Nietzsche followed "The Genealogy of Morals" with "The Case of Wagner," that famous pamphlet in which he excoriated the creator of Parsifal. Immediately after the publication of this attack, he began work on what was to be still another preparatory book for "The Will to Power." For its title he first chose "Idle Hours of a Psychologist." The book, a brief one, was already on the presses when he changed the caption to"Götzendämmerung"—"The Twilight of the Idols"—a titular parody on Wagner's"Götterdämmerung"For a subtitle he appended a characteristically Nietzschean phrase—"How to Philosophise with the Hammer." The writing of this work was done with great rapidity: it was accomplished in but a few days during August, 1888. In September it was sent to the publisher, but during its printing Nietzsche added a chapter headed "What the Germans Lack," and several aphorisms to the section called "Skirmishes in a War with the Age." In January, 1889, the book appeared.
Nietzsche was then stricken with his fatal illness, and this was the last book of his to appear during his lifetime. "The Antichrist" was already finished, having been written in the fall of 1888 immediately after the completion of "The Twilight of the Idols.""Ecce Homo"his autobiography, was written in October, 1888; and during December Nietzsche again gave hisattention to Wagner, drafting "NietzschecontraWagner," a pamphlet made up entirely of excerpts from his earlier writings. This work, intended to supplement "The Case of Wagner," was not published until 1895, although it had been printed and corrected before the author's final breakdown. "The Antichrist" appeared at the same time as this second Wagner document, while"Ecce Homo"was withheld from publication until 1908. "The Twilight of the Idols" sold 9,000 copies, but Nietzsche's mind was too clouded to know or care that at last he was coming into his own, that the public which had denied him so long had finally begun to open its eyes to his greatness.
In many ways "The Twilight of the Idols" is one of Nietzsche's most brilliant books. Being more compact, it consequently possesses a greater degree of precision and clarity than is found in his more analytical writings. It is not, however, a treatise to which one may go without considerable preparation. With the exception of "Thus Spake Zarathustra," it demands more on the part of the reader than any of Nietzsche's other books. It is, for the most part, composed of conclusions and comments which grow directly out of the laborious ethical research of his preceding volumes, and presupposes in the student an enormous amount of reading, not only of Nietzsche's own writings but of philosophical works in general. But once equipped with this preparation, one will find more of contemporary interest in it than in the closely organised books such as "Beyond Good and Evil" and "The Genealogy of Morals." There are few points in Nietzsche's philosophy not found here. For a compact expression of his entire teaching I know of no better book to which one might turn. Nietzschehimself, to judge from a passage in his"Ecce Homo"intended this book as a statement of his whole ethical system. He probably meant that it should presentin totothe principal data of his foregoing studies, in order that the reader might be familiar with all the steps in his philosophy before setting forth upon the formidable doctrines of "The Will to Power." Obviously, therefore, it is not a book for beginners. Being expositional rather than argumentative, it is open to misunderstanding and misinterpretation. It contains apparent contradictions which might confuse the student who has not followed Nietzsche in the successive points which led to his conclusions, and who is unfamiliar with the exact definitions attached to certain words relating to human conduct.
Other qualities of a misleading nature are to be encountered in this book. Many of the paragraphs have about them an air of mere cleverness, although in reality they embody profound concepts. The reader ignorant of the inner seriousness of Nietzsche will accept these passages only at their surface value. Of the forty-four short epigrams which comprise the opening chapter, I have appended but three, for fear they would be judged solely by their superficial characteristics. Many of the other aphorisms throughout the book lend themselves all too easily to the same narrow judgment.
Again, "The Problem of Socrates," the second division of the book, because of its profundity, presents many difficulties to the unprepared student. Here is a criticism of the Socratic ideals which requires, in order that it be intelligently grasped, not only a wide general knowledge, but also a specific training in the uprooting of prejudices and of traditional ethical conceptions—such a training as can be acquired only by a close study ofNietzsche's own destructive works. The explanation of Socrates's power, the condemnation of that ancient philosopher's subtle glorification of thecanaille,the reasons for his secret fascination, and the interpretation of his whole mental progress culminating in his death—all this is profound and categorical criticism which has its roots in the very fundamentals of Nietzsche's philosophy. But because it is so deep-rooted, it therefore presents a wide and all-inclusive vista of that philosophy from which it stems. Furthermore, this criticism of Socrates poses a specific problem which can be answered only by resorting to the doctrines which underlie Nietzsche's entire thought. In like manner the chapter, "Reason in Philosophy," is understandable only in the light of those investigations set forth in "Beyond Good and Evil."
Under the caption, "The Four Great Errors," Nietzsche uproots a series of correlated beliefs which have the accumulated impetus of centuries of acceptance behind them. These "errors," as stated, are (1) the error of the confusion of cause and effect, (2) the error of false causality, (3) the error of imaginary causes, and (4) the error of free will. The eradication of these errors is necessary for a complete acceptance of Nietzsche's philosophy. But unless one is familiar with the vast amount of criticism which has led up to the present discussion of them, one will experience difficulty in following the subtly drawn arguments and analogies presented against them. To demonstrate briefly the specific application of the first error, namely: the confusion of cause and effect, I offer an analogy stated in the passage. We know that Christian morality teaches us that a people perish through vice and luxury—that is to say, that these two conditions arecausesof racial degeneration.Nietzsche's contention to the contrary is that when a nation is approaching physiological degeneration, vice and luxury result in the guise of stimuli adopted by exhausted natures. By this it can be seen how the Christian conscience is developed by a misunderstanding of causes; and it can also be seen how this error may affect the very foundation on which morality is built. I am here stating merely the conclusion: for the reasons leading up to this conclusion one must go to the book direct.
Nietzsche denies the embodiment of the motive of an action in the "inner facts of consciousness" where, so we have been taught by psychologists and physicists, the responsibilities of conduct are contained. The will itself, he argues, is not a motivating force; rather is it an effect of other deeper causes. This is what he discusses in his paragraphs dealing with the second error of false causality. In his criticism of the third error relating to imaginary causes, he points to the comfort we obtain by attributing a certain unexplained fact to a familiar cause—by tracing it to a commonplace source—thereby doing away with its seeming mystery. Thus ordinary maladies or afflictions, or, to carry the case into moral regions, misfortunes and unaccountable strokes of fate, are explained by finding trite and plausible reasons for their existence. As a consequence the habit of postulating causes becomes a fixed mental habit. In the great majority of cases, and especially in the domain of morality and religion, the causes are false, inasmuch as the operation of finding them depends on the mental characteristics of the searcher. The error of free will Nietzsche attributes to the theologians' attempt to make mankind responsible for its acts and therefore amenable to punishment. I have been able to present his own words in explanationof this error, and they will be found at the end of this chapter—41-42 and 43.
In "Skirmishes in a War with the Age," the longest section in the book, Nietzsche gives us much brilliant and incisive criticism of men, art and human attributes. He is here at his best, both in clarity of mind and in his manner of expression. This passage, one of the last things to come from his pen, contains the full ripeness of his nature, and is a portion of his work which no student can afford to overlook. It contains the whole of the Nietzschean philosophy applied to the conditions of his age. Because it is not a direct voicing of his doctrines it does not lend itself to mutilation except where it touches on principles of conduct and abstract aspects of morality. Many of the most widely read passages of all of Nietzsche's work are contained in it. But here again, as in the case of "Thus Spake Zarathustra," one regrets that the surface brilliance of its style attracted readers in England and America before these nations were acquainted with the books which came before. The casual reader, unfamiliar with the principles underlying Nietzsche's ethic, will see only a bold and satanic flippancy in his definition of Zola—"the love of stinking," or in his characterisation of George Sand as "the cow with plenty of beautiful milk," or in his bracketing of "tea-grocers, Christians, cows, women, Englishmen and other democrats." Yet it is significant that Nietzsche did not venture upon these remarks until he had the great bulk of his life's work behind him.
In this chapter are discussions of Renan, Sainte-Beuve, George Eliot, George Sand, Emerson, Carlyle, Darwin, Schopenhauer, Goethe and other famous men and women. In the short essays devoted to these writerswe have, however, more than mere detached valuations. Beneath all the criticisms is arationaleof judgment based on definite philosophical doctrines. This same basis of appreciation is present in the discussion of art and artists, to which subjects many pages are devoted. In fact, "The Twilight of the Idols" contains most of the art theories and æsthetic doctrines which Nietzsche advanced. He defines the psychology of the artist, and draws the line between the two concepts, Apollonian and Dionysian, as applied to art. He analyses the meaning of beauty and ugliness, and endeavours to show in what manner the conceptions of these qualities are related to the racial instincts. He also inquires into the doctrine of"l'art pour l'art"and points out wherein it fails in its purpose. A valuable explanation of "genius" is put forth in the theory that the accumulative power of generations breaks forth in the great men of a nation, and that these great men mark the end of an age, as in the case of the Renaissance.
The most significant brief essay in this section is an answer made to certain critics who, in reviewing "Beyond Good and Evil," claimed a superiority for the present age over the older civilisations. Nietzsche calls this essay "Have We Become Moral?" and proceeds to make comparisons of contemporaneous virtues with those of the ancients. He denies that to-day, without our decrepit humanitarianism and our doctrines of weakness, we would be able to withstand, either nervously or muscularly, the conditions that prevailed during the Renaissance. He points out that our morals are those of senility, and that we have deteriorated, physically as well as mentally, as a result of an adherence to a code of morality invented to meet the needs of a weak and impoverishedpeople. Our virtues, he says, are determined and stimulated by our weakness, so that we have come to admire the moralities of the slave, the most prominent among which is the doctrine of equality. In the decline of all the positive forces of life Nietzsche sees only racial decadence. In this regard it is important to take note of one of the passages relative to the discussion of this decadence, namely: the one wherein he characterises the anarchist as "the mouthpiece of the decaying strata of society." The appellation of "anarchist" has not infrequently been applied to Nietzsche himself by those who have read him superficially or whose acquaintance with him has been the result of distorted hearsay. I know of no better analysis of anarchistic motives or of no keener dissection of anarchistic weakness than is set forth here. Nor do I know of any better answer to those critics who have accused Nietzsche of anarchy, than the criticism contained in this passage.
In a final chapter, under the caption of "Things I Owe to the Ancients," Nietzsche outlines the inspirational source of many of his doctrines and literary habits. This chapter is important only to the student who wishes to go to the remoter influences in Nietzsche's writings, and for that reason I have omitted from the following excerpts any quotation from it.
EXCERPTS FROM "THE TWILIGHT OF THE IDOLS"
Man thinks woman profound—why? Because he can never fathom her depths. Woman is not even shallow.5
The trodden worm curls up. This testifies to its caution. It thus reduces its chances of being trodden upon again. In the language of morality: Humility.5-6
The Church combats passion by means of excision ofall kinds: its practise, its "remedy," iscastration.It never inquires "how can a desire be spiritualised, beautified, deified?"—In all ages it has laid the weight of discipline in the process of extirpation (the extirpation of sensuality, pride, lust of dominion, lust of property, and revenge).—But to attack the passions at their roots, means attacking life itself at its source: the method of the Church is hostile to life.27
Only degenerates find radical methods indispensable: weakness of will, or more strictly speaking, the inability not to react to a stimulus, is in itself simply another form of degeneracy. Radical and mortal hostility to sensuality, remains a suspicious symptom: it justifies one in being suspicious of the general state of one who goes to such extremes.27
A man is productive only in so far as he is rich in contrasted instincts; he can remain young only on condition that his soul does not begin to take things easy and to yearn for peace.28-29
All naturalism is morality—that is to say, every sound morality is ruled by a life instinct—any one of the laws of life is fulfilled by the definite canon "thou shalt," "thou shalt not," and any sort of obstacle or hostile element in the road of life is thus cleared away. Conversely, the morality which is antagonistic to nature—that is to say, almost every morality that has been taught, honoured and preached hitherto, is directed precisely against the life-instincts....30
Morality, as it has been understood hitherto, is the instinct of degeneration itself, which converts itself into an imperative: it says: "Perish!" It is the death sentence of men who are already doomed.31
Morality, in so far it condemnsper se,andnotout ofany aim, consideration or motive of life, is a specific error, for which no one should feel any mercy, a degenerate idiosyncrasy, that has done an unutterable amount of harm.32
Every mistake is in every sense the sequel to degeneration of the instincts to disintegration of the will. This is almost the definition of evil.35
Morality and religion are completely and utterly parts of the psychology of error: in every particular case cause and effect are confounded.41
At present we no longer have any mercy upon the concept "free-will": we know only too well what it is—the most egregious theological trick that has ever existed for the purpose of making mankind "responsible" in a theological manner—that is to say, to make mankind dependent upon theologians.41
The doctrine of the will was invented principally for the purpose of punishment,—that is to say, with the intention of tracing guilt. The whole of ancient psychology, or the psychology of the will, is the outcome of the fact that its originators, who were the priests at the head of ancient communities, wanted to create for themselves a right to administer punishments—or the right for God to do so. Men were thought of as "free" in order that they might be held guilty....42
The fact that no one shall any longer be made responsible, that the nature of existence may not be traced to acausa prima,that the world is an entity neither as a sensorium nor as a spirit—this alone is the great deliverance,—thus alone is the innocence of Becoming restored.... The concept "God" has been the greatest objection to existence hitherto.... We deny God, we deny responsibility in God: thus alone do we save the world.43
Moral judgment has this in common with the religious one, that it believes in realities which are not real. Morality is only an interpretation of certain phenomena: or more strictly speaking, a misinterpretation of them. Moral judgment, like the religious one, belongs to a stage of ignorance in which even the concept of reality, the distinction between real and imagined things, is still lacking....44
In the early years of the Middle Ages, during which the Church was most distinctly and above all a menagerie, the most beautiful examples of the "blond beast" were hunted down in all directions,—the noble Germans, for instance, were "improved." But what did this "improved" German, who had been lured to the monastery look like after the process? He looked like a caricature of man, like an abortion: he had become a "sinner," he was caged up, he had been imprisoned behind a host of appalling notions. He now lay there, sick, wretched, malevolent even toward himself: full of hate for the instincts of life, full of suspicion in regard to all that is still strong and happy. In short a "Christian." In physiological terms: in a fight with an animal, the only way of making it weak may be to make it sick. The Church understood this: it ruined man, it made him weak,—but it laid claim to having "improved" him.45-46
All means which have been used heretofore with the object of making man moral, were through and through immoral.49
My impossible people—Seneca, or the toreador of virtue.—Rousseau, or the return to nature,in impuris naturalibus.—Schiller, or the Moral Trumpeter of Säckingen.—Dante, or the hyæna that writes poetry in tombs.—Kant, orcantas an intelligible character.—Victor Hugo,or the lighthouse on the sea of nonsense.—Liszt, or the school of racing—after women.—George Sand, orlactea ubertas,in plain English: the cow with plenty beautiful milk.—Michelet, or enthusiasm in its shirt sleeves.—Carlyle, or Pessimism after undigested meals.—John Stuart Mill, or offensive lucidity.—The brothers Goncourt, or the two Ajaxes fighting with Homer. Music by Offenbach.—Zola, or the love of stinking.60
For art to be possible at all—that is to say, in order that an æsthetic mode of action and of observation may exist, a certain preliminary physiological state is indispensable: ecstasy. This state of ecstasy must first have intensified the susceptibility of the whole machine: otherwise, no art is possible. All kinds of ecstasy, however differently produced, have this power to create art, and above all the state dependent upon sexual excitement—this most venerable and primitive form of ecstasy. The same applies to that ecstasy which is the outcome of all great desires, all strong passions; the ecstasy of the feast, of the arena, of the act of bravery, of victory, of all extreme action; the ecstasy of cruelty; the ecstasy of destruction; the ecstasy following upon certain meteorological influences, as for instance that of springtime, or upon the use of narcotics; and finally the ecstasy of will, that ecstasy which results from accumulated and surging will-power.68-68
What is the meaning of the antithetical conceptsApollonianandDionysianwhich I have introduced into the vocabulary of Æsthetic, as representing two distinct modes of ecstasy?—Apollonian ecstasy acts above all as a force stimulating the eye, so that it acquires the power of vision. The painter, the sculptor, the epic poet are essentially visionaries. In the Dionysian state, on the otherhand, the whole system of passions is stimulated and intensified, so that it discharges itself by all the means of expression at once, and vents all its power of representation, of imitation, of transfiguration, of transformation, together with every kind of mimicry and histrionic display at the same time.67-68
As to the famous "struggle for existence," it seems to me, for the present, to be more of an assumption than a fact. It does occur, but as an exception. The general condition of life is not one of want or famine, but rather of riches, of lavish luxuriance, and even of absurd prodigality,—where there is a struggle, it is a struggle for power.71
The most intellectual men, provided they are also the most courageous, experience the most excruciating tragedies: but on that very account they honour life, because it confronts them with its more formidable antagonism.73
When the anarchist, as the mouthpiece of the decaying strata of society, raises his voice in splendid indignation for "right," "justice," "equal rights," he is only groaning under the burden of his ignorance, which cannot understandwhyhe actually suffers,—what his poverty consists of—the poverty of life. 86
To bewail one's lot is always despicable: it is always the outcome of weakness. Whether one ascribes one's afflictions to others or toone's self,it is all the same. The socialist does the former, the Christian, for instance, does the latter. That which is common to both attitudes, or rather that which is equally ignoble in them both, is the fact that somebody must be toblameif one suffers—in short that the sufferer drugs himself with the honey of revenge to allay his anguish. 86
Why a Beyond, if it be not a means of splashing mud over a "Here," over this world?87
An "altruistic" morality, a morality under which selfishness withers, is in all circumstances a bad sign. This is true of individuals and above all of nations. The best are lacking when selfishness begins to be lacking. Instinctively to select that which is harmful to one, to beluredby "disinterested" motives,—these things almost provide the formula for decadence. "Not to have one's own interests at heart"—this is simply a moral fig-leaf concealing a very different fact, a physiological one, to wit:—"I no longer know how to find what is to my interest.".... Disintegration of the instincts!—All is up with man when he becomes altruistic.87
One should die proudly when it is no longer possible to live proudly. Death should be chosen freely,—death at the right time, faced clearly and joyfully and embraced while one is surrounded by one's children and other witnesses. It should be affected in such a way that a proper farewell is still possible, that he who is about to take leave of us is stillhimself,and really capable not only of valuing what he has achieved and willed in life, but also ofsumming-upthe value of life itself. Everything precisely the opposite of the ghastly comedy which Christianity has made of the hour of death. We should never forgive Christianity for having so abused the weakness of the dying man as to do violence to his conscience, or for having used his manner of dying as a means of valuing both man and his past!—In spite of all cowardly prejudices, it is our duty, in this respect, above all to reinstate the proper—that is to say, the physiological, aspect of so-callednaturaldeath, which after all is perfectly "unnatural" and nothing else than suicide. One neverperishes through anybody's fault but one's own. The only thing is that the death which takes place in the most contemptible circumstances, the death that is not free, the death which occurs at the wrong time, is the death of a coward. Out of the very love one bears to life, one should wish death to be different from this—that is to say, free, deliberate, and neither a matter of chance nor of surprise. Finally let me whisper a word of advice to our friends the pessimists and all other decadents. We have not the power to prevent ourselves from being born: but this error—for sometimes it is an error—can be rectified if we choose. The man who does away with himself performs the most estimable of deeds: he almost deserves to live for having done so.88-89
The decline of the instincts of hostility and of those instincts that arouse suspicion,—for this if anything is what constitutes our progress—is only one of the results manifested by the general decline invitality:it requires a hundred times more trouble and caution to live such a dependent and senile existence. In such circumstances everybody gives everybody else a helping hand, and, to a certain extent, everybody is either an invalid or an invalid's attendant. This is then called "virtue": among those men who knew a different life—that is to say, a fuller, more prodigal, more superabundant sort of life, it might have been called by another name,—possibly "cowardice," or "vileness," or "old woman's morality."91-92
Ages should be measured according to theirpositive forces;—valued by this standard that prodigal and fateful age of the Renaissance, appears as the lastgreatage, while we moderns with our anxious care of ourselves and love of our neighbours, with all our unassuming virtuesof industry, equity, and scientific method—with our lust of collection, of economy and of mechanism—represent aweakage.93
Liberalism, or, in plain English, thetransformation of mankind into cattle.94
Freedom is the will to be responsible for ourselves. It is to preserve the distance which separates us from other men. To grow more indifferent to hardship, to severity, to privation, and even to life itself. To be ready to sacrifice men for one's cause, one's self included. Freedom denotes that the virile instincts which rejoice in war and in victory, prevail over other instincts; for instance, over the instincts of "happiness." The man who has won his freedom, and how much more so, therefore, the spirit that has won his freedom, tramples ruthlessly upon that contemptible kind of comfort which tea-grocers, Christians, cows, women, Englishmen and other democrats worship in their dreams. The free man is awarrior.94-95
By showing ever more and more favour tolove-marriages,the very foundation of matrimony, that which alone makes it an institution, has been undermined. No institution ever has been nor ever will be built upon an idiosyncrasy; as I say, marriage cannot be based upon "love."97-98
The mere fact that there is such a thing as the question of the working-man is due to stupidity, or at bottom to degenerate instincts which are the cause of all the stupidity of modern times. Concerning certain thingsno questions ought to be put:the first imperative principle of instinct. For the life of me I cannot see what people want to do with the working-man of Europe; now that they have made a question of him. He is far toocomfortable to cease from questioning, ever more and more, and with ever less modesty. After all, he has the majority on his side. There is now not the slightest hope that an unassuming and contented sort of man, after the style of the Chinaman, will come into being in this quarter: and this would have been the reasonable course, it was even a dire necessity. What has been done? Everything has been done with the view of nipping the very pre-requisite of this accomplishment in the bud,—with the most frivolous thoughtlessness those self-same instincts by means of which a working-class becomes possible, andtolerableeven to its members themselves, have been destroyed root and branch. The working-man has been declared fit for military service; he has been granted the right of combination, and of franchise: can it be wondered at that he already regards his condition as one of distress (expressed morally, as an injustice)? But, again I ask, what do people want? If they desire a certain end, then they should desire the means thereto. If they will have slaves, then it is madness to educate them to be masters.98-99
Great men, like great ages, are explosive material, in which a stupendous amount of power is accumulated; the first conditions of their existence are always historical and physiological; they are the outcome of the fact that for long ages energy has been collected, hoarded up, saved up and preserved for their use, and that no explosion has taken place. When the tension in the bulk has become sufficiently excessive, the most fortuitous stimulus suffices in order to call "genius," "great deeds," and momentous fate into the world.101-102
The criminal type is the type of the strong man and unfavourable conditions, a strong man made sick. Helacks the wild and savage state, a form of nature and existence which is freer and more dangerous, in which everything that constitutes the shield and the sword in the instinct of the strong man, takes a place by right. Society puts a ban upon his virtues; the most spirited instincts inherent in him immediately become involved with the depressing passions, with suspicion, fear and dishonour. But this is almost the recipe for physiological degeneration. When a man has to do that which he is best suited to do, which he is most fond of doing, not only clandestinely, but also with long suspense, caution and ruse, he becomes anæmic; and inasmuch as he is always having to pay for his instincts in the form of danger, persecution and fatalities, even his feelings begin to turn against these instincts—he begins to regard them as fatal. It is society, our tame, mediocre, castrated society, in which an untutored son of nature who comes to us from his mountains or from his adventures at sea, must necessarily degenerate into a criminal. Or almost necessarily: for there are cases in which such a man shows himself to be stronger than society: the Corsican Napoleon is the most celebrated case of this.103-104
As long as thepriestrepresented the highest type of man, every valuable kind of man was depreciated.... The time is coming—this I guarantee—when he will pass as thelowesttype, as our Chandala, as the falsest and most disreputable kind of man.105
Everything good is an inheritance: that which is not inherited is imperfect, it is simply a beginning.107
Christianity with its contempt of the body is the greatest mishap that has ever befallen mankind.108
I also speak of a "return to nature," although it is not a process of going back but of going up—up into lofty, freeand even terrible nature and naturalness; such a nature as can play with great tasks andmayplay with them.108
The doctrine of equality!... But there is no more deadly poison than this for itseemsto proceed from the very lips of justice, whereas in reality it draws the curtain down on all justice.... "To equals equality, to unequals inequality"—that would be the real speech of justice and that which follows from it. "Never make unequal things equal." The fact that so much horror and blood are associated with this doctrine of equality, has lent this "modern idea"par excellencesuch a halo of fire and glory, that the Revolution as a drama has misled even the most noble minds.108-109
"The Antichrist" ("Der Antichrist") was written in September, 1888, work evidently having been begun on it as soon as "The Twilight of the Idols" had been sent to the publisher. Its composition could not have occupied more than a few weeks at most, for the former book was not despatched until September 7, and the present work was completed before October. At this time Nietzsche was working at high pressure. He must have had some presentiment of his impending breakdown for he filled in every available minute with ardent and rapid writing. The fall of 1888 was the most prolific period of his life. No less than four books "The Twilight of the Idols," "The Antichrist," "NietzschecontraWagner" and"Ecce Homo"—were completed by him between the late summer and the first of the year; and in addition to this he made many notes for his future volumes and read and corrected a considerable amount of proofs. "The Antichrist," however, though completed in 1888, was not published until the end of 1894, six years after he had laid aside his work forever, and at a time when his mind was too darkened to know or care about the circumstances of its issuance. It appeared in Vol. XIII ofNietzsches Werkewhich, although published at the close of 1894, bore the date of the following year.
"The Antichrist" which, like "Beyond Good andEvil," "The Genealogy of Morals" and "The Twilight of the Idols," forms a part of Nietzsche's final philosophic scheme, was intended—to judge from the evidence contained in his notebooks—as the first division of a work to be entitled "The Trans valuation of All Values" ("Die Umwertung Aller Werte"). In fact this title and also "The Will to Power" were considered alternately for hismagnum opuswhich he intended writing after the completion of "The Transvaluation of All Values." He finally decided on the latter title for his great work, although he used the former caption as a subtitle. The complete outline for the volumes which were to be called "The Transvaluation of All Values" and which were to be incorporated in his final general plan, is as follows:
1. "The Antichrist. An Attempted Criticism of Christianity." ("Der Antichrist: Versuch einer Kritik des Christenthums.")
2. "The Free Spirit. A Criticism of Philosophy as a Nihilistic Movement." ("Der freie Geist: Kritik der Philosophie als einer nihilistischen Bewegung")
3. "The Immoralist. A Criticism of the Most Fatal Species of Ignorance, Morality." ("Der Immoralist: Kritik der verhängnissvollsten Art von Unwissenheit, der Moral")
4. "Dionysus, the Philosophy of Eternal Recurrence." ("Dionysus, Philosophie der ewigen Wiederkunft")
But Nietzsche did not finish this task, although "The Antichrist" is in the form in which he intended it to be published. Nevertheless, it must be considered merely as a fragment of a much more extensive plan.Though Nietzsche was far from being the first, he yet was the most effective critic who ever waged war against Christianity. This was due to the fact that he went about his destructive work from an entirely new angle. Before him there had been many competent anti-Christian writers and scientists. Even during his own time there was a large and loud school of atheists at work undermining the foundations of Nazarene morality. With the methods of his predecessors and contemporaries, however, he had nothing in common. He saw that, despite the scientific denial of the miracles of Christianity and the biological opposition to the origin of Christian history, the theologian was always able to reply to the denial of Christian truth with the counter-argument of Christian practicability. Thus, while the reasoning of such men as Darwin, Huxley and Spencer held good so far as the scientific aspects of Christianity went, the results of Christianity were not involved. The church, meeting the onslaughts of the "higher criticism," denied the necessity of a literal belief in the Gospels, and asserted that, while all the anti-Christian critics might be accurate in their purely scientific and logical conclusions, Christianity itself as a workable code was still efficient and deserving of consideration as the most perfect system of conduct the world had ever known. Nietzsche therefore did not go into the field already ploughed by Voltaire, Hume, Huxley, Spencer, Paine and a host of lesser "free thinkers." The preliminary battles in the great warfare against Christianity had already been won, and he saw the futility of proceeding along historical and scientific lines. Consequently he turned his attention to a consideration of theeffectsof Christian morality upon the race, to an inquiry into thecausesof pity-morality, and to a comparison of moral codes in their relation to the needs of humanity. Whether or not the origins of Christianity conformed to biological laws did not concern him, although he assumed as his hypothesis the conclusions of the scientific investigators. The only way of determining the merits and demerits of the Christian code, he argued, was to ascertain the actual results of its application, and to compare these with the results which had accrued from the application of hardier and healthier codes. To this investigation Nietzsche devotes practically the whole of "The Antichrist," although there are a few analytical passages relating to the early dissemination of Jewish ethics. But with these passages the student need not seriously concern himself. They are speculative and non-essential.
Nietzsche's criticism of the effects of Christian virtues, however, did not begin in "The Antichrist," although this book is the final flowering of those anti-Christian ideas which cropped up continually throughout his entire work. This religious antipathy was present even in his early academic essays, and in "Human, All-Too-Human" we find him well launched upon his campaign. No book of his, with the exception of his unfinished pamphlet, "The Eternal Recurrence," is free from this criticism. But one will find all his earlier conclusions and arguments drawn together in a compact and complete whole in the present volume.
Nietzsche's accusation against Christianity, reduced to a few words, is that it works against the higher development of the individual; that, being a religion of weakness, it fails to meet the requirements of the modern man; in short, that it isdangerous.This conclusion isfounded on the principle of biological monism. Nietzsche assumes Darwin's law of the struggle for existence, and argues that the Christian virtues oppose not only this law but the law of natural selection as well. By this opposition the race has been weakened, for self-sacrifice, the basis of Christian morality, detracts from the power of the individual and consequently lessens his chances for existence. Furthermore, the Christian ideal in itself is opposed to progress and all that progress entails, such as science and research. Knowledge of any kind tends to make man more independent, and thereby reduces his need for theological supervision. As a result of the passing over of power from the strong to the weak, in accordance with the morality of Christianity, the strength of the race as a whole is depleted. Furthermore, such a procedure is in direct opposition to the laws of nature, and so long as man lives in a natural environment the only way to insure progress is to conform to the conditions of that environment. Nietzsche therefore makes a plea for the adoption of other than Christian standards—standards compatible with the laws of existence. He points out that already the race has been almost irremediably weakened by its adherence to anti-natural doctrines, that each day of Christian activity is another step in the complete degeneration of man. And he asserts that the only reason the race has maintained its power as long as it has is because the stronger members of society, despite their voiced belief, do not live up to the Christian code, but are continually compromising with it.
The problem of the origin of Christianity interests Nietzsche, because he sees in it an explanation of the results which it wished to accomplish. Christianity,says he, can be understood only in relation to the soil out of which it grew. When the Jewish people, subjugated and in a position of slavery, were confronted with the danger of extermination at the hands of a stronger people, they invented a system of conduct which would insure their continued existence. They realised that the adherence to such virtues as retaliation, aggressiveness, initiative, cruelty, arrogance and the like would mean death; the stronger nations would not have countenanced such qualities in a weak and depleted nation. As a result the Jews replaced retaliation with "long suffering," aggressiveness with peacefulness, cruelty with kindness, and arrogance with humility. Thesenegativevirtues took the place of positive virtues, and were turned into "beatitudes." By thus "turning the other cheek" and "forgiving one's enemies," instead of resenting persecution and attempting to avenge the wrongs perpetrated against them, they were able to prolong life. This system of conduct, says Nietzsche, was a direct falsification of all natural conditions and a perversion of all healthy instincts. It was the morality of an impoverished and subservient people, and was adopted by the Jews only when they had been stripped of their power.
Nietzsche presents a psychological history of Israel as an example of the process by which natural values were denaturalised. The God of Israel was Jehovah. He was the expression of the nation's consciousness of power, of joy and of hope. Victory and salvation were expected from him: he was the God of justice. The Assyrians and internal anarchy changed the conditions of Israel. Jehovah was no longer able to bring victory to his people, and consequently the nature of this God was changed. In the hands of the priest he became aweapon, and unhappiness was interpreted as punishment for "sins." Jehovah became a moral dictator, and consequently morality among the Israelites ceased to be an expression of the conditions of life and became an abstract theory opposed to life. Nor did the Jewish priesthood stop at this. It interpreted the whole of history with a view to showing that all sin against Jehovah led to punishment and that all pious worship of Jehovah resulted in reward. A moral order of the universe was thus substituted for a natural one. To bolster up this theory a "revelation" became necessary. Accordingly a "stupendous literary fraud" was perpetrated, and the "holy scriptures" were "discovered" and foisted upon the people. The priests, avid for power, made themselves indispensable by attributing to the will of God all those acts they desired of the people. Repentance, namely: submission to the priests, was inaugurated. Thus Christianity, hostile to all reality and power, gained its footing.
The psychology of Christ, as set forth in "The Antichrist," and the use made of his doctrines by those who directly followed him, form an important part of Nietzsche's argument against Christian morality. Christ's doctrine, according to Nietzsche, was one of immediacy. It was a mode of conduct and not, according to the present Christian conception, a preparation for a future world. Christ was a simple heretic in his rebellion against the existing political order. He represented a reactionary mode of existence—-a system of conduct which said Nay to life, a code of inaction and non-interference. His death on the cross was meant as a supreme example and proof of this doctrine. It remained for his disciples to attach other meanings to it. Loving Christas they did, and consequently blinded by that love, they were unable to forgive his execution at the hands of the State. At the same time they were unprepared to follow his example and to give their own lives to the cause of his teachings. A feeling of revenge sprang up in them, and they endeavoured to find an excuse for his death. To what was it attributable? And the answer they found, says Nietzsche, was "dominant Judaism, its ruling class." For the moment they failed to realise that the "Kingdom of God," as preached by Christ, was an earthly thing, something contained within the individual; and after the crucifixion it was necessary for them either to follow Christ's example or to interpret his death, a voluntary one, as a promise of future happiness, that is, to translate hispracticaldoctrine into symbolic terms. They unhesitatingly chose the latter.
In their search for an explanation as to how God could have allowed his "son" to be executed, they fell upon the theory that Christ's death was a sacrifice for their sins, an expiation for their guilt. From that time on, says Nietzsche, "there was gradually imported into the type of the Saviour the doctrine of the Last Judgment, and of the 'second coming,' the doctrine of sacrificial death, and the doctrine ofResurrection,by means of which the whole concept 'blessedness,' the entire and only reality of the gospel, is conjured away—in favour of a stateafterdeath." St. Paul then rationalised the conception by introducing into it the doctrine of personal immortality by means of having Christ rise from the dead; and he preached this immortality as a reward for virtue. Thus, asserts Nietzsche, Christ's effort toward a Buddhistic movement of peace, "toward real andnotmerely promisedhappiness on earth"was controvertedby his posterity. Nothing of Christ's original doctrine remained, once Paul, the forger, set to work to twist it to his own ends. Paul went further and by changing and falsifying it turned all Jewish history into aprophecyfor his own teachings. Thus the whole doctrine of Christ, the true meaning of his death and the realities which he taught, were altered and distorted. In short, Christ's life was used as a means for furthering the religion of Paul, who gave to it the name of Christianity.
A most important part of "The Antichrist" is that passage wherein Nietzsche defines his order of castes. Every healthy society, says he, falls naturally into three separate and distinct types. These classes condition one another and "gravitate differently in the psychological sense." Each type has its own work, its own duties, its own emotions, its own compensations and mastership. The first class, comprising the rulers, is distinguished by its intellectual superiority. It devolves upon this class "to represent happiness, beauty and goodness on earth." The members of this superior class are in the minority, but they are nevertheless the creators of values. "Their delight is self-mastery: with them asceticism becomes a second nature, a need, an instinct. They regard a difficult task as their privilege; to play with burdens which crush their fellows is to them arecreation."They are at once the most honourable, cheerful and gracious of all men. The second class is composed of those who relieve the first class of their duties and execute the will of the rulers. They are the guardians of the law, the merchants and professional men, the warriors and the judges. In brief, they are the executors of the race.The third class is made up of the workers, the lowest order of man—those destined for menial and disagreeable tasks. "The fact," says Nietzsche, "that one is publicly useful, a wheel, a function, presupposes a certain natural destiny: it is notsociety,but the only kind ofhappinessof which the great majority are capable, that makes them intelligent machines. For the mediocre it is a joy to be mediocre; in them mastery in one thing, a specialty, is a natural instinct." The conception of these classes contains the nucleus of Nietzsche's doctrine. It embodies his whole idea of a natural aristocracy as opposed to the spurious European aristocracy of the present day, wherein the rulers are in reality merely members of the second class.
The charge is constantly brought against Nietzsche by the ecclesiastic dialecticians that his criticism of Christianity is fraught with the very nihilism against which he so eloquently argues. There is perhaps a slight basis for such a contention if we confine ourselves strictly to those of his utterances against the Jewish morality which appear in his previous books. But in "The Antichrist" this does not hold true even in the slightest manner. Nietzsche is constantly supplanting modes of action for every Christian virtue he denies. He is as constructive as he is destructive. "The Antichrist" contains, not only a complete denial of all Christian morality, but a statement of a new and consistent system of ethics based on the research of all his works.
EXCERPTS FROM "THE ANTICHRIST"
What is good? All that enhances the feeling of power, the Will to Power, and power itself in man.What is bad?—All that proceeds from weakness. What is happiness?—The feeling that power isincreasing,-that resistance has been overcome.
Not contentment, but more power; not peace at any price, but war; not virtue, but efficiency (virtue in the Renaissance sense,virtu,free from all moralic acid). The weak and botched shall perish: first principle of our humanity. And they ought even to be helped to perish.
What is more harmful than any vice?—Practical sympathy with all the botched and the weak—Christianity.128
We must not deck out and adorn Christianity: it has waged a deadly war upon thishighertype of man, it has set a ban upon all the fundamental instincts of this type, and has distilled evil and the devil himself out of these instincts:—the strong man as the typical pariah, the villain. Christianity has sided with everything weak, low, and botched; it has made an ideal out ofantagonismagainst all the self-preservative instincts of strong life: it has corrupted even the reason of the strongest intellects, by teaching that the highest values of intellectuality are sinful, misleading and full of temptations.130
I call an animal, a species, an individual corrupt, when it loses its instincts, when it selects andprefersthat which is detrimental to it.131
Life itself, to my mind, is nothing more nor less than the instinct of growth, of permanence, of accumulating forces, of power: where the will to power is lacking, degeneration sets in.131
Pity is opposed to the tonic passions which enhance the energy of the feeling of life: its action is depressing. A man loses power when he pities. By means of pity thedrain on strength which suffering itself already introduces into the world is multiplied a thousandfold.131
On the whole, pity thwarts the law of development which is the law of selection. It preserves that which is ripe for death, it fights in favour of the disinherited and the condemned of life.131-132
This depressing and infectious instinct thwarts those instincts which aim at the preservation and enhancement of the value of life: bymultiplyingmisery quite as much as by preserving all that is miserable, it is the principal agent in promoting decadence.132
That which a theologian considers true,mustof necessity be false: this furnishes almost the criterion of truth. It is his most profound self-preservative instinct which forbids reality ever to attain to honour in any way, or even to raise its voice. Whithersoever the influence of the theologian extends,valuationsare topsy-turvy, and the concepts "true" and "false" have necessarily changed places: that which is most deleterious to life, is here called "true," that which enhances it, elevates it, says Yea to it, justifies it and renders it triumphant, is called "false."135
What is there that destroys a man more speedily than to work, think, feel, as an automaton of "duty," without internal promptings, without a profound personal predilection, without joy? This is the recipepar excellenceof decadence and even of idiocy.137
In Christianity, neither morality nor religion comes in touch at all with reality. Nothing but imaginarycauses(God, the soul, the ego, spirit, free will—or even non-free will); nothing but imaginaryeffects(sin, salvation, grace, punishment, forgiveness of sins). Imaginary beings are supposed to have intercourse (God, spirits,souls); imaginary Natural History (anthropocentric: total lack of the notion, "natural causes"); an imaginarypsychology(nothing but misunderstandings of self, interpretations of pleasant or unpleasant general feelings; for instance of the states of thenervus sympathicus,with the help of the sign language of a religio-moral idiosyncrasy,—repentance, pangs of conscience, the temptation of the devil, the presence of God); an imaginary teleology (the Kingdom of God, the Last Judgment, Everlasting Life).141-142
A proud people requires a God, unto whom it cansacrificethings.... Religion, when restricted to these principles, is a form of gratitude. A man is grateful for his own existence; for this he must have a God.—Such a God must be able to profit and to injure him, he must be able to act the friend and the foe. He must be esteemed for his good as well as for his evil qualities.143
When a people is on the road to ruin; when it feels its belief in a future, its hope of freedom vanishing for ever; when it becomes conscious of submission as the most useful quality, and of the virtues of the submissive as self-preservative measures, then its God must also modify himself. He then becomes a tremulous and unassuming sneak; he counsels "peace of the soul," the cessation of all hatred, leniency and "love" even towards friend and foe. He is for ever moralising, he crawls into the heart of every private virtue, becomes a God for everybody.143
The Christian concept of God—God as the deity of the sick, God as a spider, God as a spirit—is one of the most corrupt concepts of God that has ever been attained on earth. Maybe it represents the low-water mark in the evolutionary ebb of the godlike type. God degenerated into thecontradiction of life,instead of being itstransfiguration and eternal Yea! With God war is declared on life, nature, and the will to life! God is the formula for every calumny of this world and for every lie concerning a beyond!146
Christianity aims at masteringbeasts of prey;its expedient is to make themill,—to render feeble is the Christian recipe for taming, for "civilisation."151
Iffaithis above all necessary, then reason, knowledge, and scientific research must be brought into evil repute: the road to truth becomes theforbiddenroad.—Stronghopeis a much greater stimulant of life than any single realised joy could be. Sufferers must be sustained by a hope which no actuality can contradict,—and which cannot ever be realised: the hope of another world. (Precisely on account of this power that hope has of making the unhappy linger on, the Greeks regarded it as the evil of evils, as the mostmischievousevil: it remained behind in Pandora's box.) In order thatlovemay be possible, God must be a person. In order that the lowest instincts may also make their voices heard God must be young. For the ardour of the women a beautiful saint, and for the ardour of the men a Virgin Mary has to be pressed into the foreground. All this on condition that Christianity wishes to rule over a certain soil, on which Aphrodisiac or Adonis cults had already determined thenotionof a cult. To insist uponchastityonly intensifies the vehemence and profundity of the religious instinct—it makes the cult warmer, more enthusiastic, more soulful.—Love is the state in which man sees things most widely different from what they are. The force of illusion reaches its zenith here, as likewise the sweetening and transfiguring power. When a man is in love he endures more than at other times; he submits to everything.The thing was to discover a religion in which it was possible to love: by this means the worst in life is overcome—it is no longer even seen.—So much for three Christian virtues Faith, Hope, and Charity: I call them the three Christianprecautionary measures.152-153
What is Jewish morality, what is Christian morality? Chance robbed of its innocence; unhappiness polluted with the idea of "sin"; well being interpreted as a danger, as a "temptation"; physiological indisposition poisoned by means of the cankerworm of conscience.157-158
What does a "moral order of the universe" mean? That once and for all there is such a thing as will of God which determines what man has to do and what he has to leave undone; that the value of a people or of an individual is measured according to how much or how little the one or the other obeys the will of God; that in the destinies of a people or of an individual, the will of God shows itself dominant, that is to say it punishes or rewards according to the degree of obedience. In the place of this miserable falsehoodrealitysays: a parasitical type of man, who can flourish only at the cost of all the healthy elements of life, the priest abuses the name of God: he calls that state of affairs in which the priest determines the value of things "the Kingdom of God"; he calls the means whereby such a state of affairs is attained or maintained, "the Will of God"; with cold-blooded cynicism he measures peoples, ages and individuals according to whether they favour or oppose the ascendency of the priesthood.158-159
I fail to see against whom was directed the insurrection of which rightly orwronglyJesus is understood to have been the promoter, if it were not directed against the Jewish church.162
This saintly anarchist who called the lowest of the low, the outcasts and "sinners," the Chandala of Judaism, to revolt against the established order of things (and in language which, if the gospels are to be trusted, would get one sent to Siberia even to-day)—this man was a political criminal in so far as political criminals were possible in a community so absurdly non-political. This brought him to the cross: the proof of this is the inscription found thereon. He died forhissins—and no matter how often the contrary has been asserted there is absolutely nothing to show that he died for the sins of others.162-163
The instinctive hatred of realityis the outcome of an extreme susceptibility to pain and to irritation, which can no longer endure to be "touched" at all, because every sensation strikes too deep.
The instinctive exclusion of all aversion, of all hostility, of all boundaries and distances in feeling,is the outcome of an extreme susceptibility to pain and to irritation, which regards all resistance, all compulsory resistance as insufferableanguish(—that is to say, as harmful, asdeprecatedby the self-preservative instinct), and which knows blessedness (happiness) only when it is no longer obliged to offer resistance to anybody, either evil or detrimental,—love as the only ultimate possibility of life....
These are the twophysiological realitiesupon which and out of which the doctrine of salvation has grown.166
With a little terminological laxity Jesus might be called a "free spirit"—he cares not a jot for anything that is established: the wordkilleth,everything fixedkilleth.The idea,experience, "life"as he alone knows it, is, according to him, opposed to every kind of word, formula,law, faith and dogma. He speaks only of the innermost things: "life" or "truth" or "light," is his expression for the innermost things,—everything else the whole of reality, the whole of nature, language even, has only the value of a sign, of a simile for him.169-170
The whole psychology of the "gospels" lacks the concept of guilt and punishment, as also that of reward. "Sin," any sort of aloofness between God and man, is done away with,—this is precisely what constitutes the "glad tidings."Eternal bliss is not promised, it is not bound up with certain conditions; it is the only reality—the rest consists only of signs wherewith to speak about it....
The results of such a state project themselves into a new practice of life, the actual evangelical practice. It is not a "faith" which distinguishes himself by means of adifferentmode of action....171
The life of the Saviour was naught else than this practice,—neither was his death. He no longer required any formulæ, any rites for his relations with God—not even prayer. He has done with all the Jewish teaching of repentance and of atonement; he alone knows themodeof life which makes one feel "divine," "saved," "evangelical," and at all times a "child of God." Not "repentance," not "prayer and forgiveness" are the roads to God: theevangelical mode of life aloneleads to God, itis"God."—That which the gospels abolished was the Judaism of the concepts "sin," "forgiveness of sin," "faith," "salvation through faith,"—the whole doctrine of the Jewish church was denied by the "glad tidings."
The profound instinct of how one must live in order to feel "in Heaven," in order to feel "eternal," while inevery other respect one feels bynomeans "in Heaven": this alone is the psychological reality of "Salvation."—A new life andnota new faith....171-172
This "messenger of glad tidings" died as he lived and as he taught—notin order "to save mankind," but in order to show how one ought to live. It was a mode of life that he bequeathed to mankind: his behaviour before his judges, his attitude towards his executioners, his accusers, and all kinds of calumny and scorn,—his demeanour on thecross.174
The history of Christianity—from the death on the cross onwards—is the history of a gradual and ever coarser misunderstanding of an original symbolism.175
"The world" to Christianity means that a man is a soldier, a judge, a patriot, that he defends himself, that he values his honour, that he desires his own advantage, that he isproud..... The conduct of every moment, every instinct, every valuation that leads to a deed, is at present anti-Christian: what anabortion of falsehoodmodern man must be, in order to be ablewithout a blushstill to call himself a Christian!178
The very word "Christianity" is a misunderstanding,—truth to tell, there never was more than one Christian, and hediedon the Cross. The "gospel"diedon the cross. That which thenceforward was called "gospel" was the reverse of that "gospel" that Christ had lived: it was "evil tidings," adysangel.It is false to the point of nonsense to see in "faith," in the faith in salvation through Christ, the distinguishing trait of the Christian; the only thing that is Christian is the Christian mode of existence, a life such as he led who died on the Cross.... To this day a life of this kind is still possible; for certainmen, it is even necessary: genuine, primitive Christianity will be possible in all ages....Nota faith, but a course of action.178-179
To regard a man like St.-Paul as honest (a man whose home was the very headquarters of Stoical enlightenment) when he devises a proof of the continued existence of the Saviour out of a hallucination; or even to believe him when he declares that he had this hallucination, would amount to foolishness on the part of a psychologist: St.-Paul desired the end, consequently he also desired the means.... Even what he himself did not believe, was believed in by the idiots among whom he spreadhisdoctrine.—What he wanted was power; with St.-Paul the priest again aspired to power.185
When the centre of gravity of life is laid,notin life, but in a beyond—innonentity,life is utterly robbed of its balance. The great lie of personal immortality destroys all reason, all nature in the instincts,—everything in the instincts that is beneficent, that promotes life and that is a guarantee of the future, henceforward aroused suspicion. The very meaning of life is now construed as the effort to live in such a way that life no longer has any point.... Why show any public spirit? Why be grateful for one's origin and one's forebears? Why collaborate with one's fellows, and be confident? Why be concerned about the general weal or strive after it?... All these things are merely so many "temptations," so many deviations from the "straight path." "One thing only is necessary" ... that everybody, as an "immortal soul," should have equal rank, that in the totality of beings, the "salvation" of each individual may lay claim to eternal importance, that insignificant bigots and three-quarter-lunatics may have the right to suppose that thelaws of nature may be persistentlybrokenon their account,—any such magnification of every kind of selfishness to infinity, toinsolence,cannot be branded with sufficient contempt. And yet it is to this miserable flattery of personal vanity that Christianity owed itstriumph,—by this means it lured all the bungled and the botched, all revolting and revolted people, all abortions, the whole of the refuse and offal of humanity, over to its side.185-186
With Christianity, the art of feeling holy lies, which constitutes the whole of Judaism, reaches its final mastership, thanks to many centuries of Jewish and most thoroughly serious training and practice.188
Only read the gospels as books calculated to seduce by means of morality—morality is appropriated by these petty people,—they know what morality can do! The best way of leading mankind by the nose is with morality! The fact is that the most consciousconceitof people who believe themselves to bechosen,here simulates modesty: in this way they, the Christian community, the "good and the just" place themselves once and for all on a certain side, the side "of Truth"—and the rest of mankind, "the world" on the other.... This was the most fatal kind of megalomania that had ever yet existed on earth; insignificant little abortions of bigots and liars began to lay sole claim to the concepts "God," "Truth," "Light," "Spirit," "Love," "Wisdom," "Life," as if these things were, so to speak, synonyms of themselves, in order to fence themselves off from "the world"; little ultra-Jews, ripe for every kind of madhouse, twisted values round in order to suit themselves, just as if the Christian, alone, were the meaning, the salt, the standard and even the"ultimate tribunal"of all the rest of mankind.189-190
One does well to put on one's gloves when reading the New Testament. The proximity of so much pitch almost defiles one. We should feel just as little inclined to hobnob with "the first Christians" as with Polish Jews: not that we need explain our objections.... They simply smell bad.—In vain have I sought for a single sympathetic feature in the New Testament; there is not a trace of freedom, kindliness, openheartedness and honesty to be found in it. Humaneness has not even made a start in this book, whilecleanlyinstincts are entirely absent from it.... Only evil instincts are to be found in the New Testament, it shows no sign of courage, these people lack even the courage of these evil instincts. All is cowardice, all is a closing of one's eyes and self-deception. Every book becomes clean, after one has just read the New Testament.193-194
In the whole of the New Testament onlyonefigure appears which we cannot help respecting. Pilate, the Roman Governor. To take a Jewish quarrelseriouslywas a thing he could not get himself to do. One Jew more or less—what did it matter?... The noble scorn of a Roman, in whose presence the word "truth" had been shamelessly abused, has enriched the New Testament with the only saying whichis of value,—and this saying is not only the criticism, but actually the shattering of that Testament: "What is truth!"195-196