_(a)_ MODERN GLOOMINESS.
57.
My friends, we had a hard time as youths; we even suffered from
youth itself as though it were a serious disease. This is owing to
the age in which we were born--an age of enormous internal decay and
disintegration which, with all its weakness and even with the best of
its strength, is opposed to the spirit of youth. Disintegration--that
is to say, uncertainty--is peculiar to this age: nothing stands on
solid ground or on a sound faith. People live for the morrow, because
the day-after-to-morrow is doubtful. All our road is slippery and
dangerous, while the ice which still bears us has grown unconscionably
thin: we all feel the mild and gruesome breath of the thaw-wind--soon,
where we are walking, no one will any longer _be able_ to stand!
58.
If this is not an age of decay and of diminishing vitality, it is at
least one of indiscriminate and arbitrary experimentalising--and it is
probable that out of an excess of abortive experiments there has grown
this general impression, as of decay: and perhaps decay itself.
59.
_Concerning the history of modern gloominess._
The state-nomads (officials, etc.): "homeless"--.
The break-up of the family.
The "good man" as a symptom of exhaustion.
Justice as Will to Power (Rearing).
Lewdness and neurosis.
Black music: whither has real music gone?
The anarchist.
Contempt of man, loathing.
Most profound distinction: whether hunger or satiety is creative? The
first creates the _Ideals of Romanticism._
Northern unnaturalness.
The need of Alcohol: the "need" of the working classes.
Philosophical Nihilism.
60.
The slow advance and rise of the middle and lower classes (including
the lower kind of spirit and body), which was already well under way
before the French Revolution, and would have made the same progress
forward without the latter,--in short, then, the preponderance of the
herd over all herdsmen and bell-wethers,--brings in its train:--
(1) Gloominess of spirit (the juxtaposition of a stoical and a
frivolous _appearance_ of happiness, peculiar to noble cultures, is on
the decline; much suffering is allowed to be _seen_ and _heard_ which
formerly was borne in concealment);
(2) Moral hypocrisy (a way of _distinguishing_ oneself through
morality, but by means of the values of the herd: pity, solicitude,
moderation; and not by means of those virtues which are recognised and
honoured outside the herd's sphere of power);
(3) A _really_ large amount of sympathy with both pain and joy (a
feeling of pleasure resulting from being herded together, which is
peculiar to all gregarious animals--"public spirit," "patriotism,"
everything, in fact, which is apart from the individual).
61.
Our age, with its indiscriminate endeavours to mitigate distress, to
honour it, and to wage war in advance with unpleasant possibilities, is
an age of the _poor._ Our "_rich people_"--_they_ are the poorest! The
real _purpose_ of all wealth has been forgotten.
62.
_Criticism of modern man_:--"the good man," but corrupted and misled by
bad institutions (tyrants and priests);--reason elevated to a position
of authority;--history is regarded as the surmounting of errors;--the
future is regarded as progress;--the Christian state ("God of the
armies");--Christian sexual intercourse (as marriage);--the realm of
"justice" (the cult of "mankind");--"freedom."
The _romantic_ attitudes of the modern man;--the noble man
(Byron, Victor Hugo, George Sand);--taking the part of the
oppressed and the bungled and the botched: motto for historians and
romancers;--the Stoics of duty;--disinterestedness regarded as art
and as knowledge;--altruism as the most mendacious form of egoism
(utilitarianism), the most sentimental form of egoism.
All this savours of the eighteenth century. But it had other
qualities which were not inherited, namely, a certain _insouciance,_
cheerfulness, elegance, spiritual clearness. The spiritual tempo has
altered; the pleasure which was begotten by spiritual refinement and
clearness has given room to the pleasure of colour, harmony, mass,
reality, etc. etc. Sensuality in spiritual things. In short, it is the
eighteenth century of Rousseau.
63.
Taken all in all, a considerable amount of _humanity_ has been attained
by our men of to-day. That we feel this is in itself a proof of the
fact that we have become so sensitive in regard to small cases of
distress, that we somewhat unjustly overlook what has been achieved.
Here we must make allowances for the fact that a great deal of
decadence is rife, and that, through such eyes, our world _must appear_
bad and wretched. But these eyes have always seen in the same way, in
all ages.
(1) A certain hypersensitiveness, even in morality.
(2) The quantum of bitterness and gloominess, which pessimism bears
with it in its judgments--both together have helped to bring about the
preponderance of the other and _opposite_ point of view, that things
are not well with our morality.
The fact of credit, of the commerce of the world, and the means of
traffic--are expressions of an extraordinarily mild _trustfulness_ in
men.... To that may also be added--
(3) The deliverance of science from moral and religious prejudices: a
very good sign, though for the most part misunderstood.
In my own way, I am attempting a justification of history.
64.
_The second appearance of Buddhism._--Its precursory signs: the
increase of pity. Spiritual exhaustion. The reduction of all
problems to the question of pleasure and pain. The glory of war
which calls forth a counter-stroke. Just as the sharp demarcation of
nations generates a counter-movement in the form of the most hearty
"Fraternity." The fact that it is impossible for religion to carry on
its work any longer with dogma and fables.
The _catastrophe of Nihilism_ will put an end to all this Buddhistic
culture.
65.
That which is most sorely afflicted to-day is the instinct and will of
_tradition_: all institutions which owe their origin to this instinct,
are opposed to the tastes of the age.... At bottom, nothing is thought
or done which is not calculated to tear up this spirit of tradition
by the roots. Tradition is looked upon as a fatality; it is studied
and acknowledged (in the form of "heredity"), but people will not have
anything to do with it. The extension of one will over long periods
of time, the selection of conditions and valuations which make it
possible to dispose of centuries in advance--this, precisely, is what
is most utterly anti-modern. From which it follows, that disorganising
principles give our age its specific character.
66.
"Be simple"--a demand which, when made to us complicated and
incomprehensible triers of the heart and reins, is a simple
absurdity.... Be natural: but even if we are unnatural--what then?
67.
The means employed in former times in order to arrive at _similarly
constituted_ and lasting types, throughout long generations: entailed
property and the respect of parents (the origin of the faith in gods
and heroes as ancestors).
Now, the _subdivision of property_ belongs to the opposite tendency.
The centralisation of an enormous number of, different interests in one
soul: which, _to that end,_ must be very strong and mutable.
68.
Why does everything become _mummery._--The modern man is lacking in
unfailing instinct (instinct being understood here to mean that which
is the outcome of a _long period of activity in the same occupation_ on
the part of one family of men); the incapability of producing anything
perfect, is simply the result of this lack of instinct: one individual
alone cannot make up for the schooling his ancestors should have
transmitted to him.
What a morality or book of law creates: that deep instinct which
renders _automatism_ and perfection possible in life and in work.
But now we have reached the opposite point; yes, we wanted to reach
it--the most extreme consciousness, through introspection on the part
of man and of history: and thus we are practically most distant from
perfection in Being, doing, and willing: our desires--even our will
to knowledge--shows how prodigiously decadent we are. We are striving
after the very reverse of what _strong races_ and _strong natures_ will
have--understanding is an _end_....
That Science is possible in the way in which it is practised to-day,
proves that all elementary instincts, _the instincts which ward off
danger and protect life,_ are no longer active. We no longer save, we
are merely spending the capital of our forefathers, even in the way in
which we _pursue knowledge_.
69.
_Nihilistic trait_.
_(a)_ In the _natural sciences_ ("purposelessness"), causality,
mechanism, "conformity to law," an interval, a remnant.
_(b)_ Likewise in _politics_: the individual lacks the belief in his
own right, innocence; falsehood rules supreme, as also the worship of
the moment.
_(d)_ Likewise in _political economy_: the abolition of slavery: the
lack of a redeeming class, and of _one who justifies_--the rise of
anarchy. "Education"?
_(d)_ Likewise in _history_: fatalism, Darwinism; the last attempts at
reconciling reason and Godliness fail. Sentimentality in regard to the
past: biographies can no longer be endured! (Phenomenalism even here:
character regarded as a mask; there are no facts.)
_(e)_ Likewise in _Art_: romanticism and its _counter-stroke_
(repugnance towards romantic ideals and lies). The latter, morally,
as a sense of greatest truthfulness, but pessimistic. Pure "artists"
(indifference as to the "subject"). (The psychology of the
father-confessor and puritanical psychology--two forms of psychological
romanticism: but also their counter-stroke, the attempt to maintain a
purely artistic attitude towards "men"--but even in this respect no one
dares to make the _opposite_ valuation.)
70.
_Against_ the teaching of the influence of _environment_ and external
causes: the power coming from inside is infinitely _superior_;
much that appears like influence acting from without is merely the
subjection of environment to this inner power.
Precisely the same environment may be used and interpreted in opposite
ways: there are no facts. A genius is _not_ explained by such theories
concerning origins.
71.
"_Modernity_" regarded in the light of nutrition and digestion.
Sensitiveness is infinitely more acute (beneath moral vestments: the
increase of pity), the abundance of different impressions is greater
than ever. The _cosmopolitanism_ of articles of diet, of literature,
newspapers, forms, tastes, and even landscapes. The speed of this
affluence is _prestissimo_; impressions are wiped out, and people
instinctively guard against assimilating anything or against taking
anything _seriously_ and "digesting" it; the result is a weakening of
the powers of digestion. There begin a sort of _adaptation_ to this
accumulation of impressions. Man unlearns the art of _doing,_ and
_all he does is to react_ to stimuli coming from his environment. _He
spends his strength,_ partly in the process of _assimilation,_ partly
in _defending himself,_ and again partly in _responding to stimuli.
Profound enfeeblement of spontaneity_:--the historian, the critic, the
analyst, the interpreter, the observer, the collector, the reader,--all
reactive talents,--_all_ science!
Artificial _modification_ of one's own nature in order to make it
resemble a "mirror"; one is interested, but only epidermally: this
is systematic coolness, equilibrium, a steady _low_ temperature,
just beneath the thin surface on which warmth, movement, "storm," and
undulations play.
Opposition of _external_ mobility to a certain _dead heaviness and
fatigue_.
72.
Where must our modern world be classed--under exhaustion or under
increasing strength? Its multiformity and lack of repose are brought
about by the highest form of _consciousness._
73.