Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

For Nietzsche saw great dangers threatening both the 20th century and its successor. With them would come the classical era of great wars and revolutions, says this poet-philosopher, who, incidentally, was also a true prophet. In these wars and revolu tions (which by-the-bye he only foresaw and did not bring about as Allied War propaganda alleged), he welcomed a means for the masculinization of the world, the rearing of a higher type of man, and the creation of a new ruler caste.

For these, and these alone, he demanded emancipation from the Judaeo-Christian morality. Only to these higher and stronger men, from whom ultimately Superman was to spring, did he grant and recommend his famous formula of the transvaluation of all val ues :—"The aim should be to prepare a transvaluation of values for a particularly strong kind of man, most highly gifted in in tellect and will, and, to this end, slowly and cautiously to liberate in him a whole host of slandered instincts, hitherto held in check: whoever meditates about this problem belongs to us, the free spirits—though not to that kind of 'free spirit' which has ex isted hitherto : for these desired practically the reverse." (Der Wille zur Macht, Aph. 957.) And in the very next aphorism he adds : "I am writing for a race of men which does not yet exist : for the lords of the earth.". . . "Live dangerously !"—this motto, which he himself lived up to, Nietzsche addresses to these future lords of the earth, while gladly conceding to others the right to strive for happiness and safety, and to cultivate domestic virtues. For, in all his writings, the philosopher emphasized that he had set up no moral code for the generality of men, and that he had no wish to lead lesser men away from their virtues and their duties. "I am a law only for mine own; I am not a law for all. He, however, who belongs to me must be strong of bone and light of foot,"—(Also Sprach Zarathustra).

The Rejection of Nietzsche.

An aristocratic doctrine like this, addressed to a self-confident democracy, inevitably met in the first place with misunderstanding, or, rather, with silence, then contempt, and finally with rejection. It was rejected all the more firmly, when, despite Nietzsche's warning, many uninvited guests pressed into his garden, and indulged their chaotic and rebellious instincts "beyond good and evil." Nietzsche himself had forseen these unwanted disciples, and had warned the world as follows :— "The first followers of a Creed prove nothing against it." To these false followers, Nietzsche preferred his adversaries, among whom the true believers were by no means the worst.

But those he esteemed least were his former colleagues ; for the ears of scholars and university professors were least attuned to his message. To these men, as has been well said, the new teach ing was a "bolt from the blue": although even this was not entirely true ; for, like every other thinker, Nietzsche of course had his predecessors, whom he expressly mentioned by name—Heraclitus, Empedocles, Spinoza and Goethe.

His doctrine fared just as badly with the politicians whom he offended, without exception, the conservatives by his revolution ary views, and the socialists by his conservatism. He arraigned no less all the religious sects and classes. Jew and gentile, man and woman, patriot and pacifist, were all criticized ; for the roller of equality had levelled everything and everybody, and property constituted the only distinction—not, however, in Nietzsche's eyes ; for he saw and asked : "Mob above, mob below ! what to-day means poor or rich?" Thus, for the first so years after it was ex pounded, the teaching, despite the recognition of individuals, fell, as it were, between all stools ; while its messenger by his countless opponents in every country, including Germany, was branded as misanthropist, madman, promotor of wars, infidel, dysangelist and corruptor of morals.

Nietzsche's Contribution.

A further and more dispassion ate study of his philosophy must, however, lead to a different conclusion, particularly on the charge of irreligion, although it must be admitted that the firm rejection of Nietzsche's teaching by those who clung to the old beliefs is quite comprehensible. Nietzsche was a destructive genius of the first order, and his revolutionary movement could not but arouse suspicion and misunderstanding at the time. Men felt, if only unconsciously, the unprecedented acuteness and the novelty of his attack; for Nietzsche's vigilant eye descried all his opponents' weak points, and his psychological ruthlessness tore veil after veil from ideals cherished for centuries. Where his predecessors had seen vices, he saw virtues, or the possibility of virtues; and where they had seen virtues, he saw vices, or the possibility of vices. His attack on Christianity was much more thorough than that of Voltaire, whose "ecrasez l'infame!" had really done no more than assail the out-works of the Christian stronghold, its dogmas and cere monies, without however aiming at the inner core of the Faith, the Christian ideal itself. Thus Nietzsche's rejection of all the values which had been held most sacred for centuries, inevitably made him the great solitary that he was. Such daring and scornful condemnation, such glacial negation, could not be understood at once, or greeted with applause, especially as at first his very motives remained obscure. Nobody understood in the early days that his teaching against pity sprang from his love of healthy life, against morality, from his love of a higher ethic, and against pa triotism from his desire for a united Europe.