certainly in this case enough to deduct, enough to discount--there is
even something to laugh at. For we must certainly not underestimate
the fact that Schopenhauer, who in practice treated sexuality as
a personal enemy (including its tool, woman, that "_instrumentum
diaboli_"), needed enemies to keep him in a good humour; that he loved
grim, bitter, blackish-green words; that he raged for the sake of
raging, out of passion; that he would have grown ill, would have become
a _pessimist_ (for he was not a pessimist, however much he wished to
be), without his enemies, without Hegel, woman, sensuality, and the
whole "will for existence" "keeping on." Without them Schopenhauer
would not have "kept on," that is a safe wager; he would have run away:
but his enemies held him fast, his enemies always enticed him back
again to existence, his wrath was just as theirs' was to the ancient
Cynics, his balm, his recreation, his recompense, his _remedium_
against disgust, his _happiness_. So much with regard to what is most
personal in the case of Schopenhauer; on the other hand, there is
still much which is typical in him--and only now we come back to our
problem. It is an accepted and indisputable fact, so long as there
are philosophers in the world and wherever philosophers have existed
(from India to England, to take the opposite poles of philosophic
ability), that there exists a real irritation and rancour on the part
of philosophers towards sensuality. Schopenhauer is merely the most
eloquent, and if one has the ear for it, also the most fascinating
and enchanting outburst. There similarly exists a real philosophic
bias and affection for the whole ascetic ideal; there should be no
illusions on this score. Both these feelings, as has been said, belong
to the type; if a philosopher lacks both of them, then he is--you may
be certain of it--never anything but a "pseudo." What does this mean?
For this state of affairs must first be, interpreted: in itself it
stands there stupid, to all eternity, like any "Thing-in-itself." Every
animal, including la bête philosophe, strives instinctively after an
_optimum_ of favourable conditions, under which he can let his whole
strength have play, and achieves his maximum consciousness of power;
with equal instinctiveness, and with a fine perceptive flair which is
superior to any reason, every animal shudders mortally at every kind
of disturbance and hindrance which obstructs or could obstruct his way
to that optimum (it is not his way to happiness of which I am talking,
but his way to power, to action, the most powerful action, and in
point of fact in many cases his way to unhappiness). Similarly, the
philosopher shudders mortally at <b>marriage</b>, together with all
that could persuade him to it--marriage as a fatal hindrance on the
way to the _optimum_. Up to the present what great philosophers have
been married? Heracleitus, Plato, Descartes, Spinoza, Leibnitz, Kant,
Schopenhauer--they were not married, and, further, one cannot _imagine_
them as married. A married philosopher belongs to _comedy_, that is
my rule; as for that exception of a Socrates--the malicious Socrates
married himself, it seems, _ironice_, just to prove this _very_ rule.
Every philosopher would say, as Buddha said, when the birth of a son
was announced to him: "Râhoula has been born to me, a fetter has been
forged for me" (Râhoula means here "a little demon"); there must come
an hour of reflection to every "free spirit" (granted that he has had
previously an hour of thoughtlessness), just as one came once to the
same Buddha: "Narrowly cramped," he reflected, "is life in the house;
it is a place of uncleanness; freedom is found in leaving the house."
Because he thought like this, he left the house. So many bridges to
independence are shown in the ascetic idea], that the philosopher
cannot refrain from exultation and clapping of hands when he hears
the history of all those resolute ones, who on one day uttered a nay
to all servitude and went into some _desert_; even granting that they
were only strong asses, and the absolute opposite of strong minds.
What, then, does the ascetic ideal mean in a philosopher? This is my
answer--it will have been guessed long ago: when he sees this ideal
the philosopher smiles because he sees therein an _optimum_ of the
conditions of the highest and boldest intellectuality; he does not
thereby deny "existence," he rather affirms thereby _his_ existence
and _only_ his existence, and this perhaps to the point of not being
far off the blasphemous wish, _pereat mundus, fiat philosophia, fiat
philosophus, fiam!_
8.
These philosophers, you see, are by no means uncorrupted witnesses and
judges of the _value_ of the ascetic ideal. They think _of themselves_
--what is the "saint" to them? They think of that which to them
personally is most indispensable; of freedom from compulsion,
disturbance, noise: freedom from business, duties, cares; of clear
head; of the dance, spring, and flight of thoughts; of good air--rare,
clear, free, dry, as is the air on the heights, in which every animal
creature becomes more intellectual and gains wings; they think of
peace in every cellar; all the hounds neatly chained; no baying of
enmity and uncouth rancour; no remorse of wounded ambition; quiet
and submissive internal organs, busy as mills, but unnoticed; the
heart alien, transcendent, future, posthumous--to summarise, they
mean by the ascetic ideal the joyous asceticism of a deified and
newly fledged animal, sweeping over life rather than resting. We know
what are the three great catch-words of the ascetic ideal: poverty,
humility, chastity; and now just look closely at the life of all
the great fruitful inventive spirits--you will always find again
and again these three qualities up to a certain extent. _Not_ for a
minute, as is self-evident, as though, perchance, they were part of
their virtues--what has this type of man to do with virtues?--but as
the most essential and natural conditions of their _best_ existence,
their _finest_ fruitfulness. In this connection it is quite possible
that their predominant intellectualism had first to curb an unruly and
irritable pride, or an insolent sensualism, or that it had all its
work cut out to maintain its wish for the "desert" against perhaps
an inclination to luxury and dilettantism, or similarly against an
extravagant liberality of heart and hand. But their intellect did
effect all this, simply because it was the _dominant_ instinct, which
carried through its orders in the case of all the other instincts.
It effects it still; if it ceased to do so, it would simply not be
dominant. But there is not one iota of "virtue" in all this. Further,
the _desert_, of which I just spoke, in which the strong, independent,
and well-equipped spirits retreat into their hermitage--oh, how
different is it from the cultured classes' dream of a desert! In
certain cases, in fact, the cultured classes themselves are the desert.
And it is certain that all the actors of the intellect would not endure
this desert for a minute. It is nothing like romantic and Syrian enough
for them, nothing like enough of a stage desert! Here as well there
are plenty of asses, but at this point the resemblance ceases. But a
desert nowadays is something like this--perhaps a deliberate obscurity;
a getting-out-of the way of one's self; a fear of noise, admiration,
papers, influence; a little office, a daily task, something that hides
rather than brings to light; sometimes associating with harmless,
cheerful beasts and fowls, the sight of which refreshes; a mountain for
company, but not a dead one, one with _eyes_ (that is, with lakes);
in certain cases even a room in a crowded hotel where one can reckon
on not being recognised, and on being able to talk with impunity to
every one: here is the desert--oh, it is lonely enough, believe me!
I grant that when Heracleitus retreated to the courts and cloisters
of the colossal temple of Artemis, that "wilderness" was worthier;
why do we _lack_ such temples? (perchance we do not lack them: I just
think of my splendid study in the _Piazza di San Marco_, in spring, of
course, and in the morning, between ten and twelve). But that which
Heracleitus shunned is still just what we too avoid nowadays: the
noise and democratic babble of the Ephesians, their politics, their
news from the "empire" (I mean, of course, Persia), their market-trade
in "the things of to-day "--for there is one thing from which we
philosophers especially need a rest--from the things of "to-day." We
honour the silent, the cold, the noble, the far, the past, everything,
in fact, at the sight of which the soul is not bound to brace itself up
and defend itself--something with which one can speak without _speaking
aloud_. Just listen now to the tone a spirit has when it speaks; every
spirit has its own tone and loves its own tone. That thing yonder, for
instance, is bound to be an agitator, that is, a hollow head, a hollow
mug: whatever may go into him, everything comes back from him dull and
thick, heavy with the echo of the great void. That spirit yonder nearly
always speaks hoarse: has he, perchance, _thought_ himself hoarse?
It may be so--ask the physiologists--but he who thinks in _words_,
thinks as a speaker and not as a thinker (it shows that he does not
think of objects or think objectively, but only of his relations
with objects--that, in point of fact, he only thinks of himself and
his audience). This third one speaks aggressively, he comes too near
our body, his breath blows on us--we shut our mouth involuntarily,
although he speaks to us through a book: the tone of his style supplies
the reason--he has no time, he has small faith in himself, he finds
expression now or never. But a spirit who is sure of himself speaks
softly; he seeks secrecy, he lets himself be awaited, A philosopher
is recognised by the fact that he shuns three brilliant and noisy
things--fame, princes, and women: which is not to say that they do not
come to him. He shuns every glaring light: therefore he shuns his time
and its "daylight." Therein he is as a shadow; the deeper sinks the
sun, the greater grows the shadow. As for his humility, he endures, as
he endures darkness, a certain dependence and obscurity: further, he is
afraid of the shock of lightning, he shudders at the insecurity of a
tree which is too isolated and too exposed, on which every storm vents
its temper, every temper its storm. His "maternal" instinct, his secret
love for that which grows in him, guides him into states where he is
relieved from the necessity of taking care of _himself_, in the same
way in which the "_mother_" instinct in woman has thoroughly maintained
up to the present woman's dependent position. After all, they demand
little enough, do these philosophers, their favourite motto is, "He
who possesses is possessed." All this is _not_, as I must say again
and again, to be attributed to a virtue, to a meritorious wish for
moderation and simplicity; but because their supreme lord so demands
of them, demands wisely and inexorably; their lord who is eager only
for one thing, for which alone he musters, and for which alone he
hoards everything--time, strength, love, interest. This kind of man
likes not to be disturbed by enmity, he likes not to be disturbed by
friendship, it is a type which forgets or despises easily. It strikes
him as bad form to play the martyr, "to _suffer_ for truth"--he leaves
all that to the ambitious and to the stage-heroes of the intellect,
and to all those, in fact, who have time enough for such luxuries
(they themselves, the philosophers, have something _to do_ for truth).
They make a sparing use of big words; they are said to be adverse to
the word "truth" itself: it has a "high falutin'" ring. Finally, as
far as the chastity of philosophers is concerned, the fruitfulness
of this type of mind is manifestly in another sphere than that of
children; perchance in some other sphere, too, they have the survival
of their name, their little immortality (philosophers in ancient
India would express themselves with still greater boldness: "Of what
use is posterity to him whose soul is the world?"). In this attitude
there is not a trace of chastity, by reason of any ascetic scruple or
hatred of the flesh, any more than it is chastity for an athlete or a
jockey to abstain from women; it is rather the will of the dominant
instinct, at any rate, during the period of their advanced philosophic
pregnancy. Every artist knows the harm done by sexual intercourse
on occasions of great mental strain and preparation; as far as the
strongest artists and those with the surest instincts are concerned,
this is not necessarily a case of experience--hard experience--but it
is simply their "maternal" instinct which, in order to benefit the
growing work, disposes recklessly (beyond all its normal stocks and
supplies) of the _vigour_ of its _animal_ life; the greater power then
_absorbs_ the lesser. Let us now apply this interpretation to gauge
correctly the case of Schopenhauer, which we have already mentioned: in
his case, the sight of the beautiful acted manifestly like a resolving
irritant on the chief power of his nature (the power of contemplation
and of intense penetration); so that this strength exploded and became
suddenly master of his consciousness. But this by no means excludes
the possibility of that particular sweetness and fulness, which is
peculiar to the æsthetic state, springing directly from the ingredient
of sensuality (just as that "idealism" which is peculiar to girls at
puberty originates in the same source)--it may be, consequently, that
sensuality is not removed by the approach of the æsthetic state, as
Schopenhauer believed, but merely becomes transfigured, and ceases to
enter into the consciousness as sexual excitement. (I shall return once
again to this point in connection with the more delicate problems of
the _physiology of the æsthetic_, a subject which up to the present has
been singularly untouched and unelucidated.)
9.
A certain asceticism, a grimly gay whole-hearted renunciation, is, as
we have seen, one of the most favourable conditions for the highest
intellectualism, and, consequently, for the most natural corollaries
of such intellectualism: we shall therefore be proof against any
surprise at the philosophers in particular always treating the ascetic
ideal with a certain amount of predilection. A serious historical
investigation shows the bond between the ascetic ideal and philosophy
to be still much tighter and still much stronger. It may be said that
it was only in the _leading strings_ of this ideal that philosophy
really learnt to make its first steps and baby paces--alas how
clumsily, alas how crossly, alas how ready to tumble down and lie on
its stomach was this shy little darling of a brat with its bandy legs!
The early history of philosophy is like that of all good things;--for a
long time they had not the courage to be themselves, they kept always
looking round to see if no one would come to their help; further, they
were afraid of all who looked at them. Just enumerate in order the
particular tendencies and virtues of the philosopher--his tendency to
doubt, his tendency to deny, his tendency to wait (to be "ephectic"),
his tendency to analyse, search, explore, dare, his tendency to compare
and to equalise, his will to be neutral and objective, his will for
everything which is "_sine ira et studio_":--has it yet been realised
that for quite a lengthy period these tendencies went counter to the
first claims of morality and conscience? (To say nothing at all of
_Reason_, which even Luther chose to call _Frau Klüglin_,[2] the sly
whore.) Has it been yet appreciated that a philosopher, in the event
of his _arriving_ at self-consciousness, must needs feel himself an
incarnate "nitimur in vetitum"--and consequently guard himself against
"his own sensations," against self-consciousness? It is, I repeat, just
the same with all good things, on which we now pride ourselves; even
judged by the standard of the ancient Greeks, our whole modern life,
in so far as it is not weakness, but power and the consciousness of
power, appears pure "Hybris" and godlessness: for the things which are
the very reverse of those which we honour to-day, have had for a long
time conscience on their side, and God as their guardian. "Hybris"
is our whole attitude to nature nowadays, our violation of nature
with the help of machinery, and all the unscrupulous ingenuity of our
scientists and engineers. "Hybris" is our attitude to God, that is, to
some alleged teleological and ethical spider behind the meshes of the
great trap of the causal web. Like Charles the Bold in his war with
Louis the Eleventh, we may say, "je combats l'universelle araignée";
"Hybris" is our attitude to ourselves--for we experiment with ourselves
in a way that we would not allow with any animal, and with pleasure
and curiosity open our soul in our living body: what matters now to
us the "salvation" of the soul? We heal ourselves afterwards: being
ill is instructive, we doubt it not, even more instructive than being
well--inoculators of disease seem to us to-day even more necessary
than any medicine-men and "saviours." There is no doubt we do violence
to ourselves nowadays, we crackers of the soul's kernel, we incarnate
riddles, who are ever asking riddles, as though life were naught else
than the cracking of a nut; and even thereby must we necessarily become
day by day more and more worthy to be asked questions and worthy to ask
them, even thereby do we perchance also become worthier to--live?
... All good things were once bad things; from every original sin has
grown an original virtue. Marriage, for example, seemed for a long time
a sin against the rights of the community; a man formerly paid a fine
for the insolence of claiming one woman to himself (to this phase
belongs, for instance, the _jus primæ noctis_, to-day still in Cambodia
the privilege of the priest, that guardian of the "good old customs").
The soft, benevolent, yielding, sympathetic feelings--eventually valued
so highly that they almost became "intrinsic values," were for a very
long time actually despised by their possessors: gentleness was then
a subject for shame, just as hardness is now (compare _Beyond Good
and Evil_, Aph. 260). The submission to law: oh, with what qualms of
conscience was it that the noble races throughout the world renounced
the _vendetta_ and gave the law power over themselves! Law was long a
_vetitum_, a blasphemy, an innovation; it was introduced with force,
like a force, to which men only submitted with a sense of personal
shame. Every tiny step forward in the world was formerly made at
the cost of mental and physical torture. Nowadays the whole of this
point of view--"that not only stepping forward, nay, stepping at all,
movement, change, all needed their countless martyrs," rings in our
ears quite strangely. I have put it forward in the _Dawn of Day_, Aph.
18. "Nothing is purchased more dearly," says the same book a little
later, "than the modicum of human reason and freedom which is now our
pride. But that pride is the reason why it is now almost impossible
for us to feel in sympathy with those immense periods of the 'Morality
of Custom,' which lie at the beginning of the 'world's history,'
constituting as they do the real decisive historical principle which
has fixed the character of humanity; those periods, I repeat, when
throughout the world suffering passed for virtue, cruelty for virtue,
deceit for virtue, revenge for virtue, repudiation of the reason for
virtue; and when, conversely, well-being passed current for danger, the
desire for knowledge for danger, pity for danger, peace for danger,
being pitied for shame, work for shame, madness for divinity, and
_change_ for immorality and incarnate corruption!"
10.
There is in the same book, Aph. 12, an explanation of the _burden_
of unpopularity under which the earliest race of contemplative men
had to live--despised almost as widely as they were first feared!
Contemplation first appeared on earth in a disguised shape, in an
ambiguous form, with an evil heart and often with an uneasy head:
there is no doubt about it. The inactive, brooding, unwarlike element
in the instincts of contemplative men long invested them with a cloud
of suspicion: the only way to combat this was to excite a definite
_fear_. And the old Brahmans, for example, knew to a nicety how to do
this! The oldest philosophers were well versed in giving to their very
existence and appearance, meaning, firmness, background, by reason
whereof men learnt to _fear_ them; considered more precisely, they
did this from an even more fundamental need, the need of inspiring
in themselves fear and self-reverence. For they found even in their
own souls all the valuations turned _against_ themselves; they had
to fight down every kind of suspicion and antagonism against "the
philosophic element in themselves." Being men of a terrible age,
they did this with terrible means: cruelty to themselves, ingenious
self-mortification--this was the chief method of these ambitious
hermits and intellectual revolutionaries, who were obliged to force
down the gods and the traditions of their own soul, so as to enable
themselves to _believe_ in their own revolution. I remember the famous
story of the King Vicvamitra, who, as the result of a thousand years
of self-martyrdom, reached such a consciousness of power and such a
confidence in himself that he undertook to build a _new heaven_: the
sinister symbol of the oldest and newest history of philosophy in the
whole world. Every one who has ever built anywhere a "_new heaven_"
first found the power thereto in his _own hell_.. .. Let us compress
the facts into a short formula. The philosophic spirit had, in order
to be _possible_ to any extent at all, to masquerade and disguise
itself as one of the _previously fixed_ types of the contemplative
man, to disguise itself as priest, wizard, soothsayer, as a religious
man generally: the _ascetic ideal_ has for a long time served the
philosopher as a superficial form, as a condition which enabled him
to exist. .. . To be able to be a philosopher he had to exemplify the
ideal; to exemplify it, he was bound to _believe_ in it. The peculiarly
etherealised abstraction of philosophers, with their negation of the
world, their enmity to life, their disbelief in the senses, which has
been maintained up to the most recent time, and has almost thereby come
to be accepted as the ideal _philosophic attitude_--this abstraction
is the result of those enforced conditions under which philosophy
came into existence, and continued to exist; inasmuch as for quite
a very long time philosophy would have been _absolutely impossible_
in the world without an ascetic cloak and dress, without an ascetic
self-misunderstanding. Expressed plainly and palpably, the _ascetic
priest_ has taken the repulsive and sinister form of the caterpillar,
beneath which and behind which alone philosophy could live and slink
about.. ..
Has all that really changed? Has that flamboyant and dangerous winged
creature, that "spirit" which that caterpillar concealed within itself,
has it, I say, thanks to a sunnier, warmer, lighter world, really
and finally flung off its hood and escaped into the light? Can we
to-day point to enough pride, enough daring, enough courage, enough
self-confidence, enough mental will, enough will for responsibility,
enough freedom of the will, to enable the philosopher to be now in the
world really--_possible_?
11.