_Economically,_--as aiming at the greatest possible use of all
individual power, with the view of preventing the waste of exceptional
natures.
_Æsthetically,_--as the formation of fixed types, and the pleasure in
one's own.
_Politically,_--as the art of bearing with the severe divergencies of
the degrees of power in society.
_Psychologically,_ as an imaginary preference for the bungled and the
mediocre, in order to preserve the weak.
720.
Man has one terrible and fundamental wish; he desires power, and this
impulse, which is called freedom, must be the longest restrained.
Hence ethics has instinctively aimed at such an education as shall
restrain the desire for power; thus our morality slanders the would-be
tyrant, and glorifies charity, patriotism, and the ambition of the herd.
721.
Impotence to power, how it disguises itself and plays the hypocrite, as
obedience, subordination, the pride of duty and morality, submission,
devotion, love (the idolisation and apotheosis of the commander is a
kind of compensation, and indirect self-enhancement). It veils itself
further under fatalism and resignation, objectivity, self-tyranny,
stoicism, asceticism, self-abnegation, hallowing. Other disguises are:
criticism, pessimism, indignation, susceptibility, beautiful soul,
virtue, self--deification, philosophic detachment, freedom from contact
with the world (the realisation of impotence disguises itself as
disdain).
There is a universal need to exercise some kind of power, or to create
for one's self the appearance of some power, if only temporarily, in
the form of intoxication.
There are men who desire power simply for the sake of the happiness it
will bring; these belong chiefly to political parties. Other men have
the same yearning, even when power means visible disadvantages, the
sacrifice of their happiness, and well-being; they are the ambitious.
Other men, again, are only like dogs in a manger, and will have power
only to prevent its falling into the hands of others on whom they would
then be dependent.
722.
If there be justice and equality before the law, what would thereby
be abolished?--Suspense, enmity, hatred. But it is a mistake to think
that you thereby increase happiness; for the Corsicans rejoice in more
happiness than the Continentals.
723.
Reciprocity and the expectation of a reward is one of the most
seductive forms of the devaluation of mankind. It involves that
equality which depreciates any gulf as immoral.
724.
Utility is entirely dependent upon the object to be attained,--the
wherefore? And this wherefore, this purpose, is again dependent upon
the degree of power. Utilitarianism is not, therefore, a fundamental
doctrine; it is only a story of sequels, and cannot be made obligatory
for all.
725.
Of old, the State was regarded theoretically as a utilitarian
institution; it has now become so in a practical sense. The time of
kings has gone by, because people are no longer worthy of them. They do
not wish to see the symbol of their ideal in a king, but only a means
to their own ends. That's the whole truth.
726.
I am trying to grasp the absolute sense of the communal standard of
judgment and valuation, naturally without any intention of deducing
morals.
The degree of psychological falsity and denseness required in order to
sanctify the emotions essential to preservation and expansion of power,
and to create a good conscience for them.
The degree of stupidity required in order that general rules and values
may remain possible (including education, formation of culture, and
training).
The degree of inquisitiveness, suspicion, and intolerance required in
order to deal with exceptions, to suppress them as criminals, and thus
to give them bad consciences, and to make them sick with their own
singularity.
727.
Morality is essentially a shield, a means of defence; and, in so far,
it is a sign of the imperfectly developed man (he is still in armour;
he is still stoical).
The fully developed man is above all provided with _weapons:_ he is a
man who _attacks._
The weapons of war are converted into weapons of peace (out of scales
and carapaces grow feathers and hair).
728.
The very notion, "living organism", implies that there must be
growth,--that there must be a striving after an extension of power,
and therefore a process of absorption of other forces. Under the
drowsiness brought on by moral narcotics, people speak of the right of
the individual to _defend himself;_ on the same principle one might
speak of his right to _attack_: for _both_--and the latter more than
the former--are necessities where all living organisms are concerned:
aggressive and defensive egoism are not questions of choice or even of
"free will," but they are fatalities of life itself.
In this respect it is immaterial whether one have an individual, a
living body, or "an advancing society" in view. The right to punish
(or society's means of defence) has been arrived at only through a
misuse of the word "right": a right is acquired only by contract, but
self-defence and self-preservation do not stand upon the basis of a
contract. A people ought at least, with quite as much justification, to
be able to regard its lust of power, either in arms, commerce, trade,
or colonisation, as a right the right of growth, perhaps.... When the
instincts of a society ultimately make it give up war and renounce
conquest, it is decadent: it is ripe for democracy and the rule of
shopkeepers. In the majority of cases, it is true, assurances of peace
are merely stupefying draughts.
729.
The maintenance of the military State is the last means of adhering to
the great tradition of the past; or, where it has been lost, to revive
it. By means of it the superior or strong type of man is preserved,
and all institutions and ideas which perpetuate enmity and order of
rank in States, such as national feeling, protective tariffs, etc., may
on that account seem justified.
730.
In order that a thing may last longer than a person (that is to say,
in order that a work may outlive the individual who has created it),
all manner of limitations and prejudices must be imposed upon people.
But how? By means of love, reverence, gratitude towards the person
who created the work, or by means of the thought that our ancestors
fought for it, or by virtue of the feeling that the safety of our
descendants will be secured if we uphold the work--for instance, the
_polis._ Morality is essentially the means of; making something survive
the individual, because it makes him of necessity a slave. Obviously
the aspect from above is different from the aspect from below, and
will lead to quite different interpretations. How is organised power
_maintained_?--By the fact that countless generations sacrifice
themselves to its cause.
731.
Marriage, property, speech, tradition, race, family, people, and
State, are each links in a chain--separate parts which have a more
or less high or low origin. Economically they are justified by the
surplus derived from the advantages of uninterrupted work and multiple
production, as weighed against the disadvantages of greater expense
in barter and the difficulty of making things last. (The working
parts are multiplied, and yet remain largely idle. Hence the cost of
producing them is greater, and the cost of maintaining them by no means
inconsiderable.) The advantage consists in avoiding interruption and
incident loss. Nothing is more expensive than a start. "The higher the
standard of living, the greater will be the expense of maintenance,
nourishment, and propagation, as also the risk and the probability of
an utter fall on reaching the summit."
732.
In bourgeois marriages, naturally in the best sense of the word
marriage, there is no question whatsoever of love any more than there
is of money. For on love no institution can be founded. The whole
matter consists in society giving leave to two persons to satisfy
their sexual desires under conditions obviously designed to safeguard
social order. Of course there must be a certain attraction between the
parties and a vast amount of good nature, patience, compatibility, and
charity in any such contract. But the word love should not be misused
as regards such a union. For two lovers, in the real and strong meaning
of the word, the satisfaction of sexual desire is unessential; it is a
mere symbol. For the one side, as I have already said, it is a symbol
of unqualified submission: for the other, a sign of condescension--a
sign of the appropriation of property. Marriage, as understood by the
real old nobility, meant the breeding forth of the race (but are there
any nobles nowadays? _Quaeritur_),--that is to say, the maintenance
of a fixed definite type of ruler, for which object husband and wife
were sacrificed. Naturally the first consideration here had nothing to
do with love; on the contrary! It did not even presuppose that mutual
sympathy which is the _sine qua non_ of the bourgeois marriage. The
prime consideration was the interest of the race, and in the second
place came the interest of a particular class. But in the face of the
coldness and rigour and calculating lucidity of such a noble concept
of marriage as prevailed among every healthy aristocracy, like that
of ancient Athens, and even of Europe during the eighteenth century,
we warm-blooded animals, with our miserably oversensitive hearts, we
"moderns," cannot restrain a slight shudder. That is why love as a
passion, in the big meaning of this word, was invented for, and in, an
aristocratic community--where convention and abstinence are most severe.
733.
_Concerning the future of marriage._ A super-tax on inherited property,
a longer term of military service for bachelors of a certain minimum
age within the community.
Privileges of all sorts for fathers who lavish boys upon the world, and
perhaps plural votes as well.
A medical certificate as a condition of any marriage, endorsed by the
parochial authorities, in which a series of questions addressed to the
parties and the medical officers must be answered ("family histories").
As a counter-agent to prostitution, or as its ennoblement, I would
recommend leasehold marriages (to last for a term of years or months),
with adequate provision for the children.
Every marriage to be warranted and sanctioned by a certain number of
good men and true, of the parish, as a parochial obligation.
734.
_Another commandment of philanthropy._--There are cases where to have a
child would be a crime--for example, for chronic invalids and extreme
neurasthenics. These people should be converted to chastity, and for
this purpose the music of _Parsifal_ might at all events be tried. For
Parsifal himself, that born fool, had ample reasons for not desiring
to propagate. Unfortunately, however, one of the regular symptoms of
exhausted stock is the inability to exercise any self-restraint in the
presence of stimuli, and the tendency to respond to the smallest sexual
attraction. It would be quite a mistake, for instance, to think of
Leopardi as a chaste man. In such cases the priest and moralist play
a hopeless game: it would be far better to send for the apothecary.
Lastly, society here has a positive duty to fulfil, and of all the
demands that are made on it, there are few more urgent and necessary
than this one. Society as the trustee of life, is responsible to life
for every botched life that comes into existence, and as it has to
atone for such lives, it ought consequently to make it impossible for
them ever to see the light of day: it should in many cases actually
prevent the act of procreation, and may, without any regard for rank,
descent, or intellect, hold in readiness the most rigorous forms of
compulsion and restriction, and, under certain circumstances, have
recourse to castration. The Mosaic law, "Thou shalt do no murder," is
a piece of ingenuous puerility compared with the earnestness of this
forbidding of life to decadents, "Thou shalt not beget"!!! ... For
life itself recognises no solidarity or equality of rights between the
healthy and unhealthy parts of an organism. The latter must at all
cost be _eliminated,_ lest the whole fall to pieces. Compassion for
decadents, equal rights for the physiologically botched--this would be
the very pinnacle of immorality, it would be setting up Nature's most
formidable opponent as morality itself!
735.
There are some delicate and morbid natures, the so-called idealists,
who can never under any circumstances rise above a coarse, immature
crime: yet it is the great justification of their anæmic little
existence, it is the small requital for their lives of cowardice and
falsehood to have been for one _instant_ at least--strong. But they
generally collapse after such an act.
736.
In our civilised world we seldom hear of any but the bloodless,
trembling criminal, overwhelmed by the curse and contempt of society,
doubting even himself, and always belittling and belying his deeds--a
misbegotten sort of criminal; that is why we are opposed to the idea
that _all great men have been criminals_ (only in the grand style, and
neither petty nor pitiful), that crime must be inherent in greatness
(this at any rate is the unanimous verdict of all those students of
human nature who have sounded the deepest waters of great souls). To
feel one's self adrift from all questions of ancestry, conscience, and
duty--this is the danger with which every great man is confronted.
Yet this is precisely what he desires: he desires the great goal, and
consequently the means thereto.
737.
In times when man is led by reward and punishment, the class of man
which the legislator has in view is still of a low and primitive
type: he is treated as one treats a child. In our latter-day culture,
general degeneracy removes all sense from reward and punishment. This
determination of action by the prospect of reward and punishment
presupposes young, strong, and vigorous races. In effete races impulses
are so irrepressible that a mere idea has no force whatever. Inability
to offer any resistance to a stimulus, and the feeling that one must
react to it: this excessive susceptibility of decadents makes all such
systems of punishment and reform altogether senseless.
The idea "amelioration" presupposes a normal and strong creature whose
action must in some way be balanced or cancelled if he is not to be
lost and turned into an enemy of the community.
738.
_The effect of prohibition._ Every power which forbids and which knows
how to excite fear in the person forbidden creates a guilty conscience.
(That is to say, a person has a certain desire but is conscious of the
danger of gratifying it, and is consequently forced to be secretive,
underhand, and cautious.) Thus any prohibition deteriorates the
character of those who do not willingly submit themselves to it, but
are constrained thereto.
739.
_"Punishment and reward."_--These two things stand or fall together.
Nowadays no one will accept a reward or acknowledge that any authority
should have the power to punish. Warfare has been reformed. We have
a desire: it meets with opposition: we then see that we shall most
easily obtain it by coming to some agreement--by drawing up a contract.
In modern society where every one has given his assent to a certain
contract, the criminal is a man who breaks that contract. This at least
is a clear concept. But in that case, anarchists and enemies of social
order could not be tolerated.
740.
Crimes belong to the category of revolt against the social system, A
rebel is not punished, he is simply suppressed. He _may_ be an utterly
contemptible and pitiful creature; but there is nothing intrinsically
despicable about rebellion in fact, in our particular society revolt is
far from being disgraceful. There are cases in which a rebel deserves
honour precisely because he is conscious of certain elements in society
which cry aloud for hostility; for such a man rouses us from our
slumbers. When a criminal commits but one crime against a particular
person, it does not alter the fact that all his instincts urge him
to make a stand against the whole social system. His isolated act is
merely a symptom.
The idea of punishment ought to be reduced to the concept of the
suppression of revolt, a weapon against the vanquished (by means of
long or short terms of imprisonment). But punishment should not be
associated in any way with contempt. A criminal is at all events a man
who has set his life, his honour, his freedom at stake; he is therefore
a man of courage. Neither should punishment be regarded as penance or
retribution, as though there were some recognised rate of exchange
between crime and punishment. Punishment does not purify, simply
because crime does not sully.
A criminal should not be prevented from making his peace with society,
provided he does not belong to the race of criminals. In the latter
case, however, he should be opposed even before he has committed an
act of hostility. (As soon as he gets into the clutches of society the
first operation to be performed upon him should be that of castration.)
A criminal's bad manners and his low degree of intelligence should
not be reckoned against him. Nothing is more common than that he
should misunderstand himself (more particularly when his rebellious
instinct--the rancour of the _unclassed_--has not reached consciousness
simply because he has not read enough). It is natural that he should
deny and dishonour his deed while under the influence of fear at
its failure. All this is quite distinct from those cases in which,
psychologically speaking, the criminal yields to an incomprehensible
impulse, and attributes a motive to his deed by associating it with a
merely incidental and insignificant action (for example, robbing a man,
when his real desire was to take his blood).
The worth of a man should not be measured by any one isolated act.
Napoleon warned us against this. Deeds which are only skin-deep are
more particularly insignificant. If we have no crime--let us say no
murder--on our conscience; why is it? It simply means that a few
favourable circumstances have been wanting in our lives. And supposing
we were induced to commit such a crime would our worth be materially
affected? As a matter of fact, we should only be despised, if we were
not credited with possessing the power to kill a man under certain
circumstances. In nearly every crime certain qualities come into play
without which no one would be a true man. Dostoievsky was not far wrong
when he said of the inmates of the penal colonies in Siberia, that they
constituted the strongest and most valuable portion of the Russian
people. The fact that in our society the criminal happens to be a badly
nourished and stunted animal is simply a condemnation of our system. In
the days of the Renaissance the criminal was a flourishing specimen of
humanity, and acquired his own virtue for himself,--Virtue in the sense
of the Renaissance--that is to say, _virtù;_ free from moralic acid.
It is only those whom we do not despise that we are able to elevate.
Moral contempt is a far greater indignity and insult than any kind of
crime.
741.
Shame was first introduced into punishment when certain penalties
were inflicted on persons held in contempt, such as slaves. It was a
despised class that was most frequently punished, and thus it came to
pass that punishment and contempt were associated.
742.
In the ancient idea of punishment a religious concept was immanent,
namely, the retributive power of chastisement. Penalties purified; in
modern society, however, penalties degrade. Punishment is a form of
paying off a debt: once it has been paid, one is freed from the deed
for which one was so ready to suffer. Provided belief in the power of
punishment exist, once the penalty is paid a feeling of relief and
lightheartedness results, which is not so very far removed from a state
of convalescence and health. One has made one's peace with society,
and one appears to one's self more dignified pure.... To-day, however,
punishment isolates even more than the crime; the fate behind the sin
has become so formidable that it is almost hopeless. One rises from
punishment still an enemy of society. Henceforward it reckons yet
another enemy against it. The _jus talionis_ may spring from the spirit
of retribution (that is to say, from a sort of modification of the
instinct of revenge); but in the Book of Manu, for instance, it is the
need of having some equivalent in order to do penance, or to become
free in a religious sense.
743.
My pretty radical note of interrogation in the case of all more
modern laws of punishment is this: should not the punishment fit the
crime?--for in your heart of hearts thus would you have it. But then
the susceptibility of the particular criminal to pain would have to
be taken into account. In other words, there should be no such thing
as a preconceived penalty for any crime--no fixed penal code. But as
it would be no easy matter to ascertain the degree of sensitiveness
of each individual criminal, punishment would have to be abolished in
practice? What a sacrifice! Is it not? Consequently ...
744.
Ah! and the philosophy of jurisprudence! That is a science which, like
all moral sciences, has not even been wrapped in swaddling-clothes yet.
Even among jurists who consider themselves liberal, the oldest and
most valuable significance of punishment is still misunderstood--it
is not even known. So long as jurisprudence does not build upon a new
foundation--on history and comparative anthropology--it will never
cease to quarrel over the fundamentally false abstractions which are
fondly imagined to be the "philosophy of law," and which have nothing
whatever to do with modern man. The man of to-day, however, is such a
complicated woof even in regard to his legal valuation that he allows
of the most varied interpretation.
745.
An old Chinese sage once said he had heard that when mighty empires
were doomed they began to have numberless laws.
746.
Schopenhauer would have all rapscallions castrated, and all geese shut
up in convents. But from what point of view would this be desirable?
The rascal has at least this advantage over other men--that he is not
mediocre; and the fool is superior to us inasmuch as he does not suffer
at the sight of mediocrity. It would be better to widen the gulf--that
is to say, roguery and stupidity should be increased. In this way human
nature would become broader ... but, after all, this is Fate, and
it will happen, whether we desire it or not. Idiocy and roguery are
increasing: this is part of modern progress.
747.
Society, to-day, is full of consideration, tact, and reticence, and of
good-natured respect for other people's rights--even for the exactions
of strangers. To an even greater degree is there a certain charitable
and instinctive depreciation of the worth of man as shown by all
manner of trustful habits. Respect for men, and not only for the most
virtuous, is perhaps the real parting of the ways between us and the
Christian mythologists also have our good share of irony even when
listening to moral sermons. He who preaches morality to us debases
himself in our eyes and becomes almost comical. Liberal-mindedness
regarding morality is one of the best signs of our age. In cases where
it is most distinctly wanting, we regard it as a sign of a morbid
condition (the case of Carlyle in England, of Ibsen in Norway, and
Schopenhauer's pessimism throughout Europe). If there is anything
which can reconcile us to our own age, it is precisely the amount
of immorality which it allows itself without falling in its own
estimation--very much the reverse! In what, then, does the superiority
of culture over the want of culture consist--of the Renaissance, for
instance, over the Middle Ages? In this alone: the greater quantity of
acknowledged immorality. From this it necessarily follows that the very
_zenith_ of human development _must_ be regarded by the moral fanatic
as the _non plus ultra_ of corruption (in this connection let us recall
Savonarola's judgment of Florence, Plato's indictment of Athens under
Pericles, Luther's condemnation of Rome, Rousseau's anathemas against
the society of Voltaire, and Germany's hostility to Goethe).
A little more fresh air, for Heaven's sake! This ridiculous condition
of Europe _must_ not last any longer. Is there a single idea behind
this bovine nationalism? What possible value can there be in
encouraging this arrogant self-conceit when everything to-day points
to greater and more common interests?--at a moment when the spiritual
dependence and denationalisation, which are obvious to all, are paving
the way for the reciprocal _rapprochements_ and fertilisations which
make up the real value and sense of present-day culture! ... And it is
precisely now that "the new German Empire" has been founded upon the
most thread-bare and discredited of ideas--universal suffrage and equal
right for all.
Think of all this struggling for advantage among conditions which are
in every way degenerate: of this culture of big cities, of newspapers,
of hurry and scurry, and of "aimlessness"! The economic unity of
Europe must necessarily come--and with it, as a reaction, the pacivist
movement.
A pacivist party, free from all sentimentality, which forbids its
children to wage war; which forbids recourse to courts of justice;
which forswears all fighting, all contradiction, and all persecution:
for a while the party of the oppressed, and later the powerful
party:--this party would be opposed to everything in the shape of
revenge and resentment.
There will also be a war party, exercising the same thoroughness and
severity towards itself, which will proceed in precisely the opposite
direction.
749.
The princes of Europe should really consider whether as a matter of
fact they can dispense with our services--with us, the immoralists. We
are to-day the only power which can win a victory without allies: and
we are therefore far and away the strongest of the strong. We can even
do without lying, and let me ask what other power can dispense with
this weapon? A strong temptation fights for us; the strongest, perhaps,
that exists--the temptation of truth.... Truth? How do I come by this
word? I must withdraw it: I must repudiate this proud word. But no. We
do not even want it--we shall be quite able to achieve our victory of
power without its help. The real charm which fights for us, the eye
of Venus which our opponents themselves deaden and blind--this charm
is the magic of the extreme. The fascination which everything extreme
exercises: we immoralists--we are in every way the extremists.
750.
The corrupted ruling classes have brought ruling into evil odour. The
State administration of justice is a piece of cowardice, because the
great man who can serve as a standard is lacking. At last the feeling
of insecurity becomes so great that men fall in the dust before any
sort of will-power that commands.
751.
"The will to power" is so loathed in democratic ages that the whole of
the psychology of these ages seems directed towards its belittlement
and slander. The types of men who sought the highest honours are said
to have been Napoleon! Cæsar! and Alexander!--as if these had not been
precisely the greatest _scorners_ of honour.
And Helvetius would fain show us that we strive after power in order
to have those pleasures which are at the disposal of the mighty--that
is to say, according to him, this striving after power is the will to
pleasure--hedonism!
752.
According as to whether a people feels: "the rights, the keenness of
vision, and the gifts of leading, etc., are with the few" or "with the
many"--it constitutes En oligarchic or a democratic community.
Monarchy represents the belief in a man who is completely superior a
leader, a saviour, a demigod.
Aristocracy represents the belief in a chosen few--in a higher caste.
Democracy represents the disbelief in all great men and in all elite
societies: everybody is everybody else's equal, "At bottom we are all
herd and mob."
753.
I am opposed to Socialism because it dreams ingenuously of goodness,
truth, beauty, and equal rights (anarchy pursues the same ideal, but in
a more brutal fashion).
I am opposed to parliamentary government and the power of the press,
because they are the means whereby cattle become masters.
754.
The arming of the people means in the end the arming of the mob.
755.
Socialists are particularly ridiculous in my eyes, because of their
absurd optimism concerning the "good man" who is supposed to be waiting
in their cupboard, and who will come into being when the present
order of society has been overturned and has made way for natural
instincts. But the opposing party is quite as ludicrous, because it
will not see the act of violence which lies beneath every law, the
severity and egoism inherent in every kind of authority. "I and my kind
will rule and prevail. Whoever degenerates will be either expelled
or annihilated."--This was the fundamental feeling of all ancient
legislation. The idea of a higher order of man is hated much more
profoundly than monarchs themselves. Hatred of aristocracy always uses
hatred of monarchy as a mask.
756.
How treacherous are all parties! They bring to light something
concerning their leaders which the latter, perhaps, have hitherto kept
hidden beneath a bushel with consummate art.
757.
Modern Socialism would fain create a profane counterpart to jesuitism:
everybody a perfect instrument. But as to the object of it all, the
purpose of it--this has not yet been ascertained.
758.
_The slavery of to-day_: a piece of barbarism. Where are the masters
for whom these slaves work? One must not always expect the simultaneous
appearance of the two complementary castes of society.
Utility and pleasure are slave theories of life.
"The blessing of work" is an ennobling phrase for slaves. Incapacity
for leisure.
759.
There is no such thing as a right to live, a right to work, or a right
to be happy: in this respect man is not different from the meanest worm.
760.
We must undoubtedly think of these things as uncompromisingly as Nature
does: they preserve the species.
761.
We should look upon the needs of the masses with ironic compassion:
they want something which we have got--Ah!
762.
European democracy is only in a very slight degree the manifestation
of unfettered powers. It represents, above all, the unfettering of
laziness, fatigue, and _weakness_.
753.
_Concerning the future of the workman_--Workmen men should learn to
regard their duties as _soldiers_ do. They receive emoluments, incomes,
but they do not get wages!
There is no relationship between _work done_ and money received;
the individual should, _according to his kind,_ be so placed as to
_perform_ the _highest_ that is compatible with his powers.
764.
Noblemen ought one day to live as the bourgeois do now--but above
them, distinguishing themselves by the simplicity of their wants--the
superior caste will then live in a poorer and simpler way and yet be in
possession of power.
For lower orders of mankind the reverse valuations hold good: it is a
matter of implanting "virtues" in them. Absolute commands, terrible
compulsory methods, in order that they may rise above mere ease in
life. The remainder may obey, but their vanity demands that they may
feel themselves dependent, not upon great men, but upon principles.
765.
"_The Atonement of all Sin?_"
People speak of the profound injustice of the social arrangement, as
it the fact that one man is born in favourable circumstances and that
another is born in unfavourable ones--or that one should possess gifts
the other has not, were on the face of it an injustice. Among the
more honest of these opponents of society this is what is said: "We,
with all the bad, morbid, criminal qualities which we acknowledge we
possess, are only the inevitable result of the oppression for ages of
the weak by the strong"; thus they insinuate their evil natures into
the consciences of the ruling classes. They threaten and storm and
curse. They become virtuous from sheer indignation--they don't want
to have become bad men and _canaille_ for nothing. The name for this
attitude, which is an invention of the last century, is, if I am not
mistaken, pessimism; and even that pessimism which is the outcome of
indignation. It is in this attitude of mind that history is judged,
that it is deprived of its inevitable fatality, and that responsibility
and even guilt is discovered in it. For the great desideratum is to
find guilty people in it. The botched and the bungled, the decadents
of all kinds, are revolted at themselves, and require sacrifices
in order that they may not slake their thirst for destruction upon
themselves (which might, indeed, be the most reasonable procedure). But
for this purpose they at least require a semblance of justification,
_i.e._ a theory according to which the fact of their existence, and of
their character, may be expiated by a scapegoat. This scapegoat may
be God,--in Russia such resentful atheists are not wanting,--or the
order of society, or education and upbringing, or the Jews, or the
nobles, or, finally, the well-constituted of every kind. "It is a sin
for a man to have been born in decent circumstances, for by so doing
he disinherits the others, he pushes them aside, he imposes upon them
the curse of vice and of work.... How can I be made answerable for my
misery; surely some one must be responsible for it, or I could not bear
to live."...
In short, resentful pessimism discovers responsible parties in order to
create a pleasurable sensation for itself--revenge.... "Sweeter than
honey"--thus does even old Homer speak of revenge.
***
The fact that such a theory no longer meets with understanding--or
rather, let us say, contempt is accounted for by that particle of
Christianity which still circulates in the blood of every one of us; it
makes us tolerant towards things simply because we scent a Christian
savour about them.... The Socialists appeal to the Christian instincts;
this is their really refined piece of cleverness.... Thanks to
Christianity, we have now grown accustomed to the superstitious concept
of a soul--of an immortal soul, of soul monads, which, as a matter of
fact, hails from somewhere else, and which has only become inherent in
certain cases--that is to say, become incarnate in them--by accident:
but the nature of these cases is not altered, let alone determined by
it. The circumstances of society, of relationship, and of history are
only accidents for the soul, perhaps misadventures: in any case, the
world is not their work. By means of the idea of soul the individual is
made transcendental; thanks to it, a ridiculous amount of importance
can be attributed to him.
As a matter of fact, it was Christianity which first induced the
individual to take up this position of judge of all things. It made
megalomania almost his duty: it has made everything temporary and
limited subordinate to eternal rights! What is the State, what is
society, what are historical laws, what is physiology to me? Thus
speaks something from beyond Becoming, an immutable entity throughout
history: thus speaks something immortal, something divine--it is the
soul!
Another Christian, but no less insane, concept has percolated even
deeper into the tissues of modern ideas: the concept of the equality
of all souls before God. In this concept the prototype of all theories
concerning equal rights is to be found. Man was first taught to
stammer this proposition religiously: later, it was converted into
a moral; no wonder he has ultimately begun to take it seriously, to
take it _practically_!--that is to say, politically, socialistically,
resento-pessimistically.
Wherever responsible circumstances or people have been looked for,
it was the _instinct of revenge_ that sought them. This instinct of
revenge obtained such an ascendancy over man in the course of centuries
that the whole of metaphysics, psychology, ideas of society, and, above
all, morality, are tainted with it. Man has nourished this idea of
responsibility to such an extent that he has introduced the bacillus
of vengeance into everything. By means of it he has made God Himself
ill, and killed innocence in the universe, by tracing every condition
of things to acts of will, to intentions, to responsible agents. The
whole teaching of will, this most fatal fraud that has ever existed
in psychology hitherto, was invented essentially for the purpose of
punishment. It was the social utility of punishment that lent this
concept its dignity, its power, and its truth. The originator of that
psychology, that we shall call volitional psychology, must be sought in
those classes which had the right of punishment in their hands; above
all, therefore, among the priests who stood on the very pinnacle of
ancient social systems: these people wanted to create for themselves
the right to wreak revenge--they wanted to supply God with the
privilege of vengeance. For this purpose; man was declared "free": to
this end every action had to be regarded as voluntary, and the origin
of every deed had to be considered as lying in consciousness. But by
such propositions as these ancient psychology is refuted.
To-day, when Europe seems to have taken the contrary direction; when
we halcyonians would fain withdraw, dissipate, and banish the concept
of guilt and punishment with all our might from the world; when our
most serious endeavours are concentrated upon purifying psychology,
morality, history, nature, social institutions and privileges, and
even God Himself, from this filth; in whom must we recognise our most
mortal enemies? Precisely in those apostles of revenge and resentment,
in those who are _par excellence_ pessimists from indignation, who make
it their mission to sanctify their filth with the name of "righteous
indignation."... We others, whose one desire is to reclaim innocence on
behalf of Becoming, would fain be the missionaries of a purer thought,
namely, that no one is responsible for man's qualities; neither God,
nor society, nor his parents, nor his ancestors, nor himself--in
fact, that no one is to blame for him ... The being who might be made
responsible for a man's existence, for the fact that he is constituted
in a particular way, or for his birth in certain circumstances and
in a certain environment, is absolutely lacking.--_And it is a great
blessing that such a being is non-existent ..._. We are _not_ the
result of an eternal design, of a will, of a desire: there is no
attempt being made with us to attain to an "ideal of perfection," to
an "ideal of happiness," to an "ideal of virtue,"--and we are just as
little the result of a mistake on God's part in the presence of which
He ought to feel uneasy (a thought which is known to be at the very
root of the Old Testament). There is not a place nor a purpose nor a
sense to which we can attribute our existence or our kind of existence.
In the first place, no one is in a position to do this: it is quite
impossible to judge, to measure, or to compare, or even to deny the
whole universe! And why?--For five reasons, all accessible to the man
of average intelligence: for instance, _because there is no existence
outside the universe ..._ and let us say it again, this is a great
blessing, for therein lies the whole innocence of our lives.