The Portable Nietzsche (7 page)

A great value of antiquity lies in the fact that its
writings
are the only ones that modern men still
read with exactness
.

(VII, 156)

The political defeat of Greece was the greatest failure of culture: for it has brought with it the revolting theory that one can foster culture only when one is armed to the teeth and wears boxing gloves. The rise of Christianity was the second great failure: raw power there and the dull intellect here became victors over the aristocratic genius among the nations. Being a Hellenophile means: being an enemy of raw power and dull intellects. In this way Sparta was the ruin of Hellas, for she forced Athens to become active in a federation and to throw herself entirely into politics.

(VII, 192)

There remains a grave doubt whether one may argue from languages to nationalities and relatedness to other nations. A victorious language is nothing but a frequent (not even a regular) sign of successful conquest. Where have there ever been autochthonous peoples? It is a very imprecise concept to speak of Greeks who did not yet live in Greece. What is characteristically Greek is much less the result of any disposition than of adapted institutions and of the language that has been accepted.

(VII, 193)

For the highest images in every religion there is an analogue in a state of the soul. The God of Mohammed—the solitude of the desert, the distant roar of a lion, the vision of a terrible fighter. The God of the Christians—everything that men and women associate with the word “love.” The God of the Greeks—a beautiful dream image.

(VII, 195)

For once I want to enumerate everything that I no longer believe; also what I believe.

In the great whirlpool of forces man stands with the conceit that this whirlpool is rational and has a rational aim: an error! The only rational thing we know is what little reason man has: he must exert it a lot, and it is always ruinous for him when he abandons himself, say, to “Providence.”

The only happiness lies in reason; all the rest of the world is dismal. The highest reason, however, I see in the work of the artist, and he may experience it as such; there may also be something that, if only it could be produced consciously, would result in a still greater feeling of reason and happiness: for example, the course of the solar system, begetting and educating a human being.

Happiness lies in the swiftness of feeling and thinking: all the rest of the world is slow, gradual, and stupid. Whoever could feel the course of a light ray would be very happy, for it is very swift.

Thinking of oneself gives little happiness. If, however, one feels much happiness in this, it is because at bottom one is not thinking of oneself but of one's ideal. This is far, and only the swift reach it and are delighted.

(VII, 211
f.
)

To educate educators! But the first ones must educate themselves! And for these I write.

(VII, 215)

The better the state is established, the fainter is humanity.

To make the individual
uncomfortable,
that is my task.

(VII, 216)

Nietzsche's first five books,
The Birth of Tragedy
and the fcur
Untimely Meditations
, were essays. All of them dealt, in one way or another, with questions of value: the value of art and life itself, the value of history and the problem whether there are supra-historical values, and the value of self-perfection. This last point was central in the third
Meditation
, in which Nietzsche proposed that a new picture of man was needed to counter the true but deadly Darwinian doctrine of the essential continuity of man and animal. Being determined, however, to build on an empirical foundation, instead of falling back on dogma or intuition, Nietzsche found himself unable to do what he wanted. Then, roughly at the same time he decided to break with Wagner, he gave up his previous style and method and turned to writing books composed of aphorisms—largely concerned with human psychology or, in Nietzsche's phrase, with the “human, all-too-human.”

 

[2]

Original error of the philosopher.
All philosophers share this common error: they proceed from contemporary man and think they can reach their goal through an analysis of this man. Automatically they think of “man” as an eternal verity, as something abiding in the whirlpool, as a sure measure of things. Everything that the philosopher says about man, however, is at bottom no more than a testimony about the man of a very limited period. Lack of a historical sense is the original error of all philosophers. . . .

 

[5]

Misunderstanding of the dream
. In the ages of crude primeval culture man believed that in dreams he got to know
another real world
; here is the origin of all metaphysics. Without the dream one would have found no occasion for a division of the world. The separation of body and soul, too, is related to the most ancient conception of the dream; also the assumption of a quasibody of the soul, which is the origin of all belief in spirits and probably also of the belief in gods. “The dead live on; for they appear to the living in dreams”; this inference went unchallenged for many thousands of years.

 

[83]

The sleep of virtue
. When virtue has slept, she will get up more refreshed.

 

[113]

Christianity as antiquity
. When we hear the ancient bells growling on a Sunday morning we ask ourselves: Is it really possible! this, for a Jew, crucified two thousand years ago, who said he was God's son. The proof of such a claim is lacking. Certainly the Christian religion is an antiquity projected into our times from remote prehistory; and the fact that the claim is believed —whereas one is otherwise so strict in examining pretensions—is perhaps the most ancient piece of this heritage. A god who begets children with a mortal woman; a sage who bids men work no more, have no more courts, but look for the signs of the impending end of the world; a justice that accepts the innocent as a vicarious sacrifice; someone who orders his disciples to drink his blood; prayers for miraculous interventions; sins perpetrated against a god, atoned for by a god; fear of a beyond to which death is the portal; the form of the cross as a symbol in a time that no longer knows the function and the ignominy of the cross—how ghoulishly all this touches us, as if from the tomb of a primeval past! Can one believe that such things are still believed?

 

[146]

The artist's sense of truth
. Regarding truths, the artist has a weaker morality than the thinker. He definitely does not want to be deprived of the splendid and profound interpretations of life, and he resists sober, simple methods and results. Apparently he fights for the higher dignity and significance of man; in truth, he does not want to give up the most effective presuppositions of his art: the fantastic, mythical, uncertain, extreme, the sense for the symbolic, the overestimation of the person, the faith in some miraculous element in the genius. Thus he considers the continued existence of his kind of creation more important than scientific devotion to the truth in every form, however plain.

 

[170]

Artists' ambition.
The Greek artists, for example, the tragedians, wrote in order to triumph. Their whole art is unthinkable without the contest: Hesiod's good Eris, ambition, gave wings to their genius. Now this ambition demanded above all that their work attain the highest excellence in their own eyes, as they understood excellence, without consideration for any prevailing taste or public opinion concerning excellence in a work of art. Thus Aeschylus and Euripides remained unsuccessful for a long time, until they had finally educated judges of art who appraised their work by the standards they themselves applied. Thus they strove for a triumph over their rivals in their own estimation, before their own seat of judgment; they really wanted to
be
more excellent; and then they demanded outside agreement with their own estimation, a confirmation of their own judgment. Striving for honor here means “making oneself superior and also wishing to appear so publicly.” If the first is lacking and the second is desired nevertheless, then one speaks of
vanity
. If the second is lacking and is not missed, then one speaks of
pride.

 

[184]

Untranslatable
. It is neither the best nor the worst in a book that is untranslatable.

 

[189]

Thoughts in a poem
. The poet presents his thoughts festively, on the carriage of rhythm: usually because they could not walk.

 

[224]

Ennoblement through degeneration
. History teaches that the best-preserved tribe among a people is the one in which most men have a living communal sense as a consequence of sharing their customary and indisputable principles—in other words, in consequence of a common faith. Here the good, robust
mores
thrive; here the subordination of the individual is learned and the character receives firmness, first as a gift and then is further cultivated. The danger to these strong communities founded on homogeneous individuals who have character is growing stupidity, which is gradually increased by heredity, and which, in any case, follows all stability like a shadow. It is the individuals who have fewer ties and are much more uncertain and morally weaker upon whom
spiritual progress
depends in such communities; they are the men who make new and manifold experiments. Innumerable men of this sort perish because of their weakness without any very visible effect; but in general, especially if they have descendants, they loosen up and from time to time inflict a wound on the stable element of a community. Precisely in this wounded and weakened spot the whole structure is
inoculated
, as it were, with something new; but its over-all strength must be sufficient to accept this new element into its blood and assimilate it. Those who degenerate are of the highest importance wherever progress is to take place; every great progress must be preceded by a partial weakening. The strongest natures
hold fast
to the type; the weaker ones help to
develop it further
.