`The Prejudices of Philosophers`, in Beyond Good and Evil

PART ONE
_.
(<o>>_.-_
ON THE PREJUDICES
OF PHILOSOPHE,RS
l
r99
Part' One
1
The will to truth which will still tempt us to many a venture, that
famoustruthfulnessof which all philosophersso far have spoken
with respect-what questionshas this will to truth not laid before
us! What strange,wicked, questionablequestions!That is a long
story evennsw-snd yet it seemsas if it had scarcelybegun.Is it
any wonder that we should finally become suspicious,lose pa_
tience, and turn away impatiently?that we should finally learn
from this Sphinx to ask questions,too? llho is it realy qhatpUtS
qU9ltiouq!q'.us h_gfe?
lVhat in us really wants "truth"?
Indeedwe cameto a long halt at the questionaboutthe cause
of this will-until we finally came to a completestop before a still
morebasicquestion.We askedaboutthe valueof ihis will. Suppose
we want truth: l"ft) not rather untruth? and uncertainty?even ig_
no4anceJ
The problem of the value of truth came before us_or was it
we who camebeforethe problem?Who of us is Oedipushere?Who
the Sphinx?It is a rendezvous,
it seems,of questionsand question
marks.
seemscredible,it finally almost seems_
And lb_ofrgh,45g4rcqly
had never even been put so far_as if we
to qs aq lf thg pqqble_m
werethe first to seeit, fix it with our eyes,and nsk it. For it doesinvolvea risk, and perhapsthereis nonethat is greater.
i
lt
lt,
;
il,
ii
il
ll,l
I
llrl
ril
i
"How could anything originate out of i19 op-pSfite?for ex_l
amplq,_Eq1,tr-su_t
o_ferrorJ or thq will_to tlqlh out of the_rurllfo_l
Nietzsche divided this book-"into 'articles"like articles of faith," ,rd ;t;
sees."irony in this." But there is no warrant for rendering noipttliii*
i,
"articfe": it means "major part." Kant's Critique ol pure k"aron and critiq.ue.ol Practical Reason are both divided iito Hauptstiicke. So is Nietzsche'sown Human, AII-Too-Human. The term is obviously particulariyappropria,tefor books subdivided into many short sections.
,r
,
rtl
Il l
200
BEYo ND
co o D
AND
iE pREJUDIcES oF' pHrr-osoprrERs
E vIL
i deception? or selfless deeds out of selfishness?or the pure and
lsunlike gaze of the sage out of lust? Such origins are impossible;
whoever dreams of them is a fool, indeed worse; the things of the
highest value must have another, peculiar origin-they cannot be
derived from this transitory, seductive,deceptive,paltry world, from
this turmoil of delusion and lust. Rather from the lap of Being, the
intransitory, the hidden god, the 'thing-in-itself'-there must be
their basis,and nowhereelse."
This way of judging constitutes the typical prejudgment and
prejudice which give away the metaphysiciansof all ages;this kind
of valuation looms in the background of all their logical Procedures; it is on account of this "faith" that they trouble themselves
about "knowledge," about something that is finally baptized solemnly as "the truth." The fundamental faith of the metaphysicians
is the lailh in opposite values.2It has not even occurred to the most
cautious among them that one might have a doubt right here at
the threshold where it was surely most necessary-even if they
vowed to themselves,"de omnibus dubitandum." 3
;
For one may doubt, first, whether there are any opposites at
iall, and secondly whether these popular valuations and opposite
values on which the metaphysiciansput their seal, are not perhaps
merely foreground estimates, only provisional perspectives, perhaps even from some nook, perhaps from below, frog perspectives,
as it were, to borrow an expression painters use. For all the value
that the true, the truthful, the selflessmay deserve,it would still be
possible that a higher and more fundamental value for life might
and lust. It might even
have to be ascribedto deception,selfishness,
be possiblethat what constitutesthe value of these good and revered things is precisely that they are insidiously related, tied to,
and involved with these wicked, seemingly opposite things-maybe
evenone with them in essence.Maybe!
But who has the will to concern himself with such dangerous
maybes? For that, one really has to wait for the advent of a new
2 Nietzsche'sattack on this faith is prefigured in thc title of the book. This
aphorism invites comparison with the first aphorism of Hunan, Al!-TooHumane "All is to be doubted."Descartes.
2Ol
speciesof philosophers, such as have somehow another and converse taste and propensity from those we have known so farphilosophersof the dangerous"maybe" in every sense.
And in all seriousness:I see such new philosopherscoming
uP.
3
After having looked long enough between the philosopher's
lines and fingers, I say to myself: by far the greater part of con-l
scious thinking must still be included among instinctive activities,r
and that goes even for philosophicalthinking. We have to relearnl
here, as one has had to relearn about heredity and what is ..innate."
As the act of birth deservesno consideration in the whole process'
and procedureof heredity, so "being conscious"is not in any decisive sensethe oppo.siteof what is instinctive: most of the conscious;
thinking of a philosttpheris secretlyguided and forced into certain
channelsby his instincts.
Behind all logic and its seemingsovereigntyof movement,too,
there stand valuations or, more clearly, physiological demands for
the preservation of a certain type of life. For example, that the definite should be worth more than the indefinite, and mere appearance worth less than "t1u1h"-sllsh estimatesmight be, in spite of
their regulative importance for l.rs, neverthelessmcre foreground i
estimates,a certain kincl of niaiserieawhich may be necessaryfor,
the preservationof just such beings as we are. Supposing,that is,
that not just man is the "measureof things" ;+
The falsenessof a judgment is for us not necessarilyan objection to a judgment; in this respect our new languagemay sound
strangest.The question is to what.extent it is life-promoting lifepreserving, species-preserving,perhaps even species-cultivating.
a Folly, stupidity,silliness:one of Nietzsche's
favoriteFrenchwords.
'l "Man is the measureof all things."Protagoras,born about 4g0 B.c.
202
BEYOND
COOD
AND
EVIL
And we are fundamentally inclined to claim that the falsest judgments (which include the synthetic judgments a priori)6 are the
most indispensable for us; that without accepting the fictions of
logic, without measuring reality against the purely invented world
of the unconditional and self-identical, without a constant falsification of the world by means of numbers, man could not live-that
renouncing false judgments would mean renouncing life and a
denial of life. To recogpize untluth as-a coqdilioq of lifq !!at Sef:
tainly {neqns resisting accustomed value feelings in3*{-4.49e1o*t1s
way; and a philosophy that risks this would by that token alone
place itself beyond good and evil.
5
What provokes one to look at all philosophers half suspiciously, half mockingly, is not that one discovers again and again
how innocent they are-how often and how easily they make mistakes and go astray; in short, their childishnessand childlikenessbut that they are not honest enough in their work, although they all
make a lot of virtuous noise when the problem of truthfulness is
touched even remotely. They all pose as if they had discovered and
gegched their real opinions through the self-development of a
cold, pure, divinely unconcerned dialectic (as opposed to the mystics of every rank, who are more honest and doltish-and talk of
"inspiration"); while at bottom it is an assumption, a hunsb* Lndeed a kind of "inspiration"-1n6sf often a desire of the heart that
has been filtered and made abstract-that they defend with reasons they have sought after the fact. They are all advocateswho resent that name, and for the most part even wily spokesmen for
6 One of Kant's central questions was, "How are synthetic judgments a
prrbri possible?"He meanf judgments that are known for certain to be true,
independentlyof experience,but not by definition. His examplesinclude the
judgment that every event has a cause. Hans Vaihinger, a leading Kant
scholar who published a book on Nietzsche als Philosoph (1902; 4th ed.
1916), later published his own theory of necessaryfictions under the title,
Die Philosophie des Als-Ob (1911; English tr. by C. K. Ogden, 1924: The
Philosophy of "As ff"), devoting the final chapter to a detailed discussion
of Nietzsche'ssimilar ideas.Cf. section 11 below.
rE PREJUDICES oF pHILosopHERS
203
their prejudices which they baptize s(1Jsfi15,'-3ad,very far from hav_
ing the courage of the consciencethat admits this, precisely this, to
itself; very far from having the good taste of the courage *hi"h ulro
lets this be known, whether to warn an enemy or friend, or, from
exuberance,to mock itself.
The equally stiff and decorqus Tartuffery of the old Kant as
he lures us on the dialectical bypaths that lead to his "categorical
imperative"-really lead astray and seduce-this spectacle makes
us smile, as we are fastidious and find it quite amusing to watch
closely the subtle tricks of old moralists and preachers of morals.
or consider the hocus-pocus of mathematical form with which
Spinoza clad his philosophy-really .,the love of ftls wisdom,', to
render that word fairly and squarely-in mail and mask, to strike
terror at the very outset into the heart of any assailantwho should
dare to glance at that invincible maiden and pallas Athena: how
much personal timidity and vulnerability this masqueradeof a sick
hermit betrays!
6
Graduallyit hasbecomeclearto me what eyery_greatphiloso_
1
phy so far has been: nan:ely, ttre persqna!__q9qf_9pq1qg_qt_11q
uu '
ifror anOa kind q-tinvoluptary an{ unco4-s-qlous
mernoir; utso tnat i
the moral (or immoral) intentions iq every p_h!lqC_qp_hySqnStitutedl
the real germ of life from which the whole plant had grown.
Indeed,if one would explainhow the abstrusest
metaphysical
claimsof a philosopherreally came about, it is alwayswett-1and
wise) to askfirst: at what moralitydoesall this (doeshe aiml Accordingly'I do not believethat a "drive to knowledge"is the father of philosophy;but rather that anotherdrive has, here as else_
where, employed understanding(and misunderstanding)as a
mereinstrument.But anyonewho considersthe basicdrivesof man
to seeto what extentthey may have been at play just here as inspiring spirits (or demonsand kobolds) will find that ail of them
have done philosophyat sometime-and that every singleone of
themwould like only too well to representjust rrseffas the ultimate
purposeof existenceand the legitimatemqster of all the other
204
BEYOND
GOOD
AND
EV IL
drives. For every drive wants !-q bg m4ster-and it attempts to
in that spi ri t.
phiJos-ophize
To be sure: among scholarswho are really scientificmen,
things rnay be different-"better," if you like-there you may
really find somethinglike a drive for knowledge'some small, independentclockworkthat, once well wound, works on vigorously
without any essentialparticipationfrom all the other drivesof the
scholar.The real "interests" of the scholarthereforelie usually
somewhereelse-say, in his family, or in making money' or in
politics.Indeed,it is almosta matter of total indifferencewhether
t.ri. tittte machineis placed at this or that spot in science,and
whetherthe "promising" young worker turns himself into a good
philologist or an expert on fungi or a chemist: it does not characterize him that he becomesthis or that. In the philosopher,conversely,there is nothing whateverthat is impersonal;?and above
all, his morality bearsdecidedand decisivewitnessto who he isthat is, in what order of rank the innermostdrives of his nature
standin relationto eachother.
7
How maliciousphilosopherscan be! I know of nothing more
venomousthan the joke Epicuruspermittedhimself againstPlato
and the Platonists; he called them Dionysiokolakes.That means
literally-and this is the foreground meaning-('fl3f1e1s15of Dionysius," in other words, tyrant's baggageand lickspittles; but in
additionto this hb also wants to say, "they are all actors,there is
nothing genuine about them" (fot Dionysokolax was a popular
namefor an actor).8And the latter is really the malicethat Epicurus aimed at Plato: he was peevedby the grandiosemanner,the
mise en scineeat which Plato and his discipleswere so exPert-at
? Nietzscheis thinking of the "great" philosophers.Now that there are liter,.pfrilosopheri," these-tend to
more akin to their colally thousands of
-be
leaguesin other deirartmentsthan to the men discussedhere'
s The reference is to Epicurus' fragment 238, and tlle ambiguity is due to
the fact that Dionysiui was the nlrne of the Sicilian. tyrant whom Plato
had tried for severaiyearsto convert to his own philosophy'
e Staging.
ON TTTE PREJUDICES
OF PHILOSOPHERS
205
which Epicums was not an expert-he, that old schoolmasterfrom
Samos,who sat, hidden away, in his little gardenat Athens and
wrote three hundred books-who knows? perhapsfrom rage and
ambitionagainstPlato?
It took a hundred yearsuntil Greecefound out who this gardengod,Epicurus,had been.- Did theyfind out?8
There is a point in every philosophy when the philosopher's
"conviction" appearson the stage-or to use the languageof an
ancientMystery:
Adventavitasinus,
Pulcheret I ortissimus.To
9
"According to nature" you want to live? O you noble Stoics,
what deceptive words these are! Imagine a being like nature,
wasteful beyond measure, indifferent beyond measure, without
purposesand consideration,without mercy and justice, fertile and
desolateand uncertainat the sametime; imagineindifferenceitself as a power-h_ow s-oqldyou live acqgqdinglq tbis iud&r.euse?
Living-is !_hatnot preciselywanting to be othgr than lhis lalUre?
Is Uot Uyiqg- *st!44ting, prgferring, being unjust, being limited, r
wantingto be different?And supposingyour imperative"live ac-l
cordingto nature" meant at bottom'asmuch as "live accordingtol
fffs"-hev/ could you not do that? Why make a principle of whatl
areand mustbe?
vou vourselves
In truth, the matter is altogetherdifferent: while you pretend
rapturously to read the canon of your law in nature, you want
somethingopposite,you strangeactors and self-deceivers!
_Your
pride wants to imposeyour q1gf314y,Lo-qLfdgALen natu1-e'-even_
on nature-and incolporatethem in her; you demand that she
should be nature "according to the Stoa," and you would like all
r0 "The ass arrived. beautiful and most brave."
246
BEYOND
GOOD
AND
ON THE
E VIL
PREJUDICES
OF PHILOSOPHERS
207
rank the credibility of their own bodies about as low
as the credibility of the visual evidence that "the earth stands still,"
and thus.
apparently in good humor, let their securest possession
go (for in
what does one at present believe more firmlyihan in
one"'sbody?)
-rvho knows if they are not trying at bottom to win back
some_
thing that was formerly, an even ,irur", possession,something
of
the ancient domain of the faith of former times, perhaps
the im_
mortal soul," perhaps ,,the old God,,' in short, ideas
by which
one could live better, that is to say, more vigorously
and cheer_
fully, than by "modern ideas',? There is mistrust
of ihese modern
ideas in this attitude, a disbelief in all that has been
constructed
yesterday and today; there is perhaps some slight
admixture of
satiety and scorn, unable to enclure any longer the bric_a_brac
of
concepts of the most diverse origin, which is the form
in which socalled positivism offers itself on the market today;
a disgust of the
"patchiness
more fastidious taste at the village-fair motleyness
ana
of all these reality-philosophasters in whom there
is noihins n"*
ot genuine, except this motleyness. In this, it seems
to m"e, wei
should agree with these skeptical anti_realists and
knowledge_i
microscopistsof today: their instinct, which repels
thern'from midern reality, is unrefuted-what do their retrograde
bypaths con_l
cern us! The main thing about them is not that they-wish
to goi
but that they wish to get-.away. A little ior, ,t
_91.k,"
flight, courage, and artistic power, and they would
"ngih,i
want to rise*l
not return!
existenceto exist only after your own image-as an immense
eternalglorificationand generalizationof Stoicism'For all your love
of trutlr, you have forced yourselvesso long, so persistently'-:"
rigidly-hypnoticallyto seenature the wrong way, namely Stoically'
tttit you-ut" no ionger able to seeher difierently' And some abYsmal arrogancefinaiy still inspires you with the insane hope that
becauseyou know how to tyrannizeyourselves-stoicismis selftyranny-nature, too, lets herselfbe tyrannized: is not the Stoica pieceof nalurc?
But this is an ancient,eternal story: what formerly happened
with the Stoicsstill happenstoday,too, as soon as any philosophy
beginsto believein itseli. It alwayscreatesthe wolld -inits,gvn-i!0agJ; it cannotdo otherwise.Philosophyis this tyrannicaldrive iF
,if, th" most spiritual will to power' to the "creation of the world"'
to the causaprima.rr
10
The eagernessand subtlety-I might even say, shrewdnesswith which the problemof "the real and the apparentworld" is today attackedall over Europe makes one think and wonder; and
who hears nothing in the backgroundexcept a "will to
^nyon"
truth," certainlydoesnot havethe bestof ears.In rare and isolated
instancesit may really be the casethat such a will to truth, some
ambition
extravagantand adventurouscourage,a metaphysician's
prefer
ultimately
and
participate
may
to hold a hopelessposition,
possibeautiful
of
even a handful of "certainty" to a whole carload
conscience
lbilities; there may actually be puritanical fanaticsof
to an uncertainsomethingto lie
iwho prefer evena certainnothing
and the sign of a despairing'
nihilism
is
But
this
die.
iAo*n on-and
the gesturesof such a
courageous
lmortally weary soul-however
jvirtuemay look.
It seems,however,to be otherwisewith stronger and livelier
thinkers who are still eagerfor life. when they sideagainstappearthey
44ce,and speakof "perspective,"with a new arrogance;when
11
It seemsto me that today attemptsare made everywhere
to
divert attentionfrom the actualinfluenceKant exerted
on German
philosophy,and especiallyto ignore prudently the value
he set
upon himself. Kant was first and foremostproud of his
table of
categories;withthat in his hand he said: ,.Thisis the most
difficult
thing that could ever be undertakenon behalf of metaphysics.,,
Let uSonly understandthis ..couldbe"! He *u, proud of
tuu_
.
ing discovereda new faculty in man, the faculty for syntheticjudg_
ments,a priori. Supposehe deceivedhimselfin this matter:
tfr! a!-
11First cause.
;
A
I
t