150
Criticism of Saints.– Must one then, in order to have a virtue, be desirous of having it precisely in its most brutal form? – as the Christian saints desired and needed; – those who only endured life with the thought that at the sight of their virtue self-contempt might seize every man. A virtue with such an effect I call brutal.
151
The Origin of Religion.– The metaphysical requirement is not the origin of religions, as Schopenhauer claims, but only a later sprout from them. Under the dominance of religious thoughts we have accustomed ourselves to the idea of "another (back, under, or upper) world," and feel an uncomfortable void and privation through the annihilation of the religious illusion; – and then "another world" grows out of this feeling once more, but now it is only a metaphysical world, and no longer a religious one. That however which in general led to the assumption of "another world" in primitive times, was not an impulse or requirement, but an error in the interpretation of certain natural phenomena, a difficulty of the intellect.
152
The greatest Change.– The lustre and the hues of all things have changed! We no longer quite understand how earlier men conceived of the most familiar and frequent things, – for example, of the day, and the awakening in the morning: owing to their belief in dreams the waking state seemed to them differently illuminated. And similarly of the whole of life, with its reflection of death and its significance: our "death" is an entirely different death. All events were of a different lustre, for a God shone forth in them; and similarly of all resolutions and peeps into the distant future: for people had oracles, and secret hints, and believed in prognostication. "Truth" was conceived in quite a different manner, for the insane could formerly be regarded as its mouthpiece – a thing which makes us shudder, or laugh. Injustice made a different impression on the feelings: for people were afraid of divine retribution, and not only of legal punishment and disgrace. What joy was there in an age when men believed in the devil and tempter! What passion was there when people saw demons lurking close at hand! What philosophy was there when doubt was regarded as sinfulness of the most dangerous kind, and in fact as an outrage on eternal love, as distrust of everything good, high, pure, and compassionate! – We have coloured things anew, we paint them over continually, – but what have we been able to do hitherto in comparison with the splendid colouring of that old master! – I mean ancient humanity.
153
Homo poeta.– "I myself who have made this tragedy of tragedies altogether independently, in so far as it is completed; I who have first entwined the perplexities of morality about existence, and have tightened them so that only a God could unravel them – so Horace demands! – I have already in the fourth act killed all the Gods – for the sake of morality! What is now to be done about the fifth act? Where shall I get the tragic dénouement! Must I now think about a comic dénouement?"
154
Differences in the Dangerousness of Life.– You don't know at all what you experience; you run through life as if intoxicated, and now and then fall down a stair. Thanks however to your intoxication you still do not break your limbs: your muscles are too languid and your head too confused to find the stones of the staircase as hard as we others do! For, us life is a greater danger: we are made of glass – alas, if we should strike against anything! And all is lost if we should fall!
155
What we Lack.– We love the grandeur of Nature, and have discovered it; that is because human grandeur is lacking in our minds. It was the reverse with the Greeks: their feeling towards Nature was quite different from ours.
156
The most Influential Person.– The fact that a person resists the whole spirit of his age, stops it at the door and calls it to account, must exert an influence! It is indifferent whether he wishes to exert an influence; the point is that he can.
157
Mentiri.– Take care! – he reflects: he will have a lie ready immediately. This is a stage in the civilisation of whole nations. Consider only what the Romans expressed by mentiri!
158
An Inconvenient Peculiarity.– To find everything deep is an inconvenient peculiarity: it makes one constantly strain one's eyes, so that in the end one always finds more than one wishes.
159
Every Virtue has its Time.– The honesty of him who is at present inflexible often causes him remorse; for inflexibility is the virtue of a time different from that in which honesty prevails.
160
In Intercourse with Virtues.– One can also be undignified and flattering towards a virtue.
161
To the Admirers of the Age.– The runaway priest and the liberated criminal are continually making grimaces; what they want is a look without a past. But have you ever seen men who know that their looks reflect the future, and who are so courteous to you, the admirers of the "age," that they assume a look without a future? —
162
Egoism.– Egoism is the perspective law of our sentiment, according to which the near appears large and momentous, while in the distance the magnitude and importance of all things diminish.
163
After a Great Victory.– The best thing in a great victory is that it deprives the conqueror of the fear of defeat. "Why should I not be worsted for once?" he says to himself, "I am now rich enough to stand it."
164
Those who Seek Repose.– I recognise the minds that seek repose by the many dark objects with which they surround themselves: those who want to sleep darken their chambers, or creep into caverns. A hint to those who do not know what they really seek most, and would like to know!
165
The Happiness of Renunciation.– He who has absolutely dispensed with something for a long time will almost imagine, when he accidentally meets with it again, that he has discovered it, – and what happiness every discoverer has! Let us be wiser than the serpents that lie too long in the same sunshine.
166
Always in our own Society.– All that is akin to me in nature and history speaks to me, praises me, urges me forward and comforts me – : other things are unheard by me, or immediately forgotten. We are only in our own society always.
167
Misanthropy and Philanthropy.– We only speak about being sick of men when we can no longer digest them, and yet have the stomach full of them. Misanthropy is the result of a far too eager philanthropy and "cannibalism," – but who ever bade you swallow men like oysters, my Prince Hamlet?
168
Concerning an Invalid.– "Things go badly with him!" – What is wrong? – " He suffers from the longing to be praised, and finds no sustenance for it." – Inconceivable! All the world does honour to him, and he is reverenced not only in deed but in word! – "Certainly, but he is dull of hearing for the praise. When a friend praises him it sounds to him as if the friend praised himself; when an enemy praises him, it sounds to him as if the enemy wanted to be praised for it; when, finally, some one else praises him – there are by no means so many of these, he is so famous! – he is offended because they neither want him for a friend nor for an enemy; he is accustomed to say: 'What do I care for those who can still pose as the all-righteous towards me!'"
169
Avowed Enemies.– Bravery in presence of an enemy is a thing by itself: a person may possess it and still be a coward and an irresolute num-skull. That was Napoleon's opinion concerning the "bravest man" he knew, Murat: – whence it follows that avowed enemies are indispensable to some men, if they are to attain to their virtue, to their manliness, to their cheerfulness.
170
With, the Multitude.– He has hitherto gone with the multitude and is its panegyrist; but one day he will be its opponent! For he follows it in the belief that his laziness will find its advantage thereby: he has not yet learned that the multitude is not lazy enough for him! that it always presses forward! that it does not allow any one to stand still! – And he likes so well to stand still!
171
Fame.– When the gratitude of many to one casts aside all shame, then fame originates.
172
The Perverter of Taste.– A: "You are a perverter of taste – they say so everywhere!" B: "Certainly! I pervert every one's taste for his party: – no party forgives me for that."
173
To be Profound and to Appear Profound.– He who knows that he is profound strives for clearness; he who would like to appear profound to the multitude strives for obscurity. The multitude thinks everything profound of which it cannot see the bottom; it is so timid and goes so unwillingly into the water.
174
Apart.– Parliamentarism, that is to say, the public permission to choose between five main political opinions, insinuates itself into the favour of the numerous class who would fain appear independent and individual, and like to fight for their opinions. After all, however, it is a matter of indifference whether one opinion is imposed upon the herd, or five opinions are permitted to it. – He who diverges from the five public opinions and goes apart, has always the whole herd against him.
175
Concerning Eloquence.– What has hitherto had the most convincing eloquence? The rolling of the drum: and as long as kings have this at their command, they will always be the best orators and popular leaders.
176
Compassion.– The poor, ruling princes! All their rights now change unexpectedly into claims, and all these claims immediately sound like pretensions! And if they but say "we," or "my people," wicked old Europe begins laughing. Verily, a chief-master-of-ceremonies of the modern world would make little ceremony with them; perhaps he would decree that "les souverains rangent aux parvenus."
177
On "Educational Matters."– In Germany an important educational means is lacking for higher men; namely, the laughter of higher men; these men do not laugh in Germany.
178
For Moral Enlightenment. – The Germans must be talked out of their Mephistopheles – and out of their Faust also. These are two moral prejudices against the value of knowledge.
179
Thoughts. —Thoughts are the shadows of our sentiments – always however obscurer, emptier and simpler.
180
The Good Time for Free Spirits.– Free Spirits take liberties even with regard to Science – and meanwhile they are allowed to do so, – while the Church still remains! – In so far they have now their good time.
181
Following and Leading.– A: "Of the two, the one will always follow, the other will always lead, whatever be the course of their destiny. And yet the former is superior to the other in virtue and intellect." B: "And yet? And yet? That is spoken for the others; not for me, not for us! —Fit secundum regulam."
182
In Solitude.– When one lives alone one does not speak too loudly, and one does not write too loudly either, for one fears the hollow reverberation – the criticism of the nymph Echo. – And all voices sound differently in solitude!
183
The Music of the Best Future.– The first musician for me would be he who knew only the sorrow of the profoundest happiness, and no other sorrow: there has not hitherto been such a musician.
184
Justice.– Better allow oneself to be robbed than have scarecrows around one – that is my taste. And under all circumstances it is just a matter of taste – and nothing more!
185
Poor.– He is now poor, but not because everything has been taken from him, but because he has thrown everything away: – what does he care? He is accustomed to find new things. – It is the poor who misunderstand his voluntary poverty.
186
Bad Conscience.– All that he now does is excellent and proper – and yet he has a bad conscience with it all. For the exceptional is his task.
187
Offensiveness in Expression.– This artist offends me by the way in which he expresses his ideas, his very excellent ideas: so diffusely and forcibly, and with such gross rhetorical artifices, as if he were speaking to the mob. We feel always as if "in bad company" when devoting some time to his art.
188
Work.– How closely work and the workers now stand even to the most leisurely of us! The royal courtesy in the words: "We are all workers," would have been a cynicism and an indecency even under Louis XIV.
189
The Thinker.– He is a thinker: that is to say, he knows how to take things more simply than they are.
190
Against Eulogisers.– A: "One is only praised by one's equals!" B: "Yes! And he who praises you says: 'You are my equal!'"
191
Against many a Vindication.– The most perfidious manner of injuring a cause is to vindicate it intentionally with fallacious arguments.
192
The Good-natured.– What is it that distinguishes the good-natured, whose countenances beam kindness, from other people? They feel quite at ease in presence of a new person, and are quickly enamoured of him; they therefore wish him well; their first opinion is: "He pleases me." With them there follow in succession the wish to appropriate (they make little scruple about the person's worth), rapid appropriation, joy in the possession, and actions in favour of the person possessed.
193
Kant's Joke.– Kant tried to prove, in a way that dismayed "everybody," that "everybody" was in the right: – that was his secret joke. He wrote against the learned, in favour of popular prejudice; he wrote, however, for the learned and not for the people.
194
The "Open-hearted" Man.– That man acts probably always from concealed motives; for he has always communicable motives on his tongue, and almost in his open hand.
195
Laughable!– See! See! He runs away from men – : they follow him, however, because he runs before them, – they are such a gregarious lot!
196
The Limits of our Sense of Hearing.– We hear only the questions to which we are capable of finding an answer.
197
Caution therefore!– There is nothing we are fonder of communicating to others than the seal of secrecy – together with what is under it.
198
Vexation of the Proud Man.– The proud man is vexed even with those who help him forward: he looks angrily at his carriage-horses.
199
Liberality.– Liberality is often only a form of timidity in the rich.
200
Laughing.– To laugh means to love mischief, but with a good conscience.
201
In Applause.– In applause there is always some kind of noise: even in self-applause.
202
A Spendthrift.– He has not yet the poverty of the rich man who has counted all his treasure, – he squanders his spirit with the irrationalness of the spendthrift Nature.
203
Hic niger est. – Usually he has no thoughts, – but in exceptional cases bad thoughts come to him.
204
Beggars and Courtesy.– "One is not discourteous when one knocks at a door with a stone when the bell-pull is awanting" – so think all beggars and necessitous persons, but no one thinks they are in the right.
205
Need.– Need is supposed to be the cause of things; but in truth it is often only the result of things.
206
During the Rain.– It rains, and I think of the poor people who now crowd together with their many cares, which they are unaccustomed to conceal; all of them, therefore, ready and anxious to give pain to one another, and thus provide themselves with a pitiable kind of comfort, even in bad weather. This, this only, is the poverty of the poor!
207
The Envious Man.– That is an envious man – it is not desirable that he should have children; he would be envious of them, because he can no longer be a child.
208
A Great Man!– Because a person is "a great man," we are not authorised to infer that he is a man. Perhaps he is only a boy, or a chameleon of all ages, or a bewitched girl.
209
A Mode of Asking for Reasons.– There is a mode of asking for our reasons which not only makes us forget our best reasons, but also arouses in us a spite and repugnance against reason generally: – a very stupefying mode of questioning, and really an artifice of tyrannical men!
210
Moderation in Diligence.– One must not be anxious to surpass the diligence of one's father – that would make one ill.
211
Secret Enemies.– To be able to keep a secret enemy – that is a luxury which the morality even of the highest-minded persons can rarely afford.
212
Not Letting oneself be Deluded.– His spirit has bad manners, it is hasty and always stutters with impatience; so that one would hardly suspect the deep breathing and the large chest of the soul in which it resides.
213
The Way to Happiness.– A sage asked of a fool the way to happiness. The fool answered without delay, like one who had been asked the way to the next town: "Admire yourself, and live on the street!" "Hold," cried the sage, "you require too much; it suffices to admire oneself!" The fool replied: "But how can one constantly admire without constantly despising?"
214
Faith Saves.– Virtue gives happiness and a state of blessedness only to those who have a strong faith in their virtue: – not, however, to the more refined souls whose virtue consists of a profound distrust of themselves and of all virtue. After all, therefore, it is "faith that saves" here also! – and be it well observed, not virtue!
215
The Ideal and the Material.– You have a noble ideal before your eyes: but are you also such a noble stone that such a divine image could be formed out of you? And without that – is not all your labour barbaric sculpturing? A blasphemy of your ideal?
216
Danger in the Voice.– With a very loud voice a person is almost incapable of reflecting on subtle matters.
217
Cause and Effect.– Before the effect one believes in other causes than after the effect.
218
My Antipathy.– I do not like those people who, in order to produce an effect, have to burst like bombs, and in whose neighbourhood one is always in danger of suddenly losing one's hearing – or even something more.
219
The Object of Punishment.– The object of punishment is to improve him who punishes,– that is the ultimate appeal of those who justify punishment.
220
Sacrifice.– The victims think otherwise than the spectators about sacrifice and sacrificing: but they have never been allowed to express their opinion.
221
Consideration.– Fathers and sons are much more considerate of one another than mothers and daughters.
222
Poet and Liar.– The poet sees in the liar his foster-brother whose milk he has drunk up; the latter has thus remained wretched, and has not even attained to a good conscience.
223
Vicariousness of the Senses.– "We have also eyes in order to hear with them," – said an old confessor who had grown deaf; "and among the blind he that has the longest ears is king."
224
Animal Criticism.– I fear the animals regard man as a being like themselves, seriously endangered by the loss of sound animal understanding; – they regard him perhaps as the absurd animal, the laughing animal, the crying animal, the unfortunate animal.
225
The Natural.– "Evil has always had the great effect! And Nature is evil! Let us therefore be natural!" – so reason secretly the great aspirants after effect, who are too often counted among great men.
226
The Distrustful and their Style.– We say the strongest things simply, provided people are about us who believe in our strength: – such an environment educates to "simplicity of style." The distrustful, on the other hand, speak emphatically; they make things emphatic.
227
Fallacy, Fallacy.– He cannot rule himself; therefore that woman concludes that it will be easy to rule him, and throws out her lines to catch him; – the poor creature, who in a short time will be his slave.
228
Against Mediators.– He who attempts to mediate between two decided thinkers is rightly called mediocre: he has not an eye for seeing the unique; similarising and equalising are signs of weak eyes.
229
Obstinacy and Loyalty.– Out of obstinacy he holds fast to a cause of which the questionableness has become obvious, – he calls that, however, his "loyalty."
230
Lack of Reserve.– His whole nature fails to convince– that results from the fact that he has never been reticent about a good action he has performed.
231
The "Plodders."– Persons slow of apprehension think that slowness forms part of knowledge.
232
Dreaming.– Either one does not dream at all, or one dreams in an interesting manner. One must learn to be awake in the same fashion: – either not at all, or in an interesting manner.
233
The most Dangerous Point of View.– What I now do, or neglect to do, is as important for all that is to come, as the greatest event of the past: in this immense perspective of effects all actions are equally great and small.
234
Consolatory Words of a Musician.– "Your life does not sound into people's ears: for them you live a dumb life, and all refinements of melody, all fond resolutions in following or leading the way, are concealed from them. To be sure you do not parade the thoroughfares with regimental music, – but these good people have no right to say on that account that your life is lacking in music. He that hath ears let him hear."
235
Spirit and Character.– Many a one attains his full height of character, but his spirit is not adapted to the elevation, – and many a one reversely.
236
To Move the Multitude.– Is it not necessary for him who wants to move the multitude to give a stage representation of himself? Has he not first to translate himself into the grotesquely obvious, and then set forth his whole personality and cause in that vulgarised and simplified fashion?
237
The Polite Man.– "He is so polite!" – Yes, he has always a sop for Cerberus with him, and is so timid that he takes everybody for Cerberus, even you and me, – that is his "politeness."
238
Without Envy.– He is wholly without envy, but there is no merit therein: for he wants to conquer a land which no one has yet possessed and hardly any one has even seen.
239
The Joyless Person.– A single joyless person is enough to make constant displeasure and a clouded heaven in a household; and it is only by a miracle that such a person is lacking! – Happiness is not nearly such a contagious disease; – how is that?
240
On the Sea-Shore.– I would not build myself a house (it is an element of my happiness not to be a house-owner!). If I had to do so, however, I should build it, like many of the Romans, right into the sea, – I should like to have some secrets in common with that beautiful monster.
241
Work and Artist.– This artist is ambitious and nothing more; ultimately, however, his work is only a magnifying-glass, which he offers to every one who looks in his direction.
242
Suum cuique.– However great be my greed of knowledge, I cannot appropriate aught of things but what already belongs to me, – the property of others still remains in the things. How is it possible for a man to be a thief or a robber?
243
Origin of "Good" and "Bad."– He only will devise an improvement who can feel that "this is not good."
244
Thoughts and Words.– Even our thoughts we are unable to render completely in words.
245
Praise in Choice.– The artist chooses his subjects; that is his mode of praising.
246
Mathematics.– We want to carry the refinement and rigour of mathematics into all the sciences, as far as it is in any way possible, not in the belief that we shall apprehend things in this way, but in order thereby to assert our human relation to things. Mathematics is only a means to general and ultimate human knowledge.
247
Habits.– All habits make our hand wittier and our wit unhandier.
248
Books.– Of what account is a book that never carries us away beyond all books?
249
The Sigh of the Seeker of Knowledge.– "Oh, my covetousness! In this soul there is no disinterestedness – but an all-desiring self, which, by means of many individuals, would fain see as with its own eyes, and grasp as with its own hands – a self bringing back even the entire past, and wanting to lose nothing that could in anyway belong to it! Oh, this flame of my covetousness! Oh, that I were reincarnated in a hundred individuals!" – He who does not know this sigh by experience, does not know the passion of the seeker of knowledge either.
250
Guilt.– Although the most intelligent judges of the witches, and even the witches themselves, were convinced of the guilt of witchcraft, the guilt, nevertheless, was not there. So it is with all guilt.
251.
Misunderstood Sufferers.– Great natures suffer otherwise than their worshippers imagine; they suffer most severely from the ignoble, petty emotions of certain evil moments; in short, from doubt of their own greatness; – not however from the sacrifices and martyrdoms which their tasks require of them. As long as Prometheus sympathises with men and sacrifices himself for them, he is happy and proud in himself; but on becoming envious of Zeus and of the homage which mortals pay him – then Prometheus suffers!
252
Better to be in Debt.– "Better to remain in debt than to pay with money which does not bear our stamp!" – that is what our sovereignty prefers.
253
Always at Home.– One day we attain our goal– and then refer with pride to the long journeys we have made to reach it. In truth, we did not notice that we travelled. We got into the habit of thinking that we were at home in every place.
254
Against Embarrassment.– He who is always thoroughly occupied is rid of all embarrassment.
255
Imitators.– A: "What? You don't want to have imitators?" B: "I don't want people to do anything after me; I want every one to do something before himself (as a pattern to himself) – just as I do." A: "Consequently – ?"
256
Skinniness.– All profound men have their happiness in imitating the flying-fish at times, and playing on the crests of the waves; they think that what is best of all in things is their surface: their skinniness —sit venia verbo.
257
From Experience.– A person often does not know how rich he is, until he learns from experience what rich men even play the thief on him.
258
The Deniers of Chance.– No conqueror believes in chance.
259
From Paradise.– "Good and Evil are God's prejudices" – said the serpent.
260
One times One.– One only is always in the wrong, but with two truth begins. – One only cannot prove himself right; but two are already beyond refutation.
261
Originality.– What is originality? To see something that does not yet bear a name, that cannot yet be named, although it is before everybody's eyes. As people are usually constituted, it is the name that first makes a thing generally visible to them. – Original persons have also for the most part been the namers of things.
262
Sub specie æterni.– A: "You withdraw faster and faster from the living; they will soon strike you out of their lists!" – B: "It is the only way to participate in the privilege of the dead." A: "In what privilege?" – B: "No longer having to die."
263
Without Vanity.– When we love we want our defects to remain concealed, – not out of vanity, but lest the person loved should suffer therefrom. Indeed, the lover would like to appear as a God, – and not out of vanity either.
264
What we Do.– What we do is never understood, but only praised and blamed.
265
Ultimate Scepticism.– But what after all are man's truths? – They are his irrefutable errors.
266
Where Cruelty is Necessary.– He who is great is cruel to his second-rate virtues and judgments.
267
With a high Aim.– With a high aim a person is superior even to justice, and not only to his deeds and his judges.
268
What makes Heroic?– To face simultaneously one's greatest suffering and one's highest hope.
269
What dost thou Believe in?– In this: That the weights of all things must be determined anew.
270
What Saith thy Conscience?– "Thou shalt become what thou art."
271
Where are thy Greatest Dangers?– In pity.
272
What dost thou Love in others?– My hopes.
273
Whom dost thou call Bad?– Him who always wants to put others to shame.
274
What dost thou think most humane?– To spare a person shame.
275
What is the Seal of Attained Liberty?– To be no longer ashamed of oneself.