Morality is nothing else (and, above all, nothing more) than obedience
to customs, of whatsoever nature they may be. But customs are simply
the traditional way of acting and valuing. Where there is no tradition
there is no morality; and the less life is governed by tradition, the
narrower the circle of morality. The free man is immoral, because it
is his _will_ to depend upon himself and not upon tradition: in all
the primitive states of humanity "evil" is equivalent to "individual,"
"free," "arbitrary," "unaccustomed," "unforeseen," "incalculable." In
such primitive conditions, always measured by this standard, any action
performed--_not_ because tradition commands it, but for other reasons
_(e.g.,_ on account of its individual utility), even for the same
reasons as had been formerly established by custom--is termed immoral,
and is felt to be so even by the very man who performs it, for it has
not been done out of obedience to tradition. 14-15
Popular medicines and popular morals are closely related, and should
not be considered and valued, as is still customary, in so different a
way: both are most dangerous and make-believe sciences. 19
All those superior men, who felt themselves irresistibly urged
on to throw off the yoke of some morality or other, had no other
resource--_if they were not really mad--_than to feign madness, or
actually to become insane. And this holds good for innovators in every
department of life, and not only in religion and politics. 21
Every one who has hitherto overthrown a law of established morality
has always at first been considered as a _wicked man:_ but when it
was afterwards found impossible to re-establish the law, and people
gradually became accustomed to the change, the epithet was changed by
slow degrees. History deals almost exclusively with these _wicked men,_
who later on came to be recognised as _good men._ 28
A man who is under the influence of the morality of custom comes
to despise causes first of all, secondly consequences, and thirdly
reality, and weaves all his higher feelings (reverence, sublimity,
pride, gratitude, love) _into an imaginary world:_ the so-called higher
world. And even to-day we can see the consequences of this: wherever,
and in whatever fashion, man's feelings are raised, that imaginary
world is in evidence. 40
The history of the moral feelings is entirely different from the
history of moral conceptions. The first-mentioned are powerful before
the action, and the latter especially after it, in view of the
necessity for making one's self clear in regard to them. 41
Trusting in our feelings simply means obeying our grandfather and
grandmother more than the gods within _ourselves:_ our reason and
experience. 41
The same impulse, under the impression of the blame cast upon it by
custom, develops into the painful feeling of cowardice, or else the
pleasurable feeling of _humility,_ in case a morality, like that of
Christianity, has taken it to its heart and called it _good._ 43
_The origin becomes of less significance in proportion as we acquire
insight into it;_ whilst things nearest to ourselves, around and
within us, gradually begin to manifest their wealth of colours,
beauties, enigmas, and diversity of meaning, of which earlier humanity
never dreamed. 52
Only when man shall have acquired a knowledge of all things will he be
able to know himself. For things are but the boundaries of man. 53
To whatever height mankind may have developed--and perhaps in the end
it will not be so high as when they began!--there is as little prospect
of their attaining to a higher order as there is for the ant and the
earwig to enter into kinship with God and eternity at the end of their
career on earth. What is to come will drag behind it that which has
passed: why should any little star, or even any little species on
that star, form an exception to that eternal drama? Away with such
sentimentalities! 54
Those earnest, able, and just men of profound feelings, who are still
Christians at heart, owe it to themselves to make one attempt to live
for a certain space of time without Christianity! They owe it to
_their faith_ that they should thus for once take up their abode "in
the wilderness"--if for no other reason than that of being able to
pronounce on the question as to whether Christianity is needful. 63
Christianity has the instinct of a hunter for finding out all those who
may by hook or by crook be driven to despair--only a very small number
of men can be brought to this despair. Christianity lies in wait for
such as those, and pursues them. 65
The "demon" Eros becomes an object of greater interest to mankind
than all the angels and saints put together, thanks to the mysterious
Mumbo-Jumboism of the Church in all things erotic: it is due to the
Church that love stories, even in our own time, have become the one
common interest which appeals to all classes of people--with an
exaggeration which would be incomprehensible to antiquity, and which
will not fail to provoke roars of laughter in coming generations. 78
It is only those who never--or always--attend church that underestimate
the dishonesty with which this subject is still dealt in Protestant
pulpits; in what a clumsy fashion the preacher takes advantage of his
security from interruption; how the Bible is pinched and squeezed; and
how the people are made acquainted with every form of _the art of false
reading._ 85
Christianity wants blindness and frenzy and an eternal swan-song above
the waves under which reason has been drowned!... 90
What if God were not exactly truth, and if this were proved? And if he
were instead of vanity, the desire for power, the ambitious, the fear,
and the enraptured and terrified folly of mankind?... 93
One Becomes Moral--but not because one is moral! Submission to morals
may be due to slavishness or vanity, egoism or resignation, dismal
fanaticism or thoughtlessness. It may, again, be an act of despair,
such as submission to the authority of a ruler; but there is nothing
moral about it _per se._ 97
Morals are constantly undergoing changes and transformations,
occasioned by successful crimes. 97
I deny morality in the same way as I deny alchemy, _i.e.,_ I deny its
hypotheses; but I do not deny that there have been alchemists who
believed in these hypotheses and based their actions upon them. I also
deny immorality--not that innumerable people feel immoral, but that
there is any true reason why they should feel so, should not, of
course, deny--unless I were a fool--that many actions which are called
immoral should be avoided and resisted; and in the same way that many
which are called moral should be performed and encouraged; but I hold
that in both cases these actions should be performed from motives other
than those which have prevailed up to the present time. We must learn
anew in order that at last, perhaps very late in the day, we may be
able to do something more: feel anew. 100
It is a prejudice to think that morality is more favourable to the
development of the reason than immorality. It is erroneous to suppose
that the unconscious aim in the development of every conscious being
(namely, animal, man, humanity, etc.) is its "great happiness"; on
the contrary, there is a particular and incomparable happiness to be
attained at every stage of our development, one that is neither high
nor low, but quite an individual happiness. Evolution does not make
happiness its goal; it aims merely at evolution, and nothing else. It
is only if humanity had a universally recognised goal that we could
propose to do this or that: for the time being there is no such goal.
It follows that the pretensions of morality should not be brought
into any relationship with mankind: this would be merely childish and
irrational. It is quite another thing to recommend a goal to mankind:
this goal would then be something that would depend upon our own will
and pleasure. Provided that mankind in general agreed to adopt such a
goal, it could then impose a moral law upon itself, a law which would,
at all events, be imposed by their own free will. 105
Our duties are the claims which others have upon us. How did they
acquire these claims? By the fact that they considered us as capable of
making and holding agreements and contracts, by assuming that we were
their like and equals, and by consequently entrusting something to us,
bringing us up, educating us, and supporting us. 110
My rights consist of that part of my power which others have not only
conceded to me, but which they wish to maintain for me. 111
The desire for distinction is the desire to subject one's neighbor....
113
On this mirror--and our intellect is a mirror--something is going on
that indicates regularity: a certain thing is each time followed by
another certain thing. When we perceive this and wish to give it a
name, we call it cause and effect,--fools that we are! as if in this
we had understood or could understand anything! For, of course, we
have seen nothing but the images of causes and effects, and it is just
this figurativeness which renders it impossible for us to see a more
substantial relation than that of sequence!... 129
Pity, in so far as it actually gives rise to suffering--and this
must be our only point of view here--is a weakness, like every other
indulgence in an injurious emotion. It increases suffering throughout
the world, and although here and there a certain amount of suffering
may be indirectly diminished or removed altogether as a consequence of
pity, we must not bring forward these occasional consequences, which
are on the whole insignificant, to justify the nature of pity which, as
has already been stated, is prejudicial. Supposing that it prevailed,
even if only for one day, it would bring humanity to utter ruin. In
itself the nature of pity is no better than that of any other craving;
it is only where it is called for and praised--and this happens when
people do not understand what is injurious in it, but find in it
a sort of joy--that a good conscience becomes attached to it; it
is only then that we willingly yield to it, and do not shrink from
acknowledging it. In other circumstances where it is understood to be
dangerous, it is looked upon as a weakness; or, as in the case of the
Greeks, as an unhealthy periodical emotion the danger of which might be
removed by temporary and voluntary discharges. 144-145
You say that the morality of pity is a higher morality than that of
stoicism? Prove it! But take care not to measure the "higher" and
"lower" degrees of morality once more by moral yardsticks; for there
are no absolute morals. So take your yardstick from somewhere else, and
be on your guard!... 149
If, in accordance with the present definition, only those actions are
moral which are done for the sake of others, and for their sake only,
then there are no moral actions at all! If, in accordance with another
definition, only those actions are moral which spring from our own free
will, then there are no moral actions in this case either! What is it,
then, that we designate thus, which certainly exists and wishes as a
consequence to be explained? It is the result of a few intellectual
blunders; and supposing that we were able to free ourselves from these
errors, what would then become of "moral actions"? It is due to these
errors that we have up to the present attributed to certain actions a
value superior to what was theirs in reality: we separated them from
"egoistic" and "non-free" actions. When we now set them once more
in the latter categories, as we must do, we certainly reduce their
value (their own estimate of value) even below its reasonable level,
because "egoistic" and "non-free" actions have up to the present been
undervalued owing to that alleged profound and essential difference.
158-159
If I were a god, and a benevolent god, the marriages of men would cause
me more displeasure than anything else. 162
We ought publicly to declare invalid the vows of lovers, and to refuse
them permission to marry: and this because we should treat marriage
itself much more seriously, so that in cases where it is now contracted
it would not usually be allowed in future! Are not the majority of
marriages such that we should not care to have them witnessed by a
third party? And yet this third party is scarcely ever lacking--the
child--and he is more than the witness; he is the whipping-boy and
scapegoat. 163
Shame! You wish to form part of a system in which you must be a wheel,
fully and completely, or risk being crushed by wheels! where it is
understood that each one will be that which his superiors make of
him! where the seeking for "connections" will form a part of one's
natural duties! where no one feels himself offended when he has his
attention drawn to some one with the remark, "He may be useful to you
some time"; where people do not feel ashamed of paying a visit to ask
for somebody's intercession, and where they do not even suspect that
by such a voluntary submission to these morals, they are once and for
all stamped as the common pottery of nature, which others can employ
or break up of their free will without feeling in any way responsible
for doing so,--just as if one were to say, "People of my type will
never be lacking, therefore, do what you will with me! Do not stand on
ceremony!" 169
In the glorification of "work" and the never-ceasing talk about the
"blessing of labour," I see the same secret _arrière-pensée_ as I do
in the praise bestowed on impersonal acts of a general interest, viz.,
a fear of everything individual. 176
Behind the principle of the present moral fashion: "Moral actions
are actions performed out of sympathy for others," I see the social
instinct of fear, which thus assumes an intellectual disguise.... 177
Whatever may be the influence in high politics of utilitarianism and
the vanity of individuals and nations, the sharpest spur which urges
them onwards is their need for the feeling of power--a need which rises
not only in the souls of princes and rulers, but also gushes forth from
time to time from inexhaustible sources in the people. 186
As the aristocrat is able to preserve the appearance of being possessed
of a superior physical force which never leaves him, he likewise wishes
by his aspect of constant serenity and civility of disposition, even in
the most trying circumstances, to convey the impression that his mind
and soul are equal to all dangers and surprises....
This indisputable happiness of aristocratic culture, based as it
is on the feeling of superiority, is now beginning to rise to ever
higher levels; for now, thanks to the free spirits, it is henceforth
permissible and not dishonourable for people who have been born and
reared in aristocratic circles to enter the domain of knowledge, where
they may secure more intellectual consecrations and learn chivalric
services even higher than those of former times, and where they may
look up to that ideal of victorious wisdom which as yet no age has been
able to set before itself with so good a conscience as the period which
is about to dawn. 203-205
What induces one man to use false weights, another to set his house
on fire after having insured it for more than its value, a third to
take part in counterfeiting, while three-fourths of our upper classes
indulge in legalised fraud, and suffer from the pangs of conscience
that follow speculation and dealings on the Stock Exchange: what gives
rise to all this? It is not real want,--for their existence is by
no means precarious; perhaps they have even enough to eat and drink
without worrying--but they are urged on day and night by a terrible
impatience at seeing their wealth pile up so slowly, and by an equally
terrible longing and love for these heaps of gold. In this impatience
and love, however, we see re-appear once more that fanaticism of the
desire for power which was stimulated in former times by the belief
that we were in the possession of truth, a fanaticism which bore such
beautiful names that we could dare to be inhuman with a good conscience
(burning Jews, heretics, and good books, and exterminating entire
cultures superior to ours, such as those of Peru and Mexico). The means
of this desire for power are changed in our day, but the same volcano
is still smouldering, impatience and intemperate love call for their
victims, and what was once done "for the love of God" is now done
for the love of money, _i.e.,_ for the love of that which at present
affords us the highest feeling of power and a good conscience. 209-210
"Enthusiastic sacrifice," "self-immolation"--these are the catch-words
of your morality.... In reality ... you only _appear_ to sacrifice
yourselves; for your imagination turns you into gods and you enjoy
yourselves as such. 226-227
Ceremonies, official robes and court dresses, grave countenances,
solemn aspects, the slow pace, involved speech--everything, in short,
known as dignity--are all pretences adopted by those who are timid at
heart: they wish to make themselves feared (themselves or the things
they represent). The fearless (_i.e.,_ originally those who naturally
inspire others with awe) have no need of dignity and ceremonies.... 230
A strange thing, this punishment of ours! It does not purify the
criminal; it is not a form of expiation; but, on the contrary, it is
even more defiling than the crime itself. 235
When a vigorous nature has not an inclination towards cruelty, and is
not always preoccupied with itself, it involuntarily strives after
gentleness--this is its distinctive characteristic. Weak natures, on
the other hand, have a tendency towards harsh judgments.... 236
Kindness has been best developed by the long dissimulation which
endeavoured to appear as kindness: wherever great power existed
the necessity for dissimulation of this nature was recognised--it
inspires security and confidence, and multiplies the actual sum of
our physical power. Falsehood, if not actually the mother, is at all
events the nurse of kindness. In the same way, honesty has been brought
to maturity by the need for a semblance of honesty and integrity:
in hereditary aristocracies. The persistent exercise of such a
dissimulation ends by bringing about the actual nature of the thing
itself: the dissimulation in the long run suppresses itself, and organs
and instincts are the unexpected fruits in this garden of hypocrisy. 242
Neither necessity nor desire, but the love of power, is the demon of
mankind. You may give men everything possible--health, food, shelter,
enjoyment--but they are and remain unhappy and capricious, for the
demon waits and waits; and must be satisfied. 243
It is probable that there are no pure races, but only races which have
become purified, and even these are extremely rare. 253
How many married men have some morning awakened to the fact that their
young wife is dull, although she thinks quite the contrary! not to
speak of those wives whose flesh is willing but whose intellect is
weak! 255
Could there be anything more repugnant than the sentimentality which
is shown to plants and animals--and this on the part of a creature who
from the very beginning has made such ravages among them as their most
ferocious enemy--and who ends by even claiming affectionate feelings
from his weakened and mutilated victims! Before this kind of "nature"
man must above all be serious, if he is any sort of a thinking being.
258
Among cowards it is thought bad form to say anything against bravery,
for any expression of this kind would give rise to some contempt; and
unfeeling people are irritated when anything is said against pity. 259
It is the most sensual men who find it necessary to avoid women and to
torture their bodies. 261
A young man can be most surely corrupted when he is taught to value the
like-minded more highly than the differently minded. 262
The general knowledge of mankind has been furthered to a greater extent
by fear than by love. 267
The sum-total of those internal movements which come naturally to men,
and which they can consequently set in motion readily and gracefully,
is called the soul--men are looked upon as void of soul when they let
it be seen that their inward emotions are difficult and painful to
them. 268
All rules have this effect: they distract our attention from the
fundamental aim of the rule, and make us more thoughtless. 273
We are most certain to find idealistic theories among unscrupulously
practical men; for such men stand in need of the lustre of these
theories for the sake of their reputation. They adopt them
instinctively without by any means feeling hypocritical in doing so--no
more hypocritical than Englishmen with their Christianity and their
Sabbath-keeping. 277
It is not sufficient to prove a case, we must also tempt or raise men
to it. 278
Asceticism is the proper mode of thinking for those who must extirpate
their carnal instincts, because these are ferocious beasts,--but only
for such people! 278
You refuse to be dissatisfied with yourselves or to suffer from
yourselves, and this you call your moral tendency! Very well; another
may perhaps call it your cowardice! One thing, however, is certain,
and that is, that you will never take a trip round the world (and you
yourselves are this world), and you will always remain in yourselves an
accident and a clod on the face of the earth! 282
The first effect of happiness is the feeling of power, and this
feeling longs to manifest itself, whether towards ourselves or other
men, or towards ideas and imaginary beings. Its most common modes of
manifestation are making presents, derision, and destruction--all three
being due to a common fundamental instinct. 286
We approve of marriage in the first place because we are not yet
acquainted with it, in the second place because we have accustomed
ourselves to it, and in the third place because we have contracted
it--that is to say, in most cases. And yet nothing has been proved
thereby in favour of the value of marriage in general. 287
The criminal who has been found out does not suffer because of the
crime he has committed, but because of the shame and annoyance caused
him either by some blunder which he has made or by being deprived of
his habitual element. 289
Where our deficiencies are, there also is our enthusiasm. The
enthusiastic principle "love your enemies" had to be invented by the
Jews, the best haters that ever existed; and the finest glorifications
of chastity have been written by those who in their youth led dissolute
and licentious lives. 293
Women turn pale at the thought that their lover may not be worthy of
them; Men turn pale at the thought that they may not be worthy of the
women they love. I speak of perfect women, perfect men. 300-301
You wish to bid farewell to your passion? Very well, but do so without
hatred against it! Otherwise you have a second passion.--The soul
of the Christian who has freed himself from sin is generally ruined
afterwards by the hatred for sin. Just look at the faces of the great
Christians! they are the faces of great haters. 302
Men have become suffering creatures in consequence of their morals,
and the sum-total of what they have obtained by those morals is simply
the feeling that they are far too good and great for this world, and
that they are enjoying merely a transitory existence on it. As yet the
"proud sufferer" is the highest type of mankind. 309-310
Rights can only be conferred by one who is in full possession of power.
317
"The rule always appears to me to be more interesting than the
exception"--whoever thinks thus has made considerable progress in
knowledge, and is one of the initiated. 319
Through our love we have become dire offenders against truth, and even
habitual dissimulators and thieves, who give out more things as true
than seem to us to be true. 337-333
All the great excellencies of ancient humanity owed their stability to
the fact that man was standing side by side with man, and that no woman
was allowed to put forward the claim of being the nearest and highest,
nay even sole object of his love, as the feeling of passion would
teach. 351
Even if we were mad enough to consider all our opinions as truth, we
should nevertheless not wish them alone to exist. I cannot see why we
should ask for an autocracy and omnipotence of truth: it is sufficient
for me to know that it is a great power. Truth, however, must meet with
opposition and be able to fight, and we must be able to rest from it at
times in falsehood--otherwise truth will grow tiresome, powerless, and
insipid, and will render us equally so. 352-353.
To hear every day what is said about us, or even to endeavour to
discover what people think about us, will in the end kill even the
strongest man. Our neighbours permit us to live only that they may
exercise a daily claim upon us! They certainly would not tolerate us
if we wished to claim rights over them, and still less if we wished to
be right! In short, let us offer up a sacrifice to the general peace,
let us not listen when they speak of us, when they praise us, blame us,
wish for us, or hope for us--nay, let us not even think of it. 357
How many really individual actions are left undone merely because
before performing them we perceive or suspect that they will be
misunderstood!--those actions, for example, which have some intrinsic
value, both in good and evil. The more highly an age or a nation values
its individuals, therefore, and the more right and ascendency we accord
them, the more will actions of this kind venture to make themselves
known, 359-360.
Love wishes to spare the other to whom it devotes itself any feeling
of strangeness: as a consequence it is permeated with disguise and
simulation; it keeps on deceiving continuously, and feigns an equality
which in reality does not exist. And all this is done so instinctively
that women who love deny this simulation and constant tender trickery,
and have even the audacity to assert that love equalises (in other
words that it performs a miracle)! 361
Truth in itself is no power at all.... Truth must either attract power
to its side, or else side with power, for otherwise it will perish
again and again. 363
We should ... take the greatest precautions in regard to everything
connected with old age and its judgment upon life.... The reverence
which we feel for an old man, especially if he is an old thinker and
sage, easily blinds us to the deterioration of his intellect. 368