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Uglification: self-derision, dialectical dryness, intelligence in the form of a tyrant against the "tyrant" (instinct). Everything in Socrates is exaggeration, eccentricity, caricature; he is a buffoon with the blood of Voltaire in his veins. [Pg 354] He discovers a new form of agon; he is the first fencing-master in the superior classed of Athens; he stands for nothing else than the highest form of cleverness: he calls it "virtue" (he regarded it as a means of salvation; he did not choose to be clever, cleverness was de rigueur); the proper thing is to control one's self in suchwise that one enters into a struggle not with passions but with reasons as one's weapons (Spinoza's stratagem—the unravelment of the errors of passion);—it is desirable to discover how every one may be caught once he is goaded into a passion, and to know how illogically passion proceeds; self-mockery is practised in order to injure the very roots of the feelings of resentment.
It is my wish to understand which idiosyncratic states form a part of the Socratic problem: its association of reason, virtue, and happiness. With this absurd doctrine of the identity of these things it succeeded in charming the world: ancient philosophy could not rid itself of this doctrine....
Absolute lack of objective interest: hatred of science: the idiosyncrasy of considering one's self a problem. Acoustic hallucinations in Socrates: morbid element. When the intellect is rich and independent, it most strongly resists preoccupying itself with morality. How is it that Socrates is a moral-maniac?—Every "practical" philosophy immediately steps into the foreground in times of distress. When morality and religion become the chief interests of a community, they are signs of a state of distress.
433.
Intelligence, clearness, hardness, and logic as weapons against the wildness of the instincts. The latter must be dangerous and must threaten ruin, otherwise no purpose can be served by developing intelligence to this degree of tyranny. In order to make a tyrant of intelligence the instincts must first have proved themselves tyrants. This is the problem. It was a very timely one in those days. Reason became virtue—virtue equalled happiness.
Solution: Greek philosophers stand upon the same fundamental fact of their inner experiences as Socrates does; five feet from excess, from anarchy and from dissolution—all decadent men. They regard him as a doctor: Logic as will to power, as will to control self, as will to "happiness." The wildness and anarchy of Socrates' instincts is a sign of decadence, as is also the superftation of logic and clear reasoning in him. Both are abnormities, each belongs to the other. Criticism. Decadence reveals itself in this concern about "happiness" (i.e. about the "salvation of the soul"; i.e. to feel that one's condition is a danger). Its fanatical interest in "happiness" shows the pathological condition of the subconscious self: it was a vital interest. The alternative which faced them all was: to be reasonable or to perish. The morality of Greek philosophers shows that they felt they were in danger.
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Why everything resolved itself into mummery.—Rudimentary psychology, which only considered the conscious lapses of men (as causes), which regarded "consciousness" as an attribute of the soul, and which sought a will behind every action (i.e. an intention), could only answer "Happiness" to the question: "What does man desire?" (it was impossible to answer "Power," because that would have been immoral);—consequently behind all men's actions there is the intention of attaining to happiness by means of them. Secondly: if man as a matter of fact does not attain to happiness, why is it? Because he mistakes the means thereto.—What is the unfailing means of acquiring happiness? Answer: virtue.—Why virtue? Because virtue is supreme rationalness, and rationalness makes mistakes in the choice of means impossible: virtue in the form of reason is the way to happiness. Dialectics is the constant occupation of virtue, because it does away with passion and intellectual cloudiness.
As a matter of fact, man does not desire "happiness." Pleasure is a sensation of power: if the passions are excluded, those states of the mind are also excluded which afford the greatest sensation of power and therefore of pleasure. The highest rationalism is a state of cool clearness, which is very far from being able to bring about that feeling of power which every kind of exaltation involves....
The ancient philosophers combat everything [Pg 357]that intoxicates and exalts—everything that impairs the perfect coolness and impartiality of the mind.... They were consistent with their first false principle: that consciousness was the highest, the supreme state of mind, the prerequisite of perfection—whereas the reverse is true....
Any kind of action is imperfect in proportion as it has been willed or conscious. The philosophers of antiquity were the greatest duffers in practice, "because they condemned themselves" theoretically to dufferdom,.... In practice everything resolved itself into theatricalness: and he who saw through it, as Pyrrho did, for instance, thought as everybody did—that is to say, that in goodness and uprightness "paltry people" were far superior to philosophers.
All the deeper natures of antiquity were disgusted at the philosophers of virtue; all people saw in them was brawlers and actors. (This was the judgment passed on Plato by Epicurus and Pyrrho.)
Result: In practical life, in patience, goodness, and mutual assistance, paltry people were above them:—this is something like the judgment Dostoiewsky or Tolstoy claims for his muzhiks: they are more philosophical in practice, they are more courageous in their way of dealing with the exigencies of life....
435.
A criticism of the philosopher.—Philosophers and moralists merely deceive themselves when they [Pg 358]imagine that they escape from decadence by opposing it. That lies beyond their wills: and however little they may be aware of the fact, it is generally discovered, subsequently that they were among the most powerful promoters of decadence.
Let us examine the philosophers of Greece—Plato, for instance. He it was who separated the instincts from the polis, from the love of contest, from military efficiency, from art, beauty, the mysteries, and the belief in tradition and in ancestors.... He was the seducer of the nobles: he himself seduces through the roturier Socrates.... He denied all the first principles of the "noble Greek" of sterling worth; he made dialectics an everyday practice, conspired with the tyrants, dabbled in politics for the future, and was the example of a man whose instincts were the example of a man whose instincts were most perfectly separated from tradition. He is profound and passionate in everything that is anti-Hellenic....
One after the other, these great philosophers represent the typical forms of decadence: the moral and religious idiosyncrasy, anarchy, nihilism, (), cynicism, hardening principles, hedonism, and reaction.
The question of "happiness," of "virtue," and of the "salvation of the soul," is the expression of physiological contradictoriness in these declining natures: their instincts lack all balance and purpose.
