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387.
The whole idea of the hierarchy of the passions: as if the only right and normal thing were to be led by reason—whereas the passions are abnormal, dangerous, half-animal, and moreover, in so far as their end is concerned, nothing more than desires for pleasure....
Passion is deprived of its dignity (1) as if it only manifested itself in an unseemly way and were not necessary and always the motive force, [Pg 309](2) inasmuch as it is supposed to aim at no high purpose—merely at pleasure....
The misinterpretation of passion and reason, as if the latter were an independent entity, and not a state of relationship between all the various passions and desires; and as though every passion did not possess its quantum of reason....
388.
How it was that, under the pressure of the dominion of an ascetic and self-effacing morality, it was precisely the passions—love, goodness, pity, even justice, generosity, and heroism, which were necessarily misunderstood?
It is the richness of a personality, the fullness of it, its power to flow over and to bestow, its instinctive feeling of ease, and its affirmative attitude towards itself, that creates great love and great sacrifices: these passions proceed from strong and godlike personalism as surely as do the desire to be master, to obtrude, and the inner certainty that one has a right to everything. The opposite views, according to the most accepted notions, are indeed common views; and if one does not stand firmly and bravely on one's legs, one has nothing to give, and it is perfectly useless to stretch out one's hand either to protect or to support others....
How was it possible to transform these instincts to such an extent that man could feel that to be of value which is directed against himself, so that he could sacrifice himself for another self! O the [Pg 310] psychological baseness and falseness which hitherto has laid down the law in the Church and in Church-infected philosophy!
If man is thoroughly sinful, then all he can do is to hate himself. As a matter of fact, he ought not to regard even his fellows otherwise than he does himself; the love of man requires a justification, and it is found in the fact that God commanded it.—From this it follows that all the natural instincts of man (to love, etc.) appear to him to be, in themselves, prohibited; and that he re-acquires a right to them only after having denied them as an obedient worshipper of God. ... Pascal, the admirable logician of Christianity, went as far as this! let any one examine his relations to his sister. "Not to make one's self loved," seemed Christian to him.
389.
Let us consider how dearly a moral canon such as this ("an ideal") makes us pay. (Its enemies are—well? The "egoists.")
The melancholy astuteness of self-abasement in Europe (Pascal, La Rochefoucauld)—inner enfeeblement, discouragement, and self-consumption of the non-gregarious man.
The perpetual process of laying stress upon mediocre qualities as being the most valuable (modesty in rank and file, Nature converted into an instrument).
Pangs of conscience associated with all that [Pg 311]is self-glorifying and original: thus follows the unhappiness—the gloominess of the world from the standpoint of stronger and better-constituted men!
Gregarious consciousness and timorousness transferred to philosophy and religion.
Let us leave the psychological impossibility of a purely unselfish action out of consideration!
390.
My ultimate conclusion is, that the real man represents a much higher value than the "desirable" man of any ideal that has ever existed hitherto; that all "desiderata" in regard to mankind have been absurd and dangerous dissipations by means of which a particular kind of man has sought to establish his measures of preservation and of growth as a law for all; that every "desideratum" of this kind which has been made to dominate has reduced man's worth, his strength, and his trust in the future; that the indigence and mediocre intellectuality of man becomes most apparent, even to-day, when he reveals a desire; that man's ability to fix values has hitherto been developed too inadequately to do justice to the actual, not merely to the "desirable," worth of man; that, up to the present, ideals have really been the power which has most slandered man and power, the poisonous fumes which have hung over reality, and which have seduced men to yearn for nonentity....
D. A Criticism of the Words: Improving, Perfecting, Elevating.
391.
The standard according to which the value of moral valuations is to be determined.
The fundamental fact that has been overlooked: The contradiction between "becoming more moral" and the elevation and the strengthening of the type man.
Homo natura: The "will to power."
392.
Moral values regarded as values of appearance and compared with physiological values.
393.
Reflecting upon generalities is always retrograde: the last of the "desiderata" concerning men, for instance, have never been regarded as problems by philosophers. They always postulate the "improvement" of man, quite guilelessly, as though by means of some intuition they had been helped over the note of interrogation following the question, why necessarily "improve!" To what extent is it desirable that man should be more virtuous, or more intelligent, or happier! Granting that nobody yet knows the "wherefore?" of mankind, all such desiderata have no sense whatever; and if one aspires to one of them[Pg 313]—who knows?—perhaps one is frustrating the other. Is an increase of virtue compatible with an increase of intelligence and insight? Dubito: only too often shall I have occasion to show that the reverse is true. Has virtue, as an end, in the strict sense of the word, not always been opposed to happiness hitherto? And again, does it not require misfortune, abstinence, and self-castigation as a necessary means? And if the aim were to arrive at the highest insight, would it not therefore be necessary to renounce all hope of an increase in happiness, and to choose danger, adventure, mistrust, and seduction as a road to enlightenment?... And suppose one will have happiness; maybe one should join the ranks of the "poor in spirit."
394.
The wholesale deception and fraud of so-called moral improvement.
We do not believe that one man can be another if he is not that other already—that is to say, if he is not, as often happens, an accretion of personalities or at least of parts of persons. In this case it is possible to draw another set of actions from him into the foreground, and to drive back "the older man." ... The man's aspect is altered, but not his actual nature.... It is but the merest factum brutum that any one should cease from performing certain actions, and the fact allows of the most varied interpretations. Neither does it always follow therefrom that the habit of performing a certain action is entirely arrested, [Pg 314]nor that the reasons for that action are dissipated. He whose destiny and abilities make him a criminal never unlearns anything, but is continually adding to his store of knowledge: and long abstinence acts as a sort of tonic on his talent.... Certainly, as far as society is concerned, the only interesting fact is that some one has ceased from performing certain actions; and to this end society will often raise a man out of those circumstances which make him able to perform those actions: this is obviously a wiser course than that of trying to break his destiny and his particular nature. The Church,—which has done nothing except to take the place of, and to appropriate, the philosophic treasures of antiquity,—starting out from another standpoint and wishing to secure a "soul" or the "salvation" of a soul, believes in the expiatory power of punishment, as also in the obliterating power of forgiveness: both of which supposed processes are deceptions due to religious prejudice—punishment expiates nothing, forgiveness obliterates nothing; what is done cannot be undone. Because some one forgets something it by no means proves that something has been wiped out.... An action leads to certain consequences, both among men and away from men, and it matters not whether it has met with punishment, or whether it has been "expiated," "forgiven," or "obliterated," it matters not even if the Church meanwhile canonises the man who performed it. The Church believes in things that do not exist, it believes in "Souls"; it believes in "influences" that do not exist—in divine [Pg 315]influences; it believes in states that do not exist, in sin, redemption, and spiritual salvation: in all things it stops at the surface and is satisfied with signs, attitudes, words, to which it lends an arbitrary interpretation. It possesses a method of counterfeit psychology which is thought out quite systematically.
