great man is easily given. In all circumstances let a person provide
them with something very pleasant, or first let him put it into their
heads that this or that would be very pleasant, and then let him give
it to them. On no account give it _immediately,_ however: but let
him acquire it by the greatest exertions, or seem thus to acquire
it. The masses must have the impression that there is a powerful,
nay indomitable strength of will operating; at least it must seem to
be there operating. Everybody admires a strong will, because nobody
possesses it, and everybody says to himself that if he did possess
it there would no longer be any bounds for him and his egoism. If,
then, it becomes evident that such a strong will effects something
very agreeable to the masses, instead of hearkening to the wishes
of covetousness, people admire once more, and wish good luck to
themselves. Moreover, if he has all the qualities of the masses, they
are the less ashamed before him, and he is all the more popular.
Consequently, he may be violent, envious, rapacious, intriguing,
flattering, fawning, inflated, and, according to circumstances,
anything whatsoever.
461.
PRINCE AND GOD.--People frequently commune with their princes in the
same way as with their God, as indeed the prince himself was frequently
the Deity's representative, or at least His high priest. This almost
uncanny disposition of veneration, disquiet, and shame, grew, and has
grown, much weaker, but occasionally it flares up again, and fastens
upon powerful persons generally. The cult of genius is an echo of this
veneration of Gods and Princes. Wherever an effort is made to exalt
particular men to the superhuman, there is also a tendency to regard
whole grades of the population as coarser and baser than they really
are.
462.
MY UTOPIA.--In a better arranged society the heavy work and trouble
of life will be assigned to those who suffer least through it, to the
most obtuse, therefore; and so step by step up to those who are most
sensitive to the highest and sublimest kinds of suffering, and who
therefore still suffer notwithstanding the greatest alleviations of
life.
463.
A DELUSION IN SUBVERSIVE DOCTRINES.--There are political and social
dreamers who ardently and eloquently call for the overthrow of all
order, in the belief that the proudest fane of beautiful humanity
will then rear itself immediately, almost of its own accord. In these
dangerous dreams there is still an echo of Rousseau's superstition,
which believes in a marvellous primordial goodness of human nature,
buried up, as it were; and lays all the blame of that burying-up on
the institutions of civilisation, on society, State, and education.
Unfortunately, it is well known by historical experiences that
every such overthrow reawakens into new life the wildest energies,
the long-buried horrors and extravagances of remotest ages; that
an overthrow, therefore, may possibly be a source of strength to a
deteriorated humanity, but never a regulator, architect, artist,
or perfecter of human nature. It was not _Voltaire's_ moderate
nature, inclined towards regulating, purifying, and reconstructing,
but _Rousseau's_ passionate follies and half-lies that aroused the
optimistic spirit of the Revolution, against which I cry, "_Écrasez
l'infâme!_" Owing to this _the Spirit of enlightenment and progressive
development_ has been long scared away; let us see--each of us
individually--if it is not possible to recall it!
464.
MODERATION.--When perfect resoluteness in thinking and investigating,
that is to say, freedom of spirit, has become a feature of character,
it produces moderation of conduct; for it weakens avidity, attracts
much extant energy for the furtherance of intellectual aims, and shows
the semi-usefulness, or uselessness and danger, of all sudden changes.
465.
THE RESURRECTION OF THE SPIRIT.--A nation usually renews its youth on
a political sick-bed, and there finds again the spirit which it had
gradually lost in seeking and maintaining power. Culture is indebted
most of all to politically weakened periods.
466.
NEW OPINIONS IN THE OLD HOME.--The overthrow of opinions is not
immediately followed by the overthrow of institutions; on the contrary,
the new opinions dwell for a long time in the desolate and haunted
house of their predecessors, and conserve it even for want of a
habitation.
467.
PUBLIC EDUCATION.--In large States public education will always be
extremely mediocre, for the same reason that in large kitchens the
cooking is at best only mediocre.
468.
INNOCENT CORRUPTION.--In all institutions into which the sharp breeze
of public criticism does not penetrate an innocent corruption grows up
like a fungus (for instance, in learned bodies and senates).
469.
SCHOLARS AS POLITICIANS.--To scholars who become politicians the comic
role is usually assigned; they have to be the good conscience of a
state policy.
470.
THE WOLF HIDDEN BEHIND THE SHEEP.--Almost every politician, in certain
circumstances, has such need of an honest man that he breaks into the
sheep-fold like a famished wolf; not, however, to devour a stolen
sheep, but to hide himself behind its woolly back.
471.
HAPPY TIMES.--A happy age is no longer possible, because men only wish
for it but do not desire to have it; and each individual, when good
days come for him, learns positively to pray for disquiet and misery.
The destiny of mankind is arranged for _happy moments_--every life has
such--but not for happy times. Nevertheless, such times will continue
to exist in man's imagination as "over the hills and far away," an
heirloom of his earliest ancestors; for the idea of the happy age, from
the earliest times to the present, has no doubt been derived from the
state in which man, after violent exertions in hunting and warfare,
gives himself over to repose, stretches out his limbs, and hears the
wings of sleep rustle around him. It is a false conclusion when, in
accordance with that old habit, man imagines that after _whole periods_
of distress and trouble he will be able also to enjoy the state of
happiness in _proportionate increase and duration._
472.
RELIGION AND GOVERNMENT.--So long as the State, or, more properly, the
Government, regards itself as the appointed guardian of a number of
minors, and on their account considers the question whether religion
should be preserved or abolished, it is highly probable that it will
always decide for the preservation thereof. For religion satisfies
the nature of the individual in times of loss, destitution, terror,
and distrust, in cases, therefore, where the Government feels
itself incapable of doing anything directly for the mitigation of
the spiritual sufferings of the individual; indeed, even in general
unavoidable and next to inevitable evils (famines, financial crises,
and wars) religion gives to the masses an attitude of tranquillity and
confiding expectancy. Whenever the necessary or accidental deficiencies
of the State Government, or the dangerous consequences of dynastic
interests, strike the eyes of the intelligent and make them refractory,
the unintelligent will only think they see the finger of God therein
and will submit with patience to the dispensations from _on high_
(a conception in which divine and human modes of government usually
coalesce); thus internal civil peace and continuity of development
will be preserved. The power, which lies in the unity of popular
feeling, in the existence of the same opinions and aims for all, is
protected and confirmed by religion,--the rare cases excepted in
which a priesthood cannot agree with the State about the price, and
therefore comes into conflict with it. As a rule the State will know
how to win over the priests, because it needs their most private and
secret system for educating souls, and knows how to value servants who
apparently, and outwardly, represent quite other interests. Even at
present no power can become "legitimate" without the assistance of the
priests; a fact which Napoleon understood. Thus, absolutely paternal
government and the careful preservation of religion necessarily go
hand-in-hand. In this connection it must be taken for granted that
the rulers and governing classes are enlightened concerning the
advantages which religion affords, and consequently feel themselves
to a certain extent superior to it, inasmuch as they use it as a
means; thus freedom of spirit has its origin here. But how will it be
when the totally different interpretation of the idea of Government,
such as is taught in _democratic_ States, begins to prevail? When
one sees in it nothing but the instrument of the popular will, no
"upper" in contrast to an "under," but merely a function of the sole
sovereign, the people? Here also only the same attitude which the
people assume towards religion can be assumed by the Government;
every diffusion of enlightenment will have to find an echo even in
the representatives, and the utilising and exploiting of religious
impulses and consolations for State purposes will not be so easy
(unless powerful party leaders occasionally exercise an influence
resembling that of enlightened despotism). When, however, the State
is not permitted to derive any further advantage from religion, or
when people think far too variously on religious matters to allow the
State to adopt a consistent and uniform procedure with respect to them,
the way out of the difficulty will necessarily present itself, namely
to treat religion as a private affair and leave it to the conscience
and custom of each single individual. The first result of all is that
religious feeling seems to be strengthened, inasmuch as hidden and
suppressed impulses thereof, which the State had unintentionally or
intentionally stifled, now break forth and rush to extremes; later
on, however, it is found that religion is over-grown with sects, and
that an abundance of dragon's teeth were sown as soon as religion was
made a private affair. The spectacle of strife, and the hostile laying
bare of all the weaknesses of religious confessions, admit finally of
no other expedient except that every better and more talented person
should make irreligiousness his private affair, a sentiment which now
obtains the upper hand even in the minds of the governing classes,
and, almost against their will, gives an anti-religious character to
their measures. As soon as this happens, the sentiment of persons
still religiously disposed, who formerly adored the State as something
half sacred or wholly sacred, changes into decided _hostility to the
State;_ they lie in wait for governmental measures, seeking to hinder,
thwart, and disturb as much as they can, and, by the fury of their
contradiction, drive the opposing parties, the irreligious ones, into
an almost fanatical enthusiasm _for_ the State; in connection with
which there is also the silently co-operating influence, that since
their separation from religion the hearts of persons in these circles
are conscious of a void, and seek by devotion to the State to provide
themselves provisionally with a substitute for religion, a kind of
stuffing for the void. After these perhaps lengthy transitional
struggles, it is finally decided whether the religious parties are
still strong enough to revive an old condition of things, and turn the
wheel backwards: in which case enlightened despotism (perhaps less
enlightened and more timorous than formerly), inevitably gets the
State into its hands,--or whether the non-religious parties achieve
their purpose, and, possibly through schools and education, check the
increase of their opponents during several generations, and finally
make them no longer possible. Then, however, their enthusiasm for the
State also abates: it always becomes more obvious that along with
the religious adoration which regards the State as a mystery and a
supernatural institution, the reverent and pious relation to it has
also been convulsed. Henceforth individuals see only that side of the
State which may be useful or injurious to them, and press forward by
all means to obtain an influence over it. But this rivalry soon becomes
too great; men and parties change too rapidly, and throw each other
down again too furiously from the mountain when they have only just
succeeded in getting aloft. All the measures which such a Government
carries out lack the guarantee of permanence; people then fight shy of
undertakings which would require the silent growth of future decades
or centuries to produce ripe fruit. Nobody henceforth feels any other
obligation to a law than to submit for the moment to the power which
introduced the law; people immediately set to work, however, to
undermine it by a new power, a newly-formed majority. Finally--it may
be confidently asserted--the distrust of all government, the insight
into the useless and harassing nature of these short-winded struggles,
must drive men to an entirely new resolution: to the abrogation of
the conception of the State and the abolition of the contrast of
"private and public." Private concerns gradually absorb the business
of the State; even the toughest residue which is left over from the
old work of governing (the business, for instance, which is meant to
protect private persons from private persons) will at last some day
be managed by private enterprise. The neglect, decline, and _death
of the State,_ the liberation of the private person (I am careful
not to say the individual), are the consequences of the democratic
conception of the State; that is its mission. When it has accomplished
its task,--which, like everything human, involves much rationality
and irrationality,--and when all relapses into the old malady have
been overcome, then a new leaf in the story-book of humanity will be
unrolled, on which readers will find all kinds of strange tales and
perhaps also some amount of good. To repeat shortly what has been
said: the interests of the tutelary Government and the interests of
religion go hand-in-hand, so that when the latter begins to decay
the foundations of the State are also shaken. The belief in a divine
regulation of political affairs, in a mystery in the existence of
the State, is of religious origin: if religion disappears, the State
will inevitably lose its old veil of Isis, and will no longer arouse
veneration. The sovereignty of the people, looked at closely, serves
also to dispel the final fascination and superstition in the realm
of these sentiments; modern democracy is the historical form of the
_decay of the State._ The outlook which results from this certain
decay is not, however, unfortunate in every respect; the wisdom and
the selfishness of men are the best developed of all their qualities;
when the State no longer meets the demands of these impulses, chaos
will least of all result, but a still more appropriate expedient than
the State will get the mastery over the State. How man organising forces
have already been seen to die out! For example, that of the _gens_
or clan which for millennia was far mightier than the power of the
family, and indeed already ruled and regulated long before the latter
existed. We ourselves see the important notions of the right and might
of the family, which once possessed the supremacy as far as the Roman
system extended, always becoming paler and feebler. In the same way a
later generation will also see the State become meaningless in certain
parts of the world,--an idea which many contemporaries can hardly
contemplate without alarm and horror. To _labour_ for the propagation
and realisation of this idea is, certainly, another thing; one must
think very presumptuously of one's reason, and only half understand
history, to set one's hand to the plough at present--when as yet no
one can show us the seeds that are afterwards to be sown upon the
broken soil. Let us, therefore, trust to the "wisdom and selfishness
of men" that the State may _yet_ exist a good while longer, and that
the destructive attempts of over-zealous, too hasty sciolists may be in
vain!
473.
SOCIALISM, WITH REGARD TO ITS MEANS.--Socialism is the fantastic
younger brother of almost decrepit despotism, which it wants to
succeed; its efforts are, therefore, in the deepest sense reactionary.
For it desires such an amount of State power as only despotism has
possessed,--indeed, it outdoes all the past, in that it aims at the
complete annihilation of the individual, whom it deems an unauthorised
luxury of nature, which is to be improved by it into an appropriate
_organ of the general community._ Owing to its relationship, it always
appears in proximity to excessive developments of power, like the
old typical socialist, Plato, at the court of the Sicilian tyrant;
it desires (and under certain circumstances furthers) the Cæsarian
despotism of this century, because, as has been said, it would like to
become its heir. But even this inheritance would not suffice for its
objects, it requires the most submissive prostration of all citizens
before the absolute State, such as has never yet been realised; and
as it can no longer even count upon the old religious piety towards
the State, but must rather strive involuntarily and continuously for
the abolition thereof,--because it strives for the abolition of all
existing _States,_--it can only hope for existence occasionally, here
and there for short periods, by means of the extremest terrorism. It is
therefore silently preparing itself for reigns of terror, and drives
the word "justice" like a nail into the heads of the half-cultured
masses in order to deprive them completely of their understanding
(after they had already suffered seriously from the half-culture), and
to provide them with a good conscience for the bad game they are to
play. Socialism may serve to teach, very brutally and impressively, the
danger of all accumulations of State power, and may serve so far to
inspire distrust of the State itself. When its rough voice strikes up
the way-cry "_as much State as possible_," the shout at first becomes
louder than ever,--but soon the opposition cry also breaks forth, with
so much greater force: "_as little State as possible._"
474.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE MIND FEARED BY THE STATE.--The Greek _polis_
was, like every organising political power, exclusive and distrustful
of the growth of culture; its powerful fundamental impulse seemed
almost solely to have a paralysing and obstructive effect thereon.
It did not want to let any history or any becoming have a place in
culture; the education laid down in the State laws was meant to
be obligatory on all generations to keep them at _one_ stage of
development. Plato also, later on, did not desire it to be otherwise
in his ideal State. _In spite of_ the polis culture developed itself
in this manner; indirectly to be sure, and against its will, the polis
furnished assistance because the ambition of individuals therein was
stimulated to the utmost, so that, having once found the path of
intellectual development, they followed it to its farthest extremity.
On the other hand, appeal should not be made to the panegyric of
Pericles, for it is only a great optimistic dream about the alleged
necessary connection between the Polis and Athenian culture;
immediately before the night fell over Athens the plague and the
breakdown of tradition, Thucydides makes this culture flash up once
more like of the evil day that had preceded.
475.
EUROPEAN MAN AND THE DESTRUCTION OF NATIONALITIES.--Commerce and
industry, interchange of books and letters, the universality of
all higher culture, the rapid changing of locality and landscape,
and the present nomadic life of all who are not landowners,--these
circumstances necessarily bring with them a weakening, and finally
a destruction of nationalities, at least of European nationalities;
so that, in consequence of perpetual crossings, there must arise
out of them all a mixed race, that of the European man. At present
the isolation of nations, through the rise of _national_ enmities,
consciously or unconsciously counteracts this tendency; but
nevertheless the process of fusing advances slowly, in spite of those
occasional counter-currents. This artificial nationalism is, however,
as dangerous as was artificial Catholicism, for it is essentially
an un natural condition of extremity and martial la which has been
proclaimed by the few over the many, and requires artifice, lying,
and force maintain its reputation. It is not the interests the many
(of the peoples), as they probably say, but it is first of all the
interests of certain princely dynasties, and then of certain commercial
and social classes, which impel to this nationalism; once we have
recognised this fact, we should just fearlessly style ourselves _good
Europeans_ and labour actively for the amalgamation of nations; in
which efforts Germans may assist by virtue of their hereditary position
as _interpreters and intermediaries between nations._ By the way, the
great problem of the _Jews_ only exists within the national States,
inasmuch as their energy and higher intelligence, their intellectual
and volitional capital, accumulated from generation to generation in
tedious schools of suffering, must necessarily attain to universal
supremacy here to an extent provocative of envy and hatred; so that
the literary misconduct is becoming prevalent in almost all modern
nations --and all the more so as they again set up to be national--of
sacrificing the Jews as the scape-goats of all possible public
and private abuses. So soon as it is no longer a question of the
preservation or establishment of nations, but of the production and
training of a European mixed-race of the greatest possible strength,
the Jew is just as useful and desirable an ingredient as any other
national remnant. Every nation, every individual, has unpleasant and
even dangerous qualities,--it is cruel to require that the Jew should
be an exception. Those qualities may even be dangerous and frightful
in a special degree in his case; and perhaps the young Stock-Exchange
Jew is in general the most repulsive invention of the human species.
Nevertheless, in a general summing up, I should like to know how much
must be excused in a nation which, not without blame on the part of
all of us, has had the most mournful history of all nations, and to
which we owe the most loving of men (Christ), the most upright of sages
(Spinoza), the mightiest book, and the most effective moral law in the
world? Moreover, in the darkest times of the Middle Ages, when Asiatic
clouds had gathered darkly over Europe, it was Jewish free-thinkers,
scholars, and physicians who upheld the banner of enlightenment and of
intellectual independence under the severest personal sufferings, and
defended Europe against Asia; we owe it not least to their efforts that
a more natural, more reasonable, at all events un-mythical, explanation
of the world was finally able to get the upper hand once more, and
that the link of culture which now unites us with the enlightenment
of Greco-Roman antiquity has remained unbroken. If Christianity has
done everything to orientalise the Occident, Judaism has assisted
essentially in occidentalising it anew; which, in a certain sense, is
equivalent to making Europe's mission and history a _continuation of
that of Greece_.
476.
APPARENT SUPERIORITY OF THE MIDDLE AGES.--The Middle Ages present in
the Church an institution with an absolutely universal aim, involving
the whole of humanity,--an aim, moreover, which--presumedly--concerned
man's highest interests; in comparison therewith the aims of the States
and nations which modern history exhibits make a painful impression;
they seem petty, base, material, and restricted in extent. But this
different impression on our imagination should certainly not determine
our judgment; for that universal institution corresponded to feigned
and fictitiously fostered needs, such as the need of salvation, which,
wherever they did not already exist, it had first of all to create:
the, new institutions, however, relieve actual distresses; and the
time is coming when institutions will arise to minister to the common,
genuine needs of all men, and to cast that fantastic prototype, the
Catholic Church, into shade and oblivion.
477.