own time the points of support for a higher culture. For a moment he
thinks he has found them; he has deceived himself, and turns away,
for these supports impose a narrowness of direction which his mind
cannot tolerate. "There is this that is extraordinary in the life of a
thinker," he wrote in 1875--the age of the text proves the permanence
of the conflict--" that two contrary inclinations oblige him to follow,
at the same moment, two different directions and hold him under their
yokes; on the one hand he wishes to know and, abandoning without
weariness the firm ground which sustains the life of men, he adventures
into unknown regions; on the other hand he wishes to live, and, without
ever wearying, he seeks a place in which to five...." Nietzsche had
abandoned Wagner, wandered in uncertain regions. He seeks a final
security; what does he find? The narrow refuge of nationalism. He
withdraws from it: it may be a vulgar recourse, a useful artifice for
maintaining some solidity in the crowds, a certain principle of taste
and of severity; it may not be, it must not be, the doctrine of the
European élite, a scattered and, no doubt, non-existent élite to whom
his thoughts are addressed.
Nietzsche put the idea of nationalism out of his mind; it was the
expedient of a weak century. He ceased to devote himself to his
search. What mattered to him the beliefs which should be beneficent to
the humble? He thought of Napoleon and of Goethe, both of whom rose
superior to their times, and to the prejudices of their countries.
Napoleon was contemptuous of the Revolution, but artfully turned its
energy to advantage; he despised France, but ruled her. Goethe held
Germany in poor esteem and took little interest in her struggles: he
wished to possess and reanimate all the ideas, all the dreams of men,
to conserve and enrich the vast heritage of moral riches which Europe
had created. Napoleon knew the grandeur of Goethe, and Goethe joyfully
observed the life of the conqueror, _ens realissimum._ The soldier,
the poet, the one who kept men in submission and silence, held them
to effort, the other who watched, meditated, and glorified, such is
the ideal couple that reappear at every decisive instant in Friedrich
Nietzsche's life. He had admired the Greece of Theognis and Pindar,
the Germany of Bismarck and Wagner; a long winding course led him
back towards his dream, towards that unrealised Europe of strength
and beauty of which Goethe and Napoleon were, upon the morrow of the
Revolution, the solitary representatives.
* * * * *
We can tell, from a letter addressed to Peter Gast (February 13, 1887),
that Nietzsche was at this date by no means satisfied with his work. "I
am still in the tentative, the introductory, the expectant stage ..."
he wrote, and he added: "The first rough draft of my _Essay towards a
Transvaluation_ is ready; it has been, on the whole, a torture, and
I have no longer the courage to think of it. In ten years I shall do
better." What was the cause of this dissatisfaction? Was he weary of
that tolerance, that condescension to the needs of the feeble and of
the crowd which he had imposed on himself for three months? Was he
impatient to express his anger?
The letters which he then addressed to his mother and sister let
us approach him in a more intimate manner. (They have not all been
published.) He wrote to these two women from whom he was separated with
a tenderness which rendered difficult dissimulation and even courage
itself. He let himself go, as though it pleased him to find himself at
their knees a child again. He was gentle, obedient with his mother;
he signed himself humbly: _ta vieille créature._ With his sister he
talked like a comrade; he seemed to have forgotten all the grievances
he had had against her in other times; he knew that she would never
return from far-off Paraguay: he regretted her, he loved her because
she was lost. She is energetic, is Lisbeth, and valiantly risks her
life. Nietzsche admired in her the virtues which he esteemed above
all virtues, and which are, he thinks, the virtues of his race, the
noble race of the Counts Nietzki. "How strongly I feel," he wrote her,
"in all you do and say, that the same blood runs in our veins." He
hearkened to her, but she did not cease to offer him overwise advice.
As he complains of being alone, why does he not get made a professor,
why does he not marry? Nietzsche answered too easily: "Where would I
find a wife? and if by chance I did find one, would I have the right to
ask her to share my life?" He knew nevertheless, and said so, that a
wife would be sweet to him.
"NICE, _January_ 25, 1888. "I must relate a little adventure to you:
yesterday, as I was taking my usual walk, I heard, not far off, a warm
and frank laugh (I thought that I heard your laugh); and when this
laughing person came near me--I saw a very charming girl, with brown
eyes, delicate as a deer. The sight warmed my heart, my old solitary
philosopher's heart--I thought of your matrimonial advice, and for the
rest of my walk, I could not rid myself of the image of this young and
gracious girl. Assuredly it would do me good to have so gracious a
thing by me--but would it do her good? Would not I, with my ideas, make
this girl unhappy? And would not my heart break (we assume that I love
her) if I saw so amiable a creature suffering? No, no marriage!"
Was it not now that a singular and unwholesome idea fixed itself in his
thought? At every moment he was picturing to himself the joys of which
he was deprived: fame, love, and friendship; he thought rancourously
of those who possessed them, and above all of Richard Wagner, whose
genius had been always so sumptuously rewarded. How beautiful she had
been, when he knew her at Triebschen, this incomparable woman Cosima
Lizst, come, while yet married, to the scandal of the world, to live
with Wagner and help in his work! Attentive and clear-minded, active
and helpful, she assured him the security which he had hitherto lacked.
Without her, what would have become of him? Could he have mastered his
impatient, restless, excitable temperament? would he have been capable
of realising those great works which he was for ever announcing? Cosima
appeased him, directed him; thanks to her, he achieved the Tetralogy,
he reared Bayreuth, he wrote _Parsifal...._ Nietzsche recalled those
fine days at Triebschen. Cosima welcomed him, listened to his ideas and
projects, read his manuscripts, was benevolent, talked brightly to him.
Suffering and irritation deformed his memories; he became infatuated
with the thought that he had loved Cosima Wagner and that she, perhaps,
had loved him. Nietzsche wished to believe this, and came to believe
it. Yes, there had been love between them, and Cosima would have saved
him, as she saved Wagner, if, by lucky chance, she had only known him
a few years earlier. But every circumstance had been unfavourable to
Nietzsche. Here again Wagner had robbed him. He had taken all, fame,
love, friendship.
We can divine this strange romance in the last works of Friedrich
Nietzsche. A Greek myth helps him to express and veil his thoughts; it
is the myth of Ariadne, Theseus, and Bacchus. Theseus was lost; Ariadne
has met him and led him to the exit from the labyrinth; but Theseus is
treacherous: he abandons upon the rock the woman who has saved him;
Ariadne would die alone and in despair if Bacchus did not intervene,
Bacchus-Dionysios who loves her. The enigma of these three names may
be solved: Ariadne is Cosima; Theseus, Wagner; Bacchus-Dionysios,
Nietzsche.
On the 31st of March he wrote again, and his language was that of a
lost soul.
"Night and day, I am in a state of unbearable tension and oppression,
by reason of the duty imposed upon me and also on account of my
conditions of life, which are absolutely opposed to the accomplishment
of this duty; here no doubt the cause of my distress must be sought.
"... My health, thanks to an extraordinarily fine winter, to good
nourishment, to long walks, has remained sufficiently good. Nothing is
sick, but the poor soul. Besides, I will not conceal the fact that my
winter has been very rich in spiritual acquisitions for my great work:
so the mind is not sick; nothing is sick, but the poor soul."
Nietzsche left Nice next day. He wished, before going up to the
Engadine, to make the experiment of a stay in Turin. Its dry air and
spacious streets had been praised in his hearing. He travelled with
difficulty; he lost his luggage and his temper, quarrelled with the
porters, and remained for two days ill at Sampiedarena, near Genoa;
in Genoa itself, he spent three days of rest, fully occupied with the
happy memories which he found again. "I thank my luck," he wrote to
Peter Gast, "that it led me back to this town, where the will rises,
where one cannot be cowardly. I have never felt more gratitude than
during this pilgrimage to Genoa...." On Saturday, April 6th, he arrived
at Turin, broken with fatigue. "I am no longer capable of travelling
alone," he said to Peter Gast in the same letter. "It agitates me too
much, everything affects me stupidly."
III
_Towards the Darkness_
Here we should discontinue our story to forewarn the reader. Hitherto,
we have been following the history of Nietzsche's thought. Nietzsche's
thought has now no longer a history, for an influence, come not from
the mind, but from the body, has affected it. People sometimes say that
Nietzsche was mad long before this. It may be that they are right; it
is impossible to reach an assured diagnosis. At least he had retained
his power of reflection, his will. He could still hold himself and his
judgments in check. In the spring of 1888 he lost this faculty. His
intelligence is not yet darkened; there is not a word he writes but is
penetrating and trenchant. His lucidity is extreme, but disastrous,
since it exercises itself only to destroy. As one studies the last
months of this life, one feels as though one were watching the work of
some engine of war which is no longer governed by the hand of man.
Friedrich Nietzsche abandoned those moral researches which had
strengthened his work till now, enriched and elevated it. Let us recall
a letter addressed to Peter Gast in February, 1888: "I am in a state
of chronic irritability which allows me, in my better moments, a sort
of revenge, not the finest sort--it takes the form of an excess of
hardness." These words shed light on the three coming books: _The Case
of Wagner, The Twilight of the Idols, The Antichrist._
We shall hurry on with the story of those months in which Nietzsche is
no longer quite himself.
* * * * *
About the 7th of April he received an unexpected letter at Turin.
Georges Brandes wrote informing him of a projected series of
conferences which were to be devoted to his philosophy. "It annoys
me," wrote Brandes, "to think that no one knows you here, and I wish
to make you known all of a sudden." Nietzsche replied: "Truly, dear
sir, this is a surprise. Where did you get such courage that you can
speak in public of a _vir obscurissimus?.._. Perhaps you imagine that
I am known in my own country. They treat me as something singular and
absurd, which it is not at all necessary _to take seriously"_ He ended
by remarking, "The long resistance has exasperated my pride a little.
Am I a philosopher? What does it matter?"
The letter should have been an occasion of great joy; and, perhaps, had
it been possible to save him, the occasion of his salvation. Assuredly
he felt some happiness, but we scarcely discern it. The hour was late,
and Nietzsche now followed the tracks whither his destiny had drawn him.
During these days of weariness and tension, he procured a translation
of the _Laws of Manu,_ for he wished to become familiar with the
model of those hierarchic societies for whose renovation he hoped. He
read, and his expectations were not deceived; this, the last study
of his life, turned out to be one of the most important he had ever
undertaken. It delighted him to ecstasy--here was a code on which were
established the customs and the order of four castes, a language that
was beautiful, simple, human in its very severity, a constant nobleness
of thought. And the impression of security, of sweetness which detached
itself from the book as a whole! Here are some commandments from its
earlier pages:
"Before the cutting of the navel string, a ceremony is prescribed
at the birth of a male; he must be made, while sacred texts are
pronounced, to taste a little honey and clarified butter from a golden
dish.
"Let the father fulfil the ceremony of the giving of a name, on the
tenth or twelfth day after birth, on a propitious lunary day, at a
favourable moment, under a star of happy influence.
"Let the first name in the compound name of a Brahman express the
propitious favour; that of a Kshatriya, power; that of a Vaisya,
riches: that of a Sudra, abjection.
"Let the name of a girl be soft, clear, agreeable, propitious and
easily spoken, terminating in long vowels, and resembling words of
benediction."
Friedrich Nietzsche read and admired. He copied out many a passage,
recognising in the old Hindu text that _Goethean gaze, full of love and
of good will,_ hearing in its pages that _canto d' amore,_ which he had
himself wished to sing.
But if he admired, he also judged. That Hindu order had as basis a
mythology of which the priests who interpreted it were not the dupes.
"These sages," wrote Nietzsche, "do not believe in all this--or
they would not have found it...." The laws of Manu were clever and
beautiful lies. Necessarily so, since Nature is a chaos, a derision of
all thought and of all order, and whoever aspires to the foundation of
an order, must turn away from her and conceive an illusory world. Those
master builders, the Hindoo lawgivers, are masters also in the art of
lying. If Nietzsche were not careful, their genius would drag him into
the path of falsehoods.
Here was the instant of a crisis of which we know nothing but the
origin and the term. Nietzsche was alone at Turin, no one was by him
as he worked, he had no confidant. What was he thinking? Doubtless he
was studying, meditating continually over the old Aryan book which gave
him the model of his dreams, that book which was the finest monument of
æsthetic and social perfection, and, at the same time, of intellectual
knavery. How he must have loved and yet hated it! He mused, was amazed,
and suspended his work. Four years earlier a similar difficulty had
prevented him from completing his _Zarathustra._ It was no longer
a question of the _Superman,_ of an _Eternal Return._ These naïve
formulæ were abandoned, but the tendencies which they cloaked--the one,
lyrical, avid of construction and of order, even though illusory; the
other, avid of destruction and of lucidity--these unvarying tendencies
again exercised their influence at this point. Nietzsche hesitated:
should he finally listen to these Brahmins, these priests, these crafty
leaders of men. No; loyalty is the virtue upon which he can never
compound. Later perhaps, much later, when a few centuries are gone by,
humanity, more learned in the meaning of its life, in the origins and
values of its instincts, in the mechanism of heredities, may essay
new lawgivings. To-day it cannot: it would only add falsehoods and
hypocrisies to the old lies, the old hypocrisies, which already fetter
it. Nietzsche turned away from the thoughts which he had followed with
such energy for six months, and suddenly found himself exactly as he
had been in his thirtieth year, indifferent to all that was not in the
service of truth.
"All that is suspect and false must be brought into the light!" he had
then written. "We do not wish to build prematurely, we do not know that
we can build, and that it may not be better to build nothing. There are
pessimists who are cowardly and resigned--of those we do not wish to
be."
When he had thus expressed himself, Nietzsche still possessed strength
enough to consider calmly a labour made the easier by hope. But in ten
years he has lost his old force, his old calm, and all hope has left
him. His sick soul can no longer offer any resistance--irritability
overcomes it. He gives up the composition of his great work,
relinquishes it to write a pamphlet. By this circumstance our
conjectures are solved and, indeed, terminated.
The days of serenity have gone by. Wounded to the death, Nietzsche
wishes to return blow for blow. Richard Wagner is his mark, the false
apostle of _Parsifal,_ the illusionist who has seduced his period. If
he formerly served Wagner, now he will disserve him, out of passion
as out of a sense of duty. He thinks: "It is I who made Wagnerism;
it is I who must unmake it." He wishes to liberate, by means of a
violent attack, those of his contemporaries who, weaker than himself,
still submit to the prestige of this art. He wants to humiliate this
man whom he has loved, whom he still loves; he wishes to defame this
master who was the benefactor of his youth; in short, if we do not
mistake, he wishes to take vengeance on a lost happiness. So he insults
Wagner; calls him a decadent, a low comedian, a modern Cagliostro. This
indelicacy--an unheard-of thing in Nietzsche's life--suffices to prove
the presence of the evil.
No scruple haunted him. A happy excitement favoured and hastened on
his work. Alienists are familiar with those singular conditions which
precede the last crises of general paralysis, and Friedrich Nietzsche
seemed to abandon himself to an afflux of joy. He attributed the
benefit to the climate of Turin, which he was now trying.
"Turin, dear friend," wrote he to Peter Gast, "is a capital discovery.
I tell you with the idea at the back of my mind that you may perhaps
also profit from it. My humour is good, I work from morning to night--a
little pamphlet on music occupies my fingers--I digest like a demi-god,
I sleep in spite of the nocturnal noises of carriages: so many symptoms
of the eminent suitability of Turin to Nietzsche."
In July, in the Engadine, some damp and cold weeks did him a great
deal of harm. He lost his sleep. His happy excitement disappeared, or
transformed itself into bitter and febrile humours. It was then that
Fräulein von Salis-Marschlins, who has recounted her recollections in
an interesting brochure, saw him, after a separation of ten months.
She remarked the change in his condition; how he walked alone, his
hurried carriage, his sharp salute--he would stop scarcely or not at
all, in such a hurry was he to get back to his inn and put down the
thoughts which his walk had inspired in him. On the visits he paid her
he did not conceal his preoccupations. He was in dread of pecuniary
embarrassments: the capital which had constituted his little fortune
was almost gone; and could he, with the three thousand francs which
the University of Basle allowed him as a pension, provide for his
everyday needs and for the publication, always onerous, of his books?
It was in vain that he regulated his journeys and restricted himself
to the simplest lodgings and food. He was reaching the limits of his
resources.
_The Case of Wagner_ was completed; to the text, a preliminary
discourse, a postscript, a second postscript, and an epilogue were
added. He could not cease extending his work, and making it more
bitter. Nevertheless he was not satisfied, and felt, after having
written it, some remorse.
"I hope that this very _risqué_ pamphlet has pleased you," he wrote to
Peter Gast on the 11th of August, 1888. "That would be for me a comfort
by no means negligible. There are certain hours, above all, certain
evenings, when I do not feel enough courage in myself for so many
follies, for so much hardheartedness; I am in doubt over some passages.
Perhaps I went too far (not in the matter, but in my manner of
expressing the matter). Perhaps the note in which I speak of Wagner's
family origins could be suppressed."
A letter addressed about this time to Fräulein von Meysenbug gives food
for thought.
"I have given to men the most profound book," he writes; "one pays
dearly for that. The price of being immortal is sometimes life! ... And
always on my road that cretinism of Bayreuth! The old seducer Wagner,
dead though he be, continues to draw away from me just those few men
whom my influence might touch. But in Denmark--how absurd to think!--I
have been celebrated this winter. Dr. Georges Brandes, whose mind is
so full of vitality, has dared to talk about me before the University
of Copenhagen. And with brilliant success! Always more than three
hundred listeners! And a final ovation!--And something similar is being
arranged in New York. I am the most _independent_ mind in Europe and
the _only_ German writer--which is something!"
He added in a postscript: "Only a great soul can endure my writings.
Thus I have had the good luck to provoke against myself all that is
feeble and virtuous." No doubt the indulgent Fräulein von Meysenbug
saw in these lines a point directed against herself. She answered,
as usual, in her kindly manner: "You say that everything feeble and
virtuous is against you? Do not be so paradoxical. Virtue is not
weakness but strength, words say it plainly enough. And are you
not yourself the living contradiction of what you say? For you are
virtuous, and the example of your life, if men could only know it,
would, as I am assured, be more persuasive than your books." Nietzsche
replied: "I have read your charming letter, dear lady and dear friend,
with real emotion; no doubt you are right--so am I."
How headlong a thing is his life! Days spent in walking, in getting the
rhythm of phrases, in sharpening thoughts. Often he works through the
dawn and is writing still when the innkeeper rises and goes noiselessly
out to follow the traces of the chamois among the mountains. "Am I not
myself a hunter of chamois?" thinks Nietzsche, and goes on with his
work.
The _Case of Wagner_ being completed, Nietzsche began a new pamphlet,
directed not against a man, but against ideas--against all ideas that
men have found whereby to guide their acts. There is no metaphysical
world, and the rationalists are dreamers; there is no moral world,
and the moralists are dreamers. What then remains? "The world of
appearances, perhaps? But no; for with the world of truth we have
abolished the world of appearances!" Nothing exists but energy, renewed
at every instant. "Incipiet Zarathustra." Friedrich Nietzsche looked
for a title for his new pamphlet: _Leisure Hours of a Psychologist_ was
his first idea; then, _The Twilight of the Idols, or The Philosophy
of the Hammer. _ On September 7th he sent his manuscript to the
publisher. This little book--he wrote--must strike, scandalise, and
strain people's minds, and prepare them for the reception of his great
work.
Of it he is always thinking, and his second pamphlet is scarcely
finished when he starts on this labour. But we no longer recognise the
calm and Goethean work which it had been his desire to write. He tries
new titles: _We other Immoralists, We other Hyperboreans:_ then returns
to his old title and keeps to it--_The Will to Power: An Essay towards
the Transvaluation of all Values._ Between September 3rd and September
30th he draws up a first section: _The Antichrist;_ and it is a third
pamphlet. This time he speaks outright, he indicates his Yea and his
Nay, his straight line and his goal: he exalts the most brutal energy.
All moral imperatives, whether dictated by Moses or by Manu, by the
people or by the aristocracy, are lies. "Europe was near to greatness,"
he writes, "when, during the first years of the sixteenth century, it
was possible to hope that Cæsar Borgia would seize the Papacy." Are we
bound to accept these thoughts as definitive, because they are the last
that Nietzsche expressed?
While he was drawing up _The Antichrist,_ he returned again to his
_Dionysian Songs,_ outlined in 1884, and completed them. Here we find
the sure expression of the presentiments that then agitated him.
"The sun sets,
Soon thy thirst shall be quenched,
Burning heart!
A freshness is in the air,
I breathe the breath of unknown mouths,
The great cold comes....
The sun is in its place, and burns upon my head at noon.
I salute ye, ye who come,
O swift winds,
O fresh spirits of the afternoon
The air stirs, peaceable and pure.
Has it not darted towards me a sidelong glance,
A seductive glance,
To-night?
Be strong, brave heart!
Ask not: why?
Eve of my life!
The sun sets."
On the 21st September we find him at Turin. On the 22nd _The Case of
Wagner_ was published. Here at last was a book of which the newspapers
spoke a little. But Nietzsche was exasperated by their comments. With
the exception of a Swiss author, Carl Spiteler, no one had understood
him. Every word gave him the measure of the public ignorance as regards
his work. For ten years he had been seeking and following ideas found
by him alone: of this the German critics knew nothing; they knew only
that a certain Herr Nietzsche, a disciple of Wagner's, had been an
author; they read _The Case of Wagner_ and surmised that Herr Nietzsche
was just fallen out with his master. Besides, he felt that he had
incurred the blame of some of his later friends. Jacob Burckhardt,
always so precise, did not acknowledge the receipt of the pamphlet; the
good Meysenbug wrote an indignant and severe letter.
"These are subjects," Nietzsche answered him, "with regard to which I
cannot permit any contradiction. Upon the question of _decadence_ I am
the highest authority (instance) in the world: the men of to-day, with
their querulous and degenerate instinct, should consider themselves
fortunate that they have by them some one who offers them a generous
wine in their most sombre moments. That Wagner succeeded in making
himself believed in, assuredly proves genius; but the genius of
falsehood. I have the honour to be his opposite--a genius of truth."
In spite of the agitation thus displayed, his letters expressed an
unheard-of happiness. There is nothing which he does not admire. The
autumn is splendid; the roads, the galleries, the palaces, the cafés
of Turin, are magnificent; repasts are succulent and prices modest. He
digests well, sleeps marvellously. He hears French operettas: there is
nothing as perfect as their buoyant manner, "the paradise of all the
refinements." He listens to a concert: each piece, whether Beethoven,
Schubert, Bossaro, Goldmarck, Vibac, or Bizet be its author, seems to
him equally sublime. "I was in tears," he wrote to Peter Gast. "I think
that Turin, from the point of view of the musical sense, as from every
other point of view, is the _most solid_ town that I know."
One might hope that this intoxication of spirit kept Nietzsche from
knowledge of his destiny. But a rare word sufficiently indicates his
clairvoyance. He has a sense of the approaching disaster. His reason
escapes from him and he measures its flight. On the 13th of November,
1888, he expressed to Peter Gast a desire to have him near, his
regret that he could not come; this was his constant plaint, the very
constancy of which indeed diminished its significance. Nietzsche, who
knew this, warned his friend: "What I tell you, take tragically," he
wrote. On the 18th of November he sent a letter which seemed quite
happy. He spoke of operettas which he had just heard, of Judic, and of
Milly Meyer. "For our bodies and for our souls, dear friend," he wrote,
"a light Parisian intoxication, 'tis salvation." He concluded: "This
letter also, I pray you to take tragically."
Thus the condition of physical jubilation to which imminent madness
brought him let him escape neither presentiment nor anguish. He wished
to reassemble for the last time the memories and impressions which
life had left to him, and to compose a work which should be bizarre,
triumphant, and desperate. Look at the titles of the chapters: "Why
I am so prudent.--Why I am so wise.--Why I have written such good
books.--Why I am a fatality.--Glory and eternity...." He calls his
last work: _Ecce Homo._ What does he mean? Is he Antichrist or another
Christ? He is both together. Like Christ, he has sacrificed himself.
Christ is man and God: He has conquered the temptations to which He
made Himself accessible. Nietzsche is man and Superman: he has known
every feeble desire, every cowardly thought, and has cast them from
him. None before him was so tender or so hard; no reality has alarmed
him. He has taken upon himself not the sins of men, but all their
passions in their greatest force. "Jesus on the Cross," he writes,
"is an anathema upon life; Dionysos broken in bits is a _promise_ of
life, of life indestructible and ever-renewed." The solitary Christian
had his God: Nietzsche lives alone and without God. The sage of old
had his friends: Nietzsche lives alone and without friends. He lives
nevertheless, and can sing, in his cruel extremity, the Dionysian
hymn. "I am not a saint," he writes, "but a satyr." And again, "I have
written so many books, and such beautiful ones: how should I not be
grateful to life?"
No; Nietzsche was a saint, not a satyr, and a wounded saint who aspired
to die. He said that he felt grateful to life; it was false, for his
soul was quite embittered. He lied, but sometimes man has no other way
to victory. When Arria, dying from the blow she had given herself, said
to her husband as she passed him her weapon: _"Pœte, non dolet._.."
she lied, and it was to her glory that she lied. And here, may we not
pass on Nietzsche himself the judgment that he had passed upon her? "Her
holy falsehood," he wrote in 1879, "obscures all the truths that have
ever been said by the dying." Nietzsche had not triumphed. _Ecce Homo:_
he was broken but would not avow it. A poet, he wished that his cry of
agony should be a song; a last lyrical transport uplifted his soul and
gave him the force to lie.
Thou sinkst to eve!
Thine eye already
Gleams half-bruised;
Drops from thy dew,
Like tears outstrewn,
Stream; the purple of thy love
Goes silent over the milky sea,
Thy ultimate, tardy blessedness....
All around, only the waves and their mirth.
What once was hard
Has foundered in a blue oblivion--
My boat lies idle now.
Tempest and travel--how unlearnt
Hope and desire are drowned,
The soul and the sea he sleek.
_Seventh_ solitude
Never felt I
Closer to me the sweet serenity,
Warmer the rays of the sun.
--Shines not even the ice of my summit?
A rapid, silvery fish,
My bark glides away, afar."
Nevertheless he was conscious that the fame, so long desired,
approached. Georges Brandes, who was going to repeat and publish his
lectures, found him a new reader, the Swede Auguste Strindberg. Very
pleased, Nietzsche announced it to Peter Gast. "Strindberg has written
to me," he said, "and for the first time I receive a letter in which
I find a world-historic _(Welthistorik)_ accent." In St. Petersburg
they were getting ready to translate his _Case of Wagner._ In Paris,
Hippolyte Taine sought and found him a correspondent: Jean Bordeau,
contributor to the _Débats_ and the _Revue des Deux Mondes._ "At last,"
wrote Nietzsche, "the grand Panama Canal towards France has been
opened." His old comrade Deussen handed him two thousand francs, the
offering of an unknown who wished to subscribe to an edition of his
works. Madame de Salis Marschlins offered him a thousand. Friedrich
Nietzsche should have been happy, but it was too late.
How were his last days spent? We do not know. He lived in a furnished
apartment, the guest of a humble family, which lodged him and, if he
wished, fed him. He corrected the proofs of _Ecce Homo,_ adding a
postscript to the early text, then a dithyrambic poem; meanwhile he
prepared a new pamphlet for publication, _Nietzsche contra Wagner._
"Before launching the first edition of my great work," he wrote to
his publisher, "we must prepare the public, we must create a genuine
tension--or it will be _Zarathustra_ over again." On the 8th of
December he wrote to Peter Gast: "I have re-read _Ecce Homo,_ I have
weighed every word in scales of gold: literally it cuts the history of
humanity into two sections--the highest superlative of dynamite." On
the 29th of December he wrote to his publisher: "I am of your opinion,
as to _Ecce Homo;_ let us not exceed 1,000 copies; a thousand copies
for Germany of a book, written in the grand style, is indeed rather
more than reasonable. But in France, I say it quite seriously, I count
on an issue of 80,000--or 40,000 copies." On the 2nd of January another
letter (in a rough and deformed hand): "Return me the poem--on with
_Ecce!_"
There exists a tradition, difficult to verify, that, during these
latter days, Nietzsche often played fragments of Wagner to his hosts.
He would say to them: "I knew him," and talk of Triebschen. The
thing does not seem improbable, for now his memories of his greatest
happiness may well have visited him, and he may have found delight in
recounting them to simple people ignorant of his life. Had he not just
written in _Ecce Homo:_
"Since I am here recalling the consolations of my life, I ought to
express in a word my gratitude for what was by far my most profound and
best-loved joy--my intimacy with Richard Wagner. I wish to be just with
regard to the rest of my human relationships; but I absolutely cannot
efface from my life the days at Triebschen, days of confidence, of
gaiety; of sublime flashes--days of _profound_ happiness. I do not know
what Wagner was for others: our sky was never darkened by a cloud."
* * * * *
On the 9th of January, 1889, Franz Overbeck was sitting, with his
wife, at the window of his quiet house in Basle, when he saw old
Burckhardt stop and ring at his door. He was surprised: Burckhardt was
not an intimate, and some intuition warned him that Nietzsche, their
common friend, was the cause of this visit. For some weeks he had had
disquieting notes from Turin. Burckhardt brought him a long letter
which all too clearly confirmed his presentiments. Nietzsche was mad.
"I am Ferdinand de Lesseps," he wrote, "I am Prado, I am Chambige [the
two assassins with whom the Paris newspapers were then occupied]; I
have been buried twice this autumn."
A few moments later Overbeck received a similar letter, and all
Nietzsche's friends were likewise advised. He had written to each of
them.
"Friend Georges," he wrote to Brandes, "since you have discovered me,
it is not wonderful to find me: what is now difficult is to lose me.
"THE CRUCIFIED."
Peter Gast received a message the tragic significance of which he did
not understand:
_"A mon maestro Pietro._
"Sing me a new song. The world is clear and all the skies
rejoice."
"Ariadne, I love you," he wrote to Cosima Wagner.
Overbeck started immediately. He found Nietzsche, watched over by his
hosts, ploughing the piano with his elbow, singing and crying his
Dionysian glory. He was able to bring him back to Basle, and introduce
him, without too painful a scene, into a hospital, where his mother
came to seek him.
He lived another ten years. The first of them were cruel, the later
more kindly; sometimes even there seemed to be hope. He would recall
his work.
"Have I not written fine books?" he would say.
He was shown portraits of Wagner.
"Him," he would say, "I loved much."
These returns of consciousness might have been frightful; it seems that
they were not. One day his sister, as she sat by his side, could not
restrain her tears.
"Lisbeth," he said, "why do you cry? Are we not happy?"
The ruined intellect could not be saved, but the uncorrupted soul kept
sweet and charming, open to pure impressions.
One day a young man who was occupied with the publication of his work
was out with him on his short walk. Nietzsche perceived a little girl
at the side of the road, and was charmed. He went up to her, stopped,
and with a hand drew back the hair which lay low on her forehead; then,
contemplating the frank face with a smile, he said:
"Is it not the picture of innocence?"
Friedrich Nietzsche died at Weimar on the 25th of August, 1900.
[1] In French in the text.
[2] Morals are free in the pensions on the Mediterranean, and no doubt
we are unaware of all the episodes of Friedrich Nietzsche's life. But
this reservation must be made. According to evidence which we have
been able to gather, his manner of life, in the Engadine, never gave
occasion for the least gossip. On the contrary he seems, we are told,
to have avoided young women.
[3] "I am very happy," wrote Taine, "that my articles on Napoleon
have struck you as true, and nothing can more exactly sum up my
impression than the two German words which you use: _Unmensch_ und
_Uebermensch._"--Letter of July 12, 1887.
INDEX
A
About
Æschylus; Greece of
Alexander
Alsace
Anaxagoras
_Anti-Christ, The_
Apollo, "Leader of States"
Apollonian Spirit, The, Nietzsche's definition of
Aquila
Arabs, The
Ariadne
Aristotle
Athens
Attica
B
Bacchus-Dionysus
Bach, Nietzsche's love of
Bahnsen
Bashkirtseff, Marie
Basle, Nietzsche's appointment at University of;
Nietzsche's life at
Baudelaire, C.
Baumbrach, Professor
Baumgarten, Marie
Bavaria
Bayreuth, theatre of;
Wagner at;
destiny of;
foundation stone of theatre laid;
financial difficulties at;
Nietzsche's appeal on its behalf;
rehearsals at;
its "beautiful souls";
its journal condemns _Human, All Too Human_;
_Parsifal_ played at;
"6,000 feet above Bayreuth"
Beethoven;
Nietzsche studies life of;
centenary of
Bellini
Bergamo
Berlin; Nietzsche in;
parliamentary intrigues of
Berlioz
_Bestimmung der Oper, Die_
_Beyond Good and Evil_
_Birth of Tragedy_;
its Wagnerian tendency
Bismarck
Bizet
Blanc, Louis
Bohemia
Bonn, University of;
Nietzsche at
Bordeau, Jean
Borgia, Cæsar
Bourget, Paul
Brahms
Brandes, Georges;
appreciates _Genealogy of Morals_;
lectures on Nietzsche
Brenner, A.
Brockhaus, Madame
Bucharest
Büchner
Bülow, Hans von
Burckhardt, Jacob Nietzsche's confidant at Basle;
shares Nietzsche's grief
Byron; Nietzsche's love of
C
Carlsruhe
_Carmen_
_Case of Wagner, The_;
publication of
Catholicism, Nietzsche's detestation of
Cavour
Chamfort
Chiavari
Chillon, Nietzsche at
_Choephores_ of Æschylus, The
Chopin
Christianity, Wagner and; and Nietzsche's spiritual life
Cimarosa
Cloisters, Nietzsche's project of
Coire
Cologne
Columbus, Christopher
Cook, Captain
Copenhagen, University of
Corsica
Culture of _The Renaissance in Italy_ The
D
d'Agoult, Madame
Dante
Darwinism
_Dawn of Day, The_;
failure of;
preface to
De Brossé
Democritus
Descartes
Deussen, Paul, Nietzsche's college comrade;
Nietzsche's letter to on becoming Professor at Basle
Diogenes Laertius
Dionysian Songs
Dionysos; Nietzsche as
Dönhoff, Countess
Don Quixote
Dresden
Dühring; _The Value of Life_
Dürer
E
_Ecce Homo_
Eckermann
_Educational Institutions, The Future of_
Emerson, R. W.
Empedocles
Engadine, The, Nietzsche in
Eternal Return, The, Nietzsche's conception of;
his horror of;
abandons the idea;
re-adopts it;
Euripides
Europe, condition of;
tragical era of;
Europe, Goethe, and Napoleon
F
Faust, _quoted_
Feuerbach
Fichte
Finland
Flaubert, Gustave
Flimms
Florence
Förster, marriage with Nietzsche's sister
France, Nietzsche in
Franco-German War
Frankfurt, Peace of
Frederick the Great
Frederick II
Frederick William of Prussia
Freiligrath
Friburg
Friedrich von Hohenstaufen
Friendship, Nietzsche's view of
Fritzsch
Froeschwüler
Fuchs, Carl
G
Galiani, Abbé, The
Garda, Lake of, Nietzsche at
Garibaldi
Gast, Peter;
with Nietzsche at Venice;
aids Nietzsche;
Nietzsche's correspondence with
Gautier
Gavarri
_Gay Science, The_;
preface to
_Genealogy of Morals,_
Geneva
Genoa, Nietzsche at
Germany, Nietzsche's hopes of;
its "delirium of conceit after Metz,";
fails to celebrate Beethoven;
Nietzsche abandons;
the mission of the German Empire;
the "two Germanys";
Nietzsche's projected mission to;
Nietzsche "spits out lava on";
Nietzsche's summons to
the "sombre Empire,";
defaming the Germans
Gersdorff, Baron von, Nietzsche's correspondence with
Gobineau, Count
Goethe;
quoted by Mazzini;
to inspire Nietzsche's great work
Goldmarck
Goncourts, Journal of the
Greek poets, Nietzsche's love of
Greeks, The, genius of;
Germanic Hellenism;
the Homeric problem;
Goethe, Wagner, and;
and tragedy;
Nietzsche's lectures on æsthetic of Greek tragedy;
the Greek genius and war;
of the sixth and seventh centuries;
the two Greeces;
tragic philosophers of
Grunewald
Guyau
H
Hamburg
Hartmann, E. von
Hasse
Hegel
Heidelberg, Union of
Heinze
Helen
_Hellenism and Pessimism_
Heraclitus
Herodotus
Herzen
Hildebrant, Karl
Hölderlin, read by Nietzsche;
life and work of;
similarity to Nietzsche
Homer
_Human, All Too Human_
Humboldt
Hymn to Friendship
Hymn to Life
Hymn to Solitude
I
_Iliad, The_
Italy
J
Java, Earthquake of
Jena
Judic
K
Kant
Kief
Kiel
Klingenbrunn
Köselitz, _see_ Peter Gast
L
Lange
Lanzky, Paul
with Nietzsche at Nice;
with Nietzsche at Ruta
_Laws of Manu, The_
Leipsic;
Nietzsche at
Lenbach
Leopardi
Leskien
Lessing
_Letters of an Heretical esthete, The_
Liszt
_Litterarisches Centralblatt, The_
_Lohengrin,_
_L'Ombra di Venezia_
London
Louis of Bavaria; Wagner writes
treatise for; saves Bayreuth
Louvre, The, burning of
Lucerne
Lucretius
Lugano; Nietzsche among the Germans at
Lunéville
Luther; Nietzsche's Lutheranism
M
Maggiori, Lake
Manfred
Mannheim
Marasoff, Madame
Marguerite of Savoy
Marienbad
Maupassant, Guy de
Mazzini, meeting with Nietzsche;
Nietzsche's veneration for
Meiningen
_Meistersingers,_
Mendelssohn
Mentone
Mérimée, Prosper
Messina
Metz
Meyer, Milly
Meysenbug, Fräulein von;
her _Memoirs of an Idealist_;
correspondence with Nietzsche;
at Naples with Nietzsche
Michelet
Mill, S.
_Miscellaneous Opinions and Apothegms_
Moltke, von
Monaco
Mond, G.
Montaigne
Mozart
Mucius Scævola
Munich
_Music of the Future, The_
N
Nancy
Naples, Nietzsche at
Napoleon the Great
Napoleon III
Naumburg-sur-Saale, Nietzsche's home at;
provinciality of;
Nietzsche spends Christmas of 1873 at
Newton
New York
_Nibelungen, The,_
Nice, Nietzsche at
Nietzki, Counts
Nietzsche, Frau, goes to Naumburg with her family
Nietzsche's tender letters to
Nietzsche, Friedrich, birth of;
death of his father and brother;
his journal;
residence at Naumburg;
desires to become a clergyman;
first composition;
enters college at Naumburg;
writes history of childhood;
scholarship at Pforta; life at Pforta;
weakening of religious faith;
question of his future;
address to his masters and comrades;
leaves Pforta; enters University of Bonn;
his new life; fights a duel;
dislike of Bonn; studies philology;
love of the Greek poets;
letter to his sister on Christianity;
flies from Bonn; completes his studies at Leipsic;
reads _The World as Will end Representation_;
researches on Theognis of Megara;
as Prussian patriot; second year at Leipsic;
enthusiasm for art and the classics; style;
friendship with Rohde;
as conscript; falls from horse;
opinion of German politics;
discovery of Wagner;
meeting with Wagner;
appointed Professor at Basle;
visits Wagner at Triebschen;
lectures on the "Homeric Problem";
his admiration for Wagner;
_The Birth of Tragedy_; Hellenism;
aids Wagner; on Socrates;
serves as ambulancer in Franco-Prussian War;
illness of; distrust of Prussian power;
returns to Basle and sees Wagner again;
project of a cloister; on War;
at Lugano; his horror at the burning of the Louvre;
Wagner's guest; publishes _The Birth of Tragedy,_;
ill-success of the book; farewell to Triebschen;
at Bayreuth; wishes to fight for Wagner;
and Fräulein von Meysenbug;
in North Italy; at Splügen;
return to Basle; how to found a culture;
holidays at Naumburg;
philosophical formulas;
goes to Bayreuth; attack on Strauss;
his friendship with Gersdorff;
_Thoughts Out of Season_;
proposed series of twenty pamphlets;
begins to distrust Wagnerian art;
_Schopenhauer as Educator_;
visits the Wagners with his sister;
depression; serious illness;
with his sister at Basle;
at Chülon;
letter to Fräulein von Meysenbug on her
_Memoirs of an Idealist_;
his book on Wagner;
absence from Bayreuth rehearsals;
at Bayreuth festivals;
his distress; failure of eyesight;
visit to Fräulein von Meysenbug at Naples;
sees Wagner at Sorrento; isolates himself;
life at Naples;
his veneration for Mazzini; leaves Naples;
takes cure at Rosenlaui;
friendship with Rée;
_Human, All Too Human,_;
impression of _Parsifal,_;
his grief over Wagner;
resigns professorship;
awaits death in Engadine;
returns to Naumburg;
terrible sufferings;
first visit to Venice and convalescence; at Genoa;
publication of _The Dawn of Day,_; at Sils-Maria;
conceives the Eternal Return at Sils-Maria;
the discovery of _Carmen_;
Nietzsche and Lou Salomé;
his quarrel with Rée and Lou;
the poem of Zarathustra;
the principle of the Superman;
attempts to complete his poem;
friendship with Heinrich von Stein;
joined by Lanzky at Nice;
failure to win Stein from Wagnerism;
abandons his lyrical work;
says farewell to his sister at Naumburg;
at Nice;
_Beyond Good and Evil,_;
his kindness to Peter Gast;
visits Rohde at Leipsic;
visits his mother at Naumburg;
returns to the Engadine;
the _Will to Power,_;
Taine's letter of praise;
prefaces to the _Dawn of Day_ and _The Gay Science_;
returns to Nice; as a critic;
_The Genealogy of Morals,_;
returns to Venice;
relations with Rohde;
Georges Brandes's letter;
design for new work;
arrival at Turin;
reads _The Laws of Manu_;
attack on Wagner;
the _Antichrist_:
_Ecce Homo_;
his opinion of Strindberg;
loss of reason; death of
Nietzsche, Lisbeth (Förster-Nietzsche);
with Nietzsche at Naumburg;
with Nietzsche at Lugano;
with Nietzsche at Flimms;
with Nietzsche at Basle;
accompanies Nietzsche to Engadine;
marriage of;
reconciliation with Nietzsche;
correspondence with Nietzsche
_Nietzsche contra Wagner_
Novalis
O
O., Madame
_Odyssey_
Œdipus
_Of the State and Religion,_ Wagner's
_Old Faith and the New, The,_
Overbeck, Professor
P
Paraguay
Paris
Parmenides
_Parsifal_
Pascal
Pforta
Philadelphia
_Philology of the Future, The_
_Philosophers of Tragic Greece, The_
Pindar
Plato
Plutarch
Pobles
Poland
Portofino
Port Royal des Champs
Prague
Prussia
Puccini
Pythagoras
Pythagoreans, The
R
Rapallo
Recoaro
_Reden Eines Hoffenden_
Rée, Paul;
rupture with Nietzsche
Renan
_Rhinegold, The_
Ritschl, Nietzsche's master at Bonn
_Rivista Europa, La_
Röcken
Röder, Madame
Rohde, Erwin, friendship with Nietzsche;
spends holiday with Nietzsche;
project of travel with Nietzsche;
defends _Birth of Tragedy_;
appointed Professor at Leipsic;
quarrel with Nietzsche;
correspondence with Nietzsche
Rolph
Rome; Nietzsche at,
Romundt;
enters orders
Rosenlaui
Rossaro
Rossini
Rousseau
Russians, The, Nietzsche's view of
Ruten
S
Sadowa, Battle of
Sainte-Beuve
Salis-Marschlins, Fräulein von
Salomé, Lou;
poems to Nietzsche;
her description of Nietzsche;
quarrel with Nietzsche
San Remo
Santa Margherita
Schaffler, Herr
Schelling
Schiller
Schlegels, The
Schmeitzner, Herr
Schopenhauer, Arthur,
_The World as Will and Representation_;
Nietzsche's admiration of;
truest philosopher
_Schopenhauer as Educator,_
Schubert
Schumann
Schüre, E., his description of Nietzsche
Scott, Walter
Sedan
Semiramis
Seydlitz, Baron von
Seydlitz, Irene von
Sicily
_Siegfried,_ "Idyll" performed at Triebschen
Sienna
Sils-Maria, Nietzsche at
Simonides
Singer, Herr
Slavery, Nietzsche's view of its necessity
Socialism
Socrates;
Nietzsche's condemnation of;
Socratic Greece;
ranked above Æschylus
Sophocles
Sparta
Spencer, Herbert
Spinoza
Spiteler, Carl
Splügen
State, The
Stendhal
Stein, H. von;
mission to Nietzsche;
visit to Sils;
death of
Steinabad, Nietzsche at
"Stellar Friendship"
Stewart, B.
Strassbourg; University of
Strauss, D.
Stresa
Strindberg, A.
Sulzer
Superman, The
Surlei
_Sutta Nipata, The,_
"Swiss, The Loyal"
Switzerland
T
Tacitus
Taine, H., letter to Nietzsche
Tautenberg
Tempel Leborecht, meeting with Nietzsche
Thales
Theognis of Megara
Theseus
_Thoughts out of Season_
Thucydides
_Thus Spake Zarathustra_;
publication of; second part of;
Nietzsche's attempt to complete poem;
its perfection of language; failure with public;
the fourth section
_Traveller and his Shadow, The_
Treischke, Herr, German historian
Triebschen, Wagner at;
Christmas festivals at;
changed life of;
Wagner's departure from
_Tristan_
Tübingen
Turgenieff, Ivan
Turin; Nietzsche at
Tuscany
_Twilight of the Gods_
_Twilight of the Idols_
U
Universities, prestige of in Germany
_Use and Abuse of History, The_
V
V. P., Madame
_Valkyrie, The,_ Nietzsche's criticism of
Vallambrosa
Vauvenargues
Venice;
Nietzsche's visit to;
Nietzsche with Gast at
Vibac
Voltaire
W
Wagner, Cosima;
Nietzsche and
Wagner, Richard, Nietzsche's discovery
of and acquaintance with;
and Schopenhauer; at Triebschen;
his treatise _On the State and Religion_;
interest in Nietzsche and correspondence;
the "poet of Germany";
and the Beethoven centenary;
and the German victories;
buffoonery of;
advises Nietzsche on his work;
his intimates;
visits Mannheim with Nietzsche;
Nietzsche spends Christmas with;
praises _The Birth of Tragedy_;
leaves Triebschen;
lays foundation-stone of Bayreuth Theatre;
his distrust; the Wagnerian cult;
renewed intimacy with Nietzsche;
mention of;
difficulties at Bayreuth;
as an "art";
his liking for Nietzsche;
relations with Nietzsche;
letters to Nietzsche;
Nietzsche's book on;
his neo-Christianity;
triumphs of; at Sorrento;
and _Human, All Too Human_;
references to;
death of;
further references to;
_Case of Wagner_;
_Nietzsche contra Wagner_
Wahnfried
War, Nietzsche's views on
Weimar; Nietzsche's death at
_Will to Power, The_
Willamowitz
William, Emperor
Windisch
Wissenberg
Wolf, F. A.
_World as Will and Representation, The_
Wörth
Z
Zarathustra;
"the lawgiver"
Zarncke
Zimmern, Miss
Zoagli
Zola
Zürich, Nietzsche at
End of Project Gutenberg's The life of Friedrich Nietzsche, by Daniel Halévy