The Case of Wagner Complete Works, Volume 8 · Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
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When I say that, all things considered, the Greeks were more moral than modern men: what do I mean by that? From what we can perceive of the activities of their soul, it is clear that they had no shame, they had no bad conscience. They were more sincere, open-hearted, and passionate, as artists are; they exhibited a kind of child-like _naïveté._ It thus came about that even in all their evil actions they had a dash of purity about them, something approaching the holy. A remarkable number of individualities: might there not have been a higher morality in that? When we recollect that character develops slowly, what can it be that, in the long run, breeds individuality? Perhaps vanity, emulation? Possibly. Little inclination for conventional things. The Greeks as the geniuses among the nations. Their childlike nature, credulousness. Passionate. Quite unconsciously they lived in such a way as to procreate genius. Enemies of shyness and dulness. Pain. Injudicious actions. The nature of their intuitive insight into misery, despite their bright and genial temperament. Profoundness in their apprehension and glorifying of everyday things (fire, agriculture). Mendacious, unhistorical. The significance of the polis in culture instinctively recognised; favourable as a centre and periphery for great men (the facility of surveying a community, and also the possibility of addressing it as a whole). Individuality raised to the highest power through the polis. Envy, jealousy, as among gifted people.
The Greeks were lacking in sobriety and caution. Over-sensibility; abnormally active condition of the brain and the nerves; impetuosity and fervour of the will. "Invariably to see the general in the particular is the distinguishing characteristic of genius," says Schopenhauer. Think of Pindar, &c.--"ΣωΦροσύνη," according to Schopenhauer, has its roots in the clearness with which the Greeks saw into themselves and into the world at large, and thence became conscious of themselves. The "wide separation of will and intellect" indicates the genius, and is seen in the Greeks. "The melancholy associated with genius is due to the fact that the will to live, the more clearly it is illuminated by the contemplating intellect, appreciates all the more clearly the misery of its condition," says Schopenhauer. _Cf._ the Greeks. The moderation of the Greeks in their sensual luxury, eating, and drinking, and their pleasure therein; the Olympic plays and their worship: that shows what they were. In the case of the genius, "the intellect will point out the faults which are seldom absent in an instrument that is put to a use for which it was not intended." "The will is often left in the lurch at an awkward moment: hence genius, where real life is concerned is more or less unpractical--its behaviour often reminds us of madness." We contrast the Romans, with their matter-of-fact earnestness, with the genial Greeks! Schopenhauer: "The stern, practical, earnest mode of life which the Romans called _gravitas_ presupposes that the intellect does not forsake the service of the will in order to roam far off among things that have no connection with the will."
It would have been much better if the Greeks had been conquered by the Persians instead of by the Romans. The characteristics of the gifted man who is lacking in genius are to be found in the average Hellene--all the dangerous characteristics of such a disposition and character. Genius makes tributaries of all partly-talented people: hence the Persians themselves sent their ambassadors to the Greek oracles. The happiest lot that can fall to the genius is to exchange doing and acting for leisure; and this was something the Greeks knew how to value. The blessings of labour! _Nugari_ was the Roman name for all the exertions and aspirations of the Greeks. No happy course of life is open to the genius; he stands in contradiction to his age and must perforce struggle with it. Thus the Greeks: they instinctively made the utmost exertions to secure a safe refuge for themselves (in the _polis_). Finally, everything went to pieces in politics. They were compelled to take up a stand against their enemies: this became ever more and more difficult, and at last impossible. Greek culture is based on the lordship of a small class over four to nine times their number of slaves. Judged by mere numbers, Greece was a country inhabited by barbarians. How can the ancients be thought to be humane? There was a great contrast between the genius and the breadwinner, the half-beast of burden. The Greeks believed in a racial distinction. Schopenhauer wonders why Nature did not take it into her head to invent two entirely separate species of men.
The Greeks bear the same relation to the barbarians "as free-moving or winged animals do to the barnacles which cling tightly to the rocks and must await what fate chooses to send them"--Schopenhauer's simile. The Greeks as the only people of genius in the history of the world. Such they are even when considered as learners; for they understand this best of all, and can do more than merely trim and adorn themselves with what they have borrowed, as did the Romans. The constitution of the _polls_ is a Phœnician invention: even this has been imitated by the Hellenes. For a long time they dabbled in everything, like joyful dilettanti. Aphrodite is likewise Phœnician. Neither do they disavow what has come to them through immigration and does not originally belong to their own country. The happy and comfortable constitution of the politico-social position must not be sought among the Greeks: that is a goal which dazzles the eyes of our dreamers of the future! It was, on the contrary, dreadful; for this is a matter that must be judged according to the following standard: the more spirit, the more suffering (as the Greeks themselves prove). Whence it follows: the more stupidity, the more comfort. The philistine of culture is the most comfortable creature the sun has ever shone upon: and he is doubtless also in possession of the corresponding stupidity.
The Greek _polis_ and the αἰὲν ἀριστεύειν grew up out of mutual enmity. Hellenic and philanthropic are contrary adjectives, although the ancients flattered themselves sufficiently. Homer is, in the world of the Hellenic discord, the pan-Hellenic Greek. The "ἀγών" of the Greeks is also manifested in the Symposium in the shape of witty conversation. Wanton, mutual annihilation inevitable: so long as a single _polis_ wished to exist--its envy for everything superior to itself, its cupidity, the disorder of its customs, the enslavement of the women, lack of conscience in the keeping of oaths, in murder, and in cases of violent death. Tremendous power of self-control: for example in a man like Socrates, who was capable of everything evil. Its noble sense of order and systematic arrangement had rendered the Athenian state immortal.--The ten strategists in Athens! Foolish! Too big a sacrifice on the altar of jealousy. The recreations of the Spartans consisted of feasting, hunting, and making war: their every-day life was too hard. On the whole, however, their state is merely a caricature of the polis; a corruption of Hellas. The breeding of the complete Spartan--but what was there great about him that his breeding should have required such a brutal state! The political defeat of Greece is the greatest failure of culture; for it has given rise to the atrocious theory that culture cannot be pursued unless one is at the same time armed to the teeth. The rise of Christianity was the second greatest failure: brute force on the one hand, and a dull intellect on the other, won a complete victory over the aristocratic genius among the nations. To be a Philhellenist now means to be a foe of brute force and stupid intellects. Sparta was the ruin of Athens in so far as she compelled Athens to turn her entire attention to politics and to act as a federal combination.
There are domains of thought where the _ratio_ will only give rise to disorder; and the philologist, who possesses nothing more, is lost through it and is unable to see the truth: _e.g.,_ in the consideration of Greek mythology. A merely fantastic person, of course, has no claim either: one must possess Greek imagination and also a certain amount of Greek piety. Even the poet does not require to be too consistent, and consistency is the last thing Greeks would understand. Almost all the Greek divinities are accumulations of divinities: we find one layer over another, soon to be hidden and smoothed down by yet a third, and so on. It scarcely seems to me to be possible to pick these various divinities to pieces in a scientific manner; for no good method of doing so can be recommended: even the poor conclusion by analogy is in this instance a very good conclusion. At what a distance must one be from the Greeks to ascribe to them such a stupidly narrow autochthony as does Ottfried Müller![11] How Christian it is to assume, with Welcker,[12] that the Greeks were originally monotheistic! How philologists torment themselves by investigating the question whether Homer actually wrote, without being able to grasp the far higher tenet that Greek art long exhibited an inward enmity against writing, and did not wish to be read at all.
In the religious cultus an earlier degree of culture comes to light: a remnant of former times. The ages that celebrate it are not those which invent it; the contrary is often the case. There are many contrasts to be found here. The Greek cultus takes us back to a pre-Homeric disposition and culture. It is almost the oldest that we know of the Greeks--older than their mythology, which their poets have considerably remoulded, so far as we know it--Can this cult really be called Greek? I doubt it: they are finishers, not inventors. _They preserve_ by means of this beautiful completion and adornment. It is exceedingly doubtful whether we should draw any conclusion in regard to nationality and relationship with other nations from languages. A victorious language is nothing but a frequent (and not always regular) indication of a successful campaign. Where could there have been autochthonous peoples! It shows a very hazy conception of things to talk about Greeks who never lived in Greece. That which is really Greek is much less the result of natural aptitude than of adapted institutions, and also of an acquired language. To live on mountains, to travel a great deal, and to move quickly from one place to another: in these ways we can now begin to compare ourselves with the Greek gods. We know the past, too, and we almost know the future. What would a Greek say, if only he could see us!
The gods make men still more evil; this is the nature of man. If we do not like a man, we wish that he may become worse than he is, and then we are glad. This forms part of the obscure philosophy of hate--a philosophy which has never yet been written, because it is everywhere the _pudendum_ that every one feels. The pan-Hellenic Homer finds his delight in the frivolity of the gods; but it is astounding how he can also give them dignity again. This amazing ability to raise one's self again, however, is Greek.
Ideas discussed in this chapter
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.