The Dawn of Day

The Morality of Victims. – “Enthusiastic sacrifice,” “self-immolation” – these are the catch-words of your morality, and I willingly believe that you, as you say, “mean it honestly”: but I know you better than you know yourselves, if your “honesty” is capable of going arm in arm with such a morality. You look down from the heights of this morality upon that other sober morality which calls for self-control, severity, and obedience; you even go so far as to call it egoistic – and you are indeed frank towards yourselves in saying that it displeases you – it must displease you! For, in sacrificing and immolating yourselves with such enthusiasm, you delight in the intoxication of the thought that you are now one with the powerful being, God or man, to whom you are consecrating yourselves: you revel in the feeling of his power, which is again attested by this sacrifice.

In reality, however, you only appear to sacrifice yourselves; for your imagination turns you into gods and you enjoy yourselves as such. Judged from the point of view of this enjoyment, how poor and feeble must that other “egoistic” morality of obedience, duty, and reason seem to you: it is displeasing to you because in this instance true self-sacrifice and self-surrender are called for, without the victim thinking himself to be transformed into a god, as you do. In a word, you want intoxication and excess, and this morality which you despise takes up a stand against intoxication and excess – no wonder it causes you some displeasure!

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Evil People and Music. – Should the full bliss of love, which consists in unlimited confidence, ever have fallen to the lot of persons other than those who are profoundly suspicious, evil, and bitter? For such people enjoy in this bliss the gigantic, unlooked-for, and incredible exception of their souls! One day they are seized with that infinite, dreamy sensation which is entirely opposed to the remainder of their private and public life, like a delicious enigma, full of golden splendour, and impossible to be described by mere words or similes. Implicit confidence makes them speechless – there is even a species of suffering and heaviness in this blissful silence; and this is why souls that are overcome with happiness generally feel more grateful to music than others and better ones do: for they see and hear through music, as through a coloured mist, their love becoming, as it were, more distant, more touching, and less heavy. Music is the only means that such people have of observing their extraordinary condition and of becoming aware of its presence with a feeling of estrangement and relief. When the sound of music reaches the ears of every lover he thinks: “It speaks of me, it speaks in my stead; it knows everything!”

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The Artist. – The Germans wish to be transported by the artist into a state of dreamy passion; by his aid the Italians wish to rest from their real passions; the French wish him to give them an opportunity of showing their judgment and of making speeches. So let us be just!

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To deal like an Artist with One's Weaknesses. – If we must positively have weaknesses and come in the end to look upon them as laws beyond ourselves, I wish that everybody may be possessed of as much artistic capacity as will enable him to set off his virtues by means of his weaknesses, and to make us, through his weaknesses, desirous of acquiring his virtues: a power which great musicians have possessed in quite an exceptional degree. How frequently do we notice in Beethoven's music a coarse, dogmatic, and impatient tone; in Mozart, the joviality of an honest man, whose heart and mind have not overmuch to give us; in Richard Wagner, an abrupt and aggressive restlessness, in the midst of which, just as the most patient listener is on the point of losing his temper, the composer regains his powers, and likewise the others. Through their very weaknesses, these musicians have created in us an ardent desire for their virtues, and have given us a palate which is ten times more sensitive to every note of this tuneful intellect, tuneful beauty, and tuneful goodness.

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Deceit in Humiliation. – By your foolishness you have done a great wrong to your neighbour and destroyed his happiness irretrievably – and then, having overcome your vanity, you humble yourself before him, surrender your foolishness to his contempt, and fancy that, after this difficult scene, which is an exceedingly painful one for you, everything has been set right, that your own voluntary loss of honour compensates your neighbour for the injury you have done to his happiness. With this feeling you take your leave comforted, believing that your virtue has been re-established.

Your neighbour, however, suffers as intensely as before. He finds nothing to comfort him in the fact that you have been irrational and have told him so: on the contrary, he remembers the painful appearance you presented to him when you were disparaging yourself in his presence – it is as if another wound had been inflicted on him. He does not think of revenging himself, however; and cannot conceive how a proper balance can be struck between you and him. In point of fact, you have been acting that scene for yourself and before yourself: you invited a witness to be present, not on his account, but on your own – don't deceive yourself!

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Dignity and Timidity. – Ceremonies, official robes and court dresses, grave countenances, solemn aspects, the slow pace, involved speech – everything, in short, known as dignity – are all pretences adopted by those who are timid at heart: they wish to make themselves feared (themselves or the things they represent). The fearless (i. e. originally those who naturally inspire others with awe) have no need of dignity and ceremonies: they bring into repute – or, still more, into ill-repute – honesty and straightforward words and bearing, as characteristics of their self-confident awefulness.

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The Morality of Sacrifice. – The morality which is measured by the spirit of sacrifice is that of a semi-civilised state of society. Reason in this instance gains a hard-fought and bloody victory within the soul; for there are powerful contrary instincts to be overcome. This cannot be brought about without the cruelty which the sacrifices to cannibal gods demand.

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Where Fanaticism is to be Desired. – Phlegmatic natures can be rendered enthusiastic only by being fanaticised.

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The Dreaded Eye. – Nothing is dreaded more by artists, poets, and writers than the eye which sees through their little deceptions and subsequently notices how often they have stopped at the boundary where the paths branch off either to innocent delight in themselves or to the straining after effect; the eye which checks them when they try to sell little things dear, or when they try to exalt and adorn without being exalted themselves; the eye which, despite all the artifices of their art, sees the thought as it first presented itself to them, perhaps as a charming vision of light, perhaps also, however, as a theft from the whole world, or as an everyday conception which they had to expand, contract, colour, wrap up, and spice, in order to make something out of it, instead of the thought making something out of them. – Oh, this eye, which sees in your work all your restlessness, inquisitiveness, and covetousness, your imitation and exaggeration (which is only envious imitation) which knows both your blush of shame and your skill in concealing it from others and interpreting it to yourselves!

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The “Edifying” Element in our Neighbour's Misfortune. – He is in distress, and straightway the “compassionate” ones come to him and depict his misfortune to him. At last they go away again, satisfied and elevated, after having gloated over the unhappy man's misfortune and their own, and spent a pleasant Sunday afternoon.

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To be quickly Despised. – A man who speaks a great deal, and speaks quickly, soon sinks exceedingly low in our estimation, even when he speaks rationally – not only to the extent that he annoys us personally, but far lower. For we conjecture how great a burden he has already proved to many other people, and we thus add to the discomfort which he causes us all the contempt which we presume he has caused to others.

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Relations with Celebrities. —A. But why do you shun this great man? —B. I should not like to misunderstand him. Our defects are incompatible with one another: I am short-sighted and suspicious, and he wears his false diamonds as willingly as his real ones.

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The Chain-Wearers. – Beware of all those intellects which are bound in chains! clever women, for example, who have been banished by fate to narrow and dull surroundings, amid which they grow old. True, there they lie in the sun, apparently lazy and half-blind; but at every unknown step, at everything unexpected, they start up to bite: they revenge themselves on everything that has escaped their kennel.

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Revenge in Praise. – Here we have a written page which is covered with praise, and you call it flat; but when you find out that revenge is concealed in this praise you will find it almost too subtle, and you will experience a great deal of pleasure in its numerous delicate and bold strokes and similes. It is not the man himself, but his revenge, which is so subtle, rich, and ingenious: he himself is scarcely aware of it.

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Pride. – Ah, not one of you knows the feeling of the tortured man after he has been put to the torture, when he is being carried back to his cell, and his secret with him! – he still holds it in a stubborn and tenacious grip. What know ye of the exultation of human pride?

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“Utilitarian.” – At the present time men's sentiments on moral things run in such labyrinthic paths that, while we demonstrate morality to one man by virtue of its utility, we refute it to another on account of this utility.

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On German Virtue. – How degenerate in its taste, how servile to dignities, ranks, uniforms, pomp, and splendour must a nation have been, when it began to consider the simple as the bad, the simple man (schlicht) as the bad man (schlecht)! We should always oppose the moral bumptiousness of the Germans with this one little word “bad,” and nothing else.

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From a Dispute. —A. Friend, you have talked yourself hoarse. —B. Then I am refuted, so let's drop the subject.

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The “Conscientious” Ones. – Have you noticed the kind of men who attach the greatest value to the most scrupulous conscientiousness? Those who are conscious of many mean and petty sentiments, who are anxiously thinking of and about themselves, are afraid of others, and are desirous of concealing their inmost feelings as far as possible. They endeavour to impose upon themselves by means of this strict conscientiousness and rigorousness of duty, and by the stern and harsh impression which others, especially their inferiors, cannot fail to receive of them.

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Dread of Fame. —A. The endeavour to avoid one's renown, the intentional offending of one's panegyrists, the dislike of hearing opinions about one's self, and all through fear of renown: instances like these are to be met with; they actually exist – believe it or not! —B. They are found, no doubt! They exist! A little patience, Sir Arrogance!

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Refusing Thanks. – We are perfectly justified in refusing a request, but it is never right to refuse thanks – or, what comes to the same thing, to accept them coldly and conventionally. This gives deep offence – and why?

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Punishment. – A strange thing, this punishment of ours! It does not purify the criminal; it is not a form of expiation; but, on the contrary, it is even more defiling than the crime itself.

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Party Grievances. – In almost every party there is a ridiculous, but nevertheless somewhat dangerous grievance. The sufferers from it are those who have long been the faithful and honourable upholders of the doctrine propagated by the party, and who suddenly remark that one day a much stronger figure than themselves has got the ear of the public. How can they bear being reduced to silence? So they raise their voices, sometimes changing their notes.

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Striving for Gentleness. – When a vigorous nature has not an inclination towards cruelty, and is not always preoccupied with itself; it involuntarily strives after gentleness – this is its distinctive characteristic. Weak natures, on the other hand, have a tendency towards harsh judgments – they associate themselves with the heroes of the contempt of mankind, the religious or philosophical traducers of existence, or they take up their position behind strict habits and punctilious “callings”: in this way they seek to give themselves a character and a kind of strength. This is likewise done quite involuntarily.

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