The idea that the universe intentionally evades a goal,'and even knows artificial means wherewith it prevents itself from falling into a
circular
movement, must occur
to all those who would fain attribute to the uni verse the capacity of eternally regenerating itself --that is to say, they would fain impose upon a finite, definite force which is invariable in quantity, like the universe, the miraculous gift of renewing
its forms and its conditions for all eternity.
to all those who would fain attribute to the uni verse the capacity of eternally regenerating itself --that is to say, they would fain impose upon a finite, definite force which is invariable in quantity, like the universe, the miraculous gift of renewing
its forms and its conditions for all eternity.
Nietzsche - Works - v15 - Will to Power - b
?
?
?
DIOstus.
(5) We must understand the fundamental artistic phenomenon which called "Life,"---the formative spirit, which constructs under the most unfavourable circumstances: and in the slowest manner pos sible-- The proof of all its combinations must first be given afresh: maintains itsel/I
1047.
Sexuality, lust of dominion, the pleasure derived from appearance and deception, great and joyful gratitude to Life and its typical conditions--these things are essential to all paganism, and has good conscience on its side--That which hostile to Nature (already in Greek antiquity) combats paganism in the form of morality and dialectics.
1048.
remitting creation. _
1050.
"
The word "Dionysian " expresses: constraint to unity, soaring above personality, the common
5
41 5
? _ ~
An anti-metaphysical view of the world--yes, but an artistic one.
049.
Apollo's misapprehension the eternity of beauti ful forms, the aristocratic prescription, " Thus shall
ever be
Dionysus: Sensuality and cruelty. The perish
able nature of existence might be interpreted as
the joy of procreative and destructive force, as un
? ? _ *4- _2. __,. -_. . v-_ _~_
it
~w~fy~ 4- mm. '~v~
a . /
a
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is it
is it a
? THE WILL To POWER.
place, society, reality, and above the abyss of the ephemeral; the passionately painful sensation of superabundance, in darker, fuller, and more fluctu ating conditions; an ecstatic saying of yea to the collective character of existence, as that which remains the same, and equally mighty and blissful throughout all change; the great pantheistic sympathy with pleasure and pain, which declares even the most terribleand most questionable qualities of existence good, and sanctifies them; the 'eternal willtoprocreation, to fruitfulness, and to recurrence ; the feeling of unity in regard to the necessity of creating and annihilating. "
The word " Apollonian expresses: the con straint to be absolutely isolated, to the typical " in dividual," to everything that simplifies, distinguishes, and makes strong, salient, definite, and typical: to freedom within the law. ,
The further development of art is just as neces sarily bound up with the antagonism of these two natural art-forces, as the. further development of mankind is bound up with the antagonism of the sexes. The plenitude of power and restraint, the highest form of'self-affirmation in a cool, noble, and reserved kind of beauty: the Apollonianism of the
Hellenic will.
This antagonism of the Dionysian and of the
Apollonian in the Greek soul, is one of the great riddles which made me feel drawn to the essence of Hellenism. At bottom, I troubled about nothing save the solution of the question, why precisely Greek Apollonianism should have been forced to grow out of a Dionysian soil : the Dionysian Greek
416
? ? ? ? DIONYSUS.
417
had need of being Apollonian; that to
order to break his will to the titanic, to the com plex, to the uncertain, to the horrible by will to measure, to simplicity, and to submission to rule and concept. Extravagance, wildness, and
'A'siatic tendencies lie at the root of the Greeks. Their courage consists in their struggle with their Asiatic nature: they were not given beauty, any more than they were given Logic and moral naturalness: in them these things are victories, they are willed and fought for--they constitute the triumph of the Greeks.
I051.
say,in
? l
l I
'I
clear that only the rarest and most lucky cases of humanity can attain to the highest and ' most sublime human joys in which Life celebrates its own glorification; and this only happens when these rare creatures themselves and their forbears have lived long preparatory life leading to this goal, without, however, having done so consciously.
It then that an overflowing wealth of multi farious forces and the most agile power of "free will" and lordly command exist together in per fect concord in one man; then the intellect just as much at ease, or at home, in the senses as the senses are at ease or at home in and everything that takes place in the latter must give rise to ex traordinarily subtle joys in the former. And vice versd: just think of this vice versd for moment in man like Hafiz; even Goethe, though to
lesser degree, gives some idea of this process. VOL. II. 3D
? ? ! ll
l l(.
It a
a
is
It is
a
is is a
it ;
a
? 418 THE WILL TO POWER.
is probable that, in such perfect and well-constituted
men, the most sensual
figured by a symbolic elatedness of the highest intellectuality; in themselves they feel a kind of deification of the body and are most remote from the ascetic philosophy of the principle "God is a Spirit": from this principle it is clear that the ascetic is the "botched man " who declares only that to be good and " God " which is absolute, and which judges and condemns.
From that height of joy in which man feels him self completely and utterly a deified form and self
justification of nature, down to the joy of healthy peasants and healthy semi-human beasts, the whole of this long and enormous-gradation of the light and colour of happiness was called bythe Greek-- not without that grateful quivering of one who is initiated into secret, not without much caution and
pious silence--by the godlike name: Dionysus. What then do all modern men--the children of a
crumbling, multifarious, sick and strange age-- know of the compass of Greek happiness, how could they know anything about it ! Whence would the slaves of " modern ideas " derive their right to Dionysian feasts!
When the Greek body and soul were in full " bloom," and not, as it were, in states of morbid exaltation and madness, there arose the secret symbol of the loftiest affirmation and transfigura tion of life and the world that has ever existed. There we have a standard beside which everything
that has grown since must seem too short, too poor, too narrow: if we but pronounce the word
functions are finally trans
? _
? ? ? _
monvsus.
419
" Dionysus " in the presence of the best of more recent names and things, in the presence of Goethe, for instance, or Beethoven, or Shakespeare, or Raphael, in trice we realise that our best things and moments are condemned. Dionysus judge Am understood? There can be no doubt that the Greeks sought to interpret, by means of their Dionysian experiences, the final mysteries of the " destiny of the soul " and everything they knew concerning the education and the purification of man, and above all concerning the absolute hier archyand inequalityof value between man and man. There the deepest experience of all Greeks, which
they conceal beneath great silence,--we do not . know the Greeks so long as this hidden and sub
terranean access to them remains obstructed. The indiscreet eyes of scholars will never perceive any thing in these things, however much learned energy may still have to be expended in the service of this excavation--; even the noble zeal of such friends of antiquity as Goethe and Winckelmann, seems to savour somewhat of bad form and of arrogance,
precisely in this respect. T0 wait and to prepare oneself; to await the appearance of new sources of knowledge; to prepare oneself in solitude for the
sight Of new faces and the sound of new voices to cleanse one's soul ever more and more of the dust and noise, as of country fair, which peculiar to this age to overcome everything Christian by some thing super-Christian, and not only to rid oneself of it,--f0r the Christian doctrine the counter doctrine to the Dionysian to rediscover the South in oneself, and to stretch clear, glittering, and
? ? ? ; a
is
is
; is
I
a
a
;
_,. . c--W__,. _
_ _. . . _,,
is a
!
? THE WILL TO POWER.
mysterious southern sky above one; to reconquer the southern healthiness and concealed power of the soul, once more for oneself; to increase the com- pass of one's soul step by step, and to become more
'supernational, more European, more super European, more Oriental, and finally more Hellenic --for Hellenism was, as a matter of fact, the first
great union and synthesis of everything Oriental, and precisely on that account, the beginning of the European soul, the discovery of our " new world ": --he who lives under such imperatives, who knows what he may not encounter some day?
--a new dawn!
. 1052.
The two types : Dionysus and Christ on the Cross. We should ascertain whether the typically religious man is a decadent phenomenon (the great inno vators are one and all morbid and epileptic); but do not let us forget to include that type of the religious man who is pagan. Is the pagan cult not a form of gratitude for, and afl'irmation of, Life ? Ought not its most representative type to be an apology and deification of Life? The type of a well-constituted and ecstatically overflowing spirit! The type of a spirit which absorbs the contradic
tions and problems of existence, and which solves them!
At this point I set up the Dionysus of the Greeks : the religious affirmation of Life, of the whole of Life, not of denied and partial Life typical that in this cult the sexual act awakens ideas of
depth, mystery, and reverence).
420
Possibly
? ? ? (it is
? s
DIONYSUS.
42 I
Dionysus versus " Christ here you have the contrast. It not a difference in regard to the martyrdom,--but the latter has different mean ing. Life itselfl--Life's eternal fruitfulness and re currence caused anguish, destruction, and the will to annihilation. In the other case, the suffering of the " Christ as the Innocent One " stands as an ob
jection against Life, the formula of Life's c0ndemnation. --Readers will guess that the prob_ lem concerns the meaning of suffering; whether
Christian or tragic meaning be given to it. In the first case the road to holy mode of
existence; in the second case existence
? itself regarded as sufliciently holy to justify an enormous amount of suffering. The tragic man
says yea even to the most excruciating suffering: he sufficiently strong, rich, and capable of deify ing, to be able to do this; the Christian denies even the happy lots on earth: he weak, poor, and disinherited enough to suffer from life in any form. God on the Cross curse upon Life, a
signpost directing people to deliver themselves from ;--Dionysus cut into pieces promise of Life: will be for ever born anew, and rise afresh from
destruction.
? ? . ,___. ,~.
--. --.
. . -_s
it it
is a
is a
is a
"; a
is
is
it a is
is
a
it is
? III.
ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
1053
MY philosophy reveals the triumphant thought through which all other systems of thought must
? ultimately perish. It is the great
thought: those races that cannot bear it are doomed; those which regard it as the greatest blessing are destined to rule.
1054.
The greatest of all fights: for this purpose a
new weapon is required.
A hammer: a terrible alternative must be
created. Europe must be brought face to face with the logic of facts, and confronted with the question whether its will for ruin is really earnest.
General levelling down to mediocrity must be avoided. Rather than this it would be preferable to perish.
. 1055.
A pessimistic attitude of mind and a pessi mistic doctrine and ecstatic Nihilism, rriay in
'
disciplinary
? ? ? ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
I
423
certain circumstances even prove indispensable to
the philosopher--that to say, as
form of pressure, or hammer, with which he can
smash up degenerate, perishing races and them out of existence; with which he can beat track to a new order of life, or instil longing for nonentity in those who are degenerate and who desire to perish.
1056.
wish to teach the thought which gives unto many the right to cancel their existences--the great disciplinary thought.
mighty
put
? ~
The period 01 greatest danger.
The foundation of an oligarchy above peoples
and their interests: education directed at establishing political policy for humanity in general.
A counterpart qfjesuitism.
.
1057.
'Eternal Recurrence. A prophecy.
I. The exposition of the doctrine and its theo
retical first principles and results. 2. The proof of the doctrine.
Probable results which will follow from its being believed. (It makes everything break open. )
(a) The means of enduring it.
(b) The means of ignoring it. 4. Its place in history means.
? ? !
a
is a
is
3.
I
*Q->> ,. _
a
a
a
? 424
THE WILL TO POWER.
1058.
The two greatest philosophical points of view
(both discovered by Germans).
That of becoming and that of evolution. (b) That based upon the values of existence
(a)
the wretched form of German pessimism must first be overcome ! )-- Both points of view reconciled by me in a
decisive manner.
Everything becomes and returns for ever,
--escaj>e is impossible!
Granted that we could appraise the value'of
(but
? existence, what would be the result of it? thought of recurrence is a principle of selection in the service of power (and barbarity
The ripeness of man for this thought.
1059.
I. The thought of eternal recurrence: its first principles, which must necessarily be true were true. What its result is.
2. It the most oppressive thought: its prob able results, provided be not prevented, that to say, provided all values be not transvalued.
The means of enduring it: the transvalua tion of all values. Pleasure no longeiltowbefound in certainty, but in uncertainty ';prfo'longer " cause
continual creativeness; no longer , the will to self-preservation, but\to_ p_o_wer; no
longer the modest 'expression "it 'all only sub jective," but "it all our work! let us be proud of it. "
andde? ffe'ctffibiitfl
The
? ? is
is
l).
3.
is
it
is
if it
? >>
ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
1060
425
In order to endure the thought of recurrence, freedom from morality necessary; new means against the fact pain (pairf 'regarded as the instru ment, as'the father of pleasure; there no accre tive consciousness of pain); pleasure derived from all kinds of uncertainty and tentativeness, as counterpoise to extreme fatalism; suppression of
the concept "necessity" suppression of the " will "
of " absolute knowledge. "
Greatest elevation of man's consciousness
suppression
strength, as that which creates superman.
of
? proves
1061.
The two extremes of thought--the materialistic and the platonic--are reconciled in eternal recur rence: both are regarded as ideals.
1062>>
If the universe had a goal, that goal would have been reached by now. If any sort of un foreseen final state existed, that state also would have been reached" If were capable of any halting or stability of any "being," would only have possessed this capability of becoming stable for one instant in its development; and again becoming would have been at an end for ages, and with all thinking and all "spirit. " The fact of " intellects " being in state of development
that the universe can have no goal, no
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a
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;
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final state, and is incapable of being. But the old habit of thinking of some purpose in regard to all
phenomena, and of thinking of a directing and creating deity in regard to the universe, is so powerful, that the thinker has to go to great pains in order to avoid thinking of the very aimlessness of the world as intended.
The idea that the universe intentionally evades a goal,'and even knows artificial means wherewith it prevents itself from falling into a circular movement, must occur
to all those who would fain attribute to the uni verse the capacity of eternally regenerating itself --that is to say, they would fain impose upon a finite, definite force which is invariable in quantity, like the universe, the miraculous gift of renewing
its forms and its conditions for all eternity. Although the universe is no longer a God, it must still be capable of the divine power of creating and transforming; it must forbid itself to relapse into any one of its previous forms; it must not only have the intention, but also the means, of avoiding any sort of repetition; every
second of its existence, even, it must control every single one of its movements, with the view of avoiding goals, final states, and repetitions--and all the other results of such an unpardonable and insane method of thought and desire. All this is
nothing more than the old religious mode of thought and desire, which, in spite of all, longs to . . believe that in some Way or other the universe resembles the old, beloved, infinite, and infinitely-
creative God--that in some way or other "the old God still lives "--that longing of Spinoza's.
426
? ? ? ? ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
427
which expressed in the words " deus sive natura "
he really felt was " natura sive deus Which, then, the proposition and belief in which the decisive change, the present preponderance of the scientific spirit over the religious and god' fancying spirit, best formulated? Ought not to be: the universe, as force, must not be thought of as unlimited, because cannot be thought of in this way,--we forbid ourselves the concept in
finite force, because incompatible with the idea of force? Whence follows that the universe lacks the power of eternal renewal.
1063.
of the conservation of energy inevitably involves eternal recurrence.
1064.
That state of equilibrium has never been reached, proves that impossible. But in infinite space must have been reached. Like wise in spherical space. The form of space must be the cause of the eternal movement, and ulti mately of all "imperfection. "
That "energy" and "stability" and "immut ability " are contradictory. The measure of energy (dimensionally) fixed,though essentially fluid.
" That which timeless " must be refuted. At any given moment of energy, the absolute condi tions for new distribution of all forces are present;
cannot remain stationary. Change part of
(what
? ---
Theprinciple
? ? W_'__ it
___. '-. _'_ ,_
is
a
is
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it is
it is
it it is
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it
").
it
? 428
THE WILL To POWER.
its essence, therefore time is as well: by this means, however, the necessity of change has only been established once more in theory.
1065.
A certain emperor always bore the fleeting nature of all things in his mind, in order not to value them too seriously, and to be able to live quietly in their midst. Conversely, everything seems to me much too important for it to be so fleeting; I seek an eternity for everything: ought one to pour the most precious salves and wines into the sea? My consolation is that everything
that has been is eternal: the sea will wash it up again.
1066.
The new concept of the universe. The universe exists; it is nothing that grows into existence and that passes out of existence. Or, better still, it develops, it passes away, but it never began to develop, and has never ceased from passing away; it maintains itself in both states. . . . It lives on itself, its excrements are its nourishment. '
We need not concern ourselves for one instant with the hypothesis of a created world. The conl cept "create" is to-day utterly indefinable and
unrealisable; it is but a word which hails from superstitious ages ; nothing can be explained with a word. The last attempt that was made to con ceive of a world that began occurred quite recently,
? ? ? ? ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
429
in many cases with the help of logical reasoning, _----generally, too, as you will guess, with an
ulterior theological motive.
Several attempts have been made lately to show
that the concept that "the universe has an infinite past " (regressus in infinitum) contradictory:
was even demonstrated, true, at the price of confounding the head with the tail. Nothing can prevent" me from calculating backwards from this moment of time, and of saying: "I shall never reach the end"; just as can calculate without end in forward direction, from the same moment. It only when Iwish to commit the error--I shall be careful to avoid it--of reconcil ing this correct concept of regressus in infinitum
with the absolutely unrealisable concept of a finite progressus up to the present; only when con
sider the direction (forwards or backwards) as logically indifferent, that take hold of the head --this very moment--and think hold the tail:
. this pleasure leave to you, Mr. Diihring! . have come across this thought in other
thinkers before me,-and every timeI found that was determined by other ulterior motives (chiefly theological, in favour of creator spiritus). 1f the universe were in any way able to congeal,
to dry up, to perish; or were capable of attaining to state of equilibrium; or had
any kind of goal at all which long
of time, immutability, and finality reserved for
(in short, to speak metaphysically, becoming
could resolve itself into being or into nonentity), this state ought already to have been reached.
? lapse
? ? if
it
. . .
. v _. _Le _~_,,. . . _\_ it
I aI
it
if it
Ia II
it is
a a
is
if it
. .
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is a
? THE WILL To POWER.
But it has not been reached: it therefore follows. . . . This is the only certainty we can grasp, which can serve as a corrective to a host of cosmic hypotheses possible in themselves. If, for instance, materialism cannot consistently escape the conclusion of a finite state, which William Thomson has traced out for then materialism
thereby refuted.
If the universe may be conceived as definite
quantity of energy, as a definite number of centres of energy,--and every other concept remains indefinite and therefore useless,--it follows there from that the universe must go through calcul able number of combinations in the great game of chance which constitutes its existence. In infinity, at some moment or other, every possible combina tion must once have been realised; not only this, but must have been realised an infinite number of times. And inasmuch as between every one of these combinations and its next recurrence
every other possible combination would
sarily have been undergone, and since every one of these combinations would determine the whole series in the same order, a circular movement of absolutely identical series thus demonstrated:
the universe thus shown to be circular movement which has already repeated itself an infinite number of times, and which plays its game for all eternity. --This conception not
simply materialistic; for were this, would not involve an infinite recurrence of identical cases, but finite state. Owing to the fact that the uni verse has not reached this finite state, materialism
430
? neces
? ? a
it
if it
is
it
is
a
is
a
a
is
it,
? energy
ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
431
shows itself to be but an imperfect and pro visional hypothesis.
1067
And do ye know what " the universe ". is to my mind? Shall I show it to you in my mirror?
This universe is a monster of energy, beginning or end ; a fixed and brazen quantity of
which grows neither bigger nor smaller, which does not consume itself, but only alters its face; as a whole its bulk is immutable, it is a household without either losses or gains, but like wise without increase and without sources of revenue, surrounded by nonentity as by a frontier. It is nothing vague or wasteful, it does not stretch into infinity; but is a definite quantum of energy located in limited space, and not in space which would be anywhere empty. It is rather energy everywhere, the play of forces and force-waves, at the same time om: and many, agglomerat ing here and diminishing there, a sea of forces storming and raging in itself, for ever changing, for ever rolling back over -incalculable ages to
recurrence, with an ebb and flow of its forms, producing the most complicated things out of the most simple structures; producing the most ardent, most'savage, and most contradictory things out of the quietest, most rigid, and most frozen material, and then returning from multifariousness to uniformity, from the play of contradictions back into the delight of consonance, saying yea unto
' itself, even in this homogeneity of its courses and ages; for ever blessing itself as something which
withoutv
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER.
recurs for all eternity,--a becoming which knows not satiety, or disgust, or wearinessz--this, my Dionysian world Of eternal self-creation, of eternal self-destruction, this mysterious world of twofold voluptuousness; this, my "Beyond Good and Evil," without aim, unless there is an aim in the
bliss of the circle, without will, unless a ring must by nature keep goodwill to itself,--would you have a name for my world? A solution of all your riddles? Do ye also want a light, ye most concealed, strongest and most undaunted men of the blackest midnight ? --This world is the Will to Power--and nothing else! And even ye your selves are this will to power--and nothing besides ! '
432
? PRINTED BY THY. EDINBURGH PRESS, EDINBURGH
? ?
(5) We must understand the fundamental artistic phenomenon which called "Life,"---the formative spirit, which constructs under the most unfavourable circumstances: and in the slowest manner pos sible-- The proof of all its combinations must first be given afresh: maintains itsel/I
1047.
Sexuality, lust of dominion, the pleasure derived from appearance and deception, great and joyful gratitude to Life and its typical conditions--these things are essential to all paganism, and has good conscience on its side--That which hostile to Nature (already in Greek antiquity) combats paganism in the form of morality and dialectics.
1048.
remitting creation. _
1050.
"
The word "Dionysian " expresses: constraint to unity, soaring above personality, the common
5
41 5
? _ ~
An anti-metaphysical view of the world--yes, but an artistic one.
049.
Apollo's misapprehension the eternity of beauti ful forms, the aristocratic prescription, " Thus shall
ever be
Dionysus: Sensuality and cruelty. The perish
able nature of existence might be interpreted as
the joy of procreative and destructive force, as un
? ? _ *4- _2. __,. -_. . v-_ _~_
it
~w~fy~ 4- mm. '~v~
a . /
a
I :
is it
is it a
? THE WILL To POWER.
place, society, reality, and above the abyss of the ephemeral; the passionately painful sensation of superabundance, in darker, fuller, and more fluctu ating conditions; an ecstatic saying of yea to the collective character of existence, as that which remains the same, and equally mighty and blissful throughout all change; the great pantheistic sympathy with pleasure and pain, which declares even the most terribleand most questionable qualities of existence good, and sanctifies them; the 'eternal willtoprocreation, to fruitfulness, and to recurrence ; the feeling of unity in regard to the necessity of creating and annihilating. "
The word " Apollonian expresses: the con straint to be absolutely isolated, to the typical " in dividual," to everything that simplifies, distinguishes, and makes strong, salient, definite, and typical: to freedom within the law. ,
The further development of art is just as neces sarily bound up with the antagonism of these two natural art-forces, as the. further development of mankind is bound up with the antagonism of the sexes. The plenitude of power and restraint, the highest form of'self-affirmation in a cool, noble, and reserved kind of beauty: the Apollonianism of the
Hellenic will.
This antagonism of the Dionysian and of the
Apollonian in the Greek soul, is one of the great riddles which made me feel drawn to the essence of Hellenism. At bottom, I troubled about nothing save the solution of the question, why precisely Greek Apollonianism should have been forced to grow out of a Dionysian soil : the Dionysian Greek
416
? ? ? ? DIONYSUS.
417
had need of being Apollonian; that to
order to break his will to the titanic, to the com plex, to the uncertain, to the horrible by will to measure, to simplicity, and to submission to rule and concept. Extravagance, wildness, and
'A'siatic tendencies lie at the root of the Greeks. Their courage consists in their struggle with their Asiatic nature: they were not given beauty, any more than they were given Logic and moral naturalness: in them these things are victories, they are willed and fought for--they constitute the triumph of the Greeks.
I051.
say,in
? l
l I
'I
clear that only the rarest and most lucky cases of humanity can attain to the highest and ' most sublime human joys in which Life celebrates its own glorification; and this only happens when these rare creatures themselves and their forbears have lived long preparatory life leading to this goal, without, however, having done so consciously.
It then that an overflowing wealth of multi farious forces and the most agile power of "free will" and lordly command exist together in per fect concord in one man; then the intellect just as much at ease, or at home, in the senses as the senses are at ease or at home in and everything that takes place in the latter must give rise to ex traordinarily subtle joys in the former. And vice versd: just think of this vice versd for moment in man like Hafiz; even Goethe, though to
lesser degree, gives some idea of this process. VOL. II. 3D
? ? ! ll
l l(.
It a
a
is
It is
a
is is a
it ;
a
? 418 THE WILL TO POWER.
is probable that, in such perfect and well-constituted
men, the most sensual
figured by a symbolic elatedness of the highest intellectuality; in themselves they feel a kind of deification of the body and are most remote from the ascetic philosophy of the principle "God is a Spirit": from this principle it is clear that the ascetic is the "botched man " who declares only that to be good and " God " which is absolute, and which judges and condemns.
From that height of joy in which man feels him self completely and utterly a deified form and self
justification of nature, down to the joy of healthy peasants and healthy semi-human beasts, the whole of this long and enormous-gradation of the light and colour of happiness was called bythe Greek-- not without that grateful quivering of one who is initiated into secret, not without much caution and
pious silence--by the godlike name: Dionysus. What then do all modern men--the children of a
crumbling, multifarious, sick and strange age-- know of the compass of Greek happiness, how could they know anything about it ! Whence would the slaves of " modern ideas " derive their right to Dionysian feasts!
When the Greek body and soul were in full " bloom," and not, as it were, in states of morbid exaltation and madness, there arose the secret symbol of the loftiest affirmation and transfigura tion of life and the world that has ever existed. There we have a standard beside which everything
that has grown since must seem too short, too poor, too narrow: if we but pronounce the word
functions are finally trans
? _
? ? ? _
monvsus.
419
" Dionysus " in the presence of the best of more recent names and things, in the presence of Goethe, for instance, or Beethoven, or Shakespeare, or Raphael, in trice we realise that our best things and moments are condemned. Dionysus judge Am understood? There can be no doubt that the Greeks sought to interpret, by means of their Dionysian experiences, the final mysteries of the " destiny of the soul " and everything they knew concerning the education and the purification of man, and above all concerning the absolute hier archyand inequalityof value between man and man. There the deepest experience of all Greeks, which
they conceal beneath great silence,--we do not . know the Greeks so long as this hidden and sub
terranean access to them remains obstructed. The indiscreet eyes of scholars will never perceive any thing in these things, however much learned energy may still have to be expended in the service of this excavation--; even the noble zeal of such friends of antiquity as Goethe and Winckelmann, seems to savour somewhat of bad form and of arrogance,
precisely in this respect. T0 wait and to prepare oneself; to await the appearance of new sources of knowledge; to prepare oneself in solitude for the
sight Of new faces and the sound of new voices to cleanse one's soul ever more and more of the dust and noise, as of country fair, which peculiar to this age to overcome everything Christian by some thing super-Christian, and not only to rid oneself of it,--f0r the Christian doctrine the counter doctrine to the Dionysian to rediscover the South in oneself, and to stretch clear, glittering, and
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mysterious southern sky above one; to reconquer the southern healthiness and concealed power of the soul, once more for oneself; to increase the com- pass of one's soul step by step, and to become more
'supernational, more European, more super European, more Oriental, and finally more Hellenic --for Hellenism was, as a matter of fact, the first
great union and synthesis of everything Oriental, and precisely on that account, the beginning of the European soul, the discovery of our " new world ": --he who lives under such imperatives, who knows what he may not encounter some day?
--a new dawn!
. 1052.
The two types : Dionysus and Christ on the Cross. We should ascertain whether the typically religious man is a decadent phenomenon (the great inno vators are one and all morbid and epileptic); but do not let us forget to include that type of the religious man who is pagan. Is the pagan cult not a form of gratitude for, and afl'irmation of, Life ? Ought not its most representative type to be an apology and deification of Life? The type of a well-constituted and ecstatically overflowing spirit! The type of a spirit which absorbs the contradic
tions and problems of existence, and which solves them!
At this point I set up the Dionysus of the Greeks : the religious affirmation of Life, of the whole of Life, not of denied and partial Life typical that in this cult the sexual act awakens ideas of
depth, mystery, and reverence).
420
Possibly
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DIONYSUS.
42 I
Dionysus versus " Christ here you have the contrast. It not a difference in regard to the martyrdom,--but the latter has different mean ing. Life itselfl--Life's eternal fruitfulness and re currence caused anguish, destruction, and the will to annihilation. In the other case, the suffering of the " Christ as the Innocent One " stands as an ob
jection against Life, the formula of Life's c0ndemnation. --Readers will guess that the prob_ lem concerns the meaning of suffering; whether
Christian or tragic meaning be given to it. In the first case the road to holy mode of
existence; in the second case existence
? itself regarded as sufliciently holy to justify an enormous amount of suffering. The tragic man
says yea even to the most excruciating suffering: he sufficiently strong, rich, and capable of deify ing, to be able to do this; the Christian denies even the happy lots on earth: he weak, poor, and disinherited enough to suffer from life in any form. God on the Cross curse upon Life, a
signpost directing people to deliver themselves from ;--Dionysus cut into pieces promise of Life: will be for ever born anew, and rise afresh from
destruction.
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ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
1053
MY philosophy reveals the triumphant thought through which all other systems of thought must
? ultimately perish. It is the great
thought: those races that cannot bear it are doomed; those which regard it as the greatest blessing are destined to rule.
1054.
The greatest of all fights: for this purpose a
new weapon is required.
A hammer: a terrible alternative must be
created. Europe must be brought face to face with the logic of facts, and confronted with the question whether its will for ruin is really earnest.
General levelling down to mediocrity must be avoided. Rather than this it would be preferable to perish.
. 1055.
A pessimistic attitude of mind and a pessi mistic doctrine and ecstatic Nihilism, rriay in
'
disciplinary
? ? ? ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
I
423
certain circumstances even prove indispensable to
the philosopher--that to say, as
form of pressure, or hammer, with which he can
smash up degenerate, perishing races and them out of existence; with which he can beat track to a new order of life, or instil longing for nonentity in those who are degenerate and who desire to perish.
1056.
wish to teach the thought which gives unto many the right to cancel their existences--the great disciplinary thought.
mighty
put
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The period 01 greatest danger.
The foundation of an oligarchy above peoples
and their interests: education directed at establishing political policy for humanity in general.
A counterpart qfjesuitism.
.
1057.
'Eternal Recurrence. A prophecy.
I. The exposition of the doctrine and its theo
retical first principles and results. 2. The proof of the doctrine.
Probable results which will follow from its being believed. (It makes everything break open. )
(a) The means of enduring it.
(b) The means of ignoring it. 4. Its place in history means.
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? 424
THE WILL TO POWER.
1058.
The two greatest philosophical points of view
(both discovered by Germans).
That of becoming and that of evolution. (b) That based upon the values of existence
(a)
the wretched form of German pessimism must first be overcome ! )-- Both points of view reconciled by me in a
decisive manner.
Everything becomes and returns for ever,
--escaj>e is impossible!
Granted that we could appraise the value'of
(but
? existence, what would be the result of it? thought of recurrence is a principle of selection in the service of power (and barbarity
The ripeness of man for this thought.
1059.
I. The thought of eternal recurrence: its first principles, which must necessarily be true were true. What its result is.
2. It the most oppressive thought: its prob able results, provided be not prevented, that to say, provided all values be not transvalued.
The means of enduring it: the transvalua tion of all values. Pleasure no longeiltowbefound in certainty, but in uncertainty ';prfo'longer " cause
continual creativeness; no longer , the will to self-preservation, but\to_ p_o_wer; no
longer the modest 'expression "it 'all only sub jective," but "it all our work! let us be proud of it. "
andde? ffe'ctffibiitfl
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ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
1060
425
In order to endure the thought of recurrence, freedom from morality necessary; new means against the fact pain (pairf 'regarded as the instru ment, as'the father of pleasure; there no accre tive consciousness of pain); pleasure derived from all kinds of uncertainty and tentativeness, as counterpoise to extreme fatalism; suppression of
the concept "necessity" suppression of the " will "
of " absolute knowledge. "
Greatest elevation of man's consciousness
suppression
strength, as that which creates superman.
of
? proves
1061.
The two extremes of thought--the materialistic and the platonic--are reconciled in eternal recur rence: both are regarded as ideals.
1062>>
If the universe had a goal, that goal would have been reached by now. If any sort of un foreseen final state existed, that state also would have been reached" If were capable of any halting or stability of any "being," would only have possessed this capability of becoming stable for one instant in its development; and again becoming would have been at an end for ages, and with all thinking and all "spirit. " The fact of " intellects " being in state of development
that the universe can have no goal, no
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final state, and is incapable of being. But the old habit of thinking of some purpose in regard to all
phenomena, and of thinking of a directing and creating deity in regard to the universe, is so powerful, that the thinker has to go to great pains in order to avoid thinking of the very aimlessness of the world as intended.
The idea that the universe intentionally evades a goal,'and even knows artificial means wherewith it prevents itself from falling into a circular movement, must occur
to all those who would fain attribute to the uni verse the capacity of eternally regenerating itself --that is to say, they would fain impose upon a finite, definite force which is invariable in quantity, like the universe, the miraculous gift of renewing
its forms and its conditions for all eternity. Although the universe is no longer a God, it must still be capable of the divine power of creating and transforming; it must forbid itself to relapse into any one of its previous forms; it must not only have the intention, but also the means, of avoiding any sort of repetition; every
second of its existence, even, it must control every single one of its movements, with the view of avoiding goals, final states, and repetitions--and all the other results of such an unpardonable and insane method of thought and desire. All this is
nothing more than the old religious mode of thought and desire, which, in spite of all, longs to . . believe that in some Way or other the universe resembles the old, beloved, infinite, and infinitely-
creative God--that in some way or other "the old God still lives "--that longing of Spinoza's.
426
? ? ? ? ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
427
which expressed in the words " deus sive natura "
he really felt was " natura sive deus Which, then, the proposition and belief in which the decisive change, the present preponderance of the scientific spirit over the religious and god' fancying spirit, best formulated? Ought not to be: the universe, as force, must not be thought of as unlimited, because cannot be thought of in this way,--we forbid ourselves the concept in
finite force, because incompatible with the idea of force? Whence follows that the universe lacks the power of eternal renewal.
1063.
of the conservation of energy inevitably involves eternal recurrence.
1064.
That state of equilibrium has never been reached, proves that impossible. But in infinite space must have been reached. Like wise in spherical space. The form of space must be the cause of the eternal movement, and ulti mately of all "imperfection. "
That "energy" and "stability" and "immut ability " are contradictory. The measure of energy (dimensionally) fixed,though essentially fluid.
" That which timeless " must be refuted. At any given moment of energy, the absolute condi tions for new distribution of all forces are present;
cannot remain stationary. Change part of
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THE WILL To POWER.
its essence, therefore time is as well: by this means, however, the necessity of change has only been established once more in theory.
1065.
A certain emperor always bore the fleeting nature of all things in his mind, in order not to value them too seriously, and to be able to live quietly in their midst. Conversely, everything seems to me much too important for it to be so fleeting; I seek an eternity for everything: ought one to pour the most precious salves and wines into the sea? My consolation is that everything
that has been is eternal: the sea will wash it up again.
1066.
The new concept of the universe. The universe exists; it is nothing that grows into existence and that passes out of existence. Or, better still, it develops, it passes away, but it never began to develop, and has never ceased from passing away; it maintains itself in both states. . . . It lives on itself, its excrements are its nourishment. '
We need not concern ourselves for one instant with the hypothesis of a created world. The conl cept "create" is to-day utterly indefinable and
unrealisable; it is but a word which hails from superstitious ages ; nothing can be explained with a word. The last attempt that was made to con ceive of a world that began occurred quite recently,
? ? ? ? ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
429
in many cases with the help of logical reasoning, _----generally, too, as you will guess, with an
ulterior theological motive.
Several attempts have been made lately to show
that the concept that "the universe has an infinite past " (regressus in infinitum) contradictory:
was even demonstrated, true, at the price of confounding the head with the tail. Nothing can prevent" me from calculating backwards from this moment of time, and of saying: "I shall never reach the end"; just as can calculate without end in forward direction, from the same moment. It only when Iwish to commit the error--I shall be careful to avoid it--of reconcil ing this correct concept of regressus in infinitum
with the absolutely unrealisable concept of a finite progressus up to the present; only when con
sider the direction (forwards or backwards) as logically indifferent, that take hold of the head --this very moment--and think hold the tail:
. this pleasure leave to you, Mr. Diihring! . have come across this thought in other
thinkers before me,-and every timeI found that was determined by other ulterior motives (chiefly theological, in favour of creator spiritus). 1f the universe were in any way able to congeal,
to dry up, to perish; or were capable of attaining to state of equilibrium; or had
any kind of goal at all which long
of time, immutability, and finality reserved for
(in short, to speak metaphysically, becoming
could resolve itself into being or into nonentity), this state ought already to have been reached.
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But it has not been reached: it therefore follows. . . . This is the only certainty we can grasp, which can serve as a corrective to a host of cosmic hypotheses possible in themselves. If, for instance, materialism cannot consistently escape the conclusion of a finite state, which William Thomson has traced out for then materialism
thereby refuted.
If the universe may be conceived as definite
quantity of energy, as a definite number of centres of energy,--and every other concept remains indefinite and therefore useless,--it follows there from that the universe must go through calcul able number of combinations in the great game of chance which constitutes its existence. In infinity, at some moment or other, every possible combina tion must once have been realised; not only this, but must have been realised an infinite number of times. And inasmuch as between every one of these combinations and its next recurrence
every other possible combination would
sarily have been undergone, and since every one of these combinations would determine the whole series in the same order, a circular movement of absolutely identical series thus demonstrated:
the universe thus shown to be circular movement which has already repeated itself an infinite number of times, and which plays its game for all eternity. --This conception not
simply materialistic; for were this, would not involve an infinite recurrence of identical cases, but finite state. Owing to the fact that the uni verse has not reached this finite state, materialism
430
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ETERNAL RECURRENCE.
431
shows itself to be but an imperfect and pro visional hypothesis.
1067
And do ye know what " the universe ". is to my mind? Shall I show it to you in my mirror?
This universe is a monster of energy, beginning or end ; a fixed and brazen quantity of
which grows neither bigger nor smaller, which does not consume itself, but only alters its face; as a whole its bulk is immutable, it is a household without either losses or gains, but like wise without increase and without sources of revenue, surrounded by nonentity as by a frontier. It is nothing vague or wasteful, it does not stretch into infinity; but is a definite quantum of energy located in limited space, and not in space which would be anywhere empty. It is rather energy everywhere, the play of forces and force-waves, at the same time om: and many, agglomerat ing here and diminishing there, a sea of forces storming and raging in itself, for ever changing, for ever rolling back over -incalculable ages to
recurrence, with an ebb and flow of its forms, producing the most complicated things out of the most simple structures; producing the most ardent, most'savage, and most contradictory things out of the quietest, most rigid, and most frozen material, and then returning from multifariousness to uniformity, from the play of contradictions back into the delight of consonance, saying yea unto
' itself, even in this homogeneity of its courses and ages; for ever blessing itself as something which
withoutv
? ? ? ? THE WILL TO POWER.
recurs for all eternity,--a becoming which knows not satiety, or disgust, or wearinessz--this, my Dionysian world Of eternal self-creation, of eternal self-destruction, this mysterious world of twofold voluptuousness; this, my "Beyond Good and Evil," without aim, unless there is an aim in the
bliss of the circle, without will, unless a ring must by nature keep goodwill to itself,--would you have a name for my world? A solution of all your riddles? Do ye also want a light, ye most concealed, strongest and most undaunted men of the blackest midnight ? --This world is the Will to Power--and nothing else! And even ye your selves are this will to power--and nothing besides ! '
432
? PRINTED BY THY. EDINBURGH PRESS, EDINBURGH
? ?
