fear or reverence of those who demanded\nand recommended them; or from habit, because men had seen them done about\nthem from childhood upwards; or from kindness, because the practising of\nthem caused delight and approving looks on all sides; or from vanity,\nbecause they were praised. Such actions, in which the fundamental motive,\nthat of utility, has been _forgotten_, are then called moral; not, indeed,\nbecause they are done from those other motives, but because they are not\ndone with a conscious purpose of utility.\u2014Whence the hatred of utility\nthat suddenly manifests itself here, and by which all praiseworthy actions\nformally exclude all actions for the sake of utility?\u2014Clearly society, the\nrallying-point of all morality and of all maxims in praise of moral\naction, has had to battle too long and too fiercely with the selfishness\nand obstinacy of the individual not to rate every motive morally higher\nthan utility. Hence it looks as if morals had not sprung from utility,\nwhereas in fact morals are originally the public utility, which had great\ndifficulty in prevailing over the interests of the unit and securing a\nloftier reputation.\n\n\n\n\n41.\n\n\nTHE HEIRS TO THE WEALTH OF MORALITY.\u2014Even in the domain of morals there is\nan inherited wealth, which is owned by the gentle, the good-tempered, the\ncompassionate, the indulgent. They have inherited from their forefathers\ntheir gentle mode of action, but not common sense (the source of that mode\nof action). The pleasant thing about this wealth is that one must always\nbestow and communicate a portion of it, if its presence is to be felt at\nall. Thus this wealth unconsciously aims at bridging the gulf between the\nmorally rich and the morally poor, and, what is its best and most\nremarkable feature, not for the sake of a future mean between rich and\npoor, but for the sake of a universal prosperity and superfluity.\u2014Such may\nbe the prevailing view of inherited moral wealth, but it seems to me that\nthis view is maintained more _in majorem gloriam_ of morality than in\nhonour of truth. Experience at least establishes a maxim which must serve,\nif not as a refutation, at any rate as an important check upon that\ngeneralisation. Without the most exquisite intelligence, says experience,\nwithout the most refined capacity for choice and a strong propensity to\nobserve the mean, the morally rich will become spendthrifts of morality.\nFor by abandoning themselves without restraint to their compassionate,\ngentle, conciliatory, harmonising instincts, they make all about them more\ncareless, more covetous, and more sentimental. The children of these\nhighly moral spendthrifts easily and (sad to relate) at best become\npleasant but futile wasters.\n\n\n\n\n42.\n\n\nTHE JUDGE AND EXTENUATING CIRCUMSTANCES.\u2014\u201cOne should behave as a man of\nhonour even towards the devil and pay his debts,\u201d said an old soldier,\nwhen the story of Faust had been related to him in rather fuller detail.\n\u201cHell is the right place for Faust!\u201d \u201cYou are terrible, you men!\u201d cried\nhis wife; \u201chow can that be? After all, his only fault was having no ink in\nhis ink-stand! It is indeed a sin to write with blood, but surely for that\nsuch a handsome man ought not to burn in Hell-fire?\u201d\n\n\n\n\n43.\n\n\nPROBLEM OF THE DUTY OF TRUTH.\u2014Duty is an imperious sentiment that forces\nus to action. We call it good, and consider it outside the pale of\ndiscussion. The origin, limits, and justification of duty we will not\ndebate or allow to be debated. But the thinker considers everything an\nevolution and every evolution a subject for discussion, and is accordingly\nwithout duty so long as he is merely a thinker. As such, he would not\nrecognise the duty of seeing and speaking the truth; he would not _feel_\nthe sentiment at all. He asks, whence comes it and whither will it go? But\neven this questioning appears to him questionable. Surely, however, the\nconsequence would be that the thinker\u2019s machinery would no longer work\nproperly if he could really feel himself unencumbered by duty in the\nsearch for knowledge? It would appear, then, that for fuel the same\nelement is necessary as must be investigated by means of the\nmachine.\u2014Perhaps the formula will be: granted there were a duty of\nrecognising truth, what is then the truth in regard to every other kind of\nduty?\u2014But is not a hypothetical sense of duty a contradiction in terms?\n\n\n\n\n44.\n\n\nGRADES OF MORALS.\u2014Morality is primarily a means of preserving the\ncommunity and saving it from destruction. Next it is a means of\nmaintaining the community on a certain plane and in a certain degree of\nbenevolence. Its motives are fear and hope, and these in a more coarse,\nrough, and powerful form, the more the propensity towards the perverse,\none-sided, and personal still persists. The most terrible means of\nintimidation must be brought into play so long as milder forms have no\neffect and that twofold species of preservation cannot be attained. (The\nstrongest intimidation, by the way, is the invention of a hereafter with a\nhell everlasting.) For this purpose we must have racks and torturers of\nthe soul. Further grades of morality, and accordingly means to the end\nreferred to, are the commandments of a God (as in the Mosaic law). Still\nfurther and higher are the commandments of an absolute sense of duty with\na \u201cThou shalt\u201d\u2014all rather roughly hewn yet _broad_ steps, because on the\nfiner, narrower steps men cannot yet set their feet. Then comes a morality\nof inclination, of taste, finally of insight\u2014which is beyond all the\nillusory motives of morality, but has convinced itself that humanity for\nlong periods could be allowed no other.\n\n\n\n\n45.\n\n\nTHE MORALITY OF PITY IN THE MOUTHS OF THE INTEMPERATE.\u2014All those who are\nnot sufficiently masters of themselves and do not know morality as a\nself-control and self-conquest continuously exercised in things great and\nsmall, unconsciously come to glorify the good, compassionate, benevolent\nimpulses of that instinctive morality which has no head, but seems merely\nto consist of a heart and helpful hands. It is to their interest even to\ncast suspicion upon a morality of reason and to set up the other as the\nsole morality.\n\n\n\n\n46.\n\n\nSEWERS OF THE SOUL.\u2014Even the soul must have its definite sewers, through\nwhich it can allow its filth to flow off: for this purpose it may use\npersons, relations, social classes, its native country, or the world, or\nfinally\u2014for the wholly arrogant (I mean our modern \u201cpessimists\u201d)\u2014_le bon\nDieu_.\n\n\n\n\n47.\n\n\nA KIND OF REST AND CONTEMPLATION.\u2014Beware lest your rest and contemplation\nresemble that of a dog before a butcher\u2019s stall, prevented by fear from\nadvancing and by greed from retiring, and opening its eyes wide as though\nthey were mouths.\n\n\n\n\n48.\n\n\nPROHIBITIONS WITHOUT REASONS.\u2014A prohibition, the reason of which we do not\nunderstand or admit, is almost a command, not only for the stiff-necked\nbut for the thirster after knowledge. We at once make an experiment in\norder to learn _why_ the prohibition was made. Moral prohibitions, like\nthose of the Decalogue, are only suited to ages when reason lies\nvanquished. Nowadays a prohibition like \u201cThou shalt not kill,\u201d \u201cThou shalt\nnot commit adultery,\u201d laid down without reasons, would have an injurious\nrather than a beneficial effect.\n\n\n\n\n49.\n\n\nCHARACTER PORTRAIT.\u2014What sort of a man is it that can say of himself: \u201cI\ndespise very easily, but never hate. I at once find out in every man\nsomething which can be honoured and for which I honour him: the so-called\namiable qualities attract me but little\u201d?\n\n\n\n\n50.\n\n\nPITY AND CONTEMPT.\u2014The expression of pity is regarded as a sign of\ncontempt, because one has clearly ceased to be an object of _fear_ as soon\nas one becomes an object of pity. One has sunk below the level of the\nequilibrium. For this equilibrium does not satisfy human vanity, which is\nonly satisfied by the feeling that one is imposing respect and awe. Hence\nit is difficult to explain why pity is so highly prized, just as we need\nto explain why the unselfish man, who is originally despised or feared as\nbeing artful, is praised.\n\n\n\n\n51.\n\n\nTHE CAPACITY OF BEING SMALL.\u2014We must be as near to flowers, grasses, and\nbutterflies as a child, that is, not much bigger than they. We adults have\ngrown up beyond them and have to stoop to them. I think the grasses hate\nus when we confess our love for them.\u2014He who would have a share in all\ngood things must understand at times how to be small.\n\n\n\n\n52.\n\n\nTHE SUM-TOTAL OF CONSCIENCE.\u2014The sum-total of our conscience is all that\nhas regularly been demanded of us, without reason, in the days of our\nchildhood, by people whom we respected or feared. From conscience comes\nthat feeling of obligation (\u201cThis I must do, this omit\u201d) which does not\nask, Why must I?\u2014In all cases where a thing is done with \u201cbecause\u201d and\n\u201cwhy,\u201d man acts without conscience, but not necessarily on that account\n_against_ conscience.\u2014The belief in authority is the source of conscience;\nwhich is therefore not the voice of God in the heart of man, but the voice\nof some men in man.\n\n\n\n\n53.\n\n\nCONQUEST OF THE PASSIONS.\u2014The man who has overcome his passions has\nentered into possession of the most fruitful soil, like the colonist who\nhas become lord over bogs and forests. To sow the seed of spiritual good\nworks on the soil of the vanquished passions is the next and most urgent\ntask. The conquest itself is a means, not an end: if it be not so\nregarded, all kind of weeds and devil\u2019s crop quickly spring up upon the\nfertile soil that has been cleared, and soon the growth is all wilder and\nmore luxuriant than before.\n\n\n\n\n54.\n\n\nSKILL IN SERVICE.\u2014All so-called practical men have skill in service,\nwhether it be serving others or themselves; this is what makes them\npractical. Robinson owned a servant even better than Friday\u2014his name was\nCrusoe.\n\n\n\n\n55.\n\n\nDANGER IN SPEECH TO INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM.\u2014Every word is a preconceived\njudgment.\n\n\n\n\n56.\n\n\nINTELLECT AND BOREDOM.\u2014The proverb, \u201cThe Hungarian is far too lazy to feel\nbored,\u201d gives food for thought. Only the highest and most active animals\nare capable of being bored.\u2014The boredom of God on the seventh day of\nCreation would be a subject for a great poet.\n\n\n\n\n57.\n\n\nINTERCOURSE WITH ANIMALS.\u2014The origin of our morality may still be observed\nin our relations with animals. Where advantage or the reverse do not come\ninto play, we have a feeling of complete irresponsibility. For example, we\nkill or wound insects or let them live, and as a rule think no more about\nit. We are so clumsy that even our gracious acts towards flowers and small\nanimals are almost always murderous: this does not in the least detract\nfrom our pleasure in them.\u2014To-day is the festival of the small animals,\nthe most sultry day of the year. There is a swarming and crawling around\nus, and we, without intention, but also without reflection, crush here and\nthere a little fly or winged beetle.\u2014If animals do us harm, we strive to\n_annihilate_ them in every possible way. The means are often cruel enough,\neven without our really intending them to be so\u2014it is the cruelty of\nthoughtlessness. If they are useful, we turn them to advantage, until a\nmore refined wisdom teaches us that certain animals amply reward a\ndifferent mode of treatment, that of tending and breeding. Here\nresponsibility first arises. Torturing is avoided in the case of the\ndomestic animal. One man is indignant if another is cruel to his cow,\nquite in accordance with the primitive communal morality, which sees the\ncommonwealth in danger whenever an individual does wrong. He who perceives\nany transgression in the community fears indirect harm to himself. Thus we\nfear in this case for the quality of meat, agriculture, and means of\ncommunication if we see the domestic animals ill-treated. Moreover, he who\nis harsh to animals awakens a suspicion that he is also harsh to men who\nare weak, inferior, and incapable of revenge. He is held to be ignoble and\ndeficient in the finer form of pride. Thus arises a foundation of moral\njudgments and sentiments, but the greatest contribution is made by\nsuperstition. Many animals incite men by glances, tones, and gestures to\ntransfer themselves into them in imagination, and some religions teach us,\nunder certain circumstances, to see in animals the dwelling-place of human\nand divine souls: whence they recommend a nobler caution or even a\nreverential awe in intercourse with animals. Even after the disappearance\nof this superstition the sentiments awakened by it continue to exercise\ntheir influence, to ripen and to blossom.\u2014Christianity, as is well known,\nhas shown itself in this respect a poor and retrograde religion.\n\n\n\n\n58.\n\n\nNEW ACTORS.\u2014Among human beings there is no greater banality than death.\nSecond in order, because it is possible to die without being born, comes\nbirth, and next comes marriage. But these hackneyed little tragi-comedies\nare always presented, at each of their unnumbered and innumerable\nperformances, by new actors, and accordingly do not cease to find\ninterested spectators: whereas we might well believe that the whole\naudience of the world-theatre had long since hanged themselves to every\ntree from sheer boredom at these performances. So much depends on new\nactors, so little on the piece.\n\n\n\n\n59.\n\n\nWHAT IS \u201cBEING OBSTINATE\u201d?\u2014The shortest way is not the straightest\npossible, but that wherein favourable winds swell our sails. So says the\nwisdom of seamen. Not to follow his course is obstinate, firmness of\ncharacter being then adulterated by stupidity.\n\n\n\n\n60.\n\n\nTHE WORD \u201cVANITY.\u201d\u2014It is annoying that certain words, with which we\nmoralists positively cannot dispense, involve in themselves a kind of\ncensorship of morals, dating from the times when the most ordinary and\nnatural impulses were denounced. Thus that fundamental conviction that on\nthe waves of society we either find navigable waters or suffer shipwreck\nfar more through what we appear than through what we are (a conviction\nthat must act as guiding principle of all action in relation to society)\nis branded with the general word \u201cvanity.\u201d In other words, one of the most\nweighty and significant of qualities is branded with an expression which\ndenotes it as essentially empty and negative: a great thing is designated\nby a diminutive, ay, even slandered by the strokes of caricature. There is\nno help for it; we must use such words, but then we must shut our ears to\nthe insinuations of ancient habits.\n\n\n\n\n61.\n\n\nTHE FATALISM OF THE TURK.\u2014The fatalism of the Turk has this fundamental\ndefect, that it contrasts man and fate as two distinct things. Man, says\nthis doctrine, may struggle against fate and try to baffle it, but in the\nend fate will always gain the victory. Hence the most rational course is\nto resign oneself or to live as one pleases. As a matter of fact, every\nman is himself a piece of fate. When he thinks that he is struggling\nagainst fate in this way, fate is accomplishing its ends even in that\nstruggle. The combat is a fantasy, but so is the resignation in fate\u2014all\nthese fantasies are included in fate.\u2014The fear felt by most people of the\ndoctrine that denies the freedom of the will is a fear of the fatalism of\nthe Turk. They imagine that man will become weakly resigned and will stand\nbefore the future with folded hands, because he cannot alter anything of\nthe future. Or that he will give a free rein to his caprices, because the\npredestined cannot be made worse by that course. The follies of men are as\nmuch a piece of fate as are his wise actions, and even that fear of belief\nin fate is a fatality. You yourself, you poor timid creature, are that\nindomitable _Moira_, which rules even the Gods; whatever may happen, you\nare a curse or a blessing, and in any case the fetters wherein the\nstrongest lies bound: in you the whole future of the human world is\npredestined, and it is no use for you to be frightened of yourself.\n\n\n\n\n62.\n\n\nTHE ADVOCATE OF THE DEVIL.\u2014\u201cOnly by our own suffering do we become wise,\nonly by others\u2019 suffering do we become good\u201d\u2014so runs that strange\nphilosophy which derives all morality from pity and all intellectuality\nfrom the isolation of the individual. Herein this philosophy is the\nunconscious pleader for all human deterioration. For pity needs suffering,\nand isolation contempt of others.\n\n\n\n\n63.\n\n\nTHE MORAL CHARACTER-MASKS.\u2014In ages when the character-masks of different\nclasses are definitely fixed, like the classes themselves, moralists will\nbe seduced into holding the moral character-masks, too, as absolute, and\nin delineating them accordingly. Thus Moli\u00e8re is intelligible as the\ncontemporary of the society of Louis XIV.: in our society of transitions\nand intermediate stages he would seem an inspired pedant.\n\n\n\n\n64.\n\n\nTHE MOST NOBLE VIRTUE.\u2014In the first era of the higher humanity courage is\naccounted the most noble virtue, in the next justice, in the third\ntemperance, in the fourth wisdom. In which era do _we_ live? In which do\n_you_ live?\n\n\n\n\n65.\n\n\nA NECESSARY PRELIMINARY.\u2014A man who will not become master of his\nirritability, his venomous and vengeful feelings, and his lust, and\nattempts to become master in anything else, is as stupid as the farmer who\nlays out his field beside a torrent without guarding against that torrent.\n\n\n\n\n66.\n\n\nWHAT IS TRUTH?\u2014_Schwarzert_ (Melanchthon): We often preach our faith when\nwe have lost it, and leave not a stone unturned to find it\u2014and then we\noften do not preach worst!\n\n_Luther_: Brother, you are really speaking like an angel to-day.\n\n_Schwarzert_: But that is the idea of your enemies, and they apply it to\nyou.\n\n_Luther_: Then it would be a lie from the devil\u2019s hind-quarters.\n\n\n\n\n67.\n\n\nTHE HABIT OF CONTRASTS.\u2014Superficial, inexact observation sees contrasts\neverywhere in nature (for instance, \u201chot and cold\u201d), where there are no\ncontrasts, only differences of degree. This bad habit has induced us to\ntry to understand and interpret even the inner nature, the intellectual\nand moral world, in accordance with such contrasts. An infinite amount of\ncruelty, arrogance, harshness, estrangement, and coldness has entered into\nhuman emotion, because men imagined they saw contrasts where there were\nonly transitions.\n\n\n\n\n68.\n\n\nCAN WE FORGIVE?\u2014How can we forgive them at all, if they know not what they\ndo? We have nothing to forgive. But does a man ever fully know what he is\ndoing? And if this point at least remains always debatable, men never have\nanything to forgive each other, and indulgence is for the reasonable man\nan impossible thing. Finally, if the evil-doers had really known what they\ndid, we should still only have a right to forgive if we had a right to\naccuse and to punish. But we have not that right.\n\n\n\n\n69.\n\n\nHABITUAL SHAME.\u2014Why do we feel shame when some virtue or merit is\nattributed to us which, as the saying goes, \u201cwe have not deserved\u201d?\nBecause we appear to have intruded upon a territory to which we do not\nbelong, from which we should be excluded, as from a holy place or holy of\nholies, which ought not to be trodden by our foot. Through the errors of\nothers we have, nevertheless, penetrated to it, and we are now swayed\npartly by fear, partly by reverence, partly by surprise; we do not know\nwhether we ought to fly or to enjoy the blissful moment with all its\ngracious advantages. In all shame there is a mystery, which seems\ndesecrated or in danger of desecration through us. All _favour_ begets\nshame.\u2014But if it be remembered that we have never really \u201cdeserved\u201d\nanything, this feeling of shame, provided that we surrender ourselves to\nthis point of view in a spirit of Christian contemplation, becomes\nhabitual, because upon such a one God seems continually to be conferring\nhis blessing and his favours. Apart from this Christian interpretation,\nthe state of habitual shame will be possible even to the entirely godless\nsage, who clings firmly to the basic non-responsibility and\nnon-meritoriousness of all action and being. If he be treated as if he had\ndeserved this or that, he will seem to have won his way into a higher\norder of beings, who do actually deserve something, who are free and can\nreally bear the burden of responsibility for their own volition and\ncapacity. Whoever says to him, \u201cYou have deserved it,\u201d appears to cry out\nto him, \u201cYou are not a human being, but a God.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n70.\n\n\nTHE MOST UNSKILFUL TEACHER.\u2014In one man all his real virtues are implanted\non the soil of his spirit of contradiction, in another on his incapacity\nto say \u201cno\u201d\u2014in other words, on his spirit of acquiescence. A third has\nmade all his morality grow out of his pride as a solitary, a fourth from\nhis strong social instinct. Now, supposing that the seeds of the virtues\nin these four cases, owing to mischance or unskilful teachers, were not\nsown on the soil of their nature, which provides them with the richest and\nmost abundant mould, they would become weak, unsatisfactory men (devoid of\nmorality). And who would have been the most unskilful of teachers, the\nevil genius of these men? The moral fanatic, who thinks that the good can\nonly grow out of the good and on the soil of the good.\n\n\n\n\n71.\n\n\nTHE CAUTIOUS STYLE.\u2014_A._ But if this were known to _all_, it would be\ninjurious to the _majority_. You yourself call your opinions dangerous to\nthose in danger, and yet you make them public?\n\n_B._ I write so that neither the mob, nor the _populi_, nor the parties of\nall kinds can read me. So my opinions will never be \u201cpublic opinions.\u201d\n\n_A._ How do you write, then?\n\n_B._ Neither usefully nor pleasantly\u2014for the three classes I have\nmentioned.\n\n\n\n\n72.\n\n\nDIVINE MISSIONARIES.\u2014Even Socrates feels himself to be a divine\nmissionary, but I am not sure whether we should not here detect a tincture\nof that Attic irony and fondness for jesting whereby this odious, arrogant\nconception would be toned down. He talks of the fact without unction\u2014his\nimages of the gadfly and the horse are simple and not sacerdotal. The real\nreligious task which he has set himself\u2014to _test_ God in a hundred ways\nand see whether he spoke the truth\u2014betrays a bold and free attitude, in\nwhich the missionary walked by the side of his God. This testing of God is\none of the most subtle compromises between piety and free-thinking that\nhas ever been devised.\u2014Nowadays we do not even need this compromise any\nlonger.\n\n\n\n\n73.\n\n\nHONESTY IN PAINTING.\u2014Raphael, who cared a great deal for the Church (so\nfar as she could pay him), but, like the best men of his time, cared\nlittle for the objects of the Church\u2019s belief, did not advance one step to\nmeet the exacting, ecstatic piety of many of his patrons. He remained\nhonest even in that exceptional picture which was originally intended for\na banner in a procession\u2014the Sistine Madonna. Here for once he wished to\npaint a vision, but such a vision as even noble youths without \u201cfaith\u201d may\nand will have\u2014the vision of the future wife, a wise, high-souled, silent,\nand very beautiful woman, carrying her first-born in her arms. Let men of\nan older generation, accustomed to prayer and devotion, find here, like\nthe worthy elder on the left, something superhuman to revere. We younger\nmen (so Raphael seems to call to us) are occupied with the beautiful\nmaiden on the right, who says to the spectator of the picture, with her\nchallenging and by no means devout look, \u201cThe mother and her child\u2014is not\nthat a pleasant, inviting sight?\u201d The face and the look are reflected in\nthe joy in the faces of the beholders. The artist who devised all this\nenjoys himself in this way, and adds his own delight to the delight of the\nart-lover. As regards the \u201cmessianic\u201d expression in the face of the child,\nRaphael, honest man, who would not paint any state of soul in which he did\nnot believe, has amiably cheated his religious admirers. He painted that\nfreak of nature which is very often found, the man\u2019s eye in the child\u2019s\nface, and that, too, the eye of a brave, helpful man who sees distress.\nThis eye should be accompanied by a beard. The fact that a beard is\nwanting, and that two different ages are seen in one countenance, is the\npleasing paradox which believers have interpreted in accordance with their\nfaith in miracles. The artist could only expect as much from their art of\nexposition and interpretation.\n\n\n\n\n74.\n\n\nPRAYER.\u2014On two hypotheses alone is there any sense in prayer, that not\nquite extinct custom of olden times. It would have to be possible either\nto fix or alter the will of the godhead, and the devotee would have to\nknow best himself what he needs and should really desire. Both hypotheses,\naxiomatic and traditional in all other religions, are denied by\nChristianity. If Christianity nevertheless maintained prayer side by side\nwith its belief in the all-wise and all-provident divine reason (a belief\nthat makes prayer really senseless and even blasphemous), it showed here\nonce more its admirable \u201cwisdom of the serpent.\u201d For an outspoken command,\n\u201cThou shalt not pray,\u201d would have led Christians by way of boredom to the\ndenial of Christianity. In the Christian _ora et labora ora_ plays the\nr\u00f4le of pleasure. Without _ora_ what could those unlucky saints who\nrenounced _labora_ have done? But to have a chat with God, to ask him for\nall kinds of pleasant things, to feel a slight amusement at one\u2019s own\nfolly in still having any wishes at all, in spite of so excellent a\nfather\u2014all that was an admirable invention for saints.\n\n\n\n\n75.\n\n\nA HOLY LIE.\u2014The lie that was on Arria\u2019s lips when she died (_Paete, non\ndolet_(19)) obscures all the truths that have ever been uttered by the\ndying. It is the only holy _lie_ that has become famous, whereas elsewhere\nthe odour of sanctity has clung only to _errors_.\n\n\n\n\n76.\n\n\nTHE MOST NECESSARY APOSTLE.\u2014Among twelve apostles one must always be hard\nas stone, in order that upon him the new church may be built.\n\n\n\n\n77.\n\n\nWHICH IS MORE TRANSITORY, THE BODY OR THE SPIRIT?\u2014In legal, moral, and\nreligious institutions the external and concrete elements\u2014in other words,\nrites, gestures, and ceremonies\u2014are the most permanent. They are the body\nto which a new spirit is constantly being superadded. The cult, like an\nunchangeable text, is ever interpreted anew. Concepts and emotions are\nfluid, customs are solid.\n\n\n\n\n78.\n\n\nTHE BELIEF IN DISEASE _QUA_ DISEASE.\u2014Christianity first painted the devil\non the wall of the world. Christianity first brought the idea of sin into\nthe world. The belief in the remedies, which is offered as an antidote,\nhas gradually been shaken to its very foundations. But the belief in the\ndisease, which Christianity has taught and propagated, still exists.\n\n\n\n\n79.\n\n\nSPEECH AND WRITINGS OF RELIGIOUS MEN.\u2014If the priest\u2019s style and general\nexpression, both in speaking and writing, do not clearly betray the\nreligious man, we need no longer take his views upon religion and his\npleading for religion seriously. These opinions have become powerless for\nhim if, judging by his style, he has at command irony, arrogance, malice,\nhatred, and all the changing eddies of mood, just like the most\nirreligious of men\u2014how far more powerless will they be for his hearers and\nreaders! In short, he will serve to make the latter still more\nirreligious.\n\n\n\n\n80.\n\n\nTHE DANGER IN PERSONALITY.\u2014The more God has been regarded as a personality\nin himself, the less loyal have we been to him. Men are far more attached\nto their thought-images than to their best beloved. That is why they\nsacrifice themselves for State, Church, and even for God\u2014so far as he\nremains _their_ creation, their thought, and is not too much looked upon\nas a personality. In the latter case they almost always quarrel with him.\nAfter all, it was the most pious of men who let slip that bitter cry: \u201cMy\nGod, why hast thou forsaken me?\u201d\n\n\n\n\n81.\n\n\nWORLDLY JUSTICE.\u2014It is possible to unhinge worldly justice with the\ndoctrine of the complete non-responsibility and innocence of every man. An\nattempt has been made in the same direction on the basis of the opposite\ndoctrine of the full responsibility and guilt of every man. It was the\nfounder of Christianity who wished to abolish worldly justice and banish\njudgment and punishment from the world. For he understood all guilt as\n\u201csin\u201d\u2014that is, an outrage against God and not against the world. On the\nother hand, he considered every man in a broad sense, and almost in every\nsense, a sinner. The guilty, however, are not to be the judges of their\npeers\u2014so his rules of equity decided. Thus all dispensers of worldly\njustice were in his eyes as culpable as those they condemned, and their\nair of guiltlessness appeared to him hypocritical and pharisaical.\nMoreover, he looked to the motives and not to the results of actions, and\nthought that only one was keen-sighted enough to give a verdict on\nmotives\u2014himself or, as he expressed it, God.\n\n\n\n\n82.\n\n\nAN AFFECTATION IN PARTING.\u2014He who wishes to sever his connection with a\nparty or a creed thinks it necessary for him to refute it. This is a most\narrogant notion. The only thing necessary is that he should clearly see\nwhat tentacles hitherto held him to this party or creed and no longer hold\nhim, what views impelled him to it and now impel him in some other\ndirections. We have not joined the party or creed on strict grounds of\nknowledge. We should not affect this attitude on parting from it either.\n\n\n\n\n83.\n\n\nSAVIOUR AND PHYSICIAN.\u2014In his knowledge of the human soul the founder of\nChristianity was, as is natural, not without many great deficiencies and\nprejudices, and, as physician of the soul, was addicted to that\ndisreputable, laical belief in a universal medicine. In his methods he\nsometimes resembles that dentist who wishes to heal all pain by extracting\nthe tooth. Thus, for example, he assails sensuality with the advice: \u201cIf\nthine eye offend thee, pluck it out.\u201d\u2014Yet there still remains the\ndistinction that the dentist at least attains his object\u2014painlessness for\nthe patient\u2014although in so clumsy a fashion that he becomes ridiculous;\nwhereas the Christian who follows that advice and thinks he has killed his\nsensuality, is wrong, for his sensuality still lives in an uncanny,\nvampire form, and torments him in hideous disguises.\n\n\n\n\n84.\n\n\nPRISONERS.\u2014One morning the prisoners entered the yard for work, but the\nwarder was not there. Some, as their manner was, set to work at once;\nothers stood idle and gazed defiantly around. Then one of them strode\nforward and cried, \u201cWork as much as you will or do nothing, it all comes\nto the same. Your secret machinations have come to light; the warder has\nbeen keeping his eye on you of late, and will cause a terrible judgment to\nbe passed upon you in a few days\u2019 time. You know him\u2014he is of a cruel and\nresentful disposition. But now, listen: you have mistaken me hitherto. I\nam not what I seem, but far more\u2014I am the son of the warder, and can get\nanything I like out of him. I can save you\u2014nay, I will save you. But\nremember this: I will only save those of you who _believe_ that I am the\nson of the prison warder. The rest may reap the fruits of their unbelief.\u201d\n\u201cWell,\u201d said an old prisoner after an interval of silence, \u201cwhat can it\nmatter to you whether we believe you or not? If you are really the son,\nand can do what you say, then put in a good word for us all. That would be\na real kindness on your part. But have done with all talk of belief and\nunbelief!\u201d \u201cWhat is more,\u201d cried a younger man, \u201cI don\u2019t believe him: he\nhas only got a bee in his bonnet. I\u2019ll wager that in a week\u2019s time we\nshall find ourselves in the same place as we are to-day, and the warder\nwill know nothing.\u201d \u201cAnd if the warder ever knew anything, he knows it no\nlonger,\u201d said the last of the prisoners, coming down into the yard at that\nmoment, \u201cfor he has just died suddenly.\u201d \u201cAh ha!\u201d cried several in\nconfusion, \u201cah ha! Sir Son, Sir Son, how stands it now with your title?\nAre we by any chance _your_ prisoners now?\u201d \u201cI told you,\u201d answered the man\ngently, \u201cI will set free all who believe in me, as surely as my father\nstill lives.\u201d\u2014The prisoners did not laugh, but shrugged their shoulders\nand left him to himself.\n\n\n\n\n85.\n\n\nTHE PERSECUTORS OF GOD.\u2014Paul conceived and Calvin followed up the idea\nthat countless creatures have been predestined to damnation from time\nimmemorial, and that this fair world was made in order that the glory of\nGod might be manifested therein. So heaven and hell and mankind merely\nexist to satisfy the vanity of God! What a cruel, insatiable vanity must\nhave smouldered in the soul of the first or second thinker of such a\nthought!\u2014Paul, then, after all, remained Saul\u2014the persecutor of God.\n\n\n\n\n86.\n\n\nSOCRATES.\u2014If all goes well, the time will come when, in order to advance\nthemselves on the path of moral reason, men will rather take up the\n_Memorabilia_ of Socrates than the Bible, and when Montaigne and Horace\nwill be used as pioneers and guides for the understanding of Socrates, the\nsimplest and most enduring of interpretative sages. In him converge the\nroads of the most different philosophic modes of life, which are in truth\nthe modes of the different temperaments, crystallised by reason and habit\nand all ultimately directed towards the delight in life and in self. The\napparent conclusion is that the most peculiar thing about Socrates was his\nshare in all the temperaments. Socrates excels the founder of Christianity\nby virtue of his merry style of seriousness and by that wisdom of sheer\nroguish pranks which constitutes the best state of soul in a man.\nMoreover, he had a superior intelligence.\n\n\n\n\n87.\n\n\nLEARNING TO WRITE WELL.\u2014The age of good speaking is over, because the age\nof city-state culture is over. The limit allowed by Aristotle to the great\ncity\u2014in which the town-crier must be able to make himself heard by the\nwhole assembled community\u2014troubles us as little as do any\ncity-communities, us who even wish to be understood beyond the boundaries\nof nations. Therefore every one who is of a good European turn of mind\nmust learn to _write_ well, and to write better and better. He cannot help\nhimself, he must learn that: even if he was born in Germany, where bad\nwriting is looked upon as a national privilege. Better writing means\nbetter thinking; always to discover matter more worthy of communication;\nto be able to communicate it properly; to be translateable into the\ntongues of neighbouring nations; to make oneself comprehensible to\nforeigners who learn our language; to work with the view of making all\nthat is good common property, and of giving free access everywhere to the\nfree; finally, to pave the way for that still remote state of things, when\nthe great task shall come for good Europeans\u2014guidance and guardianship of\nthe universal world-culture.\u2014Whoever preaches the opposite doctrine of not\ntroubling about good writing and good reading (both virtues grow together\nand decline together) is really showing the peoples a way of becoming more\nand more _national_. He is intensifying the malady of this century, and is\na foe to good Europeans, a foe to free spirits.\n\n\n\n\n88.\n\n\nTHE THEORY OF THE BEST STYLE.\u2014The theory of the best style may at one time\nbe the theory of finding the expression by which we transfer every mood of\nours to the reader and the listener. At another, it may be the theory of\nfinding expressions for the more desirable human moods, the communication\nand transference of which one desires most\u2014for the mood of a man moved\nfrom the depth of his heart, intellectually cheerful, bright, and sincere,\nwho has conquered his passions. This will be the theory of the best style,\na theory that corresponds to the good man.\n\n\n\n\n89.\n\n\nPAYING ATTENTION TO MOVEMENT.\u2014The movement of the sentences shows whether\nthe author be tired. Individual expressions may nevertheless be still\nstrong and good, because they were invented earlier and for their own\nsake, when the thought first flashed across the author\u2019s mind. This is\nfrequently the case with Goethe, who too often dictated when he was tired.\n\n\n\n\n90.\n\n\n\u201cALREADY\u201d AND \u201cSTILL.\u201d\u2014_A._ German prose is still very young. Goethe\ndeclares that Wieland is its father.\n\n_B._ So young and already so ugly!\n\n_C._ But, so far as I am aware, Bishop Ulfilas already wrote German prose,\nwhich must therefore be fifteen hundred years old.\n\n_B._ So old and still so ugly!\n\n\n\n\n91.\n\n\nORIGINAL GERMAN.\u2014German prose, which is really not fashioned on any\npattern and must be considered an original creation of German taste,\nshould give the eager advocate of a future original German culture an\nindication of how real German dress, German society, German furniture,\nGerman meals would look without the imitation of models.\u2014Some one who had\nlong reflected on these vistas finally cried in great horror, \u201cBut, Heaven\nhelp us, perhaps we already have that original culture\u2014only we don\u2019t like\nto talk about it!\u201d\n\n\n\n\n92.\n\n\nFORBIDDEN BOOKS.\u2014One should never read anything written by those arrogant\nwiseacres and puzzle-brains who have the detestable vice of logical\nparadox. They apply _logical_ formul\u00e6 just where everything is really\nimprovised at random and built in the air. (\u201cTherefore\u201d with them means,\n\u201cYou idiot of a reader, this \u2018therefore\u2019 does not exist for you, but only\nfor me.\u201d The answer to this is: \u201cYou idiot of a writer, then why do you\nwrite?\u201d)\n\n\n\n\n93.\n\n\nDISPLAYING ONE\u2019S WIT.\u2014Every one who wishes to display his wit thereby\nproclaims that he has also a plentiful lack of wit. That vice which clever\nFrenchmen have of adding a touch of _d\u00e9dain_ to their best ideas arises\nfrom a desire to be considered richer than they really are. They wish to\nbe carelessly generous, as if weary of continual spending from overfull\ntreasuries.\n\n\n\n\n94.\n\n\nFRENCH AND GERMAN LITERATURE.\u2014The misfortune of the French and German\nliterature of the last hundred years is that the Germans ran away too\nearly from the French school, and the French, later on, went too early to\nthe German school.\n\n\n\n\n95.\n\n\nOUR PROSE.\u2014None of the present-day cultured nations has so bad a prose as\nthe German. When clever, _blas\u00e9_ Frenchmen say, \u201cThere is no German\nprose,\u201d we ought really not to be angry, for this criticism is more polite\nthan we deserve. If we look for reasons, we come at last to the strange\nphenomenon that the German knows only improvised prose and has no\nconception of any other. He simply cannot understand the Italian, who says\nthat prose is as much harder than poetry as the representation of naked\nbeauty is harder to the sculptor than that of draped beauty. Verse,\nimages, rhythm, and rhyme need honest effort\u2014that even the German\nrealises, and he is not inclined to set a very high value on extempore\npoetry. But the notion of working at a page of prose as at a statue sounds\nto him like a tale from fairyland.\n\n\n\n\n96.\n\n\nTHE GRAND STYLE.\u2014The grand style comes into being when the beautiful wins\na victory over the monstrous.\n\n\n\n\n97.\n\n\nDODGING.\u2014We do not realise, in the case of distinguished minds, wherein\nlies the excellence of their expression, their turn of phrase, until we\ncan say what word every mediocre writer would inevitably have hit upon in\nexpressing the same idea. All great artists, in steering their car, show\nthemselves prone to dodge and leave the track, but never to fall over.\n\n\n\n\n98.\n\n\nSOMETHING LIKE BREAD.\u2014Bread neutralises and takes out the taste of other\nfood, and is therefore necessary to every long meal. In all works of art\nthere must be something like bread, in order that they may produce divers\neffects. If these effects followed one another without occasional pauses\nand intervals, they would soon make us weary and provoke disgust\u2014in fact,\na long meal of art would then be impossible.\n\n\n\n\n99.\n\n\nJEAN PAUL.\u2014Jean Paul knew a great deal, but had no science; understood all\nmanner of tricks of art, but had no art; found almost everything\nenjoyable, but had no taste; possessed feeling and seriousness, but in\ndispensing them poured over them a nauseous sauce of tears; had even wit,\nbut, unfortunately for his ardent desire for it, far too little\u2014whence he\ndrives the reader to despair by his very lack of wit. In short, he was the\nbright, rank-smelling weed that shot up overnight in the fair pleasaunces\nof Schiller and Goethe. He was a good, comfortable man, and yet a destiny,\na destiny in a dressing-gown.(20)\n\n\n\n\n100.\n\n\nPALATE FOR OPPOSITES.\u2014In order to enjoy a work of the past as its\ncontemporaries enjoyed it, one must have a palate for the prevailing taste\nof the age which it attacked.\n\n\n\n\n101.\n\n\nSPIRITS-OF-WINE AUTHORS.\u2014Many writers are neither spirit nor wine, but\nspirits of wine. They can flare up, and then they give warmth.\n\n\n\n\n102.\n\n\nTHE INTERPRETATIVE SENSE.\u2014The sense of taste, as the true interpretative\nsense, often talks the other senses over to its point of view and imposes\nupon them its laws and customs. At table one can receive disclosures about\nthe most subtle secrets of the arts; it suffices to observe what tastes\ngood and when and after what and how long it tastes good.\n\n\n\n\n103.\n\n\nLESSING.\u2014Lessing had a genuine French talent, and, as writer, went most\nassiduously to the French school. He knows well how to arrange and display\nhis wares in his shop-window. Without this true art his thoughts, like the\nobjects of them, would have remained rather in the dark, nor would the\ngeneral loss be great. His art, however, has taught many (especially the\nlast generation of German scholars) and has given enjoyment to a countless\nnumber. It is true his disciples had no need to learn from him, as they\noften did, his unpleasant tone with its mingling of petulance and\ncandour.\u2014Opinion is now unanimous on Lessing as \u201clyric poet,\u201d and will\nsome day be unanimous on Lessing as \u201cdramatic poet.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n104.\n\n\nUNDESIRABLE READERS.\u2014How an author is vexed by those stolid, awkward\nreaders who always fall at every place where they stumble, and always hurt\nthemselves when they fall!\n\n\n\n\n105.\n\n\nPOETS\u2019 THOUGHTS.\u2014Real thoughts of real poets always go about with a veil\non, like Egyptian women; only the deep _eye_ of thought looks out freely\nthrough the veil.\u2014Poets\u2019 thoughts are as a rule not of such value as is\nsupposed. We have to pay for the veil and for our own curiosity into the\nbargain.\n\n\n\n\n106.\n\n\nWRITE SIMPLY AND USEFULLY.\u2014Transitions, details, colour in depicting the\npassions\u2014we make a present of all these to the author because we bring\nthem with us and set them down to the credit of his book, provided he\nmakes us some compensation.\n\n\n\n\n107.\n\n\nWIELAND.\u2014Wieland wrote German better than any one else, and had the\ngenuine adequacies and inadequacies of the master. His translations of the\nletters of Cicero and Lucian are the best in the language. His ideas,\nhowever, add nothing to our store of thought. We can endure his cheerful\nmoralities as little as his cheerful immoralities, for both are very\nclosely connected. The men who enjoyed them were at bottom better men than\nwe are, but also a good deal heavier. They _needed_ an author of this\nsort. The Germans did not need Goethe, and therefore cannot make proper\nuse of him. We have only to consider the best of our statesmen and artists\nin this light. None of them had or _could_ have had Goethe as their\nteacher.\n\n\n\n\n108.\n\n\nRARE FESTIVALS.\u2014Pithy conciseness, repose, and maturity\u2014where you find\nthese qualities in an author, cry halt and celebrate a great festival in\nthe desert. It will be long before you have such a treat again.\n\n\n\n\n109.\n\n\nTHE TREASURE OF GERMAN PROSE.\u2014Apart from Goethe\u2019s writings and especially\nGoethe\u2019s conversations with Eckermann (the best German book in existence),\nwhat German prose literature remains that is worth reading over and over\nagain? Lichtenberg\u2019s _Aphorisms_, the first book of Jung-Stilling\u2019s _Story\nof My Life_, Adalbert Stifter\u2019s _St. Martin\u2019s Summer_ and Gottfried\nKeller\u2019s _People of Seldwyla_\u2014and there, for the time being, it comes to\nan end.\n\n\n\n\n110.\n\n\nLITERARY AND COLLOQUIAL STYLE.\u2014The art of writing demands, first and\nforemost, substitutions for the means of expression which speech alone\npossesses\u2014in other words, for gestures, accent, intonation, and look.\nHence literary style is quite different from colloquial style, and far\nmore difficult, because it has to make itself as intelligible as the\nlatter with fewer accessaries. Demosthenes delivered his speeches\ndifferently from what we read; he worked them up for reading\npurposes.\u2014Cicero\u2019s speeches ought to be \u201cdemosthenised\u201d with the same\nobject, for at present they contain more of the Roman Forum than we can\nendure.\n\n\n\n\n111.\n\n\nCAUTION IN QUOTATION.\u2014Young authors do not know that a good expression or\nidea only looks well among its peers; that an excellent quotation may\nspoil whole pages, nay the whole book; for it seems to cry warningly to\nthe reader, \u201cMark you, I am the precious stone, and round about me is\nlead\u2014pale, worthless lead!\u201d Every word, every idea only desires to live in\nits own company\u2014that is the moral of a choice style.\n\n\n\n\n112.\n\n\nHOW SHOULD ERRORS BE ENUNCIATED?\u2014We may dispute whether it be more\ninjurious for errors to be enunciated badly or as well as the best truths.\nIt is certain that in the former case they are doubly harmful to the brain\nand are less easily removed from it. But, on the other hand, they are not\nso certain of effect as in the latter case. They are, in fact, less\ncontagious.\n\n\n\n\n113.\n\n\nLIMITING AND WIDENING.\u2014Homer limited and diminished the horizon of his\nsubject, but allowed individual scenes to expand and blossom out. Later,\nthe tragedians are constantly renewing this process. Each takes his\nmaterial in ever smaller and smaller fragments than his predecessor did,\nbut each attains a greater wealth of blooms within the narrow hedges of\nthese sequestered garden enclosures.\n\n\n\n\n114.\n\n\nLITERATURE AND MORALITY MUTUALLY EXPLANATORY.\u2014We can show from Greek\nliterature by what forces the Greek spirit developed, how it entered upon\ndifferent channels, and where it became enfeebled. All this also depicts\nto us how Greek morality proceeded, and how all morality will proceed: how\nit was at first a constraint and displayed cruelty, then became gradually\nmilder; how a pleasure in certain actions, in certain forms and\nconventions arose, and from this again a propensity for solitary exercise,\nfor solitary possession; how the track becomes crowded and overcrowded\nwith competitors; how satiety enters in, new objects of struggle and\nambition are sought, and forgotten aims are awakened to life; how the\ndrama is repeated, and the spectators become altogether weary of looking\non, because the whole gamut seems to have been run through\u2014and then comes\na stoppage, an expiration, and the rivulets are lost in the sand. The end,\nor at any rate _an_ end, has come.\n\n\n\n\n115.\n\n\nWHAT LANDSCAPES GIVE PERMANENT DELIGHT.\u2014Such and such a landscape has\nfeatures eminently suited for painting, but I cannot find the formula for\nit; it remains beyond my grasp as a whole. I notice that all landscapes\nwhich please me permanently have a simple geometrical scheme of lines\nunderneath all their complexity. Without such a mathematical substratum no\nscenery becomes artistically pleasing. Perhaps this rule may be applied\nsymbolically to human beings.\n\n\n\n\n116.\n\n\nREADING ALOUD.\u2014The ability to read aloud involves of necessity the ability\nto declaim. Everywhere we must apply pale tints, but we must determine the\ndegree of pallor in close relation to the richly and deeply coloured\nbackground, that always hovers before our eyes and acts as our guide\u2014in\nother words, in accordance with the way in which we should _declaim_ the\nsame passages. That is why we must be able to declaim.\n\n\n\n\n117.\n\n\nTHE DRAMATIC SENSE.\u2014He who has not the four subtler senses of art tries to\nunderstand everything with the fifth sense, which is the coarsest of\nall\u2014the dramatic sense.\n\n\n\n\n118.\n\n\nHERDER.\u2014Herder fails to be all that he made people think he was and\nhimself wished to think he was. He was no great thinker or discoverer, no\nnewly fertile soil with the unexhausted strength of a virgin forest. But\nhe possessed in the highest degree the power of scenting the future, he\nsaw and picked the first-fruits of the seasons earlier than all others,\nand they then believed that he had made them grow. Between darkness and\nlight, youth and age, his mind was like a hunter on the watch, looking\neverywhere for transitions, depressions, convulsions, the outward and\nvisible signs of internal growth. The unrest of spring drove him to and\nfro, but he was himself not the spring.\u2014At times, indeed, he had some\ninkling of this, and yet would fain not have believed it\u2014he, the ambitious\npriest, who would have so gladly been the intellectual pope of his epoch!\nThis is his despair. He seems to have lived long as a pretender to several\nkingdoms or even to a universal monarchy. He had his following which\nbelieved in him, among others the young Goethe. But whenever crowns were\nreally distributed, he was passed over. Kant, Goethe, and then the first\ntrue German historians and scholars robbed him of what he thought he had\nreserved for himself (although in silence and secret he often thought the\nreverse). Just when he doubted in himself, he gladly clothed himself in\ndignity and enthusiasm: these were often in him mere garments, which had\nto hide a great deal and also to deceive and comfort him. He really had\nfire and enthusiasm, but his ambition was far greater! It blew impatiently\nat the fire, which flickered, crackled, and smoked\u2014his _style_ flickers,\ncrackles, and smokes\u2014but he yearned for the great flame which never broke\nout. He did not sit at the table of the genuine creators, and his ambition\ndid not admit of his sitting modestly among those who simply enjoy. Thus\nhe was a restless spirit, the taster of all intellectual dishes, which\nwere collected by the Germans from every quarter and every age in the\ncourse of half a century. Never really happy and satisfied, Herder was\nalso too often ill, and then at times envy sat by his bed, and hypocrisy\npaid her visit as well. He always had an air of being scarred and\ncrippled, and he lacked simple, stalwart manliness more completely than\nany of the so-called \u201cclassical writers.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n119.\n\n\nSCENT OF WORDS.\u2014Every word has its scent; there is a harmony and discord\nof scents, and so too of words.\n\n\n\n\n120.\n\n\nTHE FAR-FETCHED STYLE.\u2014The natural style is an offence to the lover of the\nfar-fetched style.\n\n\n\n\n121.\n\n\nA VOW.\u2014I will never again read an author of whom one can suspect that he\n_wanted_ to make a book, but only those writers whose thoughts\nunexpectedly became a book.\n\n\n\n\n122.\n\n\nTHE ARTISTIC CONVENTION.\u2014Three-fourths of Homer is convention, and the\nsame is the case with all the Greek artists, who had no reason for falling\ninto the modern craze for originality. They had no fear of convention, for\nafter all convention was a link between them and their public. Conventions\nare the artistic means _acquired_ for the understanding of the hearer; the\ncommon speech, learnt with much toil, whereby the artist can really\ncommunicate his ideas. All the more when he wishes, like the Greek poets\nand musicians, to conquer at once with each of his works (since he is\naccustomed to compete publicly with one or two rivals), the first\ncondition is that he must be understood at once, and this is only possible\nby means of convention. What the artist devises beyond convention he\noffers of his own free will and takes a risk, his success at best\nresulting in the setting-up of a new convention. As a rule originality is\nmarvelled at, sometimes even worshipped, but seldom understood. A stubborn\navoidance of convention means a desire not to be understood. What, then,\nis the object of the modern craze for originality?\n\n\n\n\n123.\n\n\nARTISTS\u2019 AFFECTATION OF SCIENTIFIC METHOD.\u2014Schiller, like other German\nartists, fancied that if a man had intellect he was entitled to improvise\neven with the pen on all difficult subjects. So there we see his prose\nessays\u2014in every way a model of how _not_ to attack scientific questions of\n\u00e6sthetics and ethics, and a danger for young readers who, in their\nadmiration for Schiller the poet, have not the courage to think meanly of\nSchiller the thinker and author.\u2014The temptation to traverse for once the\nforbidden paths, and to have his say in science as well, is easy and\npardonable in the artist. For even the ablest artist from time to time\nfinds his handicraft and his workshop unendurable. This temptation is so\nstrong that it makes the artist show all the world what no one wishes to\nsee, that his little chamber of thought is cramped and untidy. Why not,\nindeed? He does not live there. He proceeds to show that the storeroom of\nhis knowledge is partly empty, partly filled with lumber. Why not, indeed?\nThis condition does not really become the artist-child badly. In\nparticular, the artist shows that for the very easiest exercises of\nscientific method, which are accessible even to beginners, his joints are\ntoo stiff and untrained. Even of that he need not really be ashamed! On\nthe other hand, he often develops no mean art in imitating all the\nmistakes, vices, and base pedantries that are practised in the scientific\ncommunity, in the belief that these belong to the appearance of the thing,\nif not to the thing itself. This is the very point that is so amusing in\nartists\u2019 writing, that the artist involuntarily acts as his vocation\ndemands: he parodies the scientific and inartistic natures. Towards\nscience he should show no attitude but that of parody, in so far as he is\nan artist and only an artist.\n\n\n\n\n124.\n\n\nTHE FAUST-IDEA.\u2014A little sempstress is seduced and plunged into despair: a\ngreat scholar of all the four Faculties is the evil-doer. That cannot have\nhappened in the ordinary course, surely? No, certainly not! Without the\naid of the devil incarnate, the great scholar would never have achieved\nthe deed.\u2014Is this really destined to be the greatest German \u201ctragic idea,\u201d\nas one hears it said among Germans?\u2014But for Goethe even this idea was too\nterrible. His kind heart could not avoid placing the little sempstress,\n\u201cthe good soul that forgot itself but once,\u201d near to the saints, after her\ninvoluntary death. Even the great scholar, \u201cthe good man\u201d with \u201cthe dark\nimpulse,\u201d is brought into heaven in the nick of time, by a trick which is\nplayed upon the devil at the decisive moment. In heaven the lovers find\nthemselves again. Goethe once said that his nature was too conciliatory\nfor really tragic subjects.\n\n\n\n\n125.\n\n\nARE THERE \u201cGERMAN CLASSICS\u201d?\u2014Sainte-Beuve observes somewhere that the word\n\u201cclassic\u201d does not suit the genius of certain literatures. For instance,\nnobody could talk seriously of \u201cGerman classics.\u201d\u2014What do our German\npublishers, who are about to add fifty more to the fifty German classics\nwe are told to accept, say to that? Does it not almost seem as if one need\nonly have been dead for the last thirty years, and lie a lawful prey to\nthe public,(21) in order to hear suddenly and unexpectedly the trumpet of\nresurrection as a \u201cClassic\u201d? And this in an age and a nation where at\nleast five out of the six great fathers of its literature are undoubtedly\nantiquated or becoming antiquated\u2014without there being any need for the age\nor the nation to be ashamed of this. For those writers have given way\nbefore the strength of our time\u2014let that be considered in all\nfairness!\u2014Goethe, as I have indicated, I do not include. He belongs to a\nhigher species than \u201cnational literatures\u201d: hence life, revival, and decay\ndo not enter into the reckoning in his relations with his countrymen. He\nlived and now lives but for the few; for the majority he is nothing but a\nflourish of vanity which is trumpeted from time to time across the border\ninto foreign ears. Goethe, not merely a great and good man, but a\n_culture_, is in German history an interlude without a sequel. Who, for\ninstance, would be able to point to any trace of Goethe\u2019s influence in\nGerman politics of the last seventy years (whereas the influence,\ncertainly of Schiller, and perhaps of Lessing, can be traced in the\npolitical world)? But what of those five others? Klopstock, in a most\nhonourable way, became out of date even in his own lifetime, and so\ncompletely that the meditative book of his later years, _The Republic of\nLearning_, has never been taken seriously from that day to this. Herder\u2019s\nmisfortune was that his writings were always either new or antiquated.\nThus for stronger and more subtle minds (like Lichtenberg) even Herder\u2019s\nmasterpiece, his _Ideas for the History of Mankind_, was in a way\nantiquated at the very moment of its appearance. Wieland, who lived to the\nfull and made others live likewise, was clever enough to anticipate by\ndeath the waning of his influence. Lessing, perhaps, still lives\nto-day\u2014but among a young and ever younger band of scholars. Schiller has\nfallen from the hands of young men into those of boys, of all German boys.\nIt is a well-known sign of obsolescence when a book descends to people of\nless and less mature age.\u2014Well, what is it that has thrust these five into\nthe background, so that well-educated men of affairs no longer read them?\nA better taste, a riper knowledge, a higher reverence for the real and the\ntrue: in other words, the very virtues which these five (and ten or twenty\nothers of lesser repute) first re-planted in Germany, and which now, like\na mighty forest, cast over their graves not only the shadow of awe, but\nsomething of the shadow of oblivion.\u2014But classical writers are not\nplanters of intellectual and literary virtues. They bring those virtues to\nperfection and are their highest luminous peaks, and being brighter,\nfreer, and purer than all that surrounds them, they remain shining above\nthe nations when the nations themselves perish. There may come an elevated\nstage of humanity, in which the Europe of the peoples is a dark, forgotten\nthing, but Europe lives on in thirty books, very old but never\nantiquated\u2014in the classics.\n\n\n\n\n126.\n\n\nINTERESTING, BUT NOT BEAUTIFUL.\u2014This countryside conceals its meaning, but\nit has one that we should like to guess. Everywhere that I look, I read\nwords and hints of words, but I do not know where begins the sentence that\nsolves the riddle of all these hints. So I get a stiff neck in trying to\ndiscover whether I should start reading from this or that point.\n\n\n\n\n127.\n\n\nAGAINST INNOVATORS IN LANGUAGE.\u2014The use of neologisms or archaisms, the\npreference for the rare and the bizarre, the attempt to enrich rather than\nto limit the vocabulary, are always signs either of an immature or of a\ncorrupted taste. A noble poverty but a masterly freedom within the limits\nof that modest wealth distinguishes the Greek artists in oratory. They\nwish to have less than the people has\u2014for the people is richest in old and\nnew\u2014but they wish to have that little _better_. The reckoning up of their\narchaic and exotic forms is soon done, but we never cease marvelling if we\nhave an eye for their light and delicate manner in handling the\ncommonplace and apparently long outworn elements in word and phrase.\n\n\n\n\n128.\n\n\nGLOOMY AND SERIOUS AUTHORS.\u2014He who commits his sufferings to paper becomes\na gloomy author, but he becomes a serious one if he tells us what he _has_\nsuffered and why he is now enjoying a pleasurable repose.\n\n\n\n\n129.\n\n\nHEALTHINESS OF TASTE.\u2014How is it that health is less contagious than\ndisease\u2014generally, and particularly in matters of taste? Or are there\nepidemics of health?\n\n\n\n\n130.\n\n\nA RESOLUTION.\u2014Never again to read a book that is born and christened (with\nink) at the same moment.\n\n\n\n\n131.\n\n\nIMPROVING OUR IDEAS.\u2014Improving our style means improving our ideas, and\nnothing else. He who does not at once concede this can never be convinced\nof the point.\n\n\n\n\n132.\n\n\nCLASSICAL BOOKS.\u2014The weakest point in every classical book is that it is\nwritten too much in the mother tongue of its author.\n\n\n\n\n133.\n\n\nBAD BOOKS.\u2014The book should demand pen, ink, and desk, but usually it is\npen, ink, and desk that demand the book. That is why books are of so\nlittle account at present.\n\n\n\n\n134.\n\n\nPRESENCE OF SENSE.\u2014When the public reflects on paintings, it becomes a\npoet; when on poems, an investigator. At the moment when the artist\nsummons it it is always lacking in the right sense, and accordingly in\npresence of sense, not in presence of mind.\n\n\n\n\n135.\n\n\nCHOICE IDEAS.\u2014The choice style of a momentous period does not only select\nits words but its ideas\u2014and both from the customary and prevailing usage.\nVenturesome ideas, that smell too fresh, are to the maturer taste no less\nrepugnant than new and reckless images and phrases. Later on both choice\nideas and choice words soon smack of mediocrity, because the scent of the\nchoice vanishes quickly, and then nothing but the customary and\ncommonplace element is tasted.\n\n\n\n\n136.\n\n\nMAIN REASON FOR CORRUPTION OF STYLE.\u2014The desire to display more sentiment\nthan one really feels for a thing corrupts style, in language and in all\nart. All great art shows rather the opposite tendency. Like every man of\nmoral significance, it loves to check emotion on its way and not let it\nrun its course to the very end. This modesty of letting emotion but half\nappear is most clearly to be observed, for example, in Sophocles. The\nfeatures of sentiment seem to become beautified when sentiment feigns to\nbe more shy than it really is.\n\n\n\n\n137.\n\n\nAN EXCUSE FOR THE HEAVY STYLE.\u2014The lightly uttered phrase seldom falls on\nthe ear with the full weight of the subject. This is, however, due to the\nbad training of the ear, which by education must pass from what has\nhitherto been called music to the school of the higher harmony\u2014in other\nwords, to conversation.\n\n\n\n\n138.\n\n\nBIRD\u2019S-EYE VIEWS.\u2014Here torrents rush from every side into a ravine: their\nmovement is so swift and stormy, and carries the eye along so quickly,\nthat the bare or wooded mountain slopes around seem not to sink down but\nto fly down. We are in an agonised tension at the sight, as if behind all\nthis were hidden some hostile element, before which all must fly, and\nagainst which the abyss alone gave protection. This landscape cannot be\npainted, unless we hover above it like a bird in the open air. Here for\nonce the so-called bird\u2019s-eye view is not an artistic caprice, but the\nsole possibility.\n\n\n\n\n139.\n\n\nRASH COMPARISONS.\u2014If rash comparisons are not proofs of the wantonness of\nthe writer, they are proofs of the exhaustion of his imagination. In any\ncase they bear witness to his bad taste.\n\n\n\n\n140.\n\n\nDANCING IN CHAINS.\u2014In the case of every Greek artist, poet, or writer we\nmust ask: What is the new constraint which he imposes upon himself and\nmakes attractive to his contemporaries, so as to find imitators? For the\nthing called \u201cinvention\u201d (in metre, for example) is always a self-imposed\nfetter of this kind. \u201cDancing in chains\u201d\u2014to make that hard for themselves\nand then to spread a false notion that it is easy\u2014that is the trick that\nthey wish to show us. Even in Homer we may perceive a wealth of inherited\nformul\u00e6 and laws of epic narration, within the circle of which he had to\ndance, and he himself created new conventions for them that came after.\nThis was the discipline of the Greek poets: first to impose upon\nthemselves a manifold constraint by means of the earlier poets; then to\ninvent in addition a new constraint, to impose it upon themselves and\ncheerfully to overcome it, so that constraint and victory are perceived\nand admired.\n\n\n\n\n141.\n\n\nAUTHORS\u2019 COPIOUSNESS.\u2014The last quality that a good author acquires is\ncopiousness: whoever has it to begin with will never become a good author.\nThe noblest racehorses are lean until they are permitted to rest from\ntheir victories.\n\n\n\n\n142.\n\n\nWHEEZING HEROES.\u2014Poets and artists who suffer from a narrow chest of the\nemotions generally make their heroes wheeze. They do not know what easy\nbreathing means.\n\n\n\n\n143.\n\n\nTHE SHORT-SIGHTED.(22)\u2014The short-sighted are the deadly foes of all\nauthors who let themselves go. These authors should know the wrath with\nwhich these people shut the book in which they observe that its creator\nneeds fifty pages to express five ideas. And the cause of their wrath is\nthat they have endangered what remains of their vision almost without\ncompensation. A short-sighted person said, \u201cAll authors let themselves\ngo.\u201d \u201cEven the Holy Ghost?\u201d \u201cEven the Holy Ghost.\u201d But he had a right to,\nfor he wrote for those who had lost their sight altogether.\n\n\n\n\n144.\n\n\nTHE STYLE OF IMMORTALITY.\u2014Thucydides and Tacitus both imagined immortal\nlife for their works when they executed them. That might be guessed (if\nnot known otherwise) from their style. The one thought to give permanence\nto his ideas by salting them, the other by boiling them down; and neither,\nit seems, made a miscalculation.\n\n\n\n\n145.\n\n\nAGAINST IMAGES AND SIMILES.\u2014By images and similes we convince, but we do\nnot prove. That is why science has such a horror of images and similes.\nScience does not want to convince or make plausible, and rather seeks to\nprovoke cold distrust by its mode of expression, by the bareness of its\nwalls. For distrust is the touchstone for the gold of certainty.\n\n\n\n\n146.\n\n\nCAUTION.\u2014In Germany, he who lacks thorough knowledge should beware of\nwriting. The good German does not say in that case \u201che is ignorant,\u201d but\n\u201che is of doubtful character.\u201d\u2014This hasty conclusion, by the way, does\ngreat credit to the Germans.\n\n\n\n\n147.\n\n\nPAINTED SKELETONS.\u2014Painted skeletons are those authors who try to make up\nfor their want of flesh by artistic colourings.\n\n\n\n\n148.\n\n\nTHE GRAND STYLE AND SOMETHING BETTER.\u2014It is easier to learn how to write\nthe grand style than how to write easily and simply. The reasons for this\nare inextricably bound up with morality.\n\n\n\n\n149.\n\n\nSEBASTIAN BACH.\u2014In so far as we do not hear Bach\u2019s music as perfect and\nexperienced connoisseurs of counterpoint and all the varieties of the\nfugal style (and accordingly must dispense with real artistic enjoyment),\nwe shall feel in listening to his music\u2014in Goethe\u2019s magnificent phrase\u2014as\nif \u201cwe were present at God\u2019s creation of the world.\u201d In other words, we\nfeel here that something great is in the making but not yet made\u2014our\nmighty modern music, which by conquering nationalities, the Church, and\ncounterpoint has conquered the world. In Bach there is still too much\ncrude Christianity, crude Germanism, crude scholasticism. He stands on the\nthreshold of modern European music, but turns from thence to look at the\nMiddle Ages.\n\n\n\n\n150.\n\n\nH\u00c4NDEL.\u2014H\u00e4ndel, who in the invention of his music was bold, original,\ntruthful, powerful, inclined to and akin to all the heroism of which a\n_nation_ is capable, often proved stiff, cold, nay even weary of himself\nin composition. He applied a few well-tried methods of execution, wrote\ncopiously and quickly, and was glad when he had finished\u2014but that joy was\nnot the joy of God and other creators in the eventide of their working\nday.\n\n\n\n\n151.\n\n\nHAYDN.\u2014So far as genius can exist in a man who is merely _good_, Haydn had\ngenius. He went just as far as the limit which morality sets to intellect,\nand only wrote music that has \u201cno past.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n152.\n\n\nBEETHOVEN AND MOZART.\u2014Beethoven\u2019s music often appears like a deeply\nemotional meditation on unexpectedly hearing once more a piece long\nthought to be forgotten, \u201cTonal Innocence\u201d: it is music about music. In\nthe song of the beggar and child in the street, in the monotonous airs of\nvagrant Italians, in the dance of the village inn or in carnival nights he\ndiscovers his melodies. He stores them together like a bee, snatching here\nand there some notes or a short phrase. To him these are hallowed memories\nof \u201cthe better world,\u201d like the ideas of Plato.\u2014Mozart stands in quite a\ndifferent relation to his melodies. He finds his inspiration not in\nhearing music but in gazing at life, at the most stirring life of southern\nlands. He was always dreaming of Italy, when he was not there.\n\n\n\n\n153.\n\n\nRECITATIVE.\u2014Formerly recitative was dry, but now we live in the age of\nmoist recitative. It has fallen into the water, and the waves carry it\nwhithersoever they list.\n\n\n\n\n154.\n\n\n\u201cCHEERFUL\u201d MUSIC.\u2014If for a long time we have heard no music, it then goes\nlike a heavy southern wine all too quickly into the blood and leaves\nbehind it a soul dazed with narcotics, half-awake, longing for sleep. This\nis particularly the case with cheerful music, which inspires in us\nbitterness and pain, satiety and home-sickness together, and forces us to\nsip again and again as at a sweetened draught of poison. The hall of gay,\nnoisy merriment then seems to grow narrow, the light to lose its\nbrightness and become browner. At last we feel as if this music were\npenetrating to a prison where a poor wretch cannot sleep for\nhome-sickness.\n\n\n\n\n155.\n\n\nFRANZ SCHUBERT.\u2014Franz Schubert, inferior as an artist to the other great\nmusicians, had nevertheless the largest share of inherited musical wealth.\nHe spent it with a free hand and a kind heart, so that for a few centuries\nmusicians will continue to _nibble_ at his ideas and inspirations. In his\nworks we find a store of _unused_ inventions; the greatness of others will\nlie in making use of those inventions. If Beethoven may be called the\nideal listener for a troubadour, Schubert has a right to be called the\nideal troubadour.\n\n\n\n\n156.\n\n\nMODERN MUSICAL EXECUTION.\u2014Great tragic or dramatic execution of music\nacquires its character by imitating the gesture of the great sinner, such\nas Christianity conceives and desires him: the slow-stepping, passionately\nbrooding man, distracted by the agonies of conscience, now flying in\nterror, now clutching with delight, now standing still in despair\u2014and all\nthe other marks of great sinfulness. Only on the Christian assumption that\nall men are great sinners and do nothing but sin could we justify the\napplication of this style of execution to _all_ music. So far, music would\nbe the reflection of all the actions and impulses of man, and would\ncontinually have to express by gestures the language of the great sinner.\nAt such a performance, a listener who was not enough of a Christian to\nunderstand this logic might indeed cry out in horror, \u201cFor the love of\nHeaven, how did sin find its way into music?\u201d\n\n\n\n\n157.\n\n\nFELIX MENDELSSOHN.\u2014Felix Mendelssohn\u2019s music is the music of the good\ntaste that enjoys all the good things that have ever existed. It always\npoints behind. How could it have much \u201cin front,\u201d much of a future?\u2014But\ndid he want it to have a future? He possessed a virtue rare among artists,\nthat of gratitude without _arri\u00e8re-pens\u00e9e_. This virtue, too, always\npoints behind.\n\n\n\n\n158.\n\n\nA MOTHER OF ARTS.\u2014In our sceptical age, real devotion requires almost a\nbrutal heroism of ambition. Fanatical shutting of the eyes and bending of\nthe knee no longer suffice. Would it not be possible for ambition\u2014in its\neagerness to be the last devotee of all the ages\u2014to become the begetter of\na final church music, as it has been the begetter of the final church\narchitecture? (They call it the Jesuit style.)\n\n\n\n\n159.\n\n\nFREEDOM IN FETTERS\u2014A PRINCELY FREEDOM.\u2014Chopin, the last of the modern\nmusicians, who gazed at and worshipped beauty, like Leopardi; Chopin, the\nPole, the inimitable (none that came before or after him has a right to\nthis name)\u2014Chopin had the same princely punctilio in convention that\nRaphael shows in the use of the simplest traditional colours. The only\ndifference is that Chopin applies them not to colour but to melodic and\nrhythmic traditions. He admitted the validity of these traditions because\nhe was born under the sway of etiquette. But in these fetters he plays and\ndances as the freest and daintiest of spirits, and, be it observed, he\ndoes not spurn the chain.\n\n\n\n\n160.\n\n\nCHOPIN\u2019S BARCAROLLE.\u2014Almost all states and modes of life have a moment of\nrapture, and good artists know how to discover that moment. Such a moment\nthere is even in life by the seashore\u2014that dreary, sordid, unhealthy\nexistence, dragged out in the neighbourhood of a noisy and covetous\nrabble. This moment of rapture Chopin in his Barcarolle expressed in sound\nso supremely that Gods themselves, when they heard it, might yearn to lie\nlong summer evenings in a boat.\n\n\n\n\n161.\n\n\nROBERT SCHUMANN.\u2014\u201cThe Stripling,\u201d as the romantic songsters of Germany and\nFrance of the first three decades of this century imagined him\u2014this\nstripling was completely translated into song and melody by Robert\nSchumann, the eternal youth, so long as he felt himself in full possession\nof his powers. There are indeed moments when his music reminds one of the\neternal \u201cold maid.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n162.\n\n\nDRAMATIC SINGERS.\u2014\u201cWhy does this beggar sing?\u201d \u201cProbably he does not know\nhow to wail.\u201d \u201cThen he does right.\u201d But our dramatic singers, who wail\nbecause they do not know how to sing\u2014are they also in the right?\n\n\n\n\n163.\n\n\nDRAMATIC MUSIC.\u2014For him who does not see what is happening on the stage,\ndramatic music is a monstrosity, just as the running commentary to a lost\ntext is a monstrosity. Such music requires us to have ears where our eyes\nare. This, however, is doing violence to Euterpe, who, poor Muse, wants to\nhave her eyes and ears where the other Muses have theirs.\n\n\n\n\n164.\n\n\nVICTORY AND REASONABLENESS.\u2014Unfortunately in the \u00e6sthetic wars, which\nartists provoke by their works and apologias for their works, just as is\nthe case in real war, it is might and not reason that decides. All the\nworld now assumes as a historical fact that, in his dispute with Piccini,\nGluck was in the right. At any rate, he was victorious, and had might on\nhis side.\n\n\n\n\n165.\n\n\nOF THE PRINCIPLE OF MUSICAL EXECUTION.\u2014Do the modern musical performers\nreally believe that the supreme law of their art is to give every piece as\nmuch high-relief as is possible, and to make it speak at all costs a\ndramatic language? Is not this principle, when applied for example to\nMozart, a veritable sin against the spirit\u2014the gay, sunny, airy, delicate\nspirit\u2014of Mozart, whose seriousness was of a kindly and not awe-inspiring\norder, whose pictures do not try to leap from the wall and drive away the\nbeholder in panic? Or do you think that all Mozart\u2019s music is identical\nwith the statue-music in _Don Juan_? And not only Mozart\u2019s, but all\nmusic?\u2014You reply that the advantage of your principle lies in its greater\n_effect_. You would be right if there did not remain the counter-question,\n\u201c_On whom_ has the effect operated, and _on whom_ should an artist of the\nfirst rank desire to produce his effect?\u201d Never on the populace! Never on\nthe immature! Never on the morbidly sensitive! Never on the diseased! And\nabove all\u2014never on the _blas\u00e9_!\n\n\n\n\n166.\n\n\nTHE MUSIC OF TO-DAY.\u2014This ultra-modern music, with its strong lungs and\nweak nerves, is frightened above all things of itself.\n\n\n\n\n167.\n\n\nWHERE MUSIC IS AT HOME.\u2014Music reaches its high-water mark only among men\nwho have not the ability or the right to argue. Accordingly, its chief\npromoters are princes, whose aim is that there should be not much\ncriticism nor even much thought in their neighbourhood. Next come\nsocieties which, under some pressure or other (political or religious),\nare forced to become habituated to silence, and so feel all the greater\nneed of spells to charm away emotional ennui\u2014these spells being generally\neternal love-making and eternal music. Thirdly, we must reckon whole\nnations in which there is no \u201csociety,\u201d but all the greater number of\nindividuals with a bent towards solitude, mystical thinking, and a\nreverence for all that is inexpressible; these are the genuine \u201cmusical\nsouls.\u201d The Greeks, as a nation delighting in talking and argument,\naccordingly put up with music only as an _hors d\u2019\u0153uvre_ to those arts\nwhich really admit of discussion and dispute. About music one can hardly\neven _think_ clearly. The Pythagoreans, who in so many respects were\nexceptional Greeks, are said to have been great musicians. This was the\nschool that invented a five-years\u2019 silence,(23) but did not invent a\ndialectic.\n\n\n\n\n168.\n\n\nSENTIMENTALITY IN MUSIC.\u2014We may be ever so much in sympathy with serious\nand profound music, yet nevertheless, or perhaps all the more for that\nreason, we shall at occasional moments be overpowered, entranced, and\nalmost melted away by its opposite\u2014I mean, by those simple Italian\noperatic airs which, in spite of all their monotony of rhythm and\nchildishness of harmony, seem at times to sing to us like the very soul of\nmusic. Admit this or not as you please, you Pharisees of good taste, it is\nso, and it is my present task to propound the riddle that it is so, and to\nnibble a little myself at the solution.\u2014In childhood\u2019s days we tasted the\nhoney of many things for the first time. Never was honey so good as then;\nit seduced us to life, into abundant life, in the guise of the first\nspring, the first flower, the first butterfly, the first friendship.\nThen\u2014perhaps in our ninth year or so\u2014we heard our first music, and this\nwas the first that we understood; thus the simplest and most childish\ntunes, that were not much more than a sequel to the nurse\u2019s lullaby and\nthe strolling fiddler\u2019s tune, were our first experience. (For even the\nmost trifling \u201crevelations\u201d of art need preparation and study; there is no\n\u201cimmediate\u201d effect of art, whatever charming fables the philosophers may\ntell.) Our sensation on hearing these Italian airs is associated with\nthose first musical raptures, the strongest of our lives. The bliss of\nchildhood and its flight, the feeling that our most precious possession\ncan never be brought back, all this moves the chords of the soul more\nstrongly than the most serious and profound music can move them.\u2014This\nmingling of \u00e6sthetic pleasure with moral pain, which nowadays it is\ncustomary to call (rather too haughtily, I think) \u201csentimentality\u201d\u2014it is\nthe mood of Faust at the end of the first scene\u2014this \u201csentimentality\u201d of\nthe listener is all to the advantage of Italian music. It is a feeling\nwhich the experienced connoisseurs in art, the pure \u201c\u00e6sthetes,\u201d like to\nignore.\u2014Moreover, almost all music has a magical effect only when we hear\nit speak the language of our own _past_. Accordingly, it seems to the\nlayman that all the old music is continually growing better, and that all\nthe latest is of little value. For the latter arouses no \u201csentimentality,\u201d\nthat most essential element of happiness, as aforesaid, for every man who\ncannot approach this art with pure \u00e6sthetic enjoyment.\n\n\n\n\n169.\n\n\nAS FRIENDS OF MUSIC.\u2014Ultimately we are and remain good friends with music,\nas we are with the light of the moon. Neither, after all, tries to\nsupplant the sun: they only want to illumine our nights to the best of\ntheir powers. Yet we may jest and laugh at them, may we not? Just a\nlittle, at least, and from time to time? At the man in the moon, at the\nwoman in the music?\n\n\n\n\n170.\n\n\nART IN AN AGE OF WORK.\u2014We have the conscience of an industrious epoch.\nThis debars us from devoting our best hours and the best part of our days\nto art, even though that art be the greatest and worthiest. Art is for us\na matter of leisure, of recreation, and we consecrate to it the _residue_\nof our time and strength. This is the cardinal fact that has altered the\nrelation of art to life. When art makes its great demands of time and\nstrength upon its recipients, it has to battle against the conscience of\nthe industrious and efficient, it is relegated to the idle and\nconscienceless, who, by their very nature, are not exactly suited to great\nart, and consider its claims arrogant. It might, therefore, be all over\nwith art, since it lacks air and the power to breathe. But perhaps the\ngreat art attempts, by a sort of coarsening and disguising, to make itself\nat home in that other atmosphere, or at least to put up with it\u2014an\natmosphere which is really a natural element only for petty art, the art\nof recreation, of pleasant distraction. This happens nowadays almost\neverywhere. Even the exponents of great art promise recreation and\ndistraction; even they address themselves to the exhausted; even they\ndemand from him the evening hours of his working-day\u2014just like the artists\nof the entertaining school, who are content to smooth the furrowed brow\nand brighten the lack-lustre eye. What, then, are the devices of their\nmightier brethren? These have in their medicine-chests the most powerful\nexcitants, which might give a shock even to a man half-dead: they can\ndeafen you, intoxicate you, make you shudder, or bring tears to your eyes.\nBy this means they overpower the exhausted man and stimulate him for one\nnight to an over-lively condition, to an ecstasy of terror and delight.\nThis great art, as it now lives in opera, tragedy, and music\u2014have we a\nright to be angry with it, because of its perilous fascination, as we\nshould be angry with a cunning courtesan? Certainly not. It would far\nrather live in the pure element of morning calm, and would far rather make\nits appeal to the fresh, expectant, vigorous morning-soul of the beholder\nor listener. Let us be thankful that it prefers living thus to vanishing\naltogether. But let us also confess that an era that once more introduces\nfree and complete high-days and holidays into life will have no use for\n_our_ great art.\n\n\n\n\n171.\n\n\nTHE EMPLOYEES OF SCIENCE AND THE OTHERS.\u2014Really efficient and successful\nmen of science might be collectively called \u201cThe Employees.\u201d If in youth\ntheir acumen is sufficiently practised, their memory is full, and hand and\neye have acquired sureness, they are appointed by an older\nfellow-craftsman to a scientific position where their qualities may prove\nuseful. Later on, when they have themselves gained an eye for the gaps and\ndefects in their science, they place themselves in whatever position they\nare needed. These persons all exist for the sake of science. But there are\nrarer spirits, spirits that seldom succeed or fully mature\u2014\u201cfor whose sake\nscience exists\u201d\u2014at least, in their view. They are often unpleasant,\nconceited, or cross-grained men, but almost always prodigies to a certain\nextent. They are neither employees nor employers; they make use of what\nthose others have worked out and established, with a certain princely\ncarelessness and with little and rare praise\u2014just as if the others\nbelonged to a lower order of beings. Yet they possess the same qualities\nas their fellow-workers, and that sometimes in a less developed form.\nMoreover, they have a peculiar limitation, from which the others are free;\nthis makes it impossible to put them into a place and to see in them\nuseful tools. They can only live in their own air and on their own soil.\nThis limitation suggests to them what elements of a science \u201care\ntheirs\u201d\u2014in other words, what they can carry home into their house and\natmosphere: they think that they are always collecting their scattered\n\u201cproperty.\u201d If they are prevented from building at their own nest, they\nperish like shelterless birds. The loss of freedom causes them to wilt\naway. If they show, like their colleagues, a fondness for certain regions\nof science, it is always only regions where the fruits and seeds necessary\nto them can thrive. What do they care whether science, taken as a whole,\nhas untilled or badly tilled regions? They lack all impersonal interest in\na scientific problem. As they are themselves personal through and through,\nall their knowledge and ideas are remoulded into a person, into a living\ncomplexity, with its parts interdependent, overlapping, jointly nurtured,\nand with a peculiar atmosphere and scent as a whole.\u2014Such natures, with\ntheir system of personal knowledge, produce the illusion that a science\n(or even the whole of philosophy) is finished and has reached its goal.\nThe life in their system works this magic, which at times has been fatal\nto science and deceptive to the really efficient workers above described,\nand at other times, when drought and exhaustion prevailed, has acted as a\nkind of restorative, as if it were the air of a cool, refreshing\nresting-place.\u2014These men are usually called _philosophers_.\n\n\n\n\n172.\n\n\nRECOGNITION OF TALENT.\u2014As I went through the village of S., a boy began to\ncrack his whip with all his might\u2014he had made great progress in this art,\nand he knew it. I threw him a look of recognition\u2014in reality it hurt me\ncruelly. We do the same in our recognition of many of the talents. We do\ngood to them when they hurt us.\n\n\n\n\n173.\n\n\nLAUGHING AND SMILING.\u2014The more joyful and assured the mind becomes, the\nmore man loses the habit of loud laughter. In compensation, there is an\nintellectual smile continually bubbling up in him, a sign of his\nastonishment at the innumerable concealed delights of a good existence.\n\n\n\n\n174.\n\n\nTHE TALK OF INVALIDS.\u2014Just as in spiritual grief we tear our hair, strike\nour foreheads, lacerate our cheeks or even (like \u0152dipus) gouge our eyes\nout, so against violent physical pain we call to our aid a bitter, violent\nemotion, through the recollection of slanderous and malignant people,\nthrough the denigration of our future, through the sword-pricks and acts\nof malice which we mentally direct against the absent. And at times it is\ntrue that one devil drives out another\u2014but then we have the other.\u2014Hence a\ndifferent sort of talk, tending to alleviate pain, should be recommended\ninvalids: reflections upon the kindnesses and courtesies that can be\nperformed towards friend and foe.\n\n\n\n\n175.\n\n\nMEDIOCRITY AS A MASK.\u2014Mediocrity is the happiest mask which the superior\nmind can wear, because it does not lead the great majority\u2014that is, the\nmediocre\u2014to think that there is any disguise. Yet the superior mind\nassumes the mask just for their sake\u2014so as not to irritate them, nay,\noften from a feeling of pity and kindness.\n\n\n\n\n176.\n\n\nTHE PATIENT.\u2014The pine tree seems to listen, the fir tree to wait, and both\nwithout impatience. They do not give a thought to the petty human being\nbelow who is consumed by his impatience and his curiosity.\n\n\n\n\n177.\n\n\nTHE BEST JOKER.\u2014My favourite joke is the one that takes the place of a\nheavy and rather hesitating idea, and that at once beckons with its finger\nand winks its eye.\n\n\n\n\n178.\n\n\nTHE ACCESSARIES OF ALL REVERENCE.\u2014Wherever the past is revered, the\nover-cleanly and over-tidy people should not be admitted. Piety does not\nfeel content without a little dust, dirt, and dross.\n\n\n\n\n179.\n\n\nTHE GREAT DANGER OF SAVANTS.\u2014It is just the most thorough and profound\nsavants who are in peril of seeing their life\u2019s goal set ever lower and\nlower, and, with a feeling of this in their minds, to become ever more\ndiscouraged and more unendurable in the latter half of their lives. At\nfirst they plunge into their science with spacious hopes and set\nthemselves daring tasks, the ends of which are already anticipated by\ntheir imaginations. Then there are moments as in the lives of the great\nmaritime discoverers\u2014knowledge, presentiment, and power raise each other\nhigher and higher, until a new shore first dawns upon the eye in the far\ndistance. But now the stern man recognises more and more how important it\nis that the individual task of the inquirer should be limited as far as\npossible, so that it may be entirely accomplished and the intolerable\nwaste of force from which earlier periods of science suffered may be\navoided. In those days everything was done ten times over, and then the\neleventh always had the last and best word. Yet the more the savant learns\nand practises this art of solving riddles in their entirety, the more\npleasure he finds in so doing. But at the same time his demands upon what\nis here called \u201centirety\u201d grow more exacting. He sets aside everything\nthat must remain in this sense incomplete, he acquires a disgust and an\nacute scent for the half-soluble\u2014for all that can only give a kind of\ncertainty in a general and indefinite form. His youthful plans crumble\naway before his eyes. There remains scarcely anything but a few little\nknots, in untying which the master now takes his pleasure and shows his\nstrength. Then, in the midst of all this useful, restless activity, he,\nnow grown old, is suddenly then often overcome by a deep misgiving, a sort\nof torment of conscience. He looks upon himself as one changed, as if he\nwere diminished, humbled, transformed into a dexterous _dwarf_; he grows\nanxious as to whether mastery in small matters be not a convenience, an\nescape from the summons to greatness in life and form. But he cannot pass\n_beyond_ any longer\u2014the time for that has gone by.\n\n\n\n\n180.\n\n\nTEACHERS IN THE AGE OF BOOKS.\u2014Now that self-education and mutual education\nare becoming more widespread, the teacher in his usual form must become\nalmost unnecessary. Friends eager to learn, who wish to master some branch\nof knowledge together, find in our age of books a shorter and more natural\nway than \u201cschool\u201d and \u201cteachers.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n181.\n\n\nVANITY AS THE GREATEST UTILITY.\u2014Originally the strong individual uses not\nonly Nature but even societies and weaker individuals as objects of\nrapine. He exploits them, so far as he can, and then passes on. As he\nlives from hand to mouth, alternating between hunger and superfluity, he\nkills more animals than he can eat, and robs and maltreats men more than\nis necessary. His manifestation of power is at the same time one of\nrevenge against his cramped and worried existence. Furthermore, he wishes\nto be held more powerful than he is, and thus misuses opportunities; the\naccretion of fear that he begets being an accretion of power. He soon\nobserves that he stands or falls not by what he _is_ but by what he is\n_thought_ to be. Herein lies the origin of vanity. The man of power seeks\nby every means to increase others\u2019 faith in his power.\u2014The thralls who\ntremble before him and serve him know, for their part, that they are worth\njust so much as they appear to him to be worth, and so they work with an\neye to this valuation rather than to their own self-satisfaction. We know\nvanity only in its most weakened forms, in its idealisations and its small\ndoses, because we live in a late and very emasculated state of society.\nOriginally vanity is the great utility, the strongest means of\npreservation. And indeed vanity will be greater, the cleverer the\nindividual, because an increase in the belief in power is easier than an\nincrease in the power itself, but only for him who has intellect or (as\nmust be the case under primitive conditions) who is cunning and crafty.\n\n\n\n\n182.\n\n\nWEATHER-SIGNS OF CULTURE.\u2014There are so few decisive weather-signs of\nculture that we must be glad to have at least one unfailing sign at hand\nfor use in house and garden. To test whether a man belongs to us (I mean\nto the free spirits) or not, we must test his sentiments regarding\nChristianity. If he looks upon Christianity with other than a critical\neye, we turn our backs to him, for he brings us impure air and bad\nweather.\u2014It is no longer our task to teach such men what a sirocco wind\nis. They have Moses and the prophets of weather and of enlightenment.(24)\nIf they will not listen to these, then\u2014\u2014\n\n\n\n\n183.\n\n\nTHERE IS A PROPER TIME FOR WRATH AND PUNISHMENT.\u2014Wrath and punishment are\nour inheritance from the animals. Man does not become of age until he has\nrestored to the animals this gift of the cradle.\u2014Herein lies buried one of\nthe mightiest ideas that men can have, the idea of a progress of all\nprogresses.\u2014Let us go forward together a few millenniums, my friends!\nThere is still reserved for mankind a great deal of joy, the very scent of\nwhich has not yet been wafted to the men of our day! Indeed, we may\npromise ourselves this joy, nay summon and conjure it up as a necessary\nthing, so long as the development of human reason does not stand still.\nSome day we shall no longer be reconciled to the logical sin that lurks in\nall wrath and punishment, whether exercised by the individual or by\nsociety\u2014some day, when head and heart have learnt to live as near together\nas they now are far apart. That they no longer stand so far apart as they\ndid originally is fairly palpable from a glance at the whole course of\nhumanity. The individual who can review a life of introspective work will\nbecome conscious of the _rapprochement_ arrived at, with a proud delight\nat the distance he has bridged, in order that he may thereupon venture\nupon more ample hopes.\n\n\n\n\n184.\n\n\nORIGIN OF PESSIMISTS.\u2014A snack of good food often decides whether we are to\nlook to the future with hollow eye or in hopeful mood. The same influence\nextends to the very highest and most intellectual states. Discontent and\nreviling of the world are for the present generation an inheritance from\nstarveling ancestors. Even in our artists and poets we often notice that,\nhowever exuberant their life, they are not of good birth, and have often,\nfrom oppressed and ill-nourished ancestors, inherited in their blood and\nbrain much that comes out as the subject and even the conscious colouring\nof their work. The culture of the Greeks is a culture of men of wealth, in\nfact, inherited wealth. For a few centuries they lived better than we do\n(better in every sense, in particular far more simply in food and drink).\nThen the brain finally became so well-stored and subtle, and the blood\nflowed so quickly, like a joyous, clear wine, that the best in them came\nto light no longer as gloomy, distorted, and violent, but full of beauty\nand sunshine.\n\n\n\n\n185.\n\n\nOF REASONABLE DEATH.\u2014Which is more reasonable, to stop the machine when\nthe works have done the task demanded of them, or to let it run on until\nit stands still of its own accord\u2014in other words, is destroyed? Is not the\nlatter a waste of the cost of upkeep, a misuse of the strength and care of\nthose who serve? Are men not here throwing away that which would be sorely\nneeded elsewhere? Is not a kind of contempt of the machines propagated, in\nthat many of them are so uselessly tended and kept up?\u2014I am speaking of\ninvoluntary (natural) and voluntary (reasonable) death. Natural death is\nindependent of all reason and is really an irrational death, in which the\npitiable substance of the shell determines how long the kernel is to exist\nor not; in which, accordingly, the stunted, diseased and dull-witted\njailer is lord, and indicates the moment at which his distinguished\nprisoner shall die. Natural death is the suicide of nature\u2014in other words,\nthe annihilation of the most rational being through the most irrational\nelement that is attached thereto. Only through religious illumination can\nthe reverse appear; for then, as is equitable, the higher reason (God)\nissues its orders, which the lower reason has to obey. Outside religious\nthought natural death is not worth glorifying. The wise dispensation and\ndisposal of death belongs to that now quite incomprehensible and\nimmoral-sounding morality of the future, the dawn of which it will be an\nineffable delight to behold.\n\n\n\n\n186.\n\n\nRETROGRADE INFLUENCES.\u2014All criminals force society back to earlier stages\nof culture than that in which they are placed for the time being. Their\ninfluence is retrograde. Let us consider the tools that society must forge\nand maintain for its defence: the cunning detectives, the jailers, the\nhangmen. Nor should we forget the public counsel for prosecution and\ndefence. Finally we may ask ourselves whether the judge himself and\npunishment and the whole legal procedure are not oppressive rather than\nelevating in their reaction upon all who are not law-breakers. For we\nshall never succeed in arraying self-defence and revenge in the garb of\ninnocence, and so long as men are used and sacrificed as a means to the\nend of society, all loftier humanity will deplore this necessity.\n\n\n\n\n187.\n\n\nWAR AS A REMEDY.\u2014For nations that are growing weak and contemptible war\nmay be prescribed as a remedy, if indeed they really want to go on living.\nNational consumption as well as individual admits of a brutal cure. The\neternal will to live and inability to die is, however, in itself already a\nsign of senility of emotion. The more fully and thoroughly we live, the\nmore ready we are to sacrifice life for a single pleasurable emotion. A\npeople that lives and feels in this wise has no need of war.\n\n\n\n\n188.\n\n\nINTELLECTUAL AND PHYSICAL TRANSPLANTATION AS REMEDIES.\u2014The different\ncultures are so many intellectual climates, every one of which is\npeculiarly harmful or beneficial to this or that organism. History as a\nwhole, as the knowledge of different cultures, is the science of remedies,\nbut not the science of the healing art itself. We still need a physician\nwho can make use of these remedies, in order to send every one\u2014temporarily\nor permanently\u2014to the climate that just suits him. To live in the present,\nwithin the limits of a single culture, is insufficient as a universal\nremedy: too many highly useful kinds of men, who cannot breathe freely in\nthis atmosphere, would perish. With the aid of history we must give them\nair and try to preserve them: even men of lower cultures have their\nvalue.\u2014Add to this cure of intellects that humanity, on considerations of\nbodily health, must strive to discover by means of a medical geography\nwhat kinds of degeneration and disease are caused by each region of the\nearth, and conversely, what ingredients of health the earth affords: and\nthen, gradually, nations, families, and individuals must be transplanted\nlong and permanently enough for them to become masters of their inherited\nphysical infirmities. The whole world will finally be a series of\nsanatoria.\n\n\n\n\n189.\n\n\nREASON AND THE TREE OF MANKIND.\u2014What you all fear in your senile\nshort-sightedness, regarding the over-population of the world, gives the\nmore hopeful a mighty task. Man is some day to become a tree overshadowing\nthe whole earth, with millions upon millions of buds that shall all grow\nto fruits side by side, and the earth itself shall be prepared for the\nnourishment of this tree. That the shoot, tiny as yet, may increase in sap\nand strength; that the sap may flow in countless channels for the\nnutrition of the whole and the parts\u2014from these and similar tasks we must\nderive our standard for measuring whether a man of to-day is useful or\nworthless. The task is unspeakably great and adventurous: let us all\ncontribute our share to prevent the tree from rotting before its time! The\nhistorically trained mind will no doubt succeed in calling up the human\nactivities of all the ages before its eyes, as the community of ants with\nits cunningly wrought mounds stands before our eyes. Superficially judged,\nmankind as a whole, like ant-kind, might admit of our speaking of\n\u201cinstinct.\u201d On a closer examination we observe how whole nations, nay\nwhole centuries, take pains to discover and test new means of benefiting\nthe great mass of humanity, and thus finally the great common fruit-tree\nof the world. Whatever injury the individual nations or periods may suffer\nin this testing process, they have each become wise through this injury,\nand from them the tide of wisdom slowly pours over the principles of whole\nraces and whole epochs. Ants too go astray and make blunders. Through the\nfolly of its remedies, mankind may well go to rack and ruin before the\nproper time. There is no sure guiding instinct for the former or the\nlatter. Rather must we boldly face the great task of preparing the earth\nfor a plant of the most ample and joyous fruitfulness\u2014a task set by reason\nto reason!\n\n\n\n\n190.\n\n\nTHE PRAISE OF DISINTERESTEDNESS AND ITS ORIGIN.\u2014Between two neighbouring\nchieftains there was a long-standing quarrel: they laid waste each other\u2019s\nterritories, stole cattle, and burnt down houses, with an indecisive\nresult on the whole, because their power was fairly equal. A third, who\nfrom the distant situation of his property was able to keep aloof from\nthese feuds, yet had reason to dread the day when one of the two\nneighbours should gain a decisive preponderance, at last intervened\nbetween the combatants with ceremonial goodwill. Secretly he lent a heavy\nweight to his peace proposal by giving either to understand that he would\nhenceforth join forces with the other against the one who strove to break\nthe peace. They met in his presence, they hesitatingly placed into his\nhand the hands that had hitherto been the tools and only too often the\ncauses of hatred\u2014and then they really and seriously tried to keep the\npeace. Either saw with astonishment how suddenly his prosperity and his\ncomfort increased; how he now had as neighbour a dealer ready to buy and\nsell instead of a treacherous or openly scornful evil-doer; how even, in\nunforeseen troubles, they could reciprocally save each other from\ndistress, instead of, as before, making capital out of this distress of\nhis neighbour and enhancing it to the highest degree. It even seemed as if\nthe human type had improved in both countries, for the eyes had become\nbrighter, the forehead had lost its wrinkles; all now felt confidence in\nthe future\u2014and nothing is more advantageous for the souls and bodies of\nmen than this confidence. They saw each other every year on the\nanniversary of the alliance, the chieftains as well as their retinue, and\nindeed before the eyes of the mediator, whose mode of action they admired\nand revered more and more, the greater the profit that they owed to him\nbecame. Then his mode of action was called _disinterested_. They had\nlooked far too fixedly at the profit they had reaped themselves hitherto\nto see anything more of their neighbour\u2019s method of dealing than that his\ncondition in consequence of this had not altered so much as their own; he\nhad rather remained the same: and thus it appeared that the former had not\nhad his profit in view. For the first time people said to themselves that\ndisinterestedness was a virtue. It is true that in minor private matters\nsimilar circumstances had arisen, but men only had eyes for this virtue\nwhen it was depicted on the walls in a large script that was legible to\nthe whole community. Moral qualities are not recognised as virtues,\nendowed with names, held in esteem, and recommended as worthy of\nacquisition until the moment when they have _visibly_ decided the\nhappiness and destiny of whole societies. For then the loftiness of\nsentiment and the excitation of the inner creative forces is in many so\ngreat, that offerings are brought to this quality, offerings from the best\nof what each possesses. At its feet the serious man lays his seriousness,\nthe dignified man his dignity, women their gentleness, the young all the\nwealth of hope and futurity that in them lies; the poet lends it words and\nnames, sets it marching in the procession of similar beings, gives it a\npedigree, and finally, as is the way of artists, adores the picture of his\nfancy as a new godhead\u2014he even teaches others to adore. Thus in the end,\nwith the co-operation of universal love and gratitude, a virtue becomes,\nlike a statue, a repository of all that is good and honourable, a sort of\ntemple and divine personage combined. It appears thenceforward as an\nindividual virtue, as an absolute entity, which it was not before, and\nexercises the power and privileges of a sanctified super-humanity.\u2014In the\nlater days of Greece the cities were full of such deified human\nabstractions (if one may so call them). The nation, in its own fashion,\nhad set up a Platonic \u201cHeaven of Ideas\u201d on earth, and I do not think that\nits inhabitants were felt to be less alive than any of the old Homeric\ndivinities.\n\n\n\n\n191.\n\n\nDAYS OF DARKNESS.\u2014\u201cDays of Darkness\u201d is the name given in Norway to the\nperiod when the sun remains below the horizon the whole day long. The\ntemperature then falls slowly but continually.\u2014A fine simile for all\nthinkers for whom the sun of the human future is temporarily eclipsed.\n\n\n\n\n192.\n\n\nTHE PHILOSOPHY OF LUXURY.\u2014A garden, figs, a little cheese, and three or\nfour good friends\u2014that was the luxury of Epicurus.\n\n\n\n\n193.\n\n\nTHE EPOCHS OF LIFE.\u2014The real epochs of life are those brief periods of\ncessation midway between the rise and decline of a dominating idea or\nemotion. Here once again there is satisfaction: all the rest is hunger and\nthirst\u2014or satiety.\n\n\n\n\n194.\n\n\nDREAMS.\u2014Our dreams, if for once in a way they succeed and are\ncomplete\u2014generally a dream is a bungled piece of work\u2014are symbolic\nconcatenations of scenes and images in place of a narrative poetical\nlanguage. They paraphrase our experiences or expectations or relations\nwith poetic boldness and definiteness, so that in the morning we are\nalways astonished at ourselves when we remember the nature of our dream.\nIn dreams we use up too much artistry\u2014and hence are often too poor in\nartistry in the daytime.\n\n\n\n\n195.\n\n\nNATURE AND SCIENCE.\u2014As in nature, so in science the worse and less fertile\nsoils are first cultivated\u2014because the means that science in its early\nstages has at command are fairly sufficient for this purpose. The working\nof the most fertile soils requires an enormous, carefully developed,\npersevering method, tangible individual results, and an organised body of\nwell-trained workers. All these are found together only at a late\nstage.\u2014Impatience and ambition often grasp too early at these most fertile\nsoils, but the results are then from the first null and void. In nature\nsuch losses would usually be avenged by the starvation of the settlers.\n\n\n\n\n196.\n\n\nTHE SIMPLE LIFE.\u2014A simple mode of life is nowadays difficult, requiring as\nit does far more reflection and gift for invention than even very clever\npeople possess. The most honourable will perhaps still say, \u201cI have not\nthe time for such lengthy reflection. The simple life is for me too lofty\na goal: I will wait till those wiser than I have discovered it.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n197.\n\n\nPEAKS AND NEEDLE-POINTS.\u2014The poor fertility, the frequent celibacy, and in\ngeneral the sexual coldness of the highest and most cultivated spirits, as\nthat of the classes to which they belong, is essential in human economy.\nIntelligence recognises and makes use of the fact that at an acme of\nintellectual development the danger of a neurotic offspring is very great.\nSuch men are the peaks of mankind\u2014they ought no longer to run out into\nneedle-points.\n\n\n\n\n198.\n\n\n_NATURA NON FACIT SALTUM._\u2014However strongly man may develop upwards and\nseem to leap from one contradiction to another, a close observation will\nreveal the dovetails where the new building grows out of the old. This is\nthe biographer\u2019s task: he must reflect upon his subject on the principle\nthat nature takes no jumps.\n\n\n\n\n199.\n\n\nCLEAN, BUT\u2014He who clothes himself with rags washed clean dresses cleanly,\nto be sure, but is still ragged.\n\n\n\n\n200.\n\n\nTHE SOLITARY SPEAKS.\u2014In compensation for much disgust, disheartenment,\nboredom\u2014such as a lonely life without friends, books, duties, and passions\nmust involve\u2014we enjoy those short spans of deep communion with ourselves\nand with Nature. He who fortifies himself completely against boredom\nfortifies himself against himself too. He will never drink the most\npowerful elixir from his own innermost spring.\n\n\n\n\n201.\n\n\nFALSE RENOWN.\u2014I hate those so-called natural beauties which really have\nsignificance only through science, especially geographical science, but\nare insignificant in an \u00e6sthetic sense: for example, the view of Mont\nBlanc from Geneva. This is an insignificant thing without the auxiliary\nmental joy of science: the nearer mountains are all more beautiful and\nfuller of expression, but \u201cnot nearly so high,\u201d adds that absurd\ndepreciatory science. The eye here contradicts science: how can it truly\nrejoice in the contradiction?\n\n\n\n\n202.\n\n\nTHOSE THAT TRAVEL FOR PLEASURE.\u2014Like animals, stupid and perspiring, they\nclimb mountains: people forgot to tell them that there were fine views on\nthe way.\n\n\n\n\n203.\n\n\nTOO MUCH AND TOO LITTLE.\u2014Men nowadays live too much and think too little.\nThey have hunger and dyspepsia together, and become thinner and thinner,\nhowever much they eat. He who now says \u201cNothing has happened to me\u201d is a\nblockhead.\n\n\n\n\n204.\n\n\nEND AND GOAL.\u2014Not every end is the goal. The end of a melody is not its\ngoal, and yet if a melody has not reached its end, it has also not reached\nits goal. A parable.\n\n\n\n\n205.\n\n\nNEUTRALITY OF NATURE ON A GRAND SCALE.\u2014The neutrality of Nature on a grand\nscale (in mountain, sea, forest, and desert) is pleasing, but only for a\nbrief space. Afterwards we become impatient. \u201cHave they all nothing to say\nto _us_? Do _we_ not exist so far as they are concerned?\u201d There arises a\nfeeling that a _l\u00e8se-majest\u00e9_ is committed against humanity.\n\n\n\n\n206.\n\n\nFORGETTING OUR PURPOSE.\u2014In a journey we commonly forget its goal. Almost\nevery vocation is chosen and entered upon as means to an end, but is\ncontinued as the ultimate end. Forgetting our purpose is the most frequent\nform of folly.\n\n\n\n\n207.\n\n\nSOLAR ORBIT OF AN IDEA.\u2014When an idea is just rising on the horizon, the\nsoul\u2019s temperature is usually very low. Gradually the idea develops in\nwarmth, and is hottest (that is to say, exerts its greatest influence)\nwhen belief in the idea is already on the wane.\n\n\n\n\n208.\n\n\nHOW TO HAVE EVERY MAN AGAINST YOU.\u2014If some one now dared to say, \u201cHe that\nis not for me is against me,\u201d he would at once have all against him.\u2014This\nsentiment does credit to our era.\n\n\n\n\n209.\n\n\nBEING ASHAMED OF WEALTH.\u2014Our age endures only a single species of rich\nmen\u2014those who are ashamed of their wealth. If we hear it said of any one\nthat he is very rich, we at once feel a similar sentiment to that\nexperienced at the sight of a repulsively swollen invalid, one suffering\nfrom diabetes or dropsy. We must with an effort remember our humanity, in\norder to go about with this rich man in such a way that he does not notice\nour feeling of disgust. But as soon as he prides himself at all on his\nwealth, our feelings are mingled with an almost compassionate surprise at\nsuch a high degree of human unreason. We would fain raise our hands to\nheaven and cry, \u201cPoor deformed and overburdened creature, fettered a\nhundredfold, to whom every hour brings or may bring something unpleasant,\nin whose frame twitches every event that occurs in scores of countries,\nhow can you make us believe that you feel at ease in your position? If you\nappear anywhere in public, we know that it is a sort of running the\ngauntlet amid countless glances that have for you only cold hate or\nimportunity or silent scorn. You may earn more easily than others, but it\nis only a superfluous earning, which brings little joy, and the guarding\nof what you have earned is now, at any rate, a more troublesome business\nthan any toilsome process of earning. You are continually suffering,\nbecause you are continually losing. What avails it you that they are\nalways injecting you with fresh artificial blood? That does not relieve\nthe pain of those cupping-glasses that are fixed, for ever fixed, on your\nneck!\u2014But, to be quite fair to you, it is difficult or perhaps impossible\nfor you _not_ to be rich. You _must_ guard, you _must_ earn more; the\ninherited bent of your character is the yoke fastened upon you. But do not\non that account deceive us\u2014be honestly and visibly ashamed of the yoke you\nwear, as in your soul you are weary and unwilling to wear it. This shame\nis no disgrace.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n210.\n\n\nEXTRAVAGANT PRESUMPTIONS.\u2014There are men so presumptuous that they can only\npraise a greatness which they publicly admire by representing it as steps\nand bridges that lead to themselves.\n\n\n\n\n211.\n\n\nON THE SOIL OF INSULT.\u2014He who wishes to deprive men of a conception is\ngenerally not satisfied with refuting it and drawing out of it the\nillogical worm that resides within. Rather, when the worm has been killed,\ndoes he throw the whole fruit as well into the mire, in order to make it\nignoble in men\u2019s sight and to inspire disgust. Thus he thinks that he has\nfound a means of making the usual \u201cthird-day resurrection\u201d of conceptions\nan impossibility.\u2014He is wrong, for on the very soil of insult, in the\nmidst of the filth, the kernel of the conception soon produces new\nseeds.\u2014The right thing then, is not to scorn and bespatter what one wishes\nfinally to remove, but to lay it tenderly on ice again and again, having\nregard to the fact that conceptions are very tenacious of life. Here we\nmust act according to the maxim: \u201cOne refutation is no refutation.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n212.\n\n\nTHE LOT OF MORALITY.\u2014Since spiritual bondage is being relaxed, morality\n(the inherited, traditional, instinctive mode of action in accordance with\nmoral sentiments) is surely also on the decline. This, however, is not the\ncase with the individual virtues, moderation, justice, repose; for the\ngreatest freedom of the conscious intellect leads at some time, even\nunconsciously, back to these virtues, and then enjoins their practice as\nexpedient.\n\n\n\n\n213.\n\n\nTHE FANATIC OF DISTRUST AND HIS SURETY.\u2014_The Elder_: You wish to make the\ntremendous venture and instruct mankind in the great things? What is your\nsurety?\n\n_Pyrrho_: It is this: I intend to warn men against myself; I intend to\nconfess all the defects of my character quite openly, and reveal to the\nworld my hasty conclusions, my contradictions, and my foolish blunders.\n\u201cDo not listen to me,\u201d I will say to them, \u201cuntil I have become equal to\nthe meanest among you, nay am even less than he. Struggle against truth as\nlong as you can, from your disgust with her advocate. I shall be your\nseducer and betrayer if you find in me the slightest glimmering of\nrespectability and dignity.\u201d\n\n_The Elder_: You promise too much; you cannot bear this burden.\n\n_Pyrrho_: Then I will tell men even that, and say that I am too weak, and\ncannot keep my promise. The greater my unworthiness, the more will they\nmistrust the truth, when it passes through my lips.\n\n_The Elder_: You propose to teach distrust of truth?\n\n_Pyrrho_: Yes; distrust as it never was yet on earth, distrust of anything\nand everything. This is the only road to truth. The right eye must not\ntrust the left eye, and for some time light must be called darkness: this\nis the path that you must tread. Do not imagine that it will lead you to\nfruit trees and fair pastures. You will find on this road little hard\ngrains\u2014these are truths. For years and years you will have to swallow\nhandfuls of lies, so as not to die of hunger, although you know that they\nare lies. But those grains will be sown and planted, and perhaps, perhaps\nsome day will come the harvest. No one may _promise_ that day, unless he\nbe a fanatic.\n\n_The Elder_: Friend, friend! Your words too are those of a fanatic!\n\n_Pyrrho_: You are right! I will be distrustful of all words.\n\n_The Elder_: Then you will have to be silent.\n\n_Pyrrho_: I shall tell men that I have to be silent, and that they are to\nmistrust my silence.\n\n_The Elder_: So you draw back from your undertaking?\n\n_Pyrrho_: On the contrary\u2014you have shown me the door through which I must\npass.\n\n_The Elder_: I don\u2019t know whether we yet completely understand each other?\n\n_Pyrrho_: Probably not.\n\n_The Elder_: If only you understand yourself!\n\n(Pyrrho turns round and laughs.)\n\n_The Elder_: Ah, friend! Silence and laughter\u2014is that now your whole\nphilosophy?\n\n_Pyrrho_: There might be a worse.\n\n\n\n\n214.\n\n\nEUROPEAN BOOKS.\u2014In reading Montaigne, La Rochefoucauld, La Bruy\u00e8re,\nFontenelle (especially the _Dialogues des Morts_), Vauvenargues, and\nChamfort we are nearer to antiquity than in any group of six authors of\nother nations. Through these six the spirit of the last centuries before\nChrist has once more come into being, and they collectively form an\nimportant link in the great and still continuous chain of the Renaissance.\nTheir books are raised above all changes of national taste and\nphilosophical nuances from which as a rule every book takes and must take\nits hue in order to become famous. They contain more real ideas than all\nthe books of German philosophers put together: ideas of the sort that\nbreed ideas\u2014\u2014I am at a loss how to define to the end: enough to say that\nthey appear to me writers who wrote neither for children nor for\nvisionaries, neither for virgins nor for Christians, neither for Germans\nnor for\u2014I am again at a loss how to finish my list. To praise them in\nplain terms, I may say that had they been written in Greek, they would\nhave been understood by Greeks. How much, on the other hand, would even a\nPlato have understood of the writings of our best German thinkers\u2014Goethe\nand Schopenhauer, for instance\u2014to say nothing of the repugnance that he\nwould have felt to their style, particularly to its obscure, exaggerated,\nand occasionally dry-as-dust elements? And these are defects from which\nthese two among German thinkers suffer least and yet far too much (Goethe\nas thinker was fonder than he should have been of embracing the cloud, and\nSchopenhauer almost constantly wanders, not with impunity, among symbols\nof objects rather than among the objects themselves).\u2014On the other hand,\nwhat clearness and graceful precision there is in these Frenchmen! The\nGreeks, whose ears were most refined, could not but have approved of this\nart, and one quality they would even have admired and reverenced\u2014the\nFrench verbal wit: they were extremely fond of this quality, without being\nparticularly strong in it themselves.\n\n\n\n\n215.\n\n\nFASHION AND MODERNITY.\u2014Wherever ignorance, uncleanness, and superstition\nare still rife, where communication is backward, agriculture poor, and the\npriesthood powerful, national costumes are still worn. Fashion, on the\nother hand, rules where the opposite conditions prevail. Fashion is\naccordingly to be found next to the virtues in modern Europe. Are we to\ncall it their seamy side?\u2014Masculine dress that is fashionable and no\nlonger national proclaims of its wearer: firstly, that he does not wish to\nappear as an individual or as member of a class or race; that he has made\nan intentional suppression of these kinds of vanity a law unto himself:\nsecondly, that he is a worker, and has little time for dressing and\nself-adornment, and moreover regards anything expensive or luxurious in\nmaterial and cut as out of harmony with his work: lastly, that by his\nclothes he indicates the more learned and intellectual callings as those\nto which he stands or would like to stand nearest as a European\u2014whereas\nsuch national costumes as still exist would exhibit the occupations of\nbrigand, shepherd, and soldier as the most desirable and distinguished.\nWithin this general character of masculine fashion exist the slight\nfluctuations demanded by the vanity of young men, the dandies and dawdlers\nof our great cities\u2014in other words, Europeans who have not yet reached\nmaturity.\u2014European women are as yet far less mature, and for this reason\nthe fluctuations with them are much greater. They also will not have the\nnational costume, and hate to be recognised by their dress as German,\nFrench, or Russian. They are, however, very desirous of creating an\nimpression as individuals. Then, too, their dress must leave no one in\ndoubt that they belong to one of the more reputable classes of society (to\n\u201cgood\u201d or \u201chigh\u201d or \u201cgreat\u201d society), and on this score their pretensions\nare all the greater if they belong scarcely or not at all to that class.\nAbove all, the young woman does not want to wear what an older woman\nwears, because she thinks she loses her market value if she is suspected\nof being somewhat advanced in years. The older woman, on the other hand,\nwould like to deceive the world as long as possible by a youthful garb.\nFrom this competition must continually arise temporary fashions, in which\nthe youthful element is unmistakably and inimitably apparent. But after\nthe inventive genius of the young female artists has run riot for some\ntime in such indiscreet revelations of youth (or rather, after the\ninventive genius of older, courtly civilisations and of still existing\npeoples\u2014in fact, of the whole world of dress\u2014has been pressed into the\nservice, and, say, the Spaniards, Turks, and ancient Greeks have been\nyoked together for the glorification of fair flesh), then they at last\ndiscover, time and again, that they have not been good judges of their own\ninterest; that if they wish to have power over men, the game of\nhide-and-seek with the beautiful body is more likely to win than naked or\nhalf-naked honesty. And then the wheel of taste and vanity turns once more\nin an opposite direction. The rather older young women find that their\nkingdom has come, and the competition of the dear, absurd creatures rages\nagain from the beginning.\u2014But the more women advance mentally, and no\nlonger among themselves concede the pre-eminence to an unripe age, the\nsmaller their fluctuations of costume grow and the less elaborate their\nadornment. A just verdict in this respect must not be based on ancient\nmodels\u2014in other words, not on the standard of the dress of women who dwell\non the shores of the Mediterranean\u2014but must have an eye to the climatic\nconditions of the central and northern regions, where the intellectual and\ncreative spirit of Europe now finds its most natural home.\u2014Generally\nspeaking, therefore, it is not change that will be the characteristic mark\nof fashion and modernity, for change is retrograde, and betokens the still\nunripened men and women of Europe; but rather the repudiation of national,\nsocial, and individual vanity. Accordingly, it is commendable, because\ninvolving a saving of time and strength, if certain cities and districts\nof Europe think and invent for all the rest in the matter of dress, in\nview of the fact that a sense of form does not seem to have been bestowed\nupon all. Nor is it really an excessive ambition, so long as these\nfluctuations still exist, for Paris, for example, to claim to be the sole\ninventor and innovator in this sphere. If a German, from hatred of these\nclaims on the part of a French city, wishes to dress differently,\u2014as, for\nexample, in the D\u00fcrer style,\u2014let him reflect that he then has a costume\nwhich the Germans of olden times wore, but which the Germans have not in\nthe slightest degree invented. For there has never been a style of dress\nthat characterised the German as a German. Moreover, let him observe how\nhe looks in his costume, and whether his altogether modern face, with all\nits hues and wrinkles, does not raise a protest against a D\u00fcrer fashion of\ndress.\u2014Here, where the concepts \u201cmodern\u201d and \u201cEuropean\u201d are almost\nidentical, we understand by \u201cEurope\u201d a far wider region than is embraced\nby the Europe of geography, the little peninsula of Asia. In particular,\nwe must include America, in so far as America is the daughter of our\ncivilisation. On the other hand, not all Europe falls under the heading of\ncultured \u201cEurope,\u201d but only those nations and divisions of nations which\nhave their common past in Greece, Rome, Judaism, and Christianity.\n\n\n\n\n216.\n\n\n\u201cGERMAN VIRTUE.\u201d\u2014There is no denying that from the end of the eighteenth\ncentury a current of moral awakening flowed through Europe. Then only\nVirtue found again the power of speech. She learnt to discover the\nunrestrained gestures of exaltation and emotion, she was no longer ashamed\nof herself, and she created philosophies and poems for her own\nglorification. If we look for the sources of this current, we come upon\nRousseau, but the mythical Rousseau, the phantom formed from the\nimpression left by his writings (one might almost say again, his\nmythically interpreted writings) and by the indications that he provided\nhimself. He and his public constantly worked at the fashioning of this\nideal figure. The other origin lies in the resurrection of the Stoical\nside of Rome\u2019s greatness, whereby the French so nobly carried on the task\nof the Renaissance. With striking success they proceeded from the\nreproduction of antique forms to the reproduction of antique characters.\nThus they may always claim a title to the highest honours, as the nation\nwhich has hitherto given the modern world its best books and its best men.\nHow this twofold archetype, the mythical Rousseau and the resurrected\nspirit of Rome, affected France\u2019s weaker neighbours, is particularly\nnoticeable in Germany, which, in consequence of her novel and quite\nunwonted impulse to seriousness and loftiness in will and self-control,\nfinally came to feel astonishment at her own newfound virtue, and launched\ninto the world the concept \u201cGerman virtue,\u201d as if this were the most\noriginal and hereditary of her possessions. The first great men who\ntransfused into their own blood that French impulse towards greatness and\nconsciousness of the moral will were more honest, and more grateful.\nWhence comes the moralism of Kant? He is continually reminding us: from\nRousseau and the revival of Stoic Rome. The moralism of Schiller has the\nsame source and the same glorification of the source. The moralism of\nBeethoven in notes is a continual song in praise of Rousseau, the antique\nFrench, and Schiller. \u201cYoung Germany\u201d was the first to forget its\ngratitude, because in the meantime people had listened to the preachers of\nhatred of the French. The \u201cyoung German\u201d came to the fore with more\nconsciousness than is generally allowed to youths. When he investigated\nhis paternity, he might well think of the proximity of Schiller,\nSchleiermacher, and Fichte. But he should have looked for his grandfathers\nin Paris and Geneva, and it was very short-sighted of him to believe what\nhe believed: that virtue was not more than thirty years old. People became\nused to demanding that the word \u201cGerman\u201d should connote \u201cvirtue,\u201d and this\nprocess has not been wholly forgotten to this day.\u2014Be it observed further\nthat this moral awakening, as may almost be guessed, has resulted only in\ndrawbacks and obstacles to the _recognition_ of moral phenomena. What is\nthe entire German philosophy, starting from Kant, with all its French,\nEnglish, and Italian offshoots and by-products? A semi-theological attack\nupon Helvetius, a rejection of the slowly and laboriously acquired views\nand signposts of the right road, which in the end he collected and\nexpressed so well. To this day Helvetius is the best-abused of all good\nmoralists and good men in Germany.\n\n\n\n\n217.\n\n\nCLASSIC AND ROMANTIC.\u2014Both classically and romantically minded spirits\u2014two\nspecies that always exist\u2014cherish a vision of the future; but the former\nderive their vision from the strength of their time, the latter from its\nweakness.\n\n\n\n\n218.\n\n\nTHE MACHINE AS TEACHER.\u2014Machinery teaches in itself the dovetailed working\nof masses of men, in activities where each has but one thing to do. It is\nthe model of party organisations and of warfare. On the other hand, it\ndoes not teach individual self-glorification, for it makes of the many a\nmachine, and of each individual a tool for one purpose. Its most general\neffect is to teach the advantage of centralisation.\n\n\n\n\n219.\n\n\nUNABLE TO SETTLE.\u2014One likes to live in a small town. But from time to time\njust this small town drives us out into bare and lonely Nature, especially\nwhen we think we know it too well. Finally, in order to refresh ourselves\nfrom Nature, we go to the big town. A few draughts from this cup and we\nsee its dregs, and the circle begins afresh, with the small town as\nstarting-point.\u2014So the moderns live; they are in all things rather too\nthorough to be able to settle like the men of other days.\n\n\n\n\n220.\n\n\nREACTION AGAINST THE CIVILISATION OF MACHINERY.\u2014The machine, itself a\nproduct of the highest mental powers, sets in motion hardly any but the\nlower, unthinking forces of the men who serve it. True, it unfetters a\nvast quantity of force which would otherwise lie dormant. But it does not\ncommunicate the impulse to climb higher, to improve, to become artistic.\nIt creates activity and monotony, but this in the long-run produces a\ncounter-effect, a despairing ennui of the soul, which through machinery\nhas learnt to hanker after the variety of leisure.\n\n\n\n\n221.\n\n\nTHE DANGER OF ENLIGHTENMENT.\u2014All the half-insane, theatrical, bestially\ncruel, licentious, and especially sentimental and self-intoxicating\nelements which go to form the true revolutionary substance, and became\nflesh and spirit, before the revolution, in Rousseau\u2014all this composite\nbeing, with factitious enthusiasm, finally set even \u201cenlightenment\u201d upon\nits fanatical head, which thereby began itself to shine as in an\nilluminating halo. Yet, enlightenment is essentially foreign to that\nphenomenon, and, if left to itself, would have pierced silently through\nthe clouds like a shaft of light, long content to transfigure individuals\nalone, and thus only slowly transfiguring national customs and\ninstitutions as well. But now, bound hand and foot to a violent and abrupt\nmonster, enlightenment itself became violent and abrupt. Its danger has\ntherefore become almost greater than its useful quality of liberation and\nillumination, which it introduced into the great revolutionary movement.\nWhoever grasps this will also know from what confusion it has to be\nextricated, from what impurities to be cleansed, in order that it may then\nby itself continue the work of enlightenment and also nip the revolution\nin the bud and nullify its effects.\n\n\n\n\n222.\n\n\nPASSION IN THE MIDDLE AGES.\u2014The Middle Ages are the period of great\npassions. Neither antiquity nor our period possesses this widening of the\nsoul. Never was the capacity of the soul greater or measured by larger\nstandards. The physical, primeval sensuality of the barbarian races and\nthe over-soulful, over-vigilant, over-brilliant eyes of Christian mystics,\nthe most childish and youthful and the most over-ripe and world-weary, the\nsavageness of the beast of prey and the effeminacy and excessive\nrefinement of the late antique spirit\u2014all these elements were then not\nseldom united in one and the same person. Thus, if a man was seized by a\npassion, the rapidity of the torrent must have been greater, the whirl\nmore confused, the fall deeper than ever before.\u2014We modern men may be\ncontent to feel that we have suffered a loss here.\n\n\n\n\n223.\n\n\nROBBING AND SAVING.\u2014All intellectual movements whereby the great may hope\nto rob and the small to save are sure to prosper. That is why, for\ninstance, the German Reformation made progress.\n\n\n\n\n224.\n\n\nGLADSOME SOULS.\u2014When even a remote hint of drink, drunkenness, and an\nevil-smelling kind of jocularity was given, the souls of the old Germans\nwaxed gladsome. Otherwise they were depressed, but here they found\nsomething they really understood.\n\n\n\n\n225.\n\n\nDEBAUCHERY AT ATHENS.\u2014Even when the fish-market of Athens acquired its\nthinkers and poets, Greek debauchery had a more idyllic and refined\nappearance than Roman or German debauchery ever had. The voice of Juvenal\nwould have sounded there like a hollow trumpet, and would have been\nanswered by a good-natured and almost childish outburst of laughter.\n\n\n\n\n226.\n\n\nCLEVERNESS OF THE GREEK.\u2014As the desire for victory and pre-eminence is an\nineradicable trait of human nature, older and more primitive than any\nrespect of or joy in equality, the Greek State sanctioned gymnastic and\nartistic competitions among equals. In other words, it marked out an arena\nwhere this impulse to conquer would find a vent without jeopardising the\npolitical order. With the final decline of gymnastic and artistic contests\nthe Greek State fell into a condition of profound unrest and dissolution.\n\n\n\n\n227.\n\n\nTHE \u201cETERNAL EPICURUS.\u201d\u2014Epicurus has lived in all periods, and lives yet,\nunbeknown to those who called and still call themselves Epicureans, and\nwithout repute among philosophers. He has himself even forgotten his own\nname\u2014that was the heaviest luggage that he ever cast off.\n\n\n\n\n228.\n\n\nTHE STYLE OF SUPERIORITY.\u2014\u201cUniversity slang,\u201d the speech of the German\nstudents, has its origin among the students who do not study. The latter\nknow how to acquire a preponderance over their more serious fellows by\nexposing all the farcical elements of culture, respectability, erudition,\norder, and moderation, and by having words taken from these realms always\non their lips, like the better and more learned students, but with malice\nin their glance and an accompanying grimace. This language of\nsuperiority\u2014the only one that is original in Germany\u2014is nowadays\nunconsciously used by statesmen and newspaper critics as well. It is a\ncontinual process of ironical quotation, a restless, cantankerous\nsquinting of the eye right and left, a language of inverted commas and\ngrimaces.\n\n\n\n\n229.\n\n\nTHE RECLUSE.\u2014We retire into seclusion, but not from personal misgivings,\nas if the political and social conditions of the day did not satisfy us;\nrather because by our retirement we try to save and collect forces which\nwill some day be urgently needed by culture, the more this present is\n_this present_, and, as such, fulfils its task. We form a capital and try\nto make it secure, but, as in times of real danger, our method is to bury\nour hoard.\n\n\n\n\n230.\n\n\nTYRANTS OF THE INTELLECT.\u2014In our times, any one who expressed a single\nmoral trait so thoroughly as the characters of Theophrastus and Moli\u00e8re\ndo, would be considered ill, and be spoken of as possessing \u201ca fixed\nidea.\u201d The Athens of the third century, if we could visit it, would appear\nto us populated by fools. Nowadays the democracy of ideas rules in every\nbrain\u2014there the multitude collectively is lord. A single idea that tried\nto be lord is now called, as above stated, \u201ca fixed idea.\u201d This is our\nmethod of murdering tyrants\u2014we hint at the madhouse.\n\n\n\n\n231.\n\n\nA MOST DANGEROUS EMIGRATION.\u2014In Russia there is an emigration of the\nintelligence. People cross the frontier in order to read and write good\nbooks. Thus, however, they are working towards turning their country,\nabandoned by the intellect, into a gaping Asiatic maw, which would fain\nswallow our little Europe.\n\n\n\n\n232.\n\n\nPOLITICAL FOOLS.\u2014The almost religious love of the king was transferred by\nthe Greeks, when the monarchy was abolished, to the _polis_. An idea can\nbe loved more than a person, and does not thwart the lover so often as a\nbeloved human being (for the more men know themselves to be loved, the\nless considerate they usually become, until they are no longer worthy of\nlove, and a rift really arises). Hence the reverence for State and _polis_\nwas greater than the reverence for princes had ever been. The Greeks are\nthe political fools of ancient history\u2014today other nations boast that\ndistinction.\n\n\n\n\n233.\n\n\nAGAINST NEGLECT OF THE EYES.\u2014Might one not find among the cultured classes\nof England, who read the _Times_, a decline in their powers of sight every\nten years?\n\n\n\n\n234.\n\n\nGREAT WORKS AND GREAT FAITH.\u2014One man had great works, but his comrade had\ngreat faith in these works. They were inseparable, but obviously the\nformer was entirely dependent upon the latter.\n\n\n\n\n235.\n\n\nTHE SOCIABLE MAN.\u2014\u201cI don\u2019t get on well with myself,\u201d said some one in\nexplanation of his fondness for society. \u201cSociety has a stronger digestion\nthan I have, and can put up with me.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n236.\n\n\nSHUTTING THE MIND\u2019S EYES.\u2014If we are practised and accustomed to reflect\nupon our actions, we must nevertheless close the inner eye while\nperforming an action (be this even only writing letters or eating or\ndrinking). Even in conversation with average people we must know how to\nobscure our own mental vision in order to attain and grasp average\nthinking. This shutting of the eyes is a conscious act and can be achieved\nby the will.\n\n\n\n\n237.\n\n\nTHE MOST TERRIBLE REVENGE.\u2014If we wish to take a thorough revenge upon an\nopponent, we must wait until we have our hand quite full of truths and\nequities, and can calmly use the whole lot against him. Hence the exercise\nof revenge may be identified with the exercise of equity. It is the most\nterrible kind of revenge, for there is no higher court to which an appeal\ncan be made. Thus did Voltaire revenge himself on Piron, with five lines\nthat sum up Piron\u2019s whole life, work, and character: every word is a\ntruth. So too he revenged himself upon Frederick the Great in a letter to\nhim from Ferney.\n\n\n\n\n238.\n\n\nTAXES OF LUXURY.\u2014In shops we buy the most necessary and urgent things, and\nhave to pay very dear, because we pay as well for what is also to be had\nthere cheap, but seldom finds a customer\u2014articles of luxury that minister\nto pleasure. Thus luxury lays a constant tax upon the man of simple life\nwho does without luxuries.\n\n\n\n\n239.\n\n\nWHY BEGGARS STILL LIVE.\u2014If all alms were given only out of compassion, the\nwhole tribe of beggars would long since have died of starvation.\n\n\n\n\n240.\n\n\nWHY BEGGARS STILL LIVE.\u2014The greatest of almsgivers is cowardice.\n\n\n\n\n241.\n\n\nHOW THE THINKER MAKES USE OF A CONVERSATION.\u2014Without being eavesdroppers,\nwe can hear a good deal if we are able to see well, and at the same time\nto let ourselves occasionally get out of our own sight. But people do not\nknow how to make use of a conversation. They pay far too much attention to\nwhat _they_ want to say and reply, whereas the true listener is often\ncontented to make a provisional answer and to say something merely as a\npayment on account of politeness, but on the other hand, with his memory\nlurking in ambush, carries away with him all that the other said, together\nwith his tones and gestures in speaking.\u2014In ordinary conversation every\none thinks _he_ is the leader, just as if two ships, sailing side by side\nand giving each other a slight push here and there, were each firmly\nconvinced that the other ship was following or even being towed.\n\n\n\n\n242.\n\n\nTHE ART OF EXCUSING ONESELF.\u2014If some one excuses himself to us, he has to\nmake out a very good case, otherwise we readily come to feel ourselves the\nculprits, and experience an unpleasant emotion.\n\n\n\n\n243.\n\n\nIMPOSSIBLE INTERCOURSE.\u2014The ship of your thoughts goes too deep for you to\nbe able to travel with it in the waters of these friendly, decorous,\nobliging people. There are too many shallows and sandbanks: you would have\nto tack and turn, and would find yourself continually at your wits\u2019 end,\nand they would soon also be in perplexity as to _your_ perplexity, the\nreason for which they cannot divine.\n\n\n\n\n244.\n\n\nTHE FOX OF FOXES.\u2014A true fox not only calls sour the grapes he cannot\nreach, but also those he has reached and snatched from the grasp of\nothers.\n\n\n\n\n245.\n\n\nIN INTIMATE INTERCOURSE.\u2014However closely men are connected, there are\nstill all the four quarters of the heavens in their common horizon, and at\ntimes they become aware of this fact.\n\n\n\n\n246.\n\n\nTHE SILENCE OF DISGUST.\u2014Behold! some one undergoes a thorough and painful\ntransformation as thinker and human being, and makes a public avowal of\nthe change. And those who hear him see nothing, and still believe he is\nthe same as before! This common experience has already disgusted many\nwriters. They had rated the intellectuality of mankind too highly, and\nmade a vow to be silent as soon as they became aware of their mistake.\n\n\n\n\n247.\n\n\nBUSINESS SERIOUSNESS.\u2014The business of many rich and eminent men is their\nform of recreation from too long periods of habitual leisure. They then\nbecome as serious and impassioned as other people do in their rare moments\nof leisure and amusement.\n\n\n\n\n248.\n\n\nTHE EYE\u2019S DOUBLE SENSE.\u2014Just as a sudden scaly ripple runs over the waters\nat your feet, so there are similar sudden uncertainties and ambiguities in\nthe human eye. They lead to the question: is it a shudder, or a smile, or\nboth?\n\n\n\n\n249.\n\n\nPOSITIVE AND NEGATIVE.\u2014This thinker needs no one to refute him\u2014he is quite\ncapable of doing that himself.\n\n\n\n\n250.\n\n\nTHE REVENGE OF THE EMPTY NETS.\u2014Above all we should beware of those who\nhave the bitter feeling of the fisherman who after a hard day\u2019s work comes\nhome in the evening with nets empty.\n\n\n\n\n251.\n\n\nNON-ASSERTION OF OUR RIGHTS.\u2014The exertion of power is laborious and\ndemands courage. That is why so many do not assert their most valid\nrights, because their rights are a kind of power, and they are too lazy or\ntoo cowardly to exercise them. _Indulgence_ and _patience_ are the names\ngiven to the virtues that cloak these faults.\n\n\n\n\n252.\n\n\nBEARERS OF LIGHT.\u2014In Society there would be no sunshine if the born\nflatterers (I mean the so-called amiable people) did not bring some in\nwith them.\n\n\n\n\n253.\n\n\nWHEN MOST BENEVOLENT.\u2014When a man has been highly honoured and has eaten a\nlittle, he is most benevolent.\n\n\n\n\n254.\n\n\nTO THE LIGHT.\u2014Men press forward to the light not in order to see better\nbut to shine better.\u2014The person before whom we shine we gladly allow to be\ncalled a light.\n\n\n\n\n255.\n\n\nTHE HYPOCHONDRIAC.\u2014The hypochondriac is a man who has just enough\nintellect and pleasure in the intellect to take his sorrows, his losses,\nand his mistakes seriously. But the field on which he grazes is too small:\nhe crops it so close that in the end he has to look for single stalks.\nThus he finally becomes envious and avaricious\u2014and only then is he\nunbearable.\n\n\n\n\n256.\n\n\nGIVING IN RETURN.\u2014Hesiod advises us to give the neighbour who has helped\nus good measure and, if possible, fuller measure in return, as soon as we\nhave the power. For this is where the neighbour\u2019s pleasure comes in, since\nhis former benevolence brings him interest. Moreover, he who gives in\nreturn also has his pleasure, inasmuch as, by giving a little more than he\ngot, he redeems the slight humiliation of being compelled to seek aid.\n\n\n\n\n257.\n\n\nMORE SUBTLE THAN IS NECESSARY.\u2014Our sense of observation for how far others\nperceive our weaknesses is far more subtle than our sense of observation\nfor the weaknesses of others. It follows that the first-named sense is\nmore subtle than is necessary.\n\n\n\n\n258.\n\n\nA KIND OF BRIGHT SHADOWS.\u2014Close to the nocturnal type of man we almost\nregularly find, as if bound up with him, a bright soul. This is, as it\nwere, the negative shadow cast by the former.\n\n\n\n\n259.\n\n\nNOT TO TAKE REVENGE.\u2014There are so many subtle sorts of revenge that one\nwho has occasion to take revenge can really do or omit to do what he\nlikes. In any case, the whole world will agree, after a time, that he\n_has_ avenged himself. Hence the avoidance of revenge is hardly within\nman\u2019s power. He must not even so much as say that he does not _want_ to do\nso, since the contempt for revenge is interpreted and felt as a sublime\nand exquisite form of revenge.\u2014It follows that we must do nothing\nsuperfluous.\n\n\n\n\n260.\n\n\nTHE MISTAKE OF THOSE WHO PAY HOMAGE.\u2014Every one thinks he is paying a most\nagreeable compliment to a thinker when he says that he himself hit upon\nexactly the same idea and even upon the same expression. The thinker,\nhowever, is seldom delighted at hearing such news, nay, rather, he often\nbecomes distrustful of his own thoughts and expressions. He silently\nresolves to revise both some day. If we wish to pay homage to any one, we\nmust beware of expressing our agreement, for this puts us on the same\nlevel.\u2014Often it is a matter of social tact to listen to an opinion as if\nit were not ours or even travelled beyond the limits of our own\nhorizon\u2014as, for example, when an old man once in a while opens the\nstorehouse of his acquired knowledge.\n\n\n\n\n261.\n\n\nLETTERS.\u2014A letter is an unannounced visit, and the postman is the\nintermediary of impolite surprises. Every week we ought to have one hour\nfor receiving letters, and then go and take a bath.\n\n\n\n\n262.\n\n\nPREJUDICED.\u2014Some one said: I have been prejudiced against myself from\nchildhood upwards, and hence I find some truth in every censure and some\nabsurdity in every eulogy. Praise I generally value too low and blame too\nhigh.\n\n\n\n\n263.\n\n\nTHE PATH TO EQUALITY.\u2014A few hours of mountain-climbing make a blackguard\nand a saint two rather similar creatures. Weariness is the shortest path\nto equality and fraternity\u2014and finally liberty is bestowed by sleep.\n\n\n\n\n264.\n\n\nCALUMNY.\u2014If we begin to trace to its source a real scandalous\nmisrepresentation, we shall rarely look for its origin in our honourable\nand straightforward enemies; for if they invented anything of the sort\nabout us, they, as being our enemies, would gain no credence. Those,\nhowever, to whom for a time we have been most useful, but who, from some\nreason or other, may be secretly sure that they will obtain no more from\nus\u2014such persons are in a position to start the ball of slander rolling.\nThey gain credence, firstly, because it is assumed that they would invent\nnothing likely to do them damage; secondly, because they have learnt to\nknow us intimately.\u2014As a consolation, the much-slandered man may say to\nhimself: Calumnies are diseases of others that break out in your body.\nThey prove that Society is a (moral) organism, so that you can prescribe\nto _yourself_ the cure that will in the end be useful to others.\n\n\n\n\n265.\n\n\nTHE CHILD\u2019S KINGDOM OF HEAVEN.\u2014The happiness of a child is as much of a\nmyth as the happiness of the Hyperboreans of whom the Greeks fabled. The\nGreeks supposed that, if indeed happiness dwells anywhere on our earth, it\nmust certainly dwell as far as possible from us, perhaps over yonder at\nthe edge of the world. Old people have the same thought\u2014if man is at all\ncapable of being happy, he must be happy as far as possible from our age,\nat the frontiers and beginnings of life. For many a man the sight of\nchildren, through the veil of this myth, is the greatest happiness that he\ncan feel. He enters himself into the forecourt of heaven when he says,\n\u201cSuffer the little children to come unto me, for of them is the kingdom of\nheaven.\u201d The myth of the child\u2019s kingdom of heaven holds good, in some way\nor other, wherever in the modern world some sentimentality exists.\n\n\n\n\n266.\n\n\nTHE IMPATIENT.\u2014It is just the growing man who does not want things in the\ngrowing stage. He is too impatient for that. The youth will not wait\nuntil, after long study, suffering, and privation, his picture of men and\nthings is complete. Accordingly, he confidently accepts another picture\nthat lies ready to his hand and is recommended to him, and pins his faith\nto that, as if it must give him at once the lines and colours of his own\npainting. He presses a philosopher or a poet to his bosom, and must from\nthat time forth perform long stretches of forced labour and renounce his\nown self. He learns much in the process, but he often forgets what is most\nworth learning and knowing\u2014his self. He remains all his life a partisan.\nAh, a vast amount of tedious work has to be done before you find your own\ncolours, your own brush, your own canvas!\u2014Even then you are very far from\nbeing a master in the art of life, but at least you are the boss in your\nown workshop.\n\n\n\n\n267.\n\n\nTHERE ARE NO TEACHERS.\u2014As thinkers we ought only to speak of\nself-teaching. The instruction of the young by others is either an\nexperiment performed upon something as yet unknown and unknowable, or else\na thorough levelling process, in order to make the new member of society\nconform to the customs and manners that prevail for the time being. In\nboth cases the result is accordingly unworthy of a thinker\u2014the handiwork\nof parents and teachers, whom some valiantly honest person(25) has called\n\u201c_nos ennemis naturels_.\u201d One day, when, as the world thinks, we have long\nsince finished our education, we _discover ourselves_. Then begins the\ntask of the thinker, and then is the time to summon him to our aid\u2014not as\na teacher, but as a self-taught man who has experience.\n\n\n\n\n268.\n\n\nSYMPATHY WITH YOUTH.\u2014We are sorry when we hear that some one who is still\nyoung is losing his teeth or growing blind. If we knew all the irrevocable\nand hopeless feelings hidden in his whole being, how great our sorrow\nwould be! Why do we really suffer on this account? Because youth has to\ncontinue the work we have undertaken, and every flaw and failing in its\nstrength is likely to injure _our_ work, that will fall into its hands. It\nis the sorrow at the imperfect guarantee of our immortality: or, if we\nonly feel ourselves as executors of the human mission, it is the sorrow\nthat this mission must pass to weaker hands than ours.\n\n\n\n\n269.\n\n\nTHE AGES OF LIFE.\u2014The comparison of the four ages of life with the four\nseasons of the year is a venerable piece of folly. Neither the first\ntwenty nor the last twenty years of a life correspond to a season of the\nyear, assuming that we are not satisfied with drawing a parallel between\nwhite hair and snow and similar colour-analogies. The first twenty years\nare a preparation for life in general, for the whole year of life, a sort\nof long New Year\u2019s Day. The last twenty review, assimilate, bring into\nunion and harmony all that has been experienced till then: as, in a small\ndegree, we do on every New Year\u2019s Eve with the whole past year. But in\nbetween there really lies an interval which suggests a comparison with the\nseasons\u2014the time from the twentieth to the fiftieth year (to speak here of\ndecades in the lump, while it is an understood thing that every one must\nrefine for himself these rough outlines). Those three decades correspond\nto three seasons\u2014summer, spring, and autumn. Winter human life has none,\nunless we like to call the (unfortunately) often intervening hard, cold,\nlonely, hopeless, unfruitful periods of disease the winters of man. The\ntwenties, hot, oppressive, stormy, impetuous, exhausting years, when we\npraise the day in the evening, when it is over, as we wipe the sweat from\nour foreheads\u2014years in which work seems to us cruel but necessary\u2014these\ntwenties are the summer of life. The thirties, on the other hand, are its\nspring-time, with the air now too warm, now too cold, ever restless and\nstimulating, bubbling sap, bloom of leaves, fragrance of buds everywhere,\nmany delightful mornings and evenings, work to which the song of birds\nawakens us, a true work of the heart, a kind of joy in our own robustness,\nstrengthened by the savour of hopeful anticipation. Lastly the forties,\nmysterious like all that is stationary, like a high, broad plateau,\ntraversed by a fresh breeze, with a clear, cloudless sky above it, which\nalways has the same gentle look all day and half the night\u2014the time of\nharvest and cordial gaiety\u2014that is the autumn of life.\n\n\n\n\n270.\n\n\nWOMEN\u2019S INTELLECT IN MODERN SOCIETY.\u2014What women nowadays think of men\u2019s\nintellect may be divined from the fact that in their art of adornment they\nthink of anything but of emphasising the intellectual side of their faces\nor their single intellectual features. On the contrary, they conceal such\ntraits, and understand, for example by an arrangement of their hair over\ntheir forehead, how to give themselves an appearance of vivid, eager\nsensuality and materialism, just when they but slightly possess those\nqualities. Their conviction that intellect in women frightens men goes so\nfar that they even gladly deny the keenness of the most intellectual sense\nand purposely invite the reputation of short-sightedness. They think they\nwill thereby make men more confiding. It is as if a soft, attractive\ntwilight were spreading itself around them.\n\n\n\n\n271.\n\n\nGREAT AND TRANSITORY.\u2014What moves the observer to tears is the rapturous\nlook of happiness with which a fair young bride gazes upon her husband. We\nfeel all the melancholy of autumn in thinking of the greatness and of the\ntransitoriness of human happiness.\n\n\n\n\n272.\n\n\nSENSE AND SACRIFICE.\u2014Many a woman has the _intelletto del sacrifizio_,(26)\nand no longer enjoys life when her husband refuses to sacrifice her. With\nall her wit, she then no longer knows\u2014whither? and without perceiving it,\nis changed from sacrificial victim to sacrificial priest.\n\n\n\n\n273.\n\n\nTHE UNFEMININE.\u2014\u201cStupid as a man,\u201d say the women; \u201cCowardly as a woman,\u201d\nsay the men. Stupidity in a woman is unfeminine.\n\n\n\n\n274.\n\n\nMASCULINE AND FEMININE TEMPERAMENT AND MORTALITY.\u2014That the male sex has a\nworse temperament than the female follows from the fact that male children\nhave a greater mortality than female, clearly because they \u201cleap out of\ntheir skins\u201d more easily. Their wildness and unbearableness soon make all\nthe bad stuff in them deadly.\n\n\n\n\n275.\n\n\nTHE AGE OF CYCLOPEAN BUILDING.\u2014The democratisation of Europe is a\nresistless force. Even he who would stem the tide uses those very means\nthat democratic thought first put into men\u2019s hands, and he makes these\nmeans more handy and workable. The most inveterate enemies of democracy (I\nmean the spirits of upheaval) seem only to exist in order, by the fear\nthat they inspire, to drive forward the different parties faster and\nfaster on the democratic course. Now we may well feel sorry for those who\nare working consciously and honourably for this future. There is something\ndreary and monotonous in their faces, and the grey dust seems to have been\nwafted into their very brains. Nevertheless, posterity may possibly some\nday laugh at our anxiety, and see in the democratic work of several\ngenerations what we see in the building of stone dams and walls\u2014an\nactivity that necessarily covers clothes and face with a great deal of\ndust, and perhaps unavoidably makes the workmen, too, a little\ndull-witted; but who would on that account desire such work undone? It\nseems that the democratisation of Europe is a link in the chain of those\nmighty prophylactic principles which are the thought of the modern era,\nand whereby we rise up in revolt against the Middle Ages. Now, and now\nonly, is the age of Cyclopean building! A final security in the\nfoundations, that the future may build on them without danger! Henceforth,\nan impossibility of the orchards of culture being once more destroyed\novernight by wild, senseless mountain torrents! Dams and walls against\nbarbarians, against plagues, against physical and spiritual serfdom! And\nall this understood at first roughly and literally, but gradually in an\never higher and more spiritual sense, so that all the principles here\nindicated may appear as the intellectual preparation of the highest artist\nin horticulture, who can only apply himself to his own task when the other\nis fully accomplished!\u2014True, if we consider the long intervals of time\nthat here lie between means and end, the great, supreme labour, straining\nthe powers and brains of centuries, that is necessary in order to create\nor to provide each individual means, we must not bear too hardly upon the\nworkers of the present when they loudly proclaim that the wall and the\nfence are already the end and the final goal. After all, no one yet sees\nthe gardener and the fruit, for whose sake the fence exists.\n\n\n\n\n276.\n\n\nTHE RIGHT OF UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE.\u2014The people has not granted itself\nuniversal suffrage but, wherever this is now in force, it has received and\naccepted it as a temporary measure. But in any case the people has the\nright to restore the gift, if it does not satisfy its anticipations. This\ndissatisfaction seems universal nowadays, for when, at any occasion where\nthe vote is exercised, scarce two-thirds, nay perhaps not even the\nmajority of all voters, go to the polls, that very fact is a vote against\nthe whole suffrage system.\u2014On this point, in fact, we must pronounce a\nmuch sterner verdict. A law that enacts that the majority shall decide as\nto the welfare of all cannot be built up on the foundation that it alone\nhas provided, for it is bound to require a far broader foundation, namely\nthe unanimity of all. Universal suffrage must not only be the expression\nof the will of a majority, but of the whole country. Thus the dissent of a\nvery small minority is already enough to set aside the system as\nimpracticable; and the abstention from voting is in fact a dissent of this\nkind, which ruins the whole institution. The \u201cabsolute veto\u201d of the\nindividual, or\u2014not to be too minute\u2014the veto of a few thousands, hangs\nover the system as the consequence of justice. On every occasion when it\nis employed, the system must, according to the variety of the division,\nfirst prove that it has still a right to exist.\n\n\n\n\n277.\n\n\nFALSE CONCLUSIONS.\u2014What false conclusions are drawn in spheres where we\nare not at home, even by those of us who are accustomed as men of science\nto draw right conclusions! It is humiliating! Now it is clear that in the\ngreat turmoil of worldly doings, in political affairs, in all sudden and\nurgent matters such as almost every day brings up, these false conclusions\nmust decide. For no one feels at home with novelties that have sprung up\nin the night. All political work, even with great statesmen, is an\nimprovisation that trusts to luck.\n\n\n\n\n278.\n\n\nPREMISSES OF THE AGE OF MACHINERY.\u2014The press, the machine, the railway,\nthe telegraph are premisses of which no one has yet dared to draw the\nconclusions that will follow in a thousand years.\n\n\n\n\n279.\n\n\nA DRAG UPON CULTURE.\u2014When we are told that here men have no time for\nproductive occupations, because military man\u0153uvres and processions take up\ntheir days, and the rest of the population must feed and clothe them,\ntheir dress, however, being striking, often gay and full of absurdities;\nthat there only a few distinguished qualities are recognised, individuals\nresemble each other more than elsewhere, or at any rate are treated as\nequals, yet obedience is exacted and yielded without reasoning, for men\ncommand and make no attempt to convince; that here punishments are few,\nbut these few cruel and likely to become the final and most terrible; that\nthere treason ranks as the capital offence, and even the criticism of\nevils is only ventured on by the most audacious; that there, again, human\nlife is cheap, and ambition often takes the form of setting life in\ndanger\u2014when we hear all this, we at once say, \u201cThis is a picture of a\nbarbarous society that rests on a hazardous footing.\u201d One man perhaps will\nadd, \u201cIt is a portrait of Sparta.\u201d But another will become meditative and\ndeclare that this is a description of our modern military system, as it\nexists in the midst of our altogether different culture and society, a\nliving anachronism, the picture, as above said, of a community resting on\na hazardous footing; a posthumous work of the past, which can only act as\na drag upon the wheels of the present.\u2014Yet at times even a drag upon\nculture is vitally necessary\u2014that is to say, when culture is advancing too\nrapidly downhill or (as perhaps in this case) _uphill_.\n\n\n\n\n280.\n\n\nMORE REVERENCE FOR THEM THAT KNOW.\u2014In the competition of production and\nsale the public is made judge of the product. But the public has no\nspecial knowledge, and judges by the appearance of the wares. In\nconsequence, the art of appearance (and perhaps the taste for it) must\nincrease under the dominance of competition, while on the other hand the\nquality of every product must deteriorate. The result will be\u2014so far as\nreason does not fall in value\u2014that one day an end will be put to that\ncompetition, and a new principle will win the day. Only the master of the\ncraft should pronounce a verdict on the work, and the public should be\ndependent on the belief in the personality of the judge and his honesty.\nAccordingly, no anonymous work! At least an expert should be there as\nguarantor and pledge his name if the name of the creator is lacking or is\nunknown. The cheapness of an article is for the layman another kind of\nillusion and deceit, since only durability can decide that a thing is\ncheap and to what an extent. But it is difficult, and for a layman\nimpossible, to judge of its durability.\u2014Hence that which produces an\neffect on the eye and costs little at present gains the advantage\u2014this\nbeing naturally machine-made work. Again, machinery\u2014that is to say, the\ncause of the greatest rapidity and facility in production\u2014favours the most\nsaleable kind of article. Otherwise it involves no tangible profit; it\nwould be too little used and too often stand idle. But as to what is most\nsaleable, the public, as above said, decides: it must be the most\nexchangeable\u2014in other words, the thing that appears good and also appears\ncheap. Thus in the domain of labour our motto must also hold good: \u201cMore\nrespect for them that know!\u201d\n\n\n\n\n281.\n\n\nTHE DANGER OF KINGS.\u2014Democracy has it in its power, without any violent\nmeans, and only by a lawful pressure steadily exerted, to make kingship\nand emperorship hollow, until only a zero remains, perhaps with the\nsignificance of every zero in that, while nothing in itself, it multiplies\na number tenfold if placed on the right side. Kingship and emperorship\nwould remain a gorgeous ornament upon the simple and appropriate dress of\ndemocracy, a beautiful superfluity that democracy allows itself, a relic\nof all the historically venerable, primitive ornaments, nay the symbol of\nhistory itself, and in this unique position a highly effective thing if,\nas above said, it does not stand alone, but is put on the right side.\u2014In\norder to avoid the danger of this nullification, kings hold by their teeth\nto their dignity as war-lords. To this end they need wars, or in other\nwords exceptional circumstances, in which that slow, lawful pressure of\nthe democratic forces is relaxed.\n\n\n\n\n282.\n\n\nTHE TEACHER A NECESSARY EVIL.\u2014Let us have as few people as possible\nbetween the productive minds and the hungry and recipient minds! The\nmiddlemen almost unconsciously adulterate the food which they supply. For\ntheir work as middlemen they want too high a fee for themselves, and this\nis drawn from the original, productive spirits\u2014namely, interest,\nadmiration, leisure, money, and other advantages.\u2014Accordingly, we should\nalways look upon the teacher as a necessary evil, just like the merchant;\nas an evil that we should make as small as possible.\u2014Perhaps the\nprevailing distress in Germany has its main cause in the fact that too\nmany wish to live and live well by trade (in other words, desiring as far\nas possible to diminish prices for the producer and raise prices for the\nconsumer, and thus to profit by the greatest possible loss to both). In\nthe same way, we may certainly trace a main cause of the prevailing\nintellectual poverty in the superabundance of teachers. It is because of\nteachers that so little is learnt, and that so badly.\n\n\n\n\n283.\n\n\nTHE TAX OF HOMAGE.\u2014Him whom we know and honour,\u2014be he physician, artist,\nor artisan,\u2014who does and produces something for us, we gladly pay as\nhighly as we can, often a fee beyond our means. On the other hand, we pay\nthe unknown as low a price as possible; here is a contest in which every\none struggles and makes others struggle for a foot\u2019s breadth of land. In\nthe work of the known there is something that cannot be bought, the\nsentiment and ingenuity put into his work for our own sake. We think we\ncannot better express our sense of obligation than by a sort of sacrifice\non our part.\u2014The heaviest tax is the tax of homage. The more competition\nprevails, the more we buy for the unknown and work for the unknown, the\nlower does this tax become, whereas it is really the standard for the\nloftiness of man\u2019s spiritual intercourse.\n\n\n\n\n284.\n\n\nTHE MEANS TOWARDS GENUINE PEACE.\u2014No government will nowadays admit that it\nmaintains an army in order to satisfy occasionally its passion for\nconquest. The army is said to serve only defensive purposes. This\nmorality, which justifies self-defence, is called in as the government\u2019s\nadvocate. This means, however, reserving morality for ourselves and\nimmorality for our neighbour, because he must be thought eager for attack\nand conquest if our state is forced to consider means of self-defence.\u2014At\nthe same time, by our explanation of our need of an army (because he\ndenies the lust of attack just as our state does, and ostensibly also\nmaintains his army for defensive reasons), we proclaim him a hypocrite and\ncunning criminal, who would fain seize by surprise, without any fighting,\na harmless and unwary victim. In this attitude all states face each other\nto-day. They presuppose evil intentions on their neighbour\u2019s part and good\nintentions on their own. This hypothesis, however, is an _inhuman_ notion,\nas bad as and worse than war. Nay, at bottom it is a challenge and motive\nto war, foisting as it does upon the neighbouring state the charge of\nimmorality, and thus provoking hostile intentions and acts. The doctrine\nof the army as a means of self-defence must be abjured as completely as\nthe lust of conquest. Perhaps a memorable day will come when a nation\nrenowned in wars and victories, distinguished by the highest development\nof military order and intelligence, and accustomed to make the heaviest\nsacrifice to these objects, will voluntarily exclaim, \u201cWe will break our\nswords,\u201d and will destroy its whole military system, lock, stock, and\nbarrel. Making ourselves defenceless (after having been the most strongly\ndefended) from a loftiness of sentiment\u2014that is the means towards genuine\npeace, which must always rest upon a pacific disposition. The so-called\narmed peace that prevails at present in all countries is a sign of a\nbellicose disposition, of a disposition that trusts neither itself nor its\nneighbour, and, partly from hate, partly from fear, refuses to lay down\nits weapons. Better to perish than to hate and fear, and twice as far\nbetter to perish than to make oneself hated and feared\u2014this must some day\nbecome the supreme maxim of every political community!\u2014Our liberal\nrepresentatives of the people, as is well known, have not the time for\nreflection on the nature of humanity, or else they would know that they\nare working in vain when they work for \u201ca gradual diminution of the\nmilitary burdens.\u201d On the contrary, when the distress of these burdens is\ngreatest, the sort of God who alone can help here will be nearest. The\ntree of military glory can only be destroyed at one swoop, with one stroke\nof lightning. But, as you know, lightning comes from the cloud and from\nabove.\n\n\n\n\n285.\n\n\nWHETHER PROPERTY CAN BE SQUARED WITH JUSTICE.\u2014When the injustice of\nproperty is strongly felt (and the hand of the great clock is once more at\nthis place), we formulate two methods of relieving this injustice: either\nan equal distribution, or an abolition of private possession and a return\nto State ownership. The latter method is especially dear to the hearts of\nour Socialists, who are angry with that primitive Jew for saying, \u201cThou\nshalt not steal.\u201d In their view the eighth(27) commandment should rather\nrun, \u201cThou shalt not possess.\u201d\u2014The former method was frequently tried in\nantiquity, always indeed on a small scale, and yet with poor success. From\nthis failure we too may learn. \u201cEqual plots of land\u201d is easily enough\nsaid, but how much bitterness is aroused by the necessary division and\nseparation, by the loss of time-honoured possessions, how much piety is\nwounded and sacrificed! We uproot the foundation of morality when we\nuproot boundary-stones. Again, how much fresh bitterness among the new\nowners, how much envy and looking askance! For there have never been two\nreally equal plots of land, and if there were, man\u2019s envy of his neighbour\nwould prevent him from believing in their equality. And how long would\nthis equality, unhealthy and poisoned at the very roots, endure? In a few\ngenerations, by inheritance, here one plot would come to five owners,\nthere five plots to one. Even supposing that men acquiesced in such abuses\nthrough the enactment of stern laws of inheritance, the same equal plots\nwould indeed exist, but there would also be needy malcontents, owning\nnothing but dislike of their kinsmen and neighbours, and longing for a\ngeneral upheaval.\u2014If, however, by the second method we try to restore\nownership to the community and make the individual but a temporary tenant,\nwe interfere with agriculture. For man is opposed to all that is only a\ntransitory possession, unblessed with his own care and sacrifice. With\nsuch property he behaves in freebooter fashion, as robber or as worthless\nspendthrift. When Plato declares that self-seeking would be removed with\nthe abolition of property, we may answer him that, if self-seeking be\ntaken away, man will no longer possess the four cardinal virtues either;\nas we must say that the most deadly plague could not injure mankind so\nterribly as if vanity were one day to disappear. Without vanity and\nself-seeking what are human virtues? By this I am far from meaning that\nthese virtues are but varied names and masks for these two qualities.\nPlato\u2019s Utopian refrain, which is still sung by Socialists, rests upon a\ndeficient knowledge of men. He lacked the historical science of moral\nemotions, the insight into the origin of the good and useful\ncharacteristics of the human soul. He believed, like all antiquity, in\ngood and evil as in black and white\u2014that is to say, in a radical\ndifference between good and bad men and good and bad qualities.\u2014In order\nthat property may henceforth inspire more confidence and become more\nmoral, we should keep open all the paths of work for small fortunes, but\nshould prevent the effortless and sudden acquisition of wealth.\nAccordingly, we should take all the branches of transport and trade which\nfavour the accumulation of large fortunes\u2014especially, therefore, the money\nmarket\u2014out of the hands of private persons or private companies, and look\nupon those who own too much, just as upon those who own nothing, as types\nfraught with danger to the community.\n\n\n\n\n286.\n\n\nTHE VALUE OF LABOUR.\u2014If we try to determine the value of labour by the\namount of time, industry, good or bad will, constraint, inventiveness or\nlaziness, honesty or make-believe bestowed upon it, the valuation can\nnever be a just one. For the whole personality would have to be thrown\ninto the scale, and this is impossible. Here the motto is, \u201cJudge not!\u201d\nBut after all the cry for justice is the cry we now hear from those who\nare dissatisfied with the present valuation of labour. If we reflect\nfurther we find every person non-responsible for his product, the labour;\nhence merit can never be derived therefrom, and every labour is as good or\nas bad as it must be through this or that necessary concatenation of\nforces and weaknesses, abilities and desires. The worker is not at liberty\nto say whether he shall work or not, or to decide how he shall work. Only\nthe standpoints of usefulness, wider and narrower, have created the\nvaluation of labour. What we at present call justice does very well in\nthis sphere as a highly refined utility, which does not only consider the\nmoment and exploit the immediate opportunity, but looks to the permanence\nof all conditions, and thus also keeps in view the well-being of the\nworker, his physical and spiritual contentment: in order that he and his\nposterity may work well for our posterity and become trustworthy for\nlonger periods than the individual span of human life. The _exploitation_\nof the worker was, as we now understand, a piece of folly, a robbery at\nthe expense of the future, a jeopardisation of society. We almost have the\nwar now, and in any case the expense of maintaining peace, of concluding\ntreaties and winning confidence, will henceforth be very great, because\nthe folly of the exploiters was very great and long-lasting.\n\n\n\n\n287.\n\n\nOF THE STUDY OF THE SOCIAL BODY.\u2014The worst drawback for the modern student\nof economics and political science in Europe, and especially in Germany,\nis that the actual conditions, instead of exemplifying rules, illustrate\nexceptions or stages of transition and extinction. We must therefore learn\nto look beyond actually existing conditions and, for example, turn our\neyes to distant North America, where we can still contemplate and\ninvestigate, if we will, the initial and normal movement of the social\nbody. In Germany such a study requires arduous and historical research,\nor, as I have suggested, a telescope.\n\n\n\n\n288.\n\n\nHOW FAR MACHINERY HUMILIATES.\u2014Machinery is impersonal; it robs the piece\nof work of its pride, of the individual merits and defects that cling to\nall work that is not machine-made\u2014in other words, of its bit of humanity.\nFormerly, all buying from handicraftsmen meant a mark of distinction for\ntheir personalities, with whose productions people surrounded themselves.\nFurniture and dress accordingly became the symbols of mutual valuation and\npersonal connection. Nowadays, on the other hand, we seem to live in the\nmidst of anonymous and impersonal serfdom.\u2014We must not buy the\nfacilitation of labour too dear.\n\n\n\n\n289.\n\n\nCENTURY-OLD QUARANTINE.\u2014Democratic institutions are centres of quarantine\nagainst the old plague of tyrannical desires. As such they are extremely\nuseful and extremely tedious.\n\n\n\n\n290.\n\n\nTHE MOST DANGEROUS PARTISAN.\u2014The most dangerous partisan is he whose\ndefection would involve the ruin of the whole party\u2014in other words, the\nbest partisan.\n\n\n\n\n291.\n\n\nDESTINY AND THE STOMACH.\u2014A piece more or less of bread and butter in the\njockey\u2019s body is occasionally the decisive factor in races and bets, and\nthus in the good and bad luck of thousands.\u2014So long as the destiny of\nnations depends upon diplomats, the stomachs of diplomats will always be\nthe object of patriotic misgivings. _Quousque tandem_....\n\n\n\n\n292.\n\n\nTHE VICTORY OF DEMOCRACY.\u2014All political powers nowadays attempt to exploit\nthe fear of Socialism for their own strengthening. Yet in the long run\ndemocracy alone gains the advantage, for _all_ parties are now compelled\nto flatter \u201cthe masses\u201d and grant them facilities and liberties of all\nkinds, with the result that the masses finally become omnipotent. The\nmasses are as far as possible removed from Socialism as a doctrine of\naltering the acquisition of property. If once they get the steering-wheel\ninto their hands, through great majorities in their Parliaments, they will\nattack with progressive taxation the whole dominant system of capitalists,\nmerchants, and financiers, and will in fact slowly create a middle class\nwhich may forget Socialism like a disease that has been overcome.\u2014The\npractical result of this increasing democratisation will next be a\nEuropean league of nations, in which each individual nation, delimited by\nthe proper geographical frontiers, has the position of a canton with its\nseparate rights. Small account will be taken of the historic memories of\npreviously existing nations, because the pious affection for these\nmemories will be gradually uprooted under the democratic r\u00e9gime, with all\nits craze for novelty and experiment. The corrections of frontiers that\nwill prove necessary will be so carried out as to serve the interests of\nthe great cantons and at the same time that of the whole federation, but\nnot that of any venerable memories. To find the standpoints for these\ncorrections will be the task of future diplomats, who will have to be at\nthe same time students of civilisation, agriculturists, and commercial\nexperts, with no armies but motives and utilities at their back. Then only\nwill foreign and home politics be inseparably connected, whereas to-day\nthe latter follows its haughty dictator, and gleans in sorry baskets the\nstubble that is left over from the harvest of the former.\n\n\n\n\n293.\n\n\nGOAL AND MEANS OF DEMOCRACY.\u2014Democracy tries to create and guarantee\nindependence for as many as possible in their opinions, way of life, and\noccupation. For this purpose democracy must withhold the political\nsuffrage both from those who have nothing and from those who are really\nrich, as being the two intolerable classes of men. At the removal of these\nclasses it must always work, because they are continually calling its task\nin question. In the same way democracy must prevent all measures that seem\nto aim at party organisation. For the three great foes of independence, in\nthat threefold sense, are the have-nots, the rich, and the parties.\u2014I\nspeak of democracy as of a thing to come. What at present goes by that\nname is distinguished from older forms of government only by the fact that\nit drives with new horses; the roads and the wheels are the same as of\nyore.\u2014Has the danger really become less with _these_ conveyances of the\ncommonwealth?\n\n\n\n\n294.\n\n\nDISCRETION AND SUCCESS.\u2014That great quality of discretion, which is\nfundamentally the virtue of virtues, their ancestress and queen, has in\ncommon life by no means always success on its side. The wooer would find\nhimself deceived if he had wooed that virtue only for the sake of success.\nFor it is rated by practical people as suspicious, and is confused with\ncunning and hypocrisy: he who obviously lacks discretion, the man who\nquickly grasps and sometimes misses his grasp, has prejudice on his\nside\u2014he is an honest, trustworthy fellow. Practical people, accordingly,\ndo not like the prudent man, thinking he is to them a danger. Moreover, we\noften assume the prudent man to be anxious, preoccupied,\npedantic\u2014unpractical, butterfly people find him uncomfortable, because he\ndoes not live in their happy-go-lucky way, without thinking of actions and\nduties; he appears among them as their embodied conscience, and the bright\nday is dimmed to their eyes before his gaze. Thus when success and\npopularity fail him, he may often say by way of private consolation, \u201cSo\nhigh are the taxes you have to pay for the possession of the most precious\nof human commodities\u2014still it is worth the price!\u201d\n\n\n\n\n295.\n\n\n_ET IN ARCADIA EGO._\u2014I looked down, over waves of hills, to a milky-green\nlake, through firs and pines austere with age; rocky crags of all shapes\nabout me, the soil gay with flowers and grasses. A herd of cattle moved,\nstretched, and expanded itself before me; single cows and groups in the\ndistance, in the clearest evening light, hard by the forest of pines;\nothers nearer and darker; all in calm and eventide contentment. My watch\npointed to half-past six. The bull of the herd had stepped into the white\nfoaming brook, and went forward slowly, now striving against, now giving\nway to his tempestuous course; thus, no doubt, he took his sort of fierce\npleasure. Two dark brown beings, of Bergamasque origin, tended the herd,\nthe girl dressed almost like a boy. On the left, overhanging cliffs and\nfields of snow above broad belts of woodland; to the right, two enormous\nice-covered peaks, high above me, shimmering in the veil of the sunny\nhaze\u2014all large, silent, and bright. The beauty of the whole was\nawe-inspiring and induced to a mute worship of the moment and its\nrevelation. Unconsciously, as if nothing could be more natural, you\npeopled this pure, clear world of light (which had no trace of yearning,\nof expectancy, of looking forward or backward) with Greek heroes. You felt\nit all as Poussin and his school felt\u2014at once heroic and idyllic.\u2014So\nindividual men too have lived, constantly feeling themselves in the world\nand the world in themselves, and among them one of the greatest men, the\ninventor of a heroico-idyllic form of philosophy\u2014Epicurus.\n\n\n\n\n296.\n\n\nCOUNTING AND MEASURING.\u2014The art of seeing many things, of weighing one\nwith another, of reckoning one thing with another and constructing from\nthem a rapid conclusion, a fairly correct sum\u2014that goes to make a great\npolitician or general or merchant. This quality is, in fact, a power of\nspeedy mental calculation. The art of seeing _one_ thing alone, of finding\ntherein the sole motive for action, the guiding principle of all other\naction, goes to make the hero and also the fanatic. This quality means a\ndexterity in measuring with one scale.\n\n\n\n\n297.\n\n\nNOT TO SEE TOO SOON.\u2014As long as we undergo some experience, we must give\nourselves up to the experience and shut our eyes\u2014in other words, not\nbecome observers of what we are undergoing. For to observe would disturb\ngood digestion of the experience, and instead of wisdom we should gain\nnothing but dyspepsia.\n\n\n\n\n298.\n\n\nFROM THE PRACTICE OF THE WISE.\u2014To become wise we must _will_ to undergo\ncertain experiences, and accordingly leap into their jaws. This, it is\ntrue, is very dangerous. Many a \u201csage\u201d has been eaten up in the process.\n\n\n\n\n299.\n\n\nEXHAUSTION OF THE INTELLECT.\u2014Our occasional coldness and indifference\ntowards people, which is imputed to us as hardness and defect of\ncharacter, is often only an exhaustion of the intellect. In this state\nother men are to us, as we are to ourselves, tedious or immaterial.\n\n\n\n\n300.\n\n\n\u201cTHE ONE THING NEEDFUL.\u201d\u2014If we are clever, the one thing we need is to\nhave joy in our hearts. \u201cAh,\u201d adds some one, \u201cif we are clever, the best\nthing we can do is to be wise.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n301.\n\n\nA SIGN OF LOVE.\u2014Some one said, \u201cThere are two persons about whom I have\nnever thought deeply. That is a sign of my love for them.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n302.\n\n\nHOW WE SEEK TO IMPROVE BAD ARGUMENTS.\u2014Many a man adds a bit of his\npersonality to his bad arguments, as if they would thus go better and\nchange into straight and good arguments. In the same way, players at\nskittles, even after a throw, try to give a direction to the ball by turns\nand gestures.\n\n\n\n\n303.\n\n\nHONESTY.\u2014It is but a small thing to be a pattern sort of man with regard\nto rights and property\u2014for instance (to name trifling points, which of\ncourse give a better proof of this sort of pattern nature than great\nexamples), if as a boy one never steals fruit from another\u2019s orchard, and\nas a man never walks on unmown fields. It is but little; you are then\nstill only a \u201claw-abiding person,\u201d with just that degree of morality of\nwhich a \u201csociety,\u201d a group of human beings, is capable.\n\n\n\n\n304.\n\n\n\u201cMAN!\u201d\u2014What is the vanity of the vainest individual as compared with the\nvanity which the most modest person feels when he thinks of his position\nin nature and in the world as \u201cMan!\u201d\n\n\n\n\n305.\n\n\nTHE MOST NECESSARY GYMNASTIC.\u2014Through deficiency in self-control in small\nmatters a similar deficiency on great occasions slowly arises. Every day\non which we have not at least once denied ourselves some _trifle_ is\nturned to bad use and a danger to the next day. This gymnastic is\nindispensable if we wish to maintain the joy of being our own master.\n\n\n\n\n306.\n\n\nLOSING OURSELVES.\u2014When we have first found ourselves, we must understand\nhow from time to time to _lose_ ourselves and then to find ourselves\nagain.\u2014This is true on the assumption that we are thinkers. A thinker\nfinds it a drawback always to be tied to one person.\n\n\n\n\n307.\n\n\nWHEN IT IS NECESSARY TO PART.\u2014You must, for a time at least, part from\nthat which you want to know and measure. Only when you have left a city do\nyou see how high its towers rise above its houses.\n\n\n\n\n308.\n\n\nAT NOONTIDE.\u2014He to whom an active and stormy morning of life is allotted,\nat the noontide of life feels his soul overcome by a strange longing for a\nrest that may last for months and years. All grows silent around him,\nvoices sound farther and farther in the distance, the sun shines straight\ndown upon him. On a hidden woodland sward he sees the great God Pan\nsleeping, and with Pan Nature seems to him to have gone to sleep with an\nexpression of eternity on their faces. He wants nothing, he troubles about\nnothing; his heart stands still, only his eye lives. It is a death with\nwaking eyes. Then man sees much that he never saw before, and, so far as\nhis eye can reach, all is woven into and as it were buried in a net of\nlight. He feels happy, but it is a heavy, very heavy kind of\nhappiness.\u2014Then at last the wind stirs in the trees, noontide is over,\nlife carries him away again, life with its blind eyes, and its tempestuous\nretinue behind it\u2014desire, illusion, oblivion, enjoyment, destruction,\ndecay. And so comes evening, more stormy and more active than was even the\nmorning.\u2014To the really active man these prolonged phases of cognition seem\nalmost uncanny and morbid, but not unpleasant.\n\n\n\n\n309.\n\n\nTO BEWARE OF ONE\u2019S PORTRAIT-PAINTER.\u2014A great painter, who in a portrait\nhas revealed and put on canvas the fullest expression and look of which a\nman is capable, will almost always think, when he sees the man later in\nreal life, that he is only looking at a caricature.\n\n\n\n\n310.\n\n\nTHE TWO PRINCIPLES OF THE NEW LIFE.\u2014_First Principle_: to arrange one\u2019s\nlife on the most secure and tangible basis, not as hitherto upon the most\ndistant, undetermined, and cloudy foundation. _Second Principle_: to\nestablish the rank of the nearest and nearer things, and of the more and\nless secure, before one arranges one\u2019s life and directs it to a final end.\n\n\n\n\n311.\n\n\nDANGEROUS IRRITABILITY.\u2014Talented men who are at the same time _idle_ will\nalways appear somewhat irritated when one of their friends has\naccomplished a thorough piece of work. Their jealousy is awakened, they\nare ashamed of their own laziness, or rather, they fear that their active\nfriend will now despise them even more than before. In such a mood they\ncriticise the new achievement, and, to the utter astonishment of the\nauthor, their criticism becomes a revenge.\n\n\n\n\n312.\n\n\nDESTRUCTIONS OF ILLUSIONS.\u2014Illusions are certainly expensive amusements;\nbut the destruction of illusions is still more expensive, if looked upon\nas an amusement, as it undoubtedly is by some people.\n\n\n\n\n313.\n\n\nTHE MONOTONE OF THE \u201cSAGE.\u201d\u2014Cows sometimes have a look of wondering which\nstops short on the path to questioning. In the eye of the higher\nintelligence, on the other hand, the _nil admirari_ is spread out like the\nmonotony of the cloudless sky.\n\n\n\n\n314.\n\n\nNOT TO BE ILL TOO LONG.\u2014We should beware of being ill too long. The\nlookers-on become impatient of their customary duty of showing sympathy,\nbecause they find it too much trouble to maintain the appearance of this\nemotion for any length of time. Then they immediately pass to suspicion of\nour character, with the conclusion: \u201cYou deserve to be ill, and we need no\nlonger be at pains to show our sympathy.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n315.\n\n\nA HINT TO ENTHUSIASTS.\u2014He who likes to be carried away, and would fain be\ncarried on high, must beware lest he become too heavy. For instance, he\nmust not learn much, and especially not let himself be crammed with\nscience. Science makes men ponderous\u2014take care, ye enthusiasts!\n\n\n\n\n316.\n\n\nKNOWLEDGE OF HOW TO SURPRISE ONESELF.\u2014He who would see himself as he is,\nmust know how to _surprise_ himself, torch in hand. For with the mind it\nis as with the body: whoever is accustomed to look at himself in the glass\nforgets his ugliness, and only recognises it again by means of the\nportrait-painter. Yet he even grows used to the picture and forgets his\nugliness all over again.\u2014Herein we see the universal law that man cannot\nendure unalterable ugliness, unless for a moment. He forgets or denies it\nin all cases.\u2014The moralists must reckon upon that \u201cmoment\u201d for bringing\nforward their truths.\n\n\n\n\n317.\n\n\nOPINIONS AND FISH.\u2014We are possessors of our opinions as of fish\u2014that is,\nin so far as we are possessors of a fish pond. We must go fishing and have\nluck\u2014then we have _our_ fish, _our_ opinions. I speak here of live\nopinions, of live fish. Others are content to possess a cabinet of\nfossils\u2014and, in their head, \u201cconvictions.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n318.\n\n\nSIGNS OF FREEDOM AND SERVITUDE.\u2014To satisfy one\u2019s needs so far as possible\noneself, even if imperfectly, is the path towards freedom in mind and\npersonality. To satisfy many even superfluous needs, and that as fully as\npossible, is a training for servitude. The Sophist Hippias, who himself\nearned and made all that he wore within and without, is the representative\nof the highest freedom of mind and personality. It does not matter whether\nall is done equally well and perfectly\u2014pride can repair the damaged\nplaces.\n\n\n\n\n319.\n\n\nBELIEF IN ONESELF.\u2014In our times we mistrust every one who believes in\nhimself. Formerly this was enough to make people believe in one. The\nrecipe for finding faith now runs: \u201cSpare not thyself! In order to set thy\nopinion in a credible light, thou must first set fire to thy own hut!\u201d\n\n\n\n\n320.\n\n\nAT ONCE RICHER AND POORER.\u2014I know a man who accustomed himself even in\nchildhood to think well of the intellectuality of mankind\u2014in other words,\nof their real devotion as regards things of the intellect, their unselfish\npreference for that which is recognised as true\u2014but who had at the same\ntime a modest or even depreciatory view of his own brain (judgment,\nmemory, presence of mind, imagination). He set no value on himself when he\ncompared himself with others. Now in the course of years he was compelled,\nfirst once and then in a hundred ways, to revise this verdict. One would\nhave thought he would be thoroughly satisfied and delighted. Such, in\nfact, was to some extent the case, but, as he once said, \u201cYet a bitterness\nof the deepest dye is mingled with my feeling, such as I did not know in\nearlier life; for since I learnt to value men and myself more correctly,\nmy intellect seems to me of less use. I scarcely think I can now do any\ngood at all with it, because the minds of others cannot understand the\ngood. I now always see before me the frightful gulf between those who\ncould give help and those who need help. So I am troubled by the\nmisfortune of having my intellect to myself and of being forced to enjoy\nit alone so far as it can give any enjoyment. But to give is more blessed\nthan to possess, and what is the richest man in the solitude of a\ndesert?\u201d(28)\n\n\n\n\n321.\n\n\nHOW WE SHOULD ATTACK.\u2014The reasons for which men believe or do not believe\nare in very few people as strong as they might be. As a rule, in order to\nshake a belief it is far from necessary to use the heaviest weapon of\nattack. Many attain their object by merely making the attack with some\nnoise\u2014in fact, pop-guns are often enough. In dealing with very vain\npersons, the semblance of a strong attack is enough. They think they are\nbeing taken quite seriously, and readily give way.\n\n\n\n\n322.\n\n\nDEATH.\u2014Through the certain prospect of death a precious, fragrant drop of\nfrivolity might be mixed with every life\u2014and now, you singular\ndruggist-souls, you have made of death a drop of poison, unpleasant to\ntaste, which makes the whole of life hideous.\n\n\n\n\n323.\n\n\nREPENTANCE.\u2014Never allow repentance free play, but say at once to yourself,\n\u201cThat would be adding a second piece of folly to the first.\u201d If you have\nworked evil, you must bethink yourself of doing good. If you are punished\nfor your actions, submit to the punishment with the feeling that by this\nvery submission you are somehow doing good, in that you are deterring\nothers from falling into the same error. Every malefactor who is punished\nhas a right to consider himself a benefactor to mankind.\n\n\n\n\n324.\n\n\nBECOMING A THINKER.\u2014How can any one become a thinker if he does not spend\nat least a third part of the day without passions, men, and books?\n\n\n\n\n325.\n\n\nTHE BEST REMEDY.\u2014A little health on and off is the best remedy for the\ninvalid.\n\n\n\n\n326.\n\n\nDON\u2019T TOUCH.\u2014There are dreadful people who, instead of solving a problem,\ncomplicate it for those who deal with it and make it harder to solve.(29)\nWhoever does not know how to hit the nail on the head should be entreated\nnot to hit the nail at all.\n\n\n\n\n327.\n\n\nFORGETTING NATURE.\u2014We speak of Nature, and, in doing so, forget ourselves:\nwe ourselves are Nature, _quand m\u00eame_.\u2014Consequently, Nature is something\nquite different from what we feel on hearing her name pronounced.\n\n\n\n\n328.\n\n\nPROFUNDITY AND ENNUI.\u2014In the case of profound men, as of deep wells, it\ntakes a long time before anything that is thrown into them reaches the\nbottom. The spectators, who generally do not wait long enough, too readily\nlook upon such a man as callous and hard\u2014or even as boring.\n\n\n\n\n329.\n\n\nWHEN IT IS TIME TO VOW FIDELITY TO ONESELF.\u2014We sometimes go astray in an\nintellectual direction which does not correspond to our talents. For a\ntime we struggle heroically against wind and tide, really against\nourselves; but finally we become weary and we pant. What we accomplish\ngives us no real pleasure, since we think that we have paid too heavy a\nprice for these successes. We even despair of our productivity, of our\nfuture, perhaps in the midst of victory.\u2014Finally, finally we turn back\u2014and\nthen the wind swells our sails and bears us into our smooth water. What\nbliss! How certain of victory we feel! Only now do we know what we are and\nwhat we intend, and now we vow fidelity to ourselves, and have a right to\ndo so\u2014as men that know.\n\n\n\n\n330.\n\n\nWEATHER PROPHETS.\u2014Just as the clouds reveal to us the direction of the\nwind high above our heads, so the lightest and freest spirits give signs\nof future weather by their course. The wind in the valley and the\nmarket-place opinions of to-day have no significance for the future, but\nonly for the past.\n\n\n\n\n331.\n\n\nCONTINUAL ACCELERATION.\u2014Those who begin slowly and find it hard to become\nfamiliar with a subject, sometimes acquire afterwards the quality of\ncontinual acceleration\u2014so that in the end no one knows where the current\nwill take them.\n\n\n\n\n332.\n\n\nTHE THREE GOOD THINGS.\u2014Greatness, calm, sunlight\u2014these three embrace all\nthat a thinker desires and also demands of himself: his hopes and duties,\nhis claims in the intellectual and moral sphere, nay even in his daily\nmanner of life and the scenic background of his residence. Corresponding\nto these three things are, firstly thoughts that exalt, secondly thoughts\nthat soothe, and thirdly thoughts that illuminate\u2014but, fourthly, thoughts\nthat share in all these three qualities, in which all earthly things are\ntransfigured. This is the kingdom of the great _trinity of joy_.\n\n\n\n\n333.\n\n\nDYING FOR \u201cTRUTH.\u201d\u2014We should not let ourselves be burnt for our\nopinions\u2014we are not so certain of them as all that. But we might let\nourselves be burnt for the right of possessing and changing our opinions.\n\n\n\n\n334.\n\n\nMARKET VALUE.\u2014If we wish to pass exactly for what we are, we must be\nsomething that has its market value. As, however, only objects in common\nuse have a market value, this desire is the consequence either of shrewd\nmodesty or of stupid immodesty.\n\n\n\n\n335.\n\n\nMORAL FOR BUILDERS.\u2014We must remove the scaffolding when the house has been\nbuilt.\n\n\n\n\n336.\n\n\nSOPHOCLEANISM.\u2014Who poured more water into wine than the Greeks? Sobriety\nand grace combined\u2014that was the aristocratic privilege of the Athenian in\nthe time of Sophocles and after. Imitate that whoever can! In life and in\nwork!\n\n\n\n\n337.\n\n\nHEROISM.\u2014The heroic consists in doing something great (or in nobly _not_\ndoing something) without feeling oneself to be in competition _with_ or\n_before_ others. The hero carries with him, wherever he goes, the\nwilderness and the holy land with inviolable precincts.\n\n\n\n\n338.\n\n\nFINDING OUR \u201cDOUBLE\u201d IN NATURE.\u2014In some country places we rediscover\nourselves, with a delightful shudder: it is the pleasantest way of finding\nour \u201cdouble.\u201d\u2014How happy must he be who has that feeling just here, in this\nperpetually sunny October air, in this happy elfin play of the wind from\nmorn till eve, in this clearest of atmospheres and mildest of\ntemperatures, in all the serious yet cheerful landscape of hill, lake, and\nforest on this plateau, which has encamped fearlessly next to the terrors\nof eternal snow: here, where Italy and Finland have joined hands, and\nwhere the home of all the silver colour-tones of Nature seems to be\nestablished. How happy must he be who can say, \u201cTrue, there are many\ngrander and finer pieces of scenery, but this is so familiar and intimate\nto me, related by blood, nay even more to me!\u201d\n\n\n\n\n339.\n\n\nAFFABILITY OF THE SAGE.\u2014The sage will unconsciously be affable in his\nintercourse with other men, as a prince would be, and will readily treat\nthem as equals, in spite of all differences of talent, rank, and\ncharacter. For this characteristic, however, so soon as people notice it,\nhe is most heavily censured.\n\n\n\n\n340.\n\n\nGOLD.\u2014All that is gold does not glitter. A soft sheen characterises the\nmost precious metal.\n\n\n\n\n341.\n\n\nWHEEL AND DRAG.\u2014The wheel and the drag have different duties, but also one\nin common\u2014that of hurting each other.\n\n\n\n\n342.\n\n\nDISTURBANCES OF THE THINKER.\u2014All that interrupts the thinker in his\nthoughts (disturbs him, as people say) must be regarded by him calmly, as\na new model who comes in by the door to offer himself to the artist.\nInterruptions are the ravens which bring food to the recluse.\n\n\n\n\n343.\n\n\nBEING VERY CLEVER.\u2014Being very clever keeps men young, but they must put up\nwith being considered, for that very reason, older than they are. For men\nread the handwriting of the intellect as signs of _experience_\u2014that is, of\nhaving lived much and evilly, of suffering, error, and repentance. Hence,\nif we are very clever and show it, we appear to them older and wickeder\nthan we are.\n\n\n\n\n344.\n\n\nHOW WE MUST CONQUER.\u2014We ought not to desire victory if we only have the\nprospect of overcoming our opponent by a hair\u2019s breadth. A good victory\nmakes the vanquished rejoice, and must have about it something divine\nwhich spares _humiliation_.\n\n\n\n\n345.\n\n\nAN ILLUSION OF SUPERIOR MINDS.\u2014Superior minds find it difficult to free\nthemselves from an illusion; for they imagine that they excite envy among\nthe mediocre and are looked upon as exceptions. As a matter of fact,\nhowever, they are looked upon as superfluous, as something that would not\nbe missed if it did not exist.\n\n\n\n\n346.\n\n\nDEMANDED BY CLEANLINESS.\u2014Changing opinions is in some natures as much\ndemanded by cleanliness as changing clothes. In the case of other natures\nit is only demanded by vanity.\n\n\n\n\n347.\n\n\nALSO WORTHY OF A HERO.\u2014Here is a hero who did nothing but shake the tree\nas soon as the fruits were ripe. Do you think that too small a thing?\nWell, just look at the tree that he shook.\n\n\n\n\n348.\n\n\nA GAUGE FOR WISDOM.\u2014The growth of wisdom may be gauged exactly by the\ndiminution of ill-temper.\n\n\n\n\n349.\n\n\nEXPRESSING AN ERROR DISAGREEABLY.\u2014It is not to every one\u2019s taste to hear\ntruth pleasantly expressed. But let no one at least believe that error\nwill become truth if it is disagreeably expressed.\n\n\n\n\n350.\n\n\nTHE GOLDEN MAXIM.\u2014Man has been bound with many chains, in order that he\nmay forget to comport himself like an animal. And indeed he has become\nmore gentle, more intellectual, more joyous, more meditative than any\nanimal. But now he still suffers from having carried his chains so long,\nfrom having been so long without pure air and free movement\u2014these chains,\nhowever, are, as I repeat again and again, the ponderous and significant\nerrors of moral, religious, and metaphysical ideas. Only when the disease\nof chains is overcome is the first great goal reached\u2014the separation of\nman from the brute. At present we stand in the midst of our work of\nremoving the chains, and in doing so we need the strictest precautions.\nOnly the ennobled man may be granted freedom of spirit; to him alone comes\nthe alleviation of life and heals his wounds; he is the first who can say\nthat he lives for the sake of joy, with no other aim; in any other mouth,\nhis motto of \u201cPeace around me and goodwill towards all the most familiar\nthings,\u201d would be dangerous.\u2014In this motto for single individuals he is\nthinking of an ancient saying, magnificent and pathetic, which applied to\nall, and has remained standing above all mankind, as a motto and a beacon\nwhereby shall perish all who adorn their banner too early\u2014the rock on\nwhich Christianity foundered. It is not even yet time, it seems, for _all\nmen_ to have the lot of those shepherds who saw the heavens lit up above\nthem and heard the words: \u201cPeace on earth and goodwill to one another\namong men.\u201d\u2014It is still the age of the individual.\n\n\n\n\n                  \u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\u2010\n\n\n\n\n_The Shadow_: Of all that you have enunciated, nothing pleased me more\nthan one promise: \u201cYe want again to be good neighbours to the most\nfamiliar things.\u201d This will be to the advantage of us poor shadows too.\nFor do but confess that you have hitherto been only too fond of reviling\nus.\n\n_The Wanderer_: Reviling? But why did you never defend yourselves? After\nall, you were very close to our ears.\n\n_The Shadow_: It seemed to us that we were too near you to have a right to\ntalk of ourselves.\n\n_The Wanderer_: What delicacy! Ah, you shadows are \u201cbetter men\u201d(30) than\nwe, I can see that.\n\n_The Shadow_: And yet you called us \u201cimportunate\u201d\u2014us, who know one thing\nat least extremely well: how to be silent and to wait\u2014no Englishman knows\nit better. It is true we are very, very often in the retinue of men, but\nnever as their bondsmen. When man shuns light, we shun man\u2014so far, at\nleast, we are free.\n\n_The Wanderer_: Ah, light shuns man far oftener, and then also you abandon\nhim.\n\n_The Shadow_: It has often pained me to leave you. I am eager for\nknowledge, and much in man has remained obscure to me, because I cannot\nalways be in his company. At the price of complete knowledge of man I\nwould gladly be your slave.\n\n_The Wanderer_: Do you know, do I know, whether you would not then\nunwittingly become master instead of slave? Or would remain a slave\nindeed, but would lead a life of humiliation and disgust because you\ndespised your master? Let us both be content with freedom such as you have\nenjoyed up to now\u2014you and I! For the sight of a being not free would\nembitter my greatest joys; all that is best would be repugnant to me if\nany one had to share it with me\u2014I will not hear of any slaves about me.\nThat is why I do not care for the dog, that lazy, tail-wagging parasite,\nwho first became \u201cdoggish\u201d as the slave of man, and of whom they still say\nthat he is loyal to his master and follows him like\u2014\u2014\n\n_The Shadow_: Like his shadow, they say. Perhaps I have already followed\nyou too long to-day? It has been the longest day, but we are nearing the\nend; be patient a little more! The grass is damp; I am feeling chilly.\n\n_The Wanderer_: Oh, is it already time to part? And I had to hurt you in\nthe end\u2014I saw you became darker.\n\n_The Shadow_: I blushed the only colour I have at command. I remembered\nthat I had often lain at your feet like a dog, and that you then\u2014\u2014\n\n_The Wanderer_: Can I not with all speed do something to please you? Have\nyou no wish?\n\n_The Shadow_: None, except perhaps the wish that the philosophic \u201cdog\u201d(31)\nexpressed to Alexander the Great\u2014just move a little out of my light; I\nfeel cold.\n\n_The Wanderer_: What am I to do?\n\n_The Shadow_: Walk under those fir-trees and look around you towards the\nmountains; the sun is sinking.\n\n_The Wanderer_: Where are you? Where are you?\n\n\n\n\n\n\nFOOTNOTES\n\n\n    1 \u201cForeword\u201d and \u201cforword\u201d would be the literal rendering of the play\n      on words.\u2014TR.\n\n    2 The allusion is to the ending of the Second Part of Goethe\u2019s\n      _Faust_\u2014\u201cdas Ewig Weibliche Zieht uns _hinan_!\u201d\u2014\u201cThe Eternal\n      Feminine Draweth us _on_!\u201d\u2014TR.\n\n    3 It has been attempted to render the play on \u201cGewissen\u201d and\n      \u201cWissen.\u201d\u2014TR.\n\n    4 Cf. John i. 1.\u2014TR.\n\n    5 The German word _Mitfreude_, coined by Nietzsche in opposition to\n      _Mitleid_ (sympathy), is untranslateable.\u2014TR.\n\n    6 Herostratus of Ephesus (in 356 B.C.) set fire to the temple of Diana\n      in order (as he confessed on the rack) to gain notoriety.\u2014TR.\n\n    7 Quotation from Schiller, _Don Carlos_, i. 5.\u2014TR.\n\n    8 This, of course, refers to Jesus and Socrates.\u2014TR.\n\n    9 Queen of the Amazons, slain by Achilles in the Trojan War.\u2014TR.\n\n   10 From Schiller, _Wallenstein\u2019s Lager_: \u201cWer den Besten seiner Zeit\n      genug gethan, der hat gelebt f\u00fcr alle Zeiten\u201d (\u201cHe that has\n      satisfied the best men of his time has lived for all time\u201d).\n\n   11 In German _Barockstil_, _i.e._ the degenerate post-Renaissance style\n      in art and literature, which spread from Italy in the seventeenth\n      century.\u2014TR.\n\n   12 The original word, _Freiz\u00fcgig_, means, in the modern German Empire,\n      possessing the free right of migration, without pecuniary burdens or\n      other restrictions, from one German state to another. The play on\n      words in _Zug zur Freiheit_ (\u201cimpulse to freedom\u201d) is\n      untranslateable.\u2014TR.\n\n   13 Nietzsche seems to allude to his own case, for he ultimately\n      contracted a myopia which bordered on blindness.\u2014TR.\n\n   14 The play on _bergen_ (shelter) and _verbergen_ (hide) is\n      untranslateable.\u2014TR.\n\n   15 Allusion to German proverb: \u201cWhere there is nothing, the Emperor has\n      lost his rights.\u201d\u2014TR.\n\n   16 Genesis xiii. 9.\u2014TR.\n\n   17 Luke viii. 33.\u2014TR.\n\n   18 The play on Freudenschaften (_i.e._ pleasure-giving passions) and\n      _Leidenschaften_ (_i.e._ pain-giving passions) is often used by\n      Nietzsche, and is untranslateable.\u2014_Tr._\n\n   19 The wife of the Stoic Thrasea Paetus, when their complicity in the\n      great conspiracy of 65 A.D. against Nero was discovered, is reported\n      to have said as she committed suicide, \u201cIt doesn\u2019t hurt,\n      Paetus.\u201d\u2014_Tr._\n\n   20 It is interesting to compare this judgment with Carlyle\u2019s praise of\n      Jean Paul. The dressing-gown is an allusion to Jean Paul\u2019s favourite\n      costume.\u2014TR.\n\n   21 The German copyright expires thirty years after publication.\u2014TR.\n\n   22 Nietzsche himself was extremely short-sighted.\u2014TR.\n\n   23 In the sixth century B.C. Pythagoras founded at Croton a \u201cschool\u201d\n      somewhat resembling a monastic order. Among the ordeals for\n      novitiates was enforced silence for five years.\u2014TR.\n\n   24 In the German _Aufkl\u00e4rung_ there is a play on the sense \u201cclearing\n      up\u201d (of weather) and \u201cenlightenment.\u201d\u2014TR.\n\n   25 Stendhal.\u2014TR.\n\n   26 A transposition of _sacrifizio dell\u2019 intelletto_, the Jesuit\n      maxim.\u2014TR.\n\n   27 The original, by a curious slip, has \u201cseventh.\u201d\u2014TR.\n\n   28 Clearly autobiographical. Nietzsche, like all great men, passed\n      through a period of modesty and doubt.\u2014TR.\n\n   29 Nietzsche here alludes to his own countrymen.\u2014TR.\n\n   30 An allusion to the poem \u201cDer Wilde\u201d (The Savage) by S\u00e4ume, which\n      ends with the line, \u201cSehet, wir wilden sind doch bessere Menschen\u201d\n      (Behold, after all, we savages are better men).\u2014TR.\n\n   31 Diogenes, founder of the Cynic school, which derived its name from\n      \u03ba\u03c5\u03ce\u03bd (dog).\u2014TR.","title":"Human, All-Too-Human: A Book for Free Spirits, Part 2","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":83974}