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On the other hand, we believe that a certain[Pg 148] conformity of means to ends rules over the very smallest phenomenon, which it is quite beyond our deepest science to understand; a sort of cautiousness, selectiveness, co-ordination, and repairing process, etc. In short, we are in the presence of an activity to which it would be necessary to ascribe an incalculably higher and more extensive intellect than the one we are acquainted with. We learn to think less of all that is conscious: we unlearn the habit of making ourselves responsible for ourselves, because, as conscious beings fixing purposes, we are but the smallest part of ourselves.
Of the numerous influences taking effect every second, for instance, air, electricity, we feel scarcely anything at all. There might be a number of forces, which, though they never make themselves felt by us, yet influence us continually. Pleasure and pain are very rare and scanty phenomena, compared with the countless stimuli with which a cell or an organ operates upon another cell or organ.
It is the phase of the modesty of consciousness. Finally, we can grasp the conscious ego itself, merely as an instrument in the service of that higher and more extensive intellect: and then we may ask whether all conscious willing, all conscious purposes, all valuations, are not perhaps only means by virtue of which something essentially different is attained, from that which consciousness supposes. We mean: it is a question of our pleasure and pain but pleasure and pain might be the means whereby we had something to do which lies outside our consciousness.
This is to show how very superficial all conscious phenomena really are; how an action and the image of it differ; how little we know about what precedes an action; how fantastic our feelings, "freewill," and "cause and effect" are; how thoughts and images, just like words, are only signs of thoughts; the impossibility of finding the grounds of any action; the superficiality of all praise and blame; how essentially our conscious life is composed of fancies and illusion; how all our words merely stand for fancies (our emotions too), and how the union of mankind depends upon the transmission and continuation of these fancies: whereas, at bottom, the real union of mankind by means of procreation pursues its unknown way. Does this belief in the common fancies of men really alter mankind? Or is the whole body of ideas and valuations only an expression in itself of unknown changes? Are there really such things as will, purposes, thoughts, values? Is the whole of conscious life perhaps no more than mirage? Even when values seem to determine the actions of a man, they are, as a matter of fact, doing something quite different! In short, granting that a certain conformity of means to end might be demonstrated in the action of nature, without the assumption of a ruling ego: could not our notion of purposes, and our will, etc., be only a symbolic language standing for something quite different—that is to say, something not-willing and unconscious? only the thinnest semblance of that natural conformity of means to end in the organic world, but not in any way different therefrom?
Briefly, perhaps the whole of mental development is a matter of the body: it is the consciously recorded history of the fact that a higher body is forming. The organic ascends to higher regions. Our longing to know Nature is a means by virtue of which the body would reach perfection. Or, better still, hundreds of thousands of experiments are made to alter the nourishment and the mode of living of the body: the body's consciousness and valuations, its kinds of pleasure and pain, are signs of these changes and experiments. In the end, it is not a question concerning man; for he must be surpassed.
677.
To what Extent are all Interpretations of the World Symptoms of a Ruling Instinct.
The artistic contemplation of the world: to sit before the world and to survey it. But here the analysis of sthetical contemplation, its reduction to cruelty, its feeling of security, its judicial and detached attitude, etc., are lacking. The artist himself must be taken, together with his psychology (the criticism of the instinct of play, as a discharge of energy, the love of change, the love of bringing one's soul in touch with strange things, the absolute egoism of the artist, etc.). What instincts does he sublimate?
The scientific contemplation of the world: a criticism of the psychological longing for science, the desire to make everything comprehensible; the desire to make everything practical, useful, capable of being exploited—to what extent this is[Pg 151] anti-sthetic. Only that value counts, which may be reckoned in figures. How it happens that a mediocre type of man preponderates under the influence of science. It would be terrible if even history were to be taken possession of in this way—the realm of the superior, of the judicial. What instincts are here sublimated!
The religious contemplation of the world: a criticism of the religious man. It is not necessary to take the moral man as the type, but the man who has extreme feelings of exaltation and of deep depression, and who interprets the former with thankfulness or suspicion without, however, seeking their origin in himself (nor the latter either). The man who essentially feels anything but free, who sublimates his conditions and states of submission.
The moral contemplation of the world. The feelings peculiar to certain social ranks are projected into the universe: stability, law, the making of things orderly, and the making of things alike, are sought in the highest spheres, because they are valued most highly,—above everything or behind everything.
What is common to all: the ruling instincts wish to be regarded as the highest values in general, even as the creative and ruling powers. It is understood that these instincts either oppose or overcome each other (join up synthetically, or alternate in power). Their profound antagonism is, however, so great, that in those cases in which they all insist upon being gratified, a man of very thorough mediocrity is the outcome.
678.
It is a question whether the origin of our apparent "knowledge" is not also a mere offshoot of our older valuations, which are so completely assimilated that they belong to the very basis of our nature. In this way only the more recent needs engage in battle with results of the oldest needs.
The world is seen, felt, and interpreted thus and thus, in order that organic life may be preserved with this particular manner of interpretation. Man is not only an individual, but the continuation of collective organic life in one definite line. The fact that man survives, proves that a certain species of interpretations (even though it still be added to) has also survived; that, as a system, this method of interpreting has not changed. "Adaptation."
Our "dissatisfaction," our "ideal," etc., may possibly be the result of this incorporated piece of interpretation, of our particular point of view: the organic world may ultimately perish owing to it just as the division of labour in organisms may be the means of bringing about the ruin of the whole, if one part happen to wither or weaken. The destruction of organic life, and even of the highest form thereof, must follow the same principles as the destruction of the individual.
