Читать книгу Nietzsche: The Will to Power - FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE, Friedrich Nietzsche - Страница 16

Table of Contents

109.

First Principle: everything that characterises modern men savours of decay: but side by side with the prevailing sickness there are signs of a strength and powerfulness of soul which are still untried. The same causes which tend to promote the belittling of men, also force the stronger and rarer individuals upwards to greatness.

110.

General survey: the ambiguous character of our modern world—precisely the same symptoms might at the same time be indicative of either decline or strength. And the signs of strength and of emancipation dearly bought, might in view of traditional (or hereditary) appreciations concerned with the feelings, be misunderstood as indications of weakness. In short, feeling, as a means of fixing valuations, is not on a level with the times.

Generalised: Every valuation is always backward; it is merely the expression of the conditions which favoured survival and growth in a much earlier age: it struggles against new conditions of existence out of which it did not arise, and which it therefore necessarily misunderstands: it hinders, and excites suspicion against, all that is new.

111.

The problem of the nineteenth century.—To discover whether its strong and weak side belong to each other. Whether they have been cut from one and the same piece. Whether the variety of its ideals and their contradictions are conditioned by a higher purpose: whether they are something higher.—For it might be the prerequisite of greatness, that growth should take place amid such violent tension. Dissatisfaction, Nihilism, might be a good sign.

112.

General survey.—As a matter of fact, all abundant growth involves a concomitant process of crumbling to bits and decay: suffering and the symptoms of decline belong to ages of enormous progress; every fruitful and powerful movement of mankind has always brought about a concurrent Nihilistic movement. Under certain circumstances, the appearance of the extremest form of Pessimism and actual Nihilism might be the sign of a process of incisive and most essential growth, and of mankind's transit into completely new conditions of existence. This is what I have understood.

113.

A.

Starting out with a thoroughly courageous appreciation of our men of to-day:—we must not allow ourselves to be deceived by appearance: this mankind is much less effective, but it gives quite different pledges of lasting strength, its tempo is slower, but the rhythm itself is richer. Healthiness is increasing, the real conditions of a healthy body are on the point of being known, and will gradually be created, "asceticism" is regarded with irony. The fear of extremes, a certain confidence in the "right way," no raving: a periodical self-habituation to narrower values (such as "mother-land," "science," etc.).

This whole picture, however, would still be ambiguous: it might be a movement either of increase or decline in Life.

B.

The belief in "progress"—in lower spheres of intelligence, appears as increasing life: but this is self-deception;

in higher spheres of intelligence it is a sign of declining life.

Description of the symptoms.

The unity of the aspect: uncertainty in regard to the standard of valuation.

Fear of a general "in vain."

Nihilism.

114.

As a matter of fact, we are no longer so urgently in need of an antidote against the first Nihilism: Life is no longer so uncertain, accidental, and senseless in modern Europe. All such tremendous exaggeration of the value of men, of the value of evil, etc., are not so necessary now; we can endure a considerable diminution of this value, we may grant a great deal of nonsense and accident: the power man has acquired now allows of a lowering of the means of discipline, of which the strongest was the moral interpretation of the universe. The hypothesis "God" is much too extreme.

115.

If anything shows that our humanisation is a genuine sign of progress, it is the fact that we no longer require excessive contraries, that we no longer require contraries at all....

We may love the senses; for we have spiritualised them in every way and made them artistic;

We have a right to all things which hitherto have been most calumniated.

116.

The reversal of the order of rank.—Those pious counterfeiters—the priests—are becoming Chandala in our midst:—they occupy the position of the charlatan, of the quack, of the counterfeiter, of the sorcerer: we regard them as corrupters of the will, as the great slanderers and vindictive enemies of Life, and as the rebels among the bungled and the botched. We have made our middle class out of our servant-caste—the Sudra—that is to say, our people or the body which wields the political power.

On the other hand, the Chandala of former times is paramount: the blasphemers, the immoralists, the independents of all kinds, the artists, the Jews, the minstrels—and, at bottom, all disreputable classes are in the van.

We have elevated ourselves to honourable thoughts,—even more, we determine what honour is on earth,—"nobility." ... All of us to-day are advocates of life.—We Immoralists are to-day the strongest power: the other great powers are in need of us ... we re-create the world in our own image.

We have transferred the label "Chandala" to the priests, the backworldsmen, and to the deformed Christian society which has become associated with these people, together with creatures of like origin, the pessimists, Nihilists, romanticists of pity, criminals, and men of vicious habits—the whole sphere in which the idea of "God" is that of Saviour....

We are proud of being no longer obliged to be liars, slanderers, and detractors of Life....

117.

The advance of the nineteenth century upon the eighteenth (at bottom we good Europeans are carrying on a war against the eighteenth century):

(1) "The return to Nature" is getting to be understood, ever more definitely, in a way which is quite the reverse of that in which Rousseau used the phrase—away from idylls and operas!

(2) Ever more decided, more anti-idealistic, more objective, more fearless, more industrious, more temperate, more suspicious of sudden changes, anti-revolutionary;

(3) The question of bodily health is being pressed ever more decidedly in front of the health of "the soul": the latter is regarded as a condition brought about by the former, and bodily health is believed to be, at least, the prerequisite to spiritual health.

118.

If anything at all has been achieved, it is a more innocent attitude towards the senses, a happier, more favourable demeanour in regard to sensuality, resembling rather the position taken up by Goethe; a prouder feeling has also been developed in knowledge, and the "reine Thor"6 meets with little faith.

119.

We "objective people."—It is not "pity" that opens up the way for us to all that is most remote and most strange in life and culture; but our accessibility and ingenuousness, which precisely does not "pity," but rather takes pleasure in hundreds of things which formerly caused pain (which in former days either outraged or moved us, or in the presence of which we were either hostile or indifferent). Pain in all its various phases is now interesting to us: on that account we are certainly not the more pitiful, even though the sight of pain may shake us to our foundations and move us to tears: and we are absolutely not inclined to be more helpful in view thereof.

In this deliberate desire to look on at all pain and error, we have grown stronger and more powerful than in the eighteenth century; it is a proof of our increase of strength (we have drawn closer to the seventeenth and sixteenth centuries). But it is a profound mistake to regard our "romanticism" as a proof of our "beautified souls." We want stronger sensations than all coarser ages and classes have wanted. (This fact must not be confounded with the needs of neurotics and decadents; in their case, of course, there is a craving for pepper —even for cruelty.)

We are all seeking conditions which are emancipated from the bourgeois, and to a greater degree from the priestly, notion of morality (every book which savours at all of priestdom and theology gives us the impression of pitiful niaiserie and mental indigence). "Good company," in fact, finds everything insipid which is not forbidden and considered compromising in bourgeois circles; and the case is the same with books, music, politics, and opinions on women.

120.

The simplification of man in the nineteenth century (The eighteenth century was that of elegance, subtlety, and generous feeling).—Not "return to nature"; for no natural humanity has ever existed yet. Scholastic, unnatural, and antinatural values are the rule and the beginning; man only reaches Nature after a long struggle—he never turns his "back" to her.... To be natural means, to dare to be as immoral as Nature is.

We are coarser, more direct, richer in irony towards generous feelings, even when we are beneath them.

Our haute volée, the society consisting of our rich and leisured men, is more natural: people hunt each other, the love of the sexes is a kind of sport in which marriage is both a charm and an obstacle; people entertain each other and live for the sake of pleasure; bodily advantages stand in the first rank, and curiosity and daring are the rule.

Our attitude towards knowledge is more natural; we are innocent in our absolute spiritual debauchery, we hate pathetic and hieratic manners, we delight in that which is most strictly prohibited, we should scarcely recognise any interest in knowledge if we were bored in acquiring it.

Our attitude to morality is also more natural. Principles have become a laughing-stock; no one dares to speak of his "duty," unless in irony. But a helpful, benevolent disposition is highly valued. (Morality is located in instinct and the rest is despised. Besides this there are few points of honour.)

Our attitude to politics is more natural: we see problems of power, of the quantum of power, against another quantum. We do not believe in a right that does not proceed from a power which is able to uphold it. We regard all rights as conquests.

Our valuation of great men and things is more natural: we regard passion as a privilege; we can conceive of nothing great which does not involve a great crime; all greatness is associated in our minds with a certain standing-beyond-the-pale in morality.

Our attitude to Nature is more natural: we no longer love her for her "innocence," her "reason," her "beauty," we have made her beautifully devilish and "foolish." But instead of despising her on that account, since then we have felt more closely related to her and more familiar in her presence. She does not aspire to virtue: we therefore respect her.

Our attitude towards Art is more natural: we do not exact beautiful, empty lies, etc., from her; brutal positivism reigns supreme, and it ascertains things with perfect calm.

In short: there are signs showing that the European of the nineteenth century is less ashamed of his instincts; he has gone a long way towards acknowledging his unconditional naturalness and immorality, without bitterness: on the contrary, he is strong enough to endure this point of view alone.

To some ears this will sound as though corruption had made strides: and certain it is that man has not drawn nearer to the "Nature" which Rousseau speaks about, but has gone one step farther in the civilisation before which Rousseau stood in horror. We have grown stronger, we have drawn nearer to the seventeenth century, more particularly to the taste which reigned towards its close (Dancourt, Le Sage, Renard).

121.

Culture versus Civilisation.—The culminating stages of culture and civilisation lie apart: one must not be led astray as regards the fundamental antagonism existing between culture and civilisation. From the moral standpoint, great periods in the history of culture have always been periods of corruption; while on the other hand, those periods in which man was deliberately and compulsorily tamed ("civilisation") have always been periods of intolerance towards the most intellectual and most audacious natures. Civilisation desires something different from what culture strives after: their aims may perhaps be opposed....

122.

What I warn people against: confounding the instincts of decadence with those of humanity;

Confounding the dissolving means of civilisation and those which necessarily promote decadence, with culture;

Confounding debauchery, and the principle, "laisser aller," with the Will to Power (the latter is the exact reverse of the former).

123.

The unsolved problems which I set anew: the problem of civilisation, the struggle between Rousseau and Voltaire about the year 1760. Man becomes deeper, more mistrustful, more "immoral," stronger, more self-confident—and therefore "more natural"; that is "progress." In this way, by a process of division of labour, the more evil strata and the milder and tamer strata of society get separated: so that the general facts are not visible at first sight.... It is a sign of strength, and of the self-control and fascination of the strong, that these stronger strata possess the arts in order to make their greater powers for evil felt as something "higher" As soon as there is "progress" there is a transvaluation of the strengthened factors into the "good."

124.

Man must have the courage of his natural instincts restored to him.—

The poor opinion he has of himself must be destroyed (not in the sense of the individual, but in the sense of the natural man ...)—

The contradictions in things must be eradicated, after it has been well understood that we were responsible for them—

Social idiosyncrasies must be stamped out of existence (guilt, punishment, justice, honesty, freedom, love, etc. etc.)—

An advance towards "naturalness": in all political questions, even in the relations between parties, even in merchants', workmen's, or contractors' parties, only questions of power come into play:— "what one can do" is the first question, what one ought to do is only a secondary consideration.

125.

Socialism—or the tyranny of the meanest and the most brainless,—that is to say, the superficial, the envious, and the mummers, brought to its zenith,—is, as a matter, of fact, the logical conclusion of "modern ideas" and their latent anarchy: but in the genial atmosphere of democratic well-being the capacity for forming resolutions or even for coming to an end at all, is paralysed. Men follow—but no longer their reason. That is why socialism is on the whole a hopelessly bitter affair: and there is nothing more amusing than to observe the discord between the poisonous and desperate faces of present-day socialists—and what wretched and nonsensical feelings does not their style reveal to us!—and the childish lamblike happiness of their hopes and desires. Nevertheless, in many places in Europe, there may be violent hand-to-hand struggles and irruptions on their account: the coming century is likely to be convulsed in more than one spot, and the Paris Commune, which finds defenders and advocates even in Germany, will seem to have been but a slight indigestion compared with what is to come. Be this as it may, there will always be too many people of property for socialism ever to signify anything more than an attack of illness: and these people of property are like one man with one faith, "one must possess something in order to be some one." This, however, is the oldest and most wholesome of all instincts; I should add: "one must desire more than one has in order to become more." For this is the teaching which life itself preaches to all living things: the morality of Development. To have and to wish to have more, in a word, Growth—that is life itself. In the teaching of socialism "a will to the denial of life" is but poorly concealed: botched men and races they must be who have devised a teaching of this sort. In fact, I even wish a few experiments might be made to show that in a socialistic society, life denies itself, and itself cuts away its own roots. The earth is big enough and man is still unexhausted enough for a practical lesson of this sort and demonstratio ad absurdum—even if it were accomplished only by a vast expenditure of lives—to seem worth while to me. Still, Socialism, like a restless mole beneath the foundations of a society wallowing in stupidity, will be able to achieve something useful and salutary: it delays "Peace on Earth" and the whole process of character-softening of the democratic herding animal; it forces the European to have an extra supply of intellect,—that is to say, craft and caution, and prevents his entirely abandoning the manly and warlike qualities,—it also saves Europe awhile from the marasmus femininus which is threatening it.

126.

The most favourable obstacles and remedies of modernity:

(1) Compulsory military service with real wars in which all joking is laid aside.

(2) National thick-headedness (which simplifies and concentrates).

(3) Improved nutrition (meat).

(4) Increasing cleanliness and wholesomeness in the home.

(5) The predominance of physiology over theology, morality, economics, and politics.

(6) Military discipline in the exaction and the practice of one's "duty" (it is no longer customary to praise).

127.

I am delighted at the military development of Europe, also at the inner anarchical conditions: the period of quietude and "Chinadom" which Galiani prophesied for this century is now over. Personal and manly capacity, bodily capacity recovers its value, valuations are becoming more physical, nutrition consists ever more and more of flesh. Fine men have once more become possible. Bloodless sneaks (with mandarins at their head, as Comte imagined them) are now a matter of the past. The savage in every one of us is acknowledged, even the wild animal. Precisely on that account, philosophers will have a better chance. —Kant is a scarecrow!

128.

I have not yet seen any reasons to feel discouraged. He who acquires and preserves a strong will, together with a broad mind, has a more favourable chance now than ever he had. For the plasticity of man has become exceedingly great in democratic Europe: men who learn easily, who readily adapt themselves, are the rule: the gregarious animal of a high order of intelligence is prepared. He who would command finds those who must obey: I have Napoleon and Bismarck in mind, for instance. The struggle against strong and unintelligent wills, which forms the surest obstacle in one's way, is really insignificant Who would not be able to knock down these "objective" gentlemen with weak wills, such as Ranke and Renan!

129.

Spiritual enlightenment is an unfailing means of making men uncertain, weak of will, and needful of succour and support; in short, of developing the herding instincts in them. That is why all great artist-rulers, hitherto (Confucius in China, the Roman Empire, Napoleon, Popedom—at a time when they had the courage of their worldliness and frankly pursued power) in whom the ruling instincts, that had prevailed until their time, culminated, also made use of the spiritual enlightenment—or at least allowed it to be supreme (after the style of the Popes of the Renaissance). The self-deception of the masses on this point, in every democracy for instance, is of the greatest possible value: all that makes men smaller and more amenable is pursued under the title "progress."

130.

The highest equity and mildness as a condition of weakness (the New Testament and the early Christian community—manifesting itself in the form of utter foolishness in the Englishmen, Darwin and Wallace). Your equity, ye higher men, drives you to universal suffrage, etc.; your "humanity" urges you to be milder towards crime and stupidity. In the end you will thus help stupidity and harmlessness to conquer.

Outwardly: Ages of terrible wars, insurrections, explosions. Inwardly: ever more and more weakness among men; events take the form of excitants. The Parisian as the type of the European extreme.

Consequences: (1) Savages (at first, of course, in conformity with the culture that has reigned hitherto); (2) Sovereign individuals (where powerful barbarous masses and emancipation from all that has been, are crossed). The age of greatest stupidity, brutality, and wretchedness in the masses, and in the highest individuals.

131.

An incalculable number of higher individuals now perish: but he who escapes their fate is as strong as the devil. In this respect we are reminded of the conditions which prevailed in the Renaissance.

132.

How are Good Europeans such as ourselves distinguished from the patriots? In the first place, we are atheists and immoralists, but we take care to support the religions and the morality which we associate with the gregarious instinct: for by means of them, an order of men is, so to speak, being prepared, which must at some time or other fall into our hands, which must actually crave for our hands.

Beyond Good and Evil,—certainly; but we insist upon the unconditional and strict preservation of herd-morality.

We reserve ourselves the right to several kinds of philosophy which it is necessary to learn: under certain circumstances, the pessimistic kind as a hammer; a European Buddhism might perhaps be indispensable.

We should probably support the development and the maturation of democratic tendencies; for it conduces to weakness of will: in "Socialism" we recognise a thorn which prevents smug ease.

Attitude towards the people.. Our prejudices; we pay attention to the results of cross-breeding.

Detached, well-to-do, strong: irony concerning the "press" and its culture. Our care: that scientific men should not become journalists. We mistrust any form of culture that tolerates news-paper reading or writing.

We make our accidental positions (as Goethe and Stendhal did), our experiences, a foreground, and we lay stress upon them, so that we may deceive concerning our backgrounds. We ourselves wait and avoid putting our heart into them. They serve us as refuges, such as a wanderer might require and use—but we avoid feeling at home in them. We are ahead of our fellows in that we have had a disciplina voluntatis. All strength is directed to the development of the will, an art which allows us to wear masks, an art of understanding beyond the passions (also "super-European" thought at times).

This is our preparation before becoming the law-givers of the future and the lords of the earth; if not we, at least our children. Caution where marriage is concerned.

133.

The twentieth century.—The Abbé Galiani says somewhere: "La prévoyance est la cause des guerres actuelles de l'Europe. Si l'on voulait se donner la peine de ne rien prévoir, tout le monde serait tranquille, et je ne crois pas qu'on serait plus malheureux parce qu'on ne ferait pas la guerre." As I in no way share the unwarlike views of my deceased friend Galiani, I have no fear whatever of saying something beforehand with the view of conjuring in some way the cause of wars.

A condition of excessive consciousness, after the worst of earthquakes: with new questions.

134.

It is the time of the great noon, of the most appalling enlightenment: my particular kind of Pessimism: the great starting-point.

(1) Fundamental contradiction between civilisation and the elevation of man.

(2) Moral valuations regarded as a history of lies and the art of calumny in the service of the Will to Power (of the will of the herd, which rises against stronger men).

(3) The conditions which determine every elevation in culture (the facilitation of a selection being made at the cost of a crowd) are the conditions of all growth.

(4). The multiformity of the world as a question of strength, which sees all things in the perspective of their growth. The moral Christian values to be regarded as the insurrection and mendacity of slaves (in comparison with the aristocratic values of the ancient world).

5. Thekla is the sentimental heroine in Schiller's Wallenstein.—TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.

6. This is a reference to Wagner's Parsifal. The character as is well known, is written to represent a son of heart's affliction, and a child of wisdom—humble, guileless, loving, pure, and a fool.—TRANSLATOR'S NOTE.