The Twilight of the Idols · Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
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All goals have been annihilated: valuations are turning against each other: People call him good who hearkens to the dictates of his own heart, but they also call him good who merely does his duty; People call the mild and conciliating man good, but they also call him good who is brave, inflexible and severe; People call him good who does not do violence to himself, but they also call the heroes of self-mastery good; People call the absolute friend of truth good-, but they also call him good who is pious and a transfigurer of things; People call him good who can obey his own voice, but they also call the devout man good; People call the noble and the haughty man good, but also him who does not despise and who does not assume condescending airs. People call him good who is kindhearted and who steps out of the way of broils, but he who thirsts for fight and triumph is also called good; People call him good who always wishes to be first, but they also call him good who does not wish to be ahead of anybody in anything. We possess a powerful store of moral _feelings,_ but we have no goal for them all. They mutually contradict each other: they have their origin in different tables of values.
There is a wonderful amount of moral power, but there is no longer any goal towards which all this power can be directed. All goals have been annihilated, mankind must give themselves a fresh goal. It is an error to suppose that they had one: they gave themselves all the goals they ever had. But the prerequisites of all previous goals have been annihilated. Science traces the course of things but points to no goal: what it does give consists of the fundamental facts upon which the new goal must be based. The profound sterility of the nineteenth century. I have not encountered a single man who really had a new ideal to bring forward. The character of German music kept me hoping longest, but in vain. A stronger type in which all our powers are synthetically correlated—this constitutes my faith. Apparently everything is decadence. We should so direct this movement of decline that it may provide the strongest with a new form of existence. The dissolution of morality, in its practical consequences, leads to the atomistic individual, and further to the subdivision of the individual into a quantity of parts—absolute liquefaction. That is why a goal is now more than ever necessary; and love, but a new love. I say: “As long as your morality hung over me I breathed like one asphyxiated. That is why I throttled this snake. I wished to live, consequently it had to die.”
As long as people are still _forced to_ act, that is to say as long as commands are given, synthesis (the suppression of the moral man) will not be realised To be unable to be otherwise: instincts and commanding reason extending beyond any immediate object: the ability to enjoy one’s own nature in action. None of them wish to bear the burden of the commander; but they will perform the most strenuous task if only thou commandest them. We must overcome the past in ourselves: we must combine the instincts afresh and direct the whole together to one goal:—an extremely difficult undertaking! It is not only the evil instincts which have to be overcome,—the so-called good instincts must be conquered also and consecrated anew! No leaps must be made in virtue! But everyone must be given a different path! Not leading to the highest development of each! Yet everyone may be a bridge and an example for others. To help, to pity, to submit and to renounce personal attacks with a good will,—these things may make even insignificant and superficial men tolerable to the eye: such men must not be contradicted in their belief that this good will is “virtue in itself.” Man makes a deed valuable: but how might a deed make man valuable? Morality is the concern of those who cannot free themselves from it: for such people morality therefore belongs to the conditions of existence. It is impossible to refute conditions of existence: the only thing one can do is not to have them.
If it were true that life did not deserve to be welcomed, the moral man, precisely on account of his self-denial and obligingness, would then be guilty of misusing his fellow to his own personal advantage. “Love thy neighbour”—this would mean first and foremost: “Let thy neighbour go his own way”—and it is precisely this kind of virtue that is the most difficult! The bad man as the parasite. We must not be merely feasters and gourmets of life: this is ignoble. It is a noble sense which forbids our being only feasters and gourmets of life—this sense revolts against hedonism—: we want to perform something in return!—But the fundamental feeling of the masses is that one must live for nothing,—that is their vulgarity. The converse valuations hold good for the lower among men: in their case therefore it is necessary to implant virtues. They must be elevated above their lives, by means of absolute commands and terrible taskmasters. What is required: the new law must be made practicable—and out of its fulfilment, the overcoming of this law, and higher law, must evolve Zarathustra defines the attitude towards law, inasmuch as he suppresses the law of laws which is morality. Laws as the backbone They must be worked at and created, by being fulfilled. The slavish attitude which has reigned hitherto towards law!
The self-overcoming of Zarathustra as the prototype of mankind’s self-overcoming for the benefit of Superman. To this end the overcoming of morality is necessary. The type of the lawgiver, his development and his suffering. What is the purpose of giving laws at all? Zarathustra is the herald who calls forth many lawgivers. _Individual instruments._ 1. The Commanders, the mighty—who do not love, unless it be that they love the images according to which they create. The rich in vitality, the versatile, the free, who overcome that which is extant 2. The obedient, the “emancipated”—love and reverence constitute their happiness, they have a sense of what is higher (their deficiencies are made whole by the sight of the lofty). 3. The slaves, the order of “henchmen”—: they must be made comfortable, they must cultivate pity for one another. The giver, the creator, the teacher—these are preludes of the ruler. All virtue and all self-mastery has only one purpose: that of preparing for the rule! Every sacrifice that the ruler makes is rewarded a hundredfold. How much does not the warrior, the prince, the man who is responsible for himself, sacrifice!—this should be highly honoured. The terrible task of the ruler who educates himself:—the kind of man and people over which he will rule must be forecast in him: it is in himself therefore that he must first have become a ruler!
The great educator like nature must elevate obstacles in order that these may be overcome. The new teachers as preparatory stages for the highest Architect (they must impose their type on things). Institutions may be regarded as the after effects of great individuals and the means of giving great individuals root and soil—until the fruit ultimately appears. As a matter of fact mankind is continually trying to be able to dispense with great individuals by means of corporations, &c But they are utterly dependent upon such great individuals for their ideal. The eudæmonistic and social ideals lead men backwards,—it may be that they aim at a very useful working class,—they are creating the ideal slave of the future, the lower caste which must on no account be lacking! Equal rights for all!—this is the most extraordinary form of injustice, for with it the highest men do not get their due. It is not a matter of the rights of the stronger, for strong and weak are alike in this, that they all extend their power as far as they can. A new form of estimating man: above all the question: How much power has he got? How manifold are his instincts? How great is his capacity for communication and assimilation? The ruler as the highest type.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.