,,we ,,moderns3 ,,enigmas ,,and ,,guesses ,by ,,edwin ,,muir ,edited with ,introduction by ,h4 ,l4 ,mencken ,,new ,,york ,,alfred4 ,a4 ,,knopf ,,mcmxx ,,contents ,,introduction ,i4 ,,the ,,old ,,age1 ,,ii4 ,,original ,,sin1 ,,iii4 ,,what ,,is ,,modern8 ,,iv4 ,,art ,,and ,,literature1 ,v4 ,,creative ,,love1 ,,vi4 ,,the ,,tragic ,,view4 ,,introduction ,that a young ,scotsman1 reacting from the vast emotional assault of the late ferocious war1 should have withdrawn himself into an ivory tower in ,glasgow town1 and there sat himself down in heroic calm to wrestle with the vexatious and no doubt intrinsically insoluble problems of being and becoming--this was surely nothing to cause1 whispers among connoisseurs of philosophical passion1 for that grim1 persistent1 cold-blooded concern with the fundamental mysteries of the world has been the habit of the ,scots ever since they emerged from massacre and blue paint4 ,from blue paint1 indeed1 the transition was almost instantaneous to blue souls1 and the conscience of ,britain1 such as it is1 has dwelt north of the ,cheviot ,hills ever since4 ,find a ,scot1 and you are at once beset by a metaphysician1 or1 at all events1 by a theologian4 ,but for a young man of those damp1 desolate parts1 throwing himself into the racial trance1 to emerge with a set of ideas reaching back1 through ,nietzsche and even worse heretics1 to the spacious1 innocent1 somewhat gaudy days of the ,greek illumination--for such a fellow1 so bred and circumscribed1 to come out of his tower with a concept of life as a grand and glittering adventure1 a tremendous spectacle1 an overpowering ecstasy1 almost an orgy--such a phenomenon was1 and is1 quite sufficient to lift the judicious eyebrow4 ,yet here is this ,mr4 ,edwin ,muir of ,caledonia bearing just that outlandish contraband1 offering just that strange flouting of all things traditionally ,scotch4 ,what he preaches in the ensuing aphorisms is the emancipation of the modern spirit from its rotting heritage of ingenuous fears and exploded certainties4 ,what he denounces most bitterly is the abandonment of a world that is beautifully surprising and charming to the rule of sordid1 timid and unimaginative men--the regimentation of ideas in a system that is half a denial of the obvious and half a conglomeration of outworn metaphors1 all taken too literally4 ,and what he pleads for most eloquently1 with his cold1 reserved northern eloquence1 is the whole-hearted acceptance of life as a sacrament1444 life as joy triumphing over fate1444 life made innocent1444 life washed free from how much filth of remorse1 guilt1 contempt1 'sin'4444 ,it goes without saying that the red hand of ,nietzsche is in all this4 ,the ,naumburg ,antichrist1 damned for five years running by the indignation of all right-thinking men1 has made steady and enormous progress under cover4 ,there has never been a time1 indeed1 when his notions enjoyed a wider dispersion or were poll-parrotted unwittingly by greater numbers of the righteous4 ,excessive draughts of the democratic cure-all1 swallowed label1 cork1 testimonials and all1 have brought ,christendom to bed with ,katzenjammer--and there stands the seductive antidote in its leering blue bottles4 ,where would philosophical opponents of ,bolshevism be without ,nietzsche8 ,who would devise arguments for them1 eloquence for them1 phrases for them8 ,on all sides one hears echoes of him--often transformed from his harsh bass to a piping falsetto1 but nevertheless recognizable enough4 ,any port in a storm6 ,if ,god is asleep1 then turn to the ,devil6 ,the show offers the best laughing that heathen have enjoyed1 perhaps1 since the ,hundred ,years' ,war4 ,and there is an extra snicker in the fact that ,scotland1 once again1 seems to resume the old trade of intellectual smuggling4 ,if one ,scot is to the front with so forthright a piece as ,we ,moderns1 then surely there must be a thousand other ,scots hard at it in a pianissimo manner4 ,thus1 ,i suppose1 the crime of ,carlyle is repeated on a wholesale scale1 and once again the poor ,sassenach is inoculated with pathogenic ,prussian organisms4 ,on this side of the ocean the business is less efficiently organized2 we have no race of illicit metaphysicians on our border4 ,but the goods come in all the same4 ,i have heard more prattling of stale ,nietzscheism of late1 from men bearing the flag in one hand and the cross in the other1 than ,i ever heard in the old days from parlour anarchists and unfrocked priests4 ,nietzsche1 belatedly discovered by a world beset by terrors too great for it and mysteries too profound1 becomes almost respectable1 nay1 almost ,episcopalian6 ,what ails it1 at bottom1 is the delusion that all the mysteries1 given doctors enough1 theories enough1 pills enough1 may be solved--that it is all a matter of finding a panacea1 unearthing a prophet1 passing a bill4 ,if it turns to ,nietzsche1 however gingerly and suspiciously1 it will turn only to fresh disappointment and dismay1 for ,nietzsche is no quack with another sure cure1 but simply an iconoclast who shows that all the sure cures of the past and present have failed1 and must fail--and particularly the sure cure of the mob1 the scheme of determining the diagnosis by taking a vote1 the notion that the medicine which most pleases the grossest palates is the medicine to get the patient upon his legs4 ,nietzsche is no reformer2 he is an assassin of reformers2 if he preaches anything at all1 it is that reform is useless1 illusory--above all1 unnecessary4 ,the patient is really not dying at all4 ,let him get up and dance6 ,let him pick up his bed and employ it upon the skulls of his physicians6 ,life is not a disease to be treated with boluses and philtres1 not an affliction to be shirked and sentimentalized1 but an adventure to be savoured and enjoyed--life1 here and now1 is the highest imaginable experience4 ,what the world needs is not a cure for it1 but room for it1 freedom for it1 innocent zest for it4 ,so accepted and regarded1 half of its terrors vanish at once1 and even its unescapable catastrophes take on a certain high stateliness1 a fine sthetic dignity4 ,this is the tragic view that ,mr4 ,muir cries up--life as joy triumphing over fate4 ,for the character of tragedy is not negative and condemnatory1 but deeply affirmative and joyous4 ,the ideal man is not the time-serving slave of ,christendom1 in endless terror of ,god1 forever flattering and bribing ,god1 but the ,nietzschean ,ja-sager1 the yes-sayer1 facing destiny courageously and a bit proudly1 living to the full the life that lies within his grasp in the present1 accepting its terms as he finds them1 undaunted by the impenetrable shadows that loom ahead4 ,what ,mr4 ,muir1 following ,nietzsche1 is most dissatisfied with in the modern spirt is its intolerable legalism--its fatuous frenzy to work everything out to nine places of constabulary decimals1 to establish windy theories and principles1 to break the soul of man to a rule4 ,in part1 of course1 that effort is of respectable enough origin4 ,it springs from intelligent self-assertion1 healthy curiosity1 the sense of competence2 it is a by-product of the unexampled conquests of nature that have gone on in the modern age4 ,but in other parts it is no more than a by-product of the democratic spirit1 the rise of the inferior1 the emancipation of the essentially in competent4 ,science is no longer self-sufficient1 isolated from moral ideas1 an end in itself2 it tends to become a mere agent of mob tyranny2 it takes on gratuitous and incomprehensible duties and responsibilities2 like the theology that it has supplanted1 it has friendlier and friendlier dealings with the secular arm4 ,and art1 too1 begins to be poisoned by this moral obsession of the awakened proletariat4 ,it ceases to be an expression of well-being1 of healthy functioning1 of unpolluted joy in life1 and becomes a thing of obscure and snuffling purposes1 a servant of some low enterprise of the cocksure4 ,the mob is surely no scientist and no artist2 it is1 in fact1 eternally the anti-scientist1 the anti-artist2 science and art offer it unscalable heights and are hence its enemies4 ,but in a world dominated by mob yearnings and mob passions1 even science and art must take on some colour from below4 ,the enemies1 if they cannot be met and overthrown on a fair field1 can at least be degraded4 ,and when the mob degrades1 it always degrades to moral tunes4 ,morality is its one avenue to superiority--false but none the less soothing4 ,it can always be good4 ,it can always dignify its stupidity1 its sordidness and its cowardice with terms borrowed from ethical revelation4 ,the good man is a numskull1 but nevertheless he is good4 ,mr4 ,muir has at the modern spirit on many other counts1 but nearly all of them may be converted with more or less plausibility into an objection to its ethical obsession1 its idiotic craze to legislate and admonish4 ,when he says1 for example1 that realism in the novel and the drama is hollow1 he leaves his case but half stated2 there is undoubtedly a void where imagination1 feeling and a true sense of the tragic ought to be1 but it is filled with the common garbage of mob thinking1 to wit1 with the common garbage of moral purpose4 ,all of the chief realists1 from ,zola to ,barbusse1 are pre-eminently moralists disguised as scientists2 what one derives from them1 reading them sympathetically1 is not illumination but merely indignation4 ,they are always violently against something--and that something is usually the fact that the world is not as secure and placid a place as a ,methodist ,sunday-school4 ,their affectation of moral agnosticism need deceive no one4 ,they are secretly appalled 7and delighted7 by their own scientific pornographies1 just as their brethren of the vice crusades are appalled and delighted4 ,realism1 of course1 can never be absolute4 ,it must always stress something and leave out something4 ,what it commonly stresses is the colossal failure of society to fit into an orderly scheme of causes and effects1 virtues and rewards1 crimes and punishments4 ,what it leaves out is the glow of romance that hangs about that failure--the poignant drama of blind chance1 the fascination of the unknowable4 ,the realists are bad artists because they are ansthetic to beauty4 ,and a good many scientists are bad scientists for precisely the same reason4 ,in their hands the gorgeous struggle of man against the mysteries and foul ambuscades of nature is converted into a banal cause before a police court1 with the complainant put on the stand to prove that his own hands are clean4 ,one cannot read some of the modern medical literature1 particularly on the side of public hygiene1 without giving one's sympathy to the tubercle bacilli and the spirocht4 ,science of that sort ceases to be a fit concern for men of dignity1 superior men1 gentlemen2 it becomes a concern for evangelists1 uplifters1 bounders4 ,its aim is no longer to penetrate the impenetrable1 to push forward the bounds of human knowledge1 to overreach the sinister trickeries of ,god2 its aim is simply to lengthen the lives of human ciphers and to reinforce their delusion that they confer a favour upon the universe by living at all4 ,worse1 it converts the salvation of such vacuums into a moral obligation1 and sets up the absurd doctrine that human progress is furthered by diminishing the death-rate in the ,balkans1 by rescuing ,georgia crackers from the hookworm and by reducing the whole ,american people1 the civilized minority with the barbarian mass1 to a race of teetotalling ascetics1 full of pious indignations and ,freudian suppressions4 ,the western world reeks with this new sentimentality4 ,it came on in ,europe with the fall of feudalism and the rise of the lower orders4 ,even war1 the last surviving enterprise of natural man1 has been transformed from a healthy play of innocent instincts into a combat of moral ideas1 nine-tenths of them obviously unsound4 ,it no longer offers a career to a ,gustavus ,adolphus1 a ,prince ,eugene or a ,napoleon ,i4 ,it loses even the spirit of gallant adventure that dignified the theological balderdash of the ,crusades--in which1 as every one knows1 the balderdash was quickly absorbed altogether by the adventure4 ,it becomes the business of specialists in moral indignation4 ,the modern general must not only know the elements of military science2 he must also show some of the gifts of a chautauqua orator1 including particularly the gift of right-thinking2 it would do him more harm to speak of his opponent with professional politeness1 as one lawyer might speak of another1 than it would do him to lose an important battle4 ,worse1 war gets out of the hands of soldiers altogether4 ,it becomes an undertaking of boob-bumpers1 spy-hunters1 emotion-pumpers1 propaganda-mongers--all sorts of disgusting cads4 ,its great prizes tend to go1 not to the men fighting in the field1 but to the man manufacturing shells1 alarms1 and moral indignation4 ,at the time of the last great series of wars it was said that every musketeer of ,france carried a marshal's baton in his haversack4 ,the haversack of the musketeer now contains only official literature1 informing him of the causes of the war as most lately determined1 the names of its appointed moral heroes1 and the penalties for discussing its aims1 for swapping tobacco with the boys on the other side1 and for inviting a pretty peasant-girl into his shell-hole4 ,the baton is being fought for by a press-agent1 a labour leader and a ,y4,m4,c4,a4 secretary4 ,it is against such degradations that ,mr4 ,muir raises his voice1 and in particular against such degradations in the field of the fine arts4 ,the superficial1 ,i daresay1 will mistake him 7once they get over the sheer immorality of his relation to ,nietzsche7 as simply one more pleader for l'art pour l'art--one more prophet of a superior and disembodied stheticism4 ,well1 turn to his singularly acute and accurate estimate of ,walter ,pater3 there is the answer to that error4 ,he has1 in fact1 no leanings whatsoever in any such direction4 ,the thing he argues for1 despite all his fury against the debasement of art to mob uses1 is not an art that shall be transcendental1 but an art that shall relate itself to life primarily and unashamedly1 an art that shall accept and celebrate life4 ,he preaches1 of course1 out of season4 ,there has never been a time in the history of the world when the natural delight of man in himself was held in greater suspicion4 ,christianity1 after two thousand years1 seems triumphant at last4 ,from the ashes of its barbaric theology there arises the phoenix of its maudlin sentimentality2 the worship of inferiority becomes its dominating cult4 ,in all directions that worship goes on4 ,it gives a new colour to politics1 and not only to politics1 but also to the sciences and the arts4 ,perhaps we are at the mere beginning of the process4 ,the doctrine that all men are equal in the sight of ,god is now defended and propagated by machine guns2 it becomes a felony to deny it2 one is already taxed in ,america to make good the lofty aspirations of ,poles1 ,jugo-,slavs and ,armenians4 ,in ,england there are signs of a further step4 ,an ,ehrlich or a ,koch1 miraculously at work there1 might be jailed for slitting the throat of a white rat3 all the lower animals1 too1 it appears1 are ,god's creatures4 ,so viewed1 a guinea-pig becomes the peer of a ,beethoven1 as a farm-hand is already the peer of a ,bach4 ,it is too late to turn back2 let us hope that the logic of it is quickly worked out to its unescapable conclusion4 ,once the pediculus vestimenti and the streptococcus are protected1 there will be a chance again1 it may be1 for the law of natural selection to achieve its benign purgation4 ,meanwhile1 ,mr4 ,muir cannot expect his ideas to get much attention4 ,a gaudy parade is passing and the populace is busy cheering4 ,nevertheless1 they were ideas worth playing with1 and they are now worth printing and pondering4 ,it seems to me that1 in more than one way1 they help to illuminate the central sthetic question--the problem as to the nature and function of artistic representation4 ,they start from ,nietzschean beginnings1 but they get further than ,nietzsche ever got4 ,his whole sthetic was hampered by the backwardness of psychology in his time4 ,he made many a brilliant guess1 but more than once he was hauled up rather sharply by his ignorance of the machinery of thought4 ,mr4 ,muir not only has ,nietzsche behind him2 he also has ,freud1 as he shows1 for example1 in #ade4 ,beyond him there is still a lot of room4 ,he will not stop the parade--but he will help the next man4 99 99 99 99 99 ,edwin ,muir was born in the ,orkney ,islands in #ahhg4 ,his father was a small crofter there4 ,when he was fourteen years old the family moved to ,glasgow4 ,within four years his father1 his mother and two older brothers died1 and he was forced to fend for himself4 ,he became a clerk in a ,glasgow office and remained there until very recently1 when he moved to ,london4 ,like all other young men with the itch to write1 he tried poetry before prose1 and his first verses were printed in ,the ,new ,age4 ,but his discovery of ,nietzsche1 at the age of twenty-two1 exerted such a powerful influence upon him that he soon turned to prose1 and five or six years later his first philosophical speculations were printed1 again in ,the ,new ,age4 ,they attracted attention and were republished in book-form1 in #aiah1 as ,we ,moderns4 ,at the last minute the author succumbed to modesty and put the nom de plume of ,edward ,moore upon his book4 ,but now1 in this ,american edition 7for which he has made certain revisions71 he returns to his own name4 ,h4 ,l4 ,,mencken4 ,i ,,the ,,old ,,age #a ,the ,advanced ,among the advanced one observes a strange contradiction3 the existence in one and the same person of confidence and enthusiasm about certain aspects of life along with diffidence and pessimism about life itself4 ,the advanced have made up their minds about all the problems of existence but not about the problem of existence4 ,in dealing with these problems they find their greatest happiness2 they are there sure-footed1 convinced and convincing4 ,but brought face to face with that other problem1 how helpless1 vacillating and spiritless are they6 ,what6 are propaganda1 reform1 and even revolution1 perchance1 with many of them simply their escape from their problem8 #b ,the ,intellectual ,coquettes ,an intellectual coquetry is one of the worst vices of this age4 ,from what does it arise8 ,from fear of a decision8 ,or from love of freedom8 ,it cannot be from the latter1 for to abstain from a choice is not freedom but irresponsibility4 ,to be free1 is1 on the contrary1 itself a choice1 a decision involving1 in its acceptance1 responsibility4 ,and it is responsibility that the intellectual coquettes fear3 rather than admit that one burden they will bear all the others of scepticism1 pessimism and impotence4 ,to accept a new gospel1 to live it out in all its ramifications1 is too troublesome1 too dangerous4 ,the average man in them pleads1 ,be prudent6 ,where may not this resolution lead you8 ,through what perils8 ,into what hells8 ,and so they remain in their prison house of doubt1 neither ,pagans nor ,christians1 neither ,theists nor ,atheists1 ignorant of the fact that they are slaves and that a decision would set them free4 ,but in the end the soul has its revenge1 for their coquetry destroys not only the power but the will to choose4 ,to flirt with dangerous ideas in a graceful manner3 that becomes their destiny4 ,for the intellectual coquette1 like other coquettes1 dislikes above everything passion--passion with its seriousness1 sincerity and--demand for a decision4 #c ,modern ,realism ,how crude and shallow is the whole theory of modern realism3 a theory of art by the average man for the average man6 ,it makes art intelligible by simplifying or popularizing it2 in short1 as ,nietzsche would say1 by vulgarizing it4 ,the average man perceives1 for instance1 that there is in great drama an element of representation4 ,come1 he says1 let us make the representation as thorough as possible6 ,let every detail of the original be reproduced6 ,let us have life as it is lived6 ,and when he has accomplished this1 when representation has become reproduction1 he is very well pleased and thinks how far he has advanced beyond the poor ,greeks4 ,but it is hardly so6 ,for the ,greeks did not aim at the reproduction but at the interpretation of life1 for which they would accept no symbol less noble than those ideal figures which move in the world of classical tragedy4 ,to the ,greeks1 indeed1 the world of art was precisely this world3 not a paltry1 sober and conscientious dexterity in the catching of the aspects of existence 7nothing so easy671 but a symbolizing of the deepest questions and enigmas of life--a thing infinitely more noble1 profound and subtle than realistic art4 ,the ,greeks would have demanded of realism1 ,why do you exist8 ,what noble end is served by the reproduction of ordinary existence8 ,are you not simply superfluous--and vilely smelling at that8 ,and realism could have given no reply1 for the truth is that realism is superfluous4 ,it is without a raison d'tre4 ,the average man1 however1 takes a second glance at classical tragedy and reaches a second discovery4 ,there is something enigmatical1 he finds1 behind the ,greek clearness of representation1 something unexplained2 in short1 a problem4 ,this problem1 however1 is not sufficiently clear4 ,let us state our problems clearly1 he cries6 ,let us have problems which can be recognized at a glance by every one6 ,let us write a play about the marriage question1 or bad-housing1 or the ,labour ,party6 ,but1 again1 the theory of the ,greeks1 at least before ,euripides1 was altogether different4 ,the problem in their tragedies was precisely not a problem which could be stated in a syllogism or solved in a treatise3 it was the eternal problem1 and it was not stated to be solved4 ,thus the ,moderns1 in their attempt to simplify art1 to understand it or misunderstand it--what does it matter which word is used8--have succeeded in destroying it4 ,the realistic and the problem drama alike are for the inartistic4 ,the first is drama without a raison d'tre1 the second is a raison d'tre without drama4 #d ,the ,modern ,tragic ,in realistic novels and dramas a new type of the tragic has been evolved4 ,it may be called tragedy without a meaning4 ,in classical and ,shakespearean tragedy1 the inevitable calamities incident to human existence were given significance and nobility by the poets4 ,that interpretive power of drama was1 indeed1 the essential thing to the great artists1 to whom representation was only a means4 ,but the realists with their shallow rationalizing of art have changed all that4 ,they have cut out the essential part of drama so as to make the other part more complete3 in short1 their tragedy is now simply tragedy in the newspaper sense4 ,and it is obvious that this kind of art is much easier to produce than tragedy in the grand style3 one has not even to read a meaning into it4 ,this absence of meaning1 however1 is itself1 in the long run1 made to appear the last word of an unfathomably ironical wisdom4 ,and in this light1 how much modern wisdom is understood6 ,the superficiality which can see only the surface here parades as the profundity which has dived into every abyss and found it empty4 ,no6 it is not tragedy but the modern tragedian who is without a raison d'tre6 #e ,realism as a ,symptom of ,poverty ,in an age in which the power of creation is weak1 men will choose the easiest forms3 those in which sustained elevation is not demanded and creation itself is eked out in various ways4 ,the world of our day has therefore as its characteristic production the realistic novel1 which in form is more loose1 in content and execution more unequal1 and in imaginative power less rich and inventive than poetic drama1 or any of the higher forms of literature4 ,if we deduct from the modern literary artist1 the diarist1 the sociologist1 the reporter1 and the collector of documents1 there is not much left4 ,for creation there is very little room in his works2 perhaps it is as well6 #f ,compliments and ,art ,the convention of gallantry observed by the sexes is the foundation of all refined understanding between them4 ,for in the mutual game of compliment it is the spiritual attitude and not the spoken word that matters4 ,there is truth in this attitude1 however unreal the words may seem3 a thousand times more truth than in the modern egalitarian1 go-as-you-please camaraderie of the sexes4 ,here there is truth neither in the spirit nor in the letter4 ,to be candid1 about this new convention there is something faintly fatuous3 the people who act thus are not subtle6 ,yet they are hardly to be blamed2 it is the age that is at fault4 ,there is no time for reflection upon men1 women and manners1 and consequently no refinement of understanding1 no form in the true sense4 ,we work so hard and have so little leisure that when we meet we are tired and wish to stretch our legs1 as ,nietzsche said4 ,it is far from our thoughts that a convention between men and women might be necessary2 we are not disposed to inquire why this convention arose2 it presents itself to us as something naively false2 and we have time only to be unconventional4 ,the ceremonious in manners arose from the recognition that between the sexes there must be distance--respect as well as intimacy--understanding4 ,the old gallantry enabled men and women to be intimate and distant at the same time3 it was the perfection of the art of manners4 ,indeed1 we can hardly have sufficient respect for this triumphant circumvention of a natural difficulty1 whereby it was made a source of actual pleasure4 ,but now distance and understanding have alike disappeared4 ,the moderns1 so obtuse have they become1 see here no difficulty at all1 consequently no need for manners3 brotherhood--comradeship--laziness has superseded that4 ,nothing is any longer understood2 but a convention means essentially that something is understood4 ,indeed1 it is already a gaucherie to explain the meaning of a good convention4 ,but what can one do8 ,against obtuseness the only weapon is obtuseness4 ,in literature this decline into bad taste and denseness is most clearly to be seen4 ,so incapable have readers become1 so resourceless writers1 that whatever is said now must be said right out2 sex must be called sex2 and no one has sufficient subtlety to suggest or to follow a suggestion4 ,hence1 ,realism4 ,an artist has to write exactly what he means3 the word must be word and nothing more4 ,but this is to misunderstand art4 ,for the words of the true artist undergo a transubstantiation and become flesh and blood1 even spirit4 ,his words are deeds--to say nothing of what he writes between his lines6 ,realism in art and comradeship between the sexes are two misunderstandings1 or1 rather1 two aspects of a misunderstanding4 ,and that misunderstanding is perhaps attributable to a lack of leisure8 ,and that to modern hurry8 ,and that to the industrial system8 #g ,a ,modern ,problem ,it has been observed again and again that as societies--forms of production1 of government1 and so on--become more complex1 the mastery of the individual over his destiny grows weaker4 ,in other words1 the more man subjugates nature1 the more of a slave he becomes4 ,the industrial system1 for instance1 which is the greatest modern example of man's subjugation of nature1 is at the same time the greatest modern example of man's enslavement4 ,what are we to think1 then8 ,is the problem a moral one1 and shall we say that a conquest of nature which is not preceded by a conquest of human nature is bound to be bad8 ,in a society which has not surpassed the phase of slavery does every addition to man's power over nature simply intensify the slavery8 ,or is the problem intellectual8 ,and when the intellect concentrates upon one branch of knowledge to the neglect of the other1 is the outcome bound to be the enslavement of the others8 ,for instance the nineteenth century devoted far more of its brains to industry than to politics--its politics1 indeed1 was merely the reflection of its industry--with the result that industry has now enslaved us all4 ,yes1 it has enslaved us all--not merely the wage-earners1 not merely the salariat6 ,in the old days the workman1 indeed1 was a slave1 but now the employer is a slave as well4 ,in this age1 therefore1 in which man appears as the helpless appendage of a machine too mighty for him1 it is natural that theories of ,determinism should flourish4 ,it is natural1 also1 that the will should become weak and discouraged1 and1 consequently1 that the power of creation should languish4 ,and so the world of art has withered and turned barren4 ,the artist needs above all things a sense of power2 it is out of the abundance of this sense that he creates4 ,but confronted with modern society1 that vast machine1 and surrounded by its hopeless mechanics and slaves1 he feels the sense dying within him2 nor does the evil cease there1 for along with the sense of power1 power itself dies4 ,well1 does not the moral become clearer and clearer8 ,if art and literature are to flourish again1 artists1 writers1 nay1 the whole community must regain the sense of power4 ,therefore1 economic emancipation first6 #h ,leisure and ,good ,things ,the very greatest danger confronts a people who renounce leisure3 that people will become shallow--just consider ,england6 ,for of all things noble it is hard to see the immediate utility3 patience and reverence are needed before one can see in them a meaning at all4 ,art1 literature and philosophy are not obvious goods3 at the first glance they appear even repellent3 alas1 then1 for them in an age of first glances6 ,in such an age1 it is true1 they will not altogether disappear4 ,something worse will happen4 ,they will be degraded1 made obvious1 misunderstood2 in one word1 popularized--the fate of our time4 ,society should be organized so as to give to its members the maximum of leisure2 thus would the dissemination of art and philosophy be made at least possible4 ,but society should at the same time provide for a privileged class of artists and philosophers1 with absolute leisure1 who would work only when the inner compulsion made them4 ,the second condition is at least as important as the first4 #i ,wanted3 ,a ,history of ,hurry ,is there a critic who wishes to be at once edifying and entertaining8 ,let him write a history of hurry in its relation to literature and art4 ,has literature decayed as hurry has intensified8 ,have standards of balance1 repose and leisured grace gradually shrunk since1 say1 the ,industrial ,revolution8 ,has the curtailment of the realm of literature1 its reduction from the ,romantic school to the ,victorian circle and from that to the ,decadent clique1 been due to the everstrengthening encroachment of hurry8 ,and has hurry now become finally triumphant so that our critics and even our artists and savants are nothing more than journalists8 ,for certainly they seem to be so4 ,these are questions to be investigated by our historian4 #aj ,the ,sex ,novel ,how did the vogue of the sex novel arise8 ,perhaps from the great attention which was in the last century given to the sciences of biology and physiology2 and perhaps1 more especially from the popularization of these sciences4 ,love was1 under the spell of science1 translated by the novelists into sex4 ,not the psychology1 but the physiology of love was found interesting3 with the result that for the production of a modern novel one qualification alone is now necessary3 a knowledge of the simple facts of physiology1 as the primer-writers say4 ,well1 what is the remedy for this8 ,not a denial of physiology3 those who have learned it cannot now erase it from their memory and become voluntarily ignorant4 ,no2 let1 rather1 the opposite course be taken6 ,let us popularize psychology as well6 #aa ,these ,advanced ,people ,a4 ,free ,love is all right in theory1 but all wrong in practice4 ,b4 ,on the contrary6 ,i think it is all right in practice1 but all wrong in theory4 #ab ,sex in ,literature ,in ,english literature1 until very modern times1 sex was treated only within the limits of a very well-understood convention4 ,from this convention the physiological was strictly excluded4 ,yet1 of our classical writers1 even in the most artificial periods1 it cannot be said that they did not understand sex4 ,no matter how unreal they might be in writing about ,love1 the physiological contingencies of ,love were unmistakably implied in their works1 but only1 it is true1 implied4 ,the moderns1 however1 saw in this treatment of ,love nothing but a convention1 a lie2 and they became impatient of the artificiality1 as if art could be anything but artificial6 ,to what was the change of attitude due8 ,not to a failure in the artistic convention3 that was perfectly sound4 ,no1 it was the reader who had failed3 a generation of readers had arisen who had not learnt the art of reading1 who did not understand reading as a cultured amateur of the eighteenth century1 for instance1 understood it4 ,literature was to this reader a document1 not an art4 ,he had no eye for what is written between the lines--for symbolism1 idealization1 literature4 ,and it was to satisfy him that the realistic school arose3 it arose1 indeed1 out of himself4 ,in the realist the modern reader has become writer3 the man who could not learn the art of reading has here essayed the more difficult art of writing--documentary art6 #ac ,history of a ,realist ,who will write a series of biographies of modern writers1 illustrating this thesis3 that they are nothing more than modern readers wielding a hasty pen8 ,such a set of memoirs would almost compensate us for having read the works of these writers4 ,how interesting1 for instance1 it would be to know how many years--surely it would be years8--they spent in trying to understand literature before they dedicated themselves to its service4 ,how interesting1 again1 to discover how many hours each day ,x1 the celebrated novelist1 devotes to contemplation1 how many to writing for the newspapers1 and how many to his present masterpiece4 ,what6 one hour's thought has actually preceded five hours' dictation6 ,this revelation is1 after all1 not so startling4 ,on second thought1 these memoirs seem superfluous2 we can read everything we wish to know of the moderns in their works4 ,yet1 for our better amusement1 will not some one write his one and only novel1 giving the true history of the novelist8 ,a novel against novels6 ,but for that we need a second ,cervantes1 yet how unlike the first6 ,for on this occasion it is not ,don ,quixote that must be satirized1 but ,sancho ,panza4 #ad ,novelists by ,habit ,all of us who read are novelists more or less nowadays3 that is to say1 we collect impressions1 analyse ourselves1 make a pother about sex1 and think that people1 once they are divorced1 live happily ever after4 ,the habit of reading novels has turned us into this6 ,when one of us becomes articulate1 however--in the form of a novel--he only makes explicit his kinship with the rest2 he proclaims to all the world that he is a mediocrity4 #ae ,the ,only ,course ,all the figures in this novel are paltry2 we despise them1 and1 if we were in danger of meeting them in real life1 would take steps to avoid them2 yet such is the author's adroitness that we are led on helplessly through the narrative1 through unspeakable sordidness of circumstance and soul1 hating ourselves and him1 and feeling nothing better than slaves4 ,to rouse our anxiety lest ,herbert lose five pounds1 or ,mabel find it impossible to get a new dress1 this is art1 this is modern art6 ,but to feel anxiety about such things is ignoble2 and to live in a sordid atmosphere1 even if it be of a book1 is the part of a slave4 ,and yet we cannot but admire4 ,for in this novel what subtlety in the treatment there must be overlying the fundamental vulgarity of the theme6 ,how is ,art1 which should make ,man free1 here transformed into a potent means for enslaving him6 ,it is impossible to yield oneself to the sway of a modern realist without a loss in one's self-respect4 ,to what is due this conspicuous absence of nobility in modern writers8 ,but is the question1 indeed1 worth the asking8 ,for to the artist and to him who would retain freedom of soul1 there is only one course with the paltry in literature--to avoid it4 #af ,the ,average ,man ,it is surely one of ,g4 ,k4 ,chesterton's paradoxes that he praises the average man4 ,for he is not himself an average man1 but a man of genius2 he does not write of the average man1 but of grotesques2 he is not read by the average man1 but by intellectuals and the nonconformist middle-class4 ,the true prophets of the average man are the popular realistic novelists4 ,for they write of him and for him--yes1 even when they write for themselves1 when they are serious artists4 ,who1 then1 but them should extol him8 ,it is their mtier4 #ag ,the ,new ,writers ,the fault of the most modern writers--and especially of the novelists--is not that they are too modern1 but that they are too traditional4 ,it is true1 they are not traditional in the historical manner of ,g4 ,k4 ,chesterton1 who wishes to destroy one tradition--the modern tradition--in order to get back to another--the medival4 ,to ,mr4 ,chesterton tradition is a matter of selection2 the dead tradition seems to him nobler than the living2 and1 deliberately1 therefore1 he would return to it4 ,the new writers1 however1 follow a tradition also1 though a much narrower one2 they1 too1 believe in the past1 but only1 alas1 in the immediate past2 they are slaves to the generation which preceded theirs4 ,in short1 that which is disgusting in them is their inability to rise high enough to see their little decade or two1 and to challenge it1 if they cannot from the standpoint of a nobler future1 then1 at least1 from that of the noblest past4 ,but how weak must a generation be which is not strong enough to challenge and supersede ,arnold ,bennett1 for instance4 #ah ,the ,modern ,reader ,what is it that the modern reader demands from those who write for him8 ,to be challenged1 and again to be challenged1 and evermore to be challenged--but on no account to be asked to accept a challenge1 on no account to be expected to take sides6 ,a seat at the tournament is all that he asks1 where he may watch the most sincere and intrepid spirits of his time waging their desperate battle and spilling their life blood upon the sand4 ,how he loves them when1 with high gesture1 they fling down their gauntlets and utter their blasphemies6 ,his heart then exults within him2 but1 why8 ,simply because he is a connoisseur2 simply because he collects gauntlets6 #ai ,the ,public ,of the modern writers who are in earnest1 ,mr4 ,chesterton has had the most ironical fate3 he has been read by the people who will never agree with him4 ,to the average man for whom he writes he is an intellectual made doubly inaccessible by his orthodoxy and his paradoxy4 ,it is the advanced1 his bte noire1 who read him1 admire him1 and--disagree with him4 #bj ,reader and ,writer ,the modern reader loves to be challenged4 ,the modern writer1 if he is in earnest1 however1 is bound to challenge him4 ,this is his greatest burden2 that he must fall a victim of the advanced idlers4 ,but one day he thinks he see a way of escape4 ,he has noticed that the reader desires not only to be challenged1 but to be able to understand the challenge at a glance4 ,and here he sees his advantage4 ,i shall write1 he says1 to himself1 in a manner beautiful1 exact1 and yet not easily understood2 so ,i shall throw off the intellectual coquettes and secure my audience of artists1 for my style is beautiful2 an audience of critics1 for my style is exact2 an audience of patient1 resolute1 conscientious intellects1 for my style is difficult4 ,this1 perhaps1 was the conscious practice of ,nietzsche4 ,but he did not foresee that1 for the benefit of the intellectual coquettes1 who must have hold of new thoughts by one end or another1 a host of popularizers would be born2 he did not reckon with the ,nietzscheans6 #ba ,popularity ,how amazingly popular he is4 ,even the man in the street reads him4 ,yes2 but it is because he has first read the man in the street4 #bb ,middle ,age's ,betrayals ,it is not easy to tell by a glance what is the character of a young man2 his soul has not yet etched itself clearly enough upon his body4 ,but one may read a middle-aged man's soul with perfect ease2 and not only his soul but his history4 ,for when a man has passed five-and-forty1 he looks--not what he is1 perhaps--but certainly what he has been4 ,if he has been invariably respectable1 he is now the very picture of respectability4 ,if he has been a man about town or a secret toper1 the fact is blazoned so clearly on his face that even a child can read it4 ,if he has studied1 his very walk1 to use a phrase of ,nietzsche's1 is learned4 ,as for the poet1 we know how terribly poetical he looks in middle age--poor devil6 ,well1 to every one of you1 ,i say1 ,beware6 #bc ,the ,novelists and the ,artist ,is it the modern novelists who are to be blamed for the degraded image of the artist which lives in the minds of the cultured populace8 ,turgenieff in ,on the ,eve1 and ,henry ,james in ,roderick ,hudson display the artist simply as a picturesque waster1 an oh so charming1 impulsive1 childlike1 nave waster4 ,but1 in doing so1 they surely confused the artist with the man of artistic temperament4 ,of the artistic temperament1 however1 the great artists had very often little or nothing--far less1 certainly1 than either ,shubin or ,roderick4 ,the great examples of last century1 the ,goethes1 ,ibsens1 and ,nietzsches1 knew that there were qualities more essential to them than temperament2 discipline1 for instance1 perseverance1 truth to themselves1 self-control4 ,how is it possible1 indeed1 without these virtues--virtues of the most difficult and heroic kind--for the artist to bring his gifts to maturity1 to become great8 ,his discipline to beauty must be as severe as the discipline of the saint to holiness4 ,and1 then1 how has his sensuousness been misconstrued and vulgarized2 and treated precisely1 indeed1 as if it were the licentiousness of a present-day ,tom ,jones6 ,that artists can be thought about in such a way proves only one thing1 namely1 in what poor esteem they are now held4 ,we need a new ideal of the artist2 or1 failing that1 an old one1 that of ,plato1 perhaps1 or of ,leonardo1 or of ,nietzsche4 #bd ,decadence and ,health ,it is in the decadent periods that the most triumphantly healthy men--one or two--appear4 ,the corrupt ,italy of the ,renaissance gave birth to ,leonardo2 the ,europe of ,gautier1 ,baudelaire and ,wilde produced ,nietzsche4 ,in decadent eras both disease and health become more self-conscious2 they are cultivated1 enhanced and refined4 ,it has been said that the best way to remain healthy is not to think of health4 ,but lack of self-consciousness speaks here4 ,perhaps the ,middle ,ages were as diseased as our own--only they did not know it6 ,is decadence nothing more than the symptom of a self-conscious age8 ,and is objectivity the antidote8 ,well1 we might believe this if we could renounce our faith that mankind will yet become healthy--if we could become optimists in the present-day sense6 #be ,art in ,modern ,society ,an object of beauty has in modern surroundings a dangerous seduction which it did not possess in less hideous eras4 ,in this is there to be found a contributory explanation of ,decadence--the decadent being one who feels the power of beauty intensely1 and the repulsion from his environment as intensely1 and who plunges into the enjoyment of beauty madly1 with abandonment8 ,in a society1 however1 which was not hideous as ours is1 and in which beauty was distributed widely over all the aspects and forms of existence1 the intoxication of beauty would not be felt with the same terrible intensity2 a beautiful object would be enjoyed simply as one among many lovely things4 ,in short1 it would be enjoyed in the manner of health1 not in that of sickness4 ,it is the contrast that is dangerous2 the aridity of modern life arouses a terrible thirst1 which is suddenly presented with the spectacle of a beauty unaccountable and awful2 and this produces a dislocation and convulsion of the very soul4 ,so that the present-day artist1 if he would retain his health--if he would remain an artist--must curb his very love of the beautiful1 and treat beauty1 when he meets it1 as he always does1 in the gutter1 a little cynically4 ,otherwise he will lose his wits1 and ,art will become his ,circe4 ,therefore1 mockery and hard laughter--alas1 that it must be so6 #bf ,art in ,industry ,in those wildernesses of dirt1 ugliness and obscenity1 our industrial towns1 there are usually art galleries1 where the daintiest and most beautiful things1 the flowers of ,greek statuary1 for instance1 bloom among the grime like a band of gods imprisoned in a slum4 ,the spectacle of art in such surroundings sometimes strikes us as being at once ludicrous and pathetic1 like something delicate and lovely sprawling in the gutter1 or an angel with a dirty face4 #bg ,conventions ,the revolt against conventions in art1 thought1 life and manners may be due to at least more than one cause4 ,it is usually ascribed to vitality which breaks through forms1 because it desires to be free4 ,but common sense tells us that more than two or three of our friends abjure convention for an altogether different reason--to be candid1 on account of a lack of vitality resulting in laziness and the inability to endure restraint of any kind4 ,and1 for the others1 we shall judge their vitality to be justified when they build new conventions worthy of observance1 instead of running their heads finally into illimitable space4 ,or does their strength not go just so far8 ,there is something suspicious about this vitality which cannot create3 it resembles impotence so much6 ,heaven preserve the moderns from their vitality6 #bh ,vitality ,when moderns talk of the vitality of their most lauded writer1 what they mean is finally the size of his muscles1 physical energy1 or1 at the most1 strong emotions2 not vigour of mind4 ,well1 let us on no account make the opposite mistake and revile the large muscle and energetic feelings3 they are admirable things4 ,let us point out1 however1 that vitality of emotion undisciplined by vitality of thought leads nowhere1 is often disruptive and cannot build4 ,but to build is our highest duty and our peculiar form of freedom--we who have realized that there is no freedom without power4 ,as for the old freedom--it is only the slaves who are not already tired of it4 #bi ,decadence ,the decisive thing1 determining whether an artist shall be major or minor1 is very often not artistic at all1 but moral4 ,yes1 though it shock our modern ears1 let this be proclaimed6 ,the more temperament an artist has1 the more character he requires to govern it1 to make it fruitful for him1 if he would not have it get beyond control1 and wreck both him and itself4 ,and1 consequently1 the great artists show1 as a rule1 less temperament than the minor2 they appear more self-contained and less artistic4 ,indeed1 they smile with the hint of irony at the merely artistic4 ,it is1 perhaps1 when the traditions of artistic morality and discipline have broken down1 when the temperament has1 therefore1 become unfettered and lawless1 that decadence in art is born4 ,the sincerity of the artist1 his chief virtue1 is gone--the sincerity which commands him to create only under the pressure of an artistic necessity1 which tells him1 in other words1 to produce nothing which is not genuine4 ,without sincerity1 severity and patience1 nothing great in art can be created4 ,and it is precisely in these virtues that the decadent is lacking4 ,a love of beauty is his only credential as an artist1 but1 undisciplined1 it degenerates very soon into a love of mere effect4 ,an effect of beauty at all costs1 whether it be the true beauty or not6 ,that becomes his object4 ,without a root in any soil1 he aspires to the condition of the water lily1 and1 in due time1 becomes a full-blown sthete4 ,is it because he is incapable of becoming anything else8 ,has he in despair grown artistic simply because he is not an artist8 ,is ,decadence the most subtle disguise of impotence8 ,and are decadents those who1 if they had submitted to an artistic discipline of sincerity1 would never have written at all8 ,of some of them this is true1 but of others it is not2 and in that lies the tragedy of ,decadence4 ,wilde himself was1 perhaps1 a decadent by misadventure2 for on occasion he could rise above decadence into sincerity4 ,the ,ballad of ,reading ,gaol proves that4 ,he was the victim of a bad sthetic morality1 to which1 it is true1 he had a predisposition4 ,and if this is true of him1 it is true1 also1 of his followers4 ,a baleful artistic ethic still rules1 demoralizing the young artist at the moment when he should be disciplining himself2 and turning1 perhaps1 some one with the potentiality of greatness into a minor artist4 ,by neglecting the harder virtues1 the decadents have made minor art inevitable and great art almost impossible4 ,the old tradition of artistic discipline must be regained1 then1 or a new and even more severe tradition inaugurated4 ,a text-book of morality for artists is now overdue4 ,when it has been written1 and the new discipline has been hailed and submitted to by the artists1 who can say if greatness may not again be possible8 #cj ,decadence ,again ,how is the dissolution of the tradition of artistic discipline to be explained8 ,to what cause is it to be traced8 ,perhaps to the more general dissolution of tradition which has taken place in modern times4 ,when theological dogmas and moral values are thrown into the melting-pot1 and the discipline of centuries is dissolved into anarchy1 it is natural that artistic traditions should perish along with them4 ,decadence follows free-thought3 it appears at the time when the old values lie deliquescent and the new values have not yet risen1 the dry land has not yet appeared4 ,but this does not happen always3 the old traditions of morality1 theology1 politics and industry are overthrown1 the beginnings of a new tradition appear tentatively1 everything fixed has vanished1 the wildest hopes and the most chilling despair are the common possession of one and the same generation--but1 throughout1 the artistic tradition is held securely and confidently1 it remains the one thing fixed in a world of dissolution4 ,then an art arises greater even than that of the eras of tradition4 ,the pathos of the dying and the inexpressible hope of the newly born find expression side by side2 all chains are broken1 and the world appears suddenly to be immeasurable4 ,is this what happened at the ,renaissance8 #ca ,wilde ,the refined degeneracy of ,oscar ,wilde might be explained on the assumption that he was at once over--and under--civilized3 he had acquired all the exquisite and superfluous without the necessary virtues4 ,these exquisite virtues are unfortunately dangerous to all but those who have become masters of the essential ones2 they are qualities of the body more than of the mind2 they are developments and embellishments of the shell of man4 ,in acquiring them1 ,wilde ministered to his body merely1 and1 as a consequence1 it became more and more powerful and subtle--far more powerful and subtle than his mind4 ,eventually this body--senses1 passions and appetite--actually became the intellectual principle in him1 of which his mind was merely a drugged and stupefied slave6 #cb ,wilde and the ,sensualists ,the so-called ,paganism of our time1 the movement towards sensualism of the followers of ,wilde1 is not an attempt1 however absurd1 to supersede ,christianity2 nor is it even in essence anti-,christian4 ,at the most it is a reaction--not a step beyond current religion into a new world of the spirit1 but a changing from one foot to the other1 a reliance on the senses for a little1 so that the over-laboured soul may rest4 ,and there is still much of ,christianity in this modern ,paganism4 ,its devotees are too deeply corrupted to be capable either of pure sensuousness or of pure spirituality4 ,they speak of ,christ like voluptuaries1 and of ,eros like penitents4 ,but it is impossible now to become a ,pagan3 one must remember ,ibsen's ,julian and take warning4 ,two thousand years of bad conscience1 of ,christian self-probing1 with its deepening of the soul1 cannot be disavowed1 forgotten1 unlived4 ,for ,paganism a simpler spirit1 mind and sensuousness are required than we can reproduce4 ,we cannot feel1 we cannot think1 above all1 we cannot feel without thinking of our feelings1 as the ,pagans did4 ,our modern desire to take out our soul and look at it separates us from the nave classic sensuousness4 ,what1 then1 does modern sensualism mean8 ,what satisfaction does it bring to those1 by no means few in number1 its followers8 ,a respite1 an escapade1 a holiday from ,christianity1 from the inevitable4 ,for ,christianity is assumed by them to be the inevitable1 and it fills them with the loathing which is evoked by the enforced contemplation of things tyrannical and permanent4 ,to escape from it they plunge madly into sensuality as into a sea of redemption4 ,but the disgust which drives them there will eventually drive them forth again--into asceticism and the denial of the senses4 ,christianity will then appear stronger than ever1 having been purged of its uncleanness4 ,yes1 the sensualists of our time are the best unconscious friends of ,christianity1 its saviours1 who have taken its sins upon their shoulders4 ,there still remain the few who do not assume ,christianity to be inevitable1 who desire1 no matter how hopeless the fight may seem1 to surmount it1 and who see that men have played too long the game of reaction4 ,to cure the senses by the soul and the soul by the senses seems to them a creed for invalids4 ,and1 therefore1 that against which1 above all1 they guard1 is a mere relapse into sensualism4 ,not by fleeing from ,christianity do they hope to reach their goal2 but by understanding it1 perhaps by seeing through it1 certainly by benefiting in so far as they can by it1 and1 finally1 emancipating themselves from it4 ,they know that the soil no longer exists out of which grew the flower of ,paganism1 and that they must pass through ,christianity if they would reach a new sensuality and a new spirituality4 ,but their motto is1 ,spirituality first1 and1 after that1 only as much sensuality as our spirituality can govern6 ,they hold that as men become more spiritual they may safely become more sensual2 but that1 to the man without spirit1 sensuality and asceticism are alike an indulgence and a curse4 ,that the spirit should rule--such is their desire2 but it must rule as a constitutional governor1 not as an arbitrary tyrant4 ,for the senses1 too1 as ,heine said1 have their rights4 #cc ,arnold ,going ,down the ,hill ,one section of the realist school--that represented by ,bennett and ,john ,galsworthy--may be described as a reaction from asceticism4 ,men had become tired of experiencing ,life only in its selected and costly sensations1 and sought an escape from sensations1 sought the ordinary4 ,but another section of the school--,george ,moore1 for example--was merely a bad translation of stheticism4 ,equally tired of the exquisite1 already having sampled all that luxury in sensation could provide1 the artists now sought new sensations--and nothing else--in the squalid4 ,it was the rle of the sthetes to go downhill gracefully1 but when they turned realists they ceased even to do that4 ,they went downhill sans art4 ,yet1 in doing so1 did they not rob stheticism of its seductiveness8 ,and should we not1 therefore1 feel grateful to them8 ,alas1 no2 for to the taste of this age1 grace and art have little fascination3 it is the heavy1 unlovely and sordid that seduces4 ,to disfigure stheticism was to popularize it4 ,and now the very man in the street is--artistically speaking--corrupted3 a calamity second in importance only to the corruption of the artists and thinkers4 #cd ,pater and the sthetes ,how much of ,walter ,pater's exclusiveness and reclusiveness was a revulsion from the ugliness of his time--an ugliness which he was not strong enough to contemplate1 far less to fight--it is hard to say4 ,perhaps his phase of the ,decadence may be defined as largely a reaction against industrialism1 just as that of ,wilde may be defined as largely a reaction against ,christianity3 but1 in the former case as in the latter1 that against which the reaction was made was assumed to be permanent4 ,indeed1 by escaping from industrialism instead of fighting it1 ,pater and his followers made its persistence only a little more secure4 ,it is true1 there are excuses enough to palliate their weakness3 the delicateness of their own nerves and senses1 making them peculiarly liable to suffering1 the ugliness and apparent invulnerability of industrialism1 the beauty and repose of the world of art wherein they might take refuge and be happy4 ,art as forgetfulness1 art as ,lethe1 the seduction of that cry was strong6 ,but to yield to it was none the less unforgivable3 it was an act traitorous not only to society but to art itself4 ,for what was the confession underlying it8 ,that the society of today and of tomorrow is1 and must be1 barren2 that no great art can hereafter be produced2 that there is nothing left but to enjoy what has been accomplished6 ,against that presumption1 not the ,philistines but the great artists will cry as the last word of ,nihilism4 ,pater's creed marks1 therefore1 a degradation of the conception of art4 ,art as something exclusive1 fragile and a little odd1 the occupation of a few sthetic eccentrics--this is the most pitiable caricature6 ,to make themselves understood by one another1 this little clique invented a jargon of their own2 in this jargon ,pater's books are written1 and not only his1 but those of his followers to this day4 ,it is a style lacking1 above all1 in good taste2 it very easily drops into absurdity2 indeed1 it is always on the verge of absurdity4 ,it has no masculinity1 no hardness2 and it is meant to be read by people a little insincerely sthetic1 who are conscious that they are open to ridicule1 and who are accordingly indulgent to the ridiculous2 the ,fabians of art4 ,to admire ,pater's style1 it is necessary first to put oneself into the proper attitude4 #ce ,creator and sthete ,the true creators and the mere sthetes agree in this1 that they are not realists4 ,neither of them copies existence in its external details3 wherein do they differ8 ,in that the creators write of certain realities behind life1 and the sthetes--of the words standing for these realities4 #cf ,hypocrisy of ,words ,the sthetes1 and ,pater and ,wilde in particular1 made a cult of the use of decorative words4 ,they demanded1 not that a word should be true1 nor even that it should be true and pretty at the same time1 but simply that it should be pretty4 ,it cannot be denied that writers here and there before them had been guilty of using a fine word where a common one was most honest2 but this had been generally regarded as a forgiveable1 artistic weakness4 ,wilde and his followers1 however1 chose exquisite words systematically1 in conformity to an artistic dogma1 and held that literature consisted in doing nothing else4 ,and that was dangerous2 for truth was thereby banished from the realm of diction and a hypocrisy of words arose4 ,in short1 language no longer grasped at realities1 and literature ceased to express any thing at all1 except a writer's taste in words4 #cg ,the ,average ,man ,in this welter of dissolving values1 the intellectuals of our time find themselves struggling1 and liable at any moment to be engulfed4 ,a few of them1 however1 have snatched at something which1 in the prevailing deliquescence1 appears to be solid--the average man4 ,encamped upon him1 they have won back sanity and happiness4 ,but their act is nevertheless simply a reaction2 here the real problem has not yet been faced6 ,what is it that makes the average man more sane and happy than the modern man8 ,the possession of dogmas1 says ,g4 ,k4 ,chesterton2 let us therefore have dogmas6 ,but1 alas1 for them he goes back and not forward4 ,and not only back1 but back to the very dogmas against which modern thought1 and ,decadence with it1 are a reaction1 nay1 the inevitable reaction4 ,what6 has ,mr4 ,chesterton1 then1 postponed the solution of the problem8 ,and on the heels of his remedy does there tread the old disease over again8 ,perhaps it is so4 ,the acceptance of the old dogmas will be followed by a new reaction from them1 a new disintegration of values therefore1 and a new ,decadence4 ,the hands of the clock can be put back1 it is true2 but they will eventually reach the time when the hour shall strike again for the solution of the modern problem4 ,and that is the criticism which modern men must pass upon ,mr4 ,chesterton2 that he interposed in the course of their malady to bring relief with a remedy which was not a remedy4 ,the modern problem should have been worked out to a new solution1 to its own solution4 ,instead of going back to the old dogmas1 we should have strained on towards the new4 ,and if1 in this generation1 the new dogmas are still out of sight1 if we have meantime to live our lives without peace or stability1 does it matter so very much8 ,to do so is1 perhaps1 our allotted task4 ,and as sacrifices to the future we justify our very fruitlessness1 our very modernity6 ,,ii ,,original ,,sin #ch ,original ,sin ,original ,sin and the ,future are essentially irreconcilable conceptions4 ,the believer in the future looks upon humanity as plastic3 the good and the bad in man are not fixed quantities1 always1 in every age1 past and future1 to be found in the same proportions3 an elevation of the type man is1 therefore1 possible4 ,but the believer in ,original ,sin regards mankind as that in which--the less said about the good1 the better--there is1 at any rate1 a fixed substratum of the bad4 ,and that can never be lessened1 never weakened1 never conquered4 ,therefore1 man has to fight constantly to escape the menace of an ever-present defeat4 ,a battle in which victory is impossible2 a contest in which man has to climb continually in order not to fall lower2 existence as the tread mill3 that is what is meant by ,original ,sin4 ,and as such it is the great enemy of the ,future1 the believers in which hold that there is not this metaphysical drag4 ,but it is more4 ,at all things aspiring it sets the tongue in the cheek1 gladly provides a caricature for them1 and becomes their ,sancho ,panza4 ,to the great man it says1 through the mouths of its chosen apostles1 the average men1 ,what matter how high you climb6 ,this load which you carry even as we will bring you back to us at last4 ,and the higher you climb the greater will be your fall4 ,humanity cannot rise above its own level4 ,and therefore1 humility1 equality1 radicalism1 comradeship in sin--the ideas of ,christianity6 #ci ,again ,distrust of the future springs from the same root as distrust of great men4 ,it derives from the belief in the average man1 which derives from the belief in ,original ,sin4 ,the egalitarian sentiment strives always to become unconditional4 ,it claims not only that all men are equal1 but that the men who live now are no more than the equals of those who lived one1 or five1 thousand years ago1 and no less than the equals of those who will live in another one1 or five1 thousand years4 ,and it desires that this should be so3 its jealousy embraces not only the living1 but the dead and the unborn4 #dj ,again ,society is a conspiracy1 said ,emerson1 against the great man4 ,and to blast him utterly in the centre of his being1 it invented ,original ,sin4 ,is ,original ,sin1 then1 a theological dogma or a political device8 #da ,equality ,is equality1 in truth1 a generous dogma8 ,does it express1 as every one assumes1 the solidarity of men in their higher attributes8 ,it is time to question this1 and to ask if inequality be not the more noble and generous belief4 ,for1 surely1 it is in their nobler qualities that men are most unequal4 ,it was not in his genius that ,shakespeare was only the equal1 for instance1 of his commentators2 it was in the groundwork of his nature1 in those feelings and desires without which he would not have been a man at all1 in the things which made him human1 but which did not make him ,shakespeare3 in a word1 in that which is for us of no significance4 ,equality in the common part of man's nature1 equality in sin1 equality before ,god--it is the same thing--that is the only equality which can be admitted4 ,and if its admission is insisted upon by apologists for ,christianity1 that is because to the common part of man's nature they give so much importance1 because they are believers in ,original ,sin4 ,in their equality there is accordingly more malice than generosity4 ,the belief that no one is other than themselves1 the will that no one shall be other than themselves--there is nothing generous in that belief and that will4 ,for man1 according to them1 is guilty from the womb4 ,and what1 then1 is equality but the infinitely consoling consciousness of tainted creatures that every one on this earth is tainted8 ,the believer in ,original ,sin will1 of course1 deny this1 and say that in his philosophy men are equals also in their higher rle as sons of ,god4 ,but is this so8 ,is salvation1 like sin1 common to all men8 ,is it not1 on the contrary1 something conferred as the reward of a belief and a choice--a belief and a choice which an ,atheist1 for instance1 simply cannot embrace8 ,so that here1 touching the highest part of men1 their soul1 there is introduced1 by ,christianity itself1 a distinction1 an inequality--the distinction1 the inequality between the saved and the lost4 ,men are equal inasmuch as they are all damned1 but they are not equal inasmuch as they are not all redeemed4 ,gazing at man1 however1 no longer through the eyes of the serpent1 shall we not be bound to find1 if we look high enough1 distinction1 superiority1 inferiority1 valuation8 ,the dogma of equality is itself a device to evade valuation4 ,for valuation is difficult1 and demands generosity for its exercise4 ,to recognize that one is greater than you1 and cheerfully to acknowledge it2 to see that another is less than you1 and to treat the inferiority as a trifling thing1 that is difficult1 that requires generosity4 ,but one who believes in inequality will always be looking for greatness in others2 his eye1 habituated to the contemplation of lofty things1 will become subtle in the detection of concealed nobility2 while to the ignoble he will give only a glance--and is it not good1 where one may not help1 to pass on the other side8 ,the egalitarians will cry that it is ungenerous to believe that some men are vile2 but it is a strange generosity which would persuade us with them that all men are vile4 ,let us be frank4 ,to those who believe in the future1 inequality is a holy thing2 their pledge that greatness shall not disappear from the earth2 the rainbow assuring them that ,man shall not go down beneath the vast tide of mankind4 ,all great men are to them at once forerunners and sacrifices2 the imperfect forms which the ,future has shattered in trying to incarnate itself2 the sublime ruins of future greatness4 #db ,if ,men ,were ,equal ,if men had been equal at the beginning1 they would never have risen above the savage4 ,for in absolute equality even the concept of greatness could not have come into being4 ,inequality is the source of all advancement4 #dc ,the ,fall of ,man ,in very early times men must have had a deep sense of the tragicality of existence3 life was then so full of pain2 death1 as a rule1 so sudden and unforeseen1 and the world generally so beset with terrors4 ,the few who were fortunate enough to escape violent death had yet to toil incessantly to retain a footing on this unkind star4 ,life would1 accordingly1 appear to them in the most sombre tones and colours4 ,and it was to explain this human misfortune1 and not sin at all1 that the whole fable of ,adam and ,eve and the ,fall was invented4 ,the doctrine of ,original ,sin was simply an interpretation which was afterwards read into the story1 an interpretation1 perhaps1 as arbitrary as the orthodox interpretation of the ,song of ,songs4 ,how would the fable arise8 ,well1 a primitive poet one day in a fit of melancholy made the whole thing up4 ,out of his misery his desires created for him an imaginary state1 its opposite1 the ,garden of ,eden4 ,but this state being created1 the problem arose1 ,how did ,man fall from it8 ,and the ,tree was brought in4 ,but to the nave1 untheological poet1 this tree had nothing to do with metaphysics or with sin1 the child of metaphysics4 ,it was simply a magical tree1 and if ,man ate of the fruit of it1 something terrible would happen to him4 ,the ,fall of ,man was a mystery to the poet1 which he did not rationalize or theologize4 ,well1 ,man succumbed to curiosity1 and pain and misfortune befell the human race4 ,but we must not assume in the modern manner that with the eating of the fruit early man associated any idea of guilt4 ,rather the contrary2 he regarded the act simply as unfortunate1 just as at the present day we regard as unfortunate the foolish princess in some fairy tale4 ,so the ,fall was not to him a crime1 branding all mankind with a metaphysical stigma4 ,that conception came much later1 when the conscience had become deeper1 more subtle and more neurotic2 when individualism had been introduced into morality4 ,and at that time1 too1 the ideal of the ,redeemer became vitiated4 ,early man1 if he did envisage a ,redeemer1 envisaged him as one who would set him back in the ,garden of ,eden again1 in the literal1 terrestrial ,garden of ,eden1 be it understood3 theology had not yet been etherealized4 ,and this ,redeemer would redeem all men3 the distinction of the individual came afterwards4 ,it was not until later1 too1 that this ideal was interpreted1 and1 as a concession to the conscience1 salvation was made a conditional thing3 the reward of those who were successful in a competition in credulity1 in which the first prize went to the most simple1 most stupid4 ,the guilt now implicated in the ,fall was not purged away from all men by the ,redeemer1 but only from such as would accept it4 ,and1 lastly1 with the passing of ,jesus1 the redemption was still further de-actualized4 ,it was found that acceptance of the ,redeemer did not reinstate ,man in an earthly ,garden3 paradise was1 therefore1 drawn on the invisible wires of theology into the inaccessible heavens4 ,salvation lay at the other side of the grave1 and there it was safe from assault4 ,nevertheless1 what our primitive poet meant by the ,fall and the ,redemption was probably something entirely different4 ,the ,fall to him was the fall into misfortune1 not into sin3 the ,redemption to him was the redemption from misfortune1 not from sin4 ,and his ,redeemer would be1 therefore--whom8 ,perhaps it is impossible for us to imagine the nature of such a being4 ,this is not an interpretation1 but an attempted explanation of the story of the ,fall4 #dd ,interpretations ,how inexhaustible is myth6 ,in the story of the ,fall is a meaning for every age and every creed4 ,the interpretation called ,original ,sin is only one of a thousand1 and not the greatest of them4 ,let us dip our bucket into the well4 ,the tree of the knowledge of good and evil--that was the tree of morality6 ,and morality was then the original sin8 ,and through it ,man lost his innocence8 ,the antithesis of morality and innocence is as old as the world4 ,and if we are to capture innocence again1 if the world is to become sthetically acceptable to us1 we must dispense more and more with morality and limit its domain4 ,this1 one desperate glance into the depths of the myth tells us4 ,instinct is upheld in it against isolated reason and exterior law4 ,detached1 abstract ,reason brought sin into the world1 but ,instinct1 which is fundamentally ,love1 ,creation1 ,will to ,power1 is forever innocent1 beyond good and evil4 ,it was when ,reason1 no longer the sagacity of ,instinct1 no longer the eyes of ,love1 became its opponent and oppressor1 that morality arose and ,man fell4 ,or to take another guess1 granted we read ,original ,sin in the ,fall1 must we not read there1 also1 the way to get rid of it8 ,if by ,original ,sin ,man fell1 then by renouncing it let him arise again4 ,but how renounce it8 ,what6 ,cannot ,man renounce a metaphor8 ,yet how powerful is metaphor6 ,man is ruled by metaphor4 ,the gods were nothing but that1 some sublime1 some terrible1 some lovely1 all metaphors1 ,jehovah1 ,moloch1 ,apollo1 ,eros4 ,life is now stained through and through with metaphor4 ,and there are further transfigurations still possible6 ,yet we would not destroy the beauty already starring ,life's skies1 the lovely hues lent by ,aphrodite1 and ,artemis1 and ,dionysos1 or the sublime colours of ,jehovah and ,thor4 ,but the heavy disfiguring blot tarnishing all1 ,love1 ,innocence1 ,ecstasy1 ,wrath1 that we would rather altogether extirpate and annul4 ,original ,sin we would cut off as a disfigurement and disease of ,life4 ,or1 again1 may not the myth be an attempt to glorify ,man and to clothe him with a sad splendour4 ,and not ,original ,sin1 but ,original ,innocence is the true reading of the fable8 ,its raison d'tre is the ,garden of ,eden1 not the ,fall8 ,to glorify ,humanity at its source it set there a ,superman4 ,the fall from innocence--that was the fall from the ,superman into ,man4 ,and how1 then1 is ,man to be redeemed8 ,by the return of the ,superman6 ,let that be our reading of the myth6 #de ,the ,use of ,myth ,in the early world myth was used to dignify ,man by idealizing his origin4 ,henceforward it must be used to dignify him by idealizing his goal4 ,that is the task of the poets and artists4 #df ,before the ,fall ,innocence is the morality of the instincts4 ,original ,sin--that was war upon the instincts1 morality become abstract1 separate1 self-centred1 accusing and tyrannical4 ,this self-consciousness of morality1 this disruption in the nature of ,man1 was the ,fall4 #dg ,beyond ,original ,sin ,how far is ,man still from his goal8 ,how sexual1 foul in word and thought1 naively hedonistic6 ,how little of spirit is in him6 ,how clumsily his mind struggles in the darkness6 ,how far he is still from his goal6--,this is a cry which the believer in ,original ,sin cannot understand1 because he accepts all this imperfection as inevitable1 as the baleful heritage of ,man1 from which he cannot escape4 ,the feeling of pure joy in life1 the feeling that ,life is a sacrament--that also is forever denied to the believer in ,original ,sin4 ,for ,life is not a sacrament to him1 but a sin of which joy itself is only an aggravation4 #dh ,the ,eternal ,bluestocking ,the bluestocking is as old as mankind4 ,her original was ,eve1 the first dabbler in moral philosophy4 #di ,the ,sin of ,intellectualism ,the first sin1 the original sin was that of the intellectuals4 ,the knowledge of ,good and ,evil was not an instantaneous illumination2 it was the result of long experiment and analysis3 the apple took perhaps hundreds of years to eat6 ,before that1 in the happy day of innocence1 ,good and ,evil were not1 for instinct and morality were one and not twain4 ,as time passed1 however1 the physically lazy1 who had been from the beginning1 became weaker and wiser4 ,enforced contemplation1 the contemplation of those who were not strong enough to hunt or to labour1 made them more subtle than their simple brethren2 they formed themselves into a priesthood1 and created a theology4 ,in these priests instinct was not strong3 they were invalids with powerful reason4 ,but they had the lust for power2 they wished to conquer by means of their reason2 therefore1 they said to themselves1 belittle instinct1 tyrannize over instinct1 discover an absolute good and an absolute evil1 become moral4 ,morality1 which had in the days of innocence been unconscious1 the harmony of the instincts1 was now given a separate existence4 ,the cry was morality against the instincts4 ,thus triumphed the priests1 the intellectuals1 by means of their reason4 ,original ,sin was their sin--the result of the analysis by which they had separated morality and the instincts4 ,if we are to speak of ,original ,sin at all1 let it be in this manner4 #ej ,once ,more ,the belief in ,original ,sin--that was itself ,man's original sin4 #ea ,apropos ,gautier ,he had just read ,mlle4 de ,maupin1 ,what seduction there is still for ,man in the senses6 he exclaimed4 ,how much more of an animal than a spirit he must be to be charmed and enslaved by this book6 ,yet1 what ground had he to conclude that because the sensual intoxicates ,man1 therefore ,man is more sensual than spiritual8 ,for we are most fatally attracted by what is most alien to us4 #eb ,psychology of the ,humble ,there is something very nave in those who speak of humility as a certain good and of pride as a proven evil4 ,in the first place these are not opposites at all2 there are a hundred kinds of both1 and humility is sometimes simply a refined form of pride4 ,humility may be prudence1 or good taste1 or timidity1 or a concealment1 or a sermon1 or a snub4 ,how much of it1 for instance1 is simple prudence8 ,is not this1 indeed1 its chief utility1 that it saves men from the dangers which accompany pride8 ,on the day on which some one discovered that ,pride goeth before a fall1 humility became no mean virtue4 ,for if one become the servant and proclaim himself the least of all1 how can he still fall8 ,yet if he does it is a fall into greater humility1 and his virtue only shows the brighter4 ,this is the sagacity of the humble1 that they turn even ignominy to their glorification4 ,humility is most commonly used with a different meaning1 however4 ,there are people who wish to be anonymous and uniform1 and people who desire to be personal and distinct4 ,or1 more exactly1 it is their instincts that seek these ends4 ,the first are humble in the fundamental sense that they are instinctively so2 the latter are proud in the same sense4 ,humility1 then1 is the desire to be as others are and to escape notice2 and this desire can only be realized in conformity4 ,it is true1 people become conceited after a while about their very conformity1 and would be wounded in their vanity if they failed to comply with fashion2 but vanity and humility are not incompatible4 ,pride1 however1 is something much more subtle4 ,the nave1 unconditional contemners of pride1 who plead with men to cast it out1 have certainly no idea what would happen if they were obeyed4 ,for pride is the condition of all fruitful action4 ,this thought must be consciously or subconsciously present in the doer1 ,what ,i do is of value6 ,i am capable of doing a thing which is worth doing6 ,the ,christian1 it is true1 still acts1 though he is convinced that all action is sinful and of little worth4 ,but it is only his mind that is convinced3 his instincts are by no means persuaded of the truth of this6 ,for though in the conscious there may be self-doubt1 in the unconscious there must be pride1 or actions would not be performed at all4 ,moreover1 in all those qualities which are personal and not common--in personality--pride is an essential ingredient4 ,the pronoun ,i is itself an affirmation of pride4 ,the feeling1 ,this is myself1 this quality is my quality1 by possessing it ,i am different from you1 these things constitute my personality and are me3 what a nave assumption of the valuableness of these qualities do we have there1 how much pride is there in that unconscious confession6 ,and without this instinctive pride1 these qualities1 personality could never have been possible4 ,in the heart of all distinct1 valuable and heroic things1 pride lies coiled4 ,yes1 even in the heart of humility1 of the most refined1 spiritual humility4 ,for such humility is not a conformity2 it separates and individualizes its possessor as effectually as pride could2 it takes its own path and not that of the crowd2 and so its source must be in an inward sense of worth1 of independence3 it is a form of pride4 ,but pride is so closely woven into life that to wound it is to wound life2 to abolish it1 if that were possible1 would be to abolish life4 ,well do its subtler defamers know that6 ,and when they shoot their arrows at pride1 it is ,life they hope to hit4 #ec ,les ,humbles ,humility is the chief virtue1 said a humble man4 ,then are you the vainest man1 said his friend1 for you are renowned for your humility4 ,good taste demands from writers who praise humility a little aggressiveness and dogmatism1 lest they be taken for humble1 and1 therefore1 proud4 ,on the other hand1 if humility is the chief virtue1 it is immoral not to practise it4 ,and1 therefore1 one should praise humility1 and practise it8 ,or praise it and not practise it8 ,or not praise it and practise it8 ,there is contradiction in every course4 ,that is the worst of believing in paradoxical virtues6 #ed ,against the ,ostentatiously ,humble ,he who is truly humble conceals even his humility4 #ee ,the ,pessimists ,in pessimistic valuations of ,life1 the alternative contemplated is generally not between ,life and ,death1 but between different types of ,life4 ,the real goal of ,schopenhauerism is not the extinction of life1 for death is a perfectly normal aspect of existence1 and ,life would not be denied even if death became universal4 ,in order to deny ,life and to triumph over it1 the pessimist must continue at least to exist1 in a sort of death in life3 he must be dead1 but he must also know it4 ,that is the goal of ,schopenhauerism2 perhaps not so difficult1 perhaps frequently attained6 ,they have not enough life even to die1 said ,nietzsche4 #ef ,sickness and ,health ,some men have such unconquerable faith in ,life that they defy their very maladies1 creating out of them forms of ecstasy3 that is their way of triumphing over them4 ,perhaps some poetry1 certainly not a little religion has sprung from this4 ,in religions defaming the senses and enjoining asceticism1 or1 in other words1 a lowering of vitality1 the chronic sufferers affirm ,life in their own way2 for sickness is their life3 their praise of sickness is their praise of ,life4 ,and if they sometimes morbidly invite death1 that is because death is nothing but another form of experience1 of ,life4 ,to the sick1 if they are to retain self-respect and pride1 these doctrines are perhaps the best possible2 it is only to the healthy that they are noxious4 ,for the healthy who are converted by them1 become sick through them1 yet not so sick as to find comfort in them4 ,the aspiration after an ascetic life contends in these men with their old health1 their desire to live fully1 and causes untold perplexities and conflicts2 leaving them at last with nothing but a despairing desire for release4 ,thus1 a religion of consolation becomes for the strong a ,will to ,death--the very opposite of that which it was to those who created it4 #eg ,the ,pride of the ,sterile ,ecclesiastical1 ceremonious humility is the pride of those who cannot create or initiate1 either because they are sterile1 or because the obstacles in their way are too great4 ,their pride is centred1 not on what they can do1 but on what they can endure4 ,the anchorite goes into the wilderness1 perhaps rather to get his background than to escape attention1 and there imposes upon himself the most difficult and loathsome tasks1 enduring not only outward penances1 fasting and goading of the flesh1 but such inward convulsions1 portents and horrors1 as the soul of man has by no other means experienced4 ,here1 in endurance1 is his power1 and here1 therefore1 is his pride3 the poor ,atlas1 who does not remove1 but supports mountains1 and these of his own making6 ,men who have the power to create but are at the same time extremely timid belong to this class4 ,rather than venture outside themselves they will do violence to their own nature4 ,the forces which in creation would have been liberated are pent within them and cause untold restlessness1 uneasiness and pain4 ,religions which stigmatize self-expression1 separating the individual into an outward and an inward and raising a barrier between the two1 encourage the growth of this type of man4 ,these religions themselves have their roots in a timidity1 a fear of pain4 ,for self-expression is by no means painless2 it is1 on the contrary1 a great cause of suffering4 ,essentially its outcome is strife1 the clash of egos3 ,tragedy is the great recognition in ,art of this truth4 ,christianity saw the suffering which conflict brought with it1 said it was altogether evil1 and sought to abolish it4 ,but a law of ,life cannot be abolished3 strife1 driven from the world of outward event1 retreated into the very core of man1 and there became baleful1 indeed1 disintegrating1 and subversive4 ,the early ,christians did not see that men would suffer more from that inward psychic conflict than from the other4 ,it was the ,greeks who elevated conflict to an honourable position in their outward actions2 with them1 as ,nietzsche said1 there was no distinction between the outward and inward2 they lived completely and died once4 ,but the ,christians1 to use the words of ,st4 ,paul1 died daily4 ,how true was that of those proudly humble anchorites6 ,what a light it throws upon their sternly endured convulsions of the soul6 ,in the end1 ,death itself came no doubt to many of them as a relief from this terribly protracted dying4 ,perhaps one thing1 however1 made their lives bearable and even enjoyable--the power of the soul to plumb its own sufferings and capacity for endurance4 ,psychology arose first among the ecclesiastically humble men4 ,well1 let us count up our gains and losses4 ,spiritual humility1 wherever it has spread1 has certainly weakened the expression of ,life3 for it has weakened man by introducing within him a disrupting conflict4 ,but it has also made ,life subtler and deeper2 it has enlarged the inward world of man1 even if it has straitened the world outside4 ,so that when we return--as we must--to the ,pagan ideal of expression1 our works shall be richer than those of the ,pagans1 for man has now more to express4 #eh ,when ,pride is ,necessary ,perhaps in all great undertakings into which uncertainty enters pride is necessary4 ,in the ,elizabethan age1 our most productive and adventurous age1 pride was at its zenith4 ,was that pride the necessary condition of that productiveness8 ,would the poets1 the thinkers and the discoverers have attempted what they did attempt1 had they been humble men8 ,what is needed is more enquiry3 a new psychology1 and1 above all1 a new history of pride4 #ei ,humility and the ,artists ,there is one man1 at any rate1 who has always owed more to pride than to humility--the artist4 ,whether it be in himself1 where it is almost the condition of productiveness1 or in others1 where it is the cause of all actions and movements sthetically agreeable1 ,pride is his great benefactor4 ,all artists are proud1 but not all have the good conscience of their pride4 ,in their thoughts they permit themselves to be persuaded too much by the theologians2 they have not enough free spirit to say1 ,pride is my atmosphere1 in which ,i create4 ,i do not choose to refuse my atmosphere4 ,but if pride were banished even from the remainder of ,life1 how poor would the artists be left6 ,for every gesture that is beautiful1 all free1 spirited1 swift movement and all noble repose have in them pride4 ,humility uglifies1 except1 indeed1 the humility which is a form of pride2 that has a sublimity of its own4 ,even the ,christian ,church--the ,church of the humble--had to make its ceremonies magnificent to make itself sthetically presentable2 without its magnificence it would have been an impossible institution4 ,humility1 to be supportable1 must have in it an admixture of pride4 ,that gives it standing4 ,it was ,his subtle pride that communicated to the humility of ,jesus its gracious charm4 ,poetic tragedy and pride are profoundly associated4 ,no event is tragic which has not arisen out of pride1 and has not been borne proudly3 the ,greeks knew that4 ,but1 as well1 is not pride at times laughable and absurd8 ,well1 what does that prove1 except that comedy as well as tragedy has been occasioned by it8 ,humility is not even laughable6 #fj ,love and ,pride ,pride is so indissolubly bound up with everything great--,joy1 ,beauty1 ,courage1 ,creation--that surely it must have had some celestial origin4 ,who created it8 ,was it ,love1 who wished to shape a weapon for itself1 the better to fashion things8 ,pride has so much to do with creation that sometimes it imagines it is a creator4 ,but that it is not4 ,only ,love can create4 ,pride was fashioned out of a rib taken from the side of ,love4 #fa ,pride and the ,fall ,it was not humility that was the parent of the fable of the ,fall4 ,or is it humility to boast of one's high ancestry1 and if the ancestry does not exist1 to invent it8 ,the nave poet who created that old allegory did not foresee the number of interpretations which would be read into it4 ,he did not foresee that it would be used to humiliate ,man instead of to exalt him2 he did not at all foresee ,original ,sin4 ,as less than justice1 then1 has been meted to him1 let us now accord him more than justice4 ,let us say that he was a divine philosopher who perceived that in unconditional morality lay the grand misfortune of mankind4 ,man is innocent2 thus1 he said1 it is an absolute ethic that defiles him--the knowledge of ,good and ,evil4 ,sweep that away1 and he is innocent and back in the ,garden of ,eden again4 ,let us say this of the first poet1 for certainly he did not mean it6 ,perhaps he knew nothing at all about morality6 ,all that he wished for was to provide a dignified family tree for his generation4 #fb ,the ,good ,conscience ,what a revolution for mankind it would be to get back the good conscience8 ,life made innocent1 washed free from how much filth of remorse1 guilt1 contempt1 sin--that vision arouses a longing more intense than that of the religious for any heaven4 ,and it seems at least equally possible of realization6 ,bad conscience arises when religion and the instincts are in opposition2 the more comprehensive and deep this conflict1 the more guilty the conscience4 ,but there have been religions not antagonistic to the instincts1 which1 instead of condemning them1 have thought so well of them as to become their rule1 their discipline4 ,the religion of the ,greeks was an example of this2 and in ,greece1 accordingly1 there was no bad conscience in our sense4 ,well1 how is it possible1 if it is possible1 to regain the good conscience8 ,not by any miracle6 ,not by an instantaneous change of heart1 for even the heart changes slowly4 ,but suppose that a new instinctive religion and morality were to be set up1 and painfully complied with1 until they became a second nature as ours have become1 should we not then gradually lose our bad conscience1 born as it is out of the antagonism between instinct and morality8 ,nay1 if we were to persevere still further until instinct and religion and morality became intermingled and indistinguishable1 might we not enter the ,garden of ,eden again1 might not innocence itself become ours8 ,but to attain that end1 an unremitting discipline1 extending over hundreds of years1 might be necessary2 and who1 in the absence of gods1 is to impose that discipline8 #fc ,the ,other ,side ,the life-defaming creeds are not to be condemned unconditionally3 even they are not evil4 ,guilt1 asceticism1 contempt for the world--these are the physiologically bad things which have sharpened1 deepened and made subtle the soul of man4 ,the ,greeks were simple compared with modern man2 a thousand times more healthy1 it is true--perhaps because they were incapable of contracting our maladies4 ,well1 let us judge ,christianity1 which in ,europe was mainly responsible for this deepening of ,man1 by an artistic criterion3 let us judge it by the effects it achieved1 not by what it said4 #fd ,effects of ,christianity ,if there are gods who take an interest in ,man1 and experiment upon him1 what better means could they have devised for getting out of him certain effects1 not ,christian at all1 than ,christianity8 ,far more significant for mankind than the virtues of ,christianity1 are its contradictions1 excesses and states of mind4 ,the way of life1 ,christian morality1 is of little account compared with the permanent physiological and psychological transformations effected upon ,man by the discipline of centuries of religion4 ,not that ,man has been forced into the mould of ,christian morality1 but that in the process he has undergone the most unique convulsions1 adaptations and permutations1 that an entire new world of conflict1 pain1 fear1 horror1 exaltation1 faith and scepticism has been born within him1 that ,life1 driven within itself1 has deepened1 enriched and invested him--that is from the standpoint of human culture the most important thing1 beside which what is usually understood by the ,christianizing of ,europe is relatively insignificant4 ,not ,christian morality1 but the effects of ,christian morality it is that now concern us4 ,and these effects are not themselves ,christian2 rather the contrary4 ,christianity has made ,man more complex1 contradictory1 sceptical1 tragic and sublime2 it has given him more capacity for good and for evil1 and has added to these two qualities subtlety and spirituality4 ,,iii ,,what ,,is ,,modern8 #fe ,whither8 ,the fever of modern thought which burns in our veins1 and from which we refuse to escape by reactionary backdoors--,christianity and the like--is not without its distinction3 it is an honourable sickness1 to use the phrase of ,nietzsche4 ,i speak of those who sincerely strive to seek an issue from this fever2 to pass through it into a new health4 ,of the others to whom fever is the condition of existence1 who make a profession of their maladies1 the valetudinarians of the spirit1 the dabblers in quack soul-remedies for their own sake1 it is impossible to speak without disdain4 ,our duty is to exterminate them1 by ridicule or any other means found effectual4 ,but we are ourselves already too grievously harassed2 we are caught in the whirlwind of modern thought1 which contains as much dust as wind4 ,we see outside our field of conflict a region of ,christian calm1 but never1 never1 never can we return there1 for our instincts as well as our intellect are averse to it4 ,the problem must have a different solution4 ,and what1 indeed1 is the problem8 ,to some of us it is still that of emancipation--that which confronted ,goethe1 ,ibsen1 ,nietzsche1 and the other great spirits of last century4 ,it is an error to think that these men have yet been refuted or even understood2 they have simply been buried beneath the corpses of later writers4 ,and it is the worst intellectual weakness1 and1 therefore1 crime1 of our age that ideas are no longer disproved1 but simply superseded by newer ideas4 ,the latest is the true1 and ,time refutes everything6 ,that is our modern superstition4 ,we have still1 then1 to go back--or1 rather1 forward--to ,goethe1 ,ibsen and ,nietzsche4 ,our problem is still that of clearing a domain of freedom around us1 of enlarging our field of choice1 and so making destiny itself more spacious2 and1 then1 having delivered ourselves from prejudice and superstition--and how many other things6--of setting an aim before us for the unflinching pursuit of which we make ourselves responsible4 ,greater freedom1 and therefore greater responsibility1 above all greater aims1 an enlargement of life1 not a whittling of it down to ,christian standards--that is our problem still6 #ff ,the ,restoration of ,christianity ,will ,christianity ever be established again8 ,it is doubtful4 ,at the most1 it may be restored--in the manner of the architectural restorations1 against which ,ruskin declaimed4 ,the difficulty of re-establishing it must needs be greater than that of establishing it4 ,for it has now been battered by science 7people no longer believe in miracles7 and by history 7people have read what the ,church has done--or has not done74 ,christianity has become a ,church1 and the ,church1 an object of criticism4 ,as the body which housed the spirit of ,christianity1 men have studied it with secular eyes1 and have found little to reverence1 much to censure2 and in the disrepute into which the body has fallen1 the spirit1 also1 has shared4 ,and now the atmosphere cannot be created in which ,christianity may grow young again and recapture its faith4 ,the necessary credulity1 or1 at any rate1 the proper kind of credulity1 is no longer ours4 ,for ,christianity grew1 like the mushrooms1 in the night4 ,had there been newspapers in ,judea1 there had been no ,christianity4 ,and this age of ours1 in which the clank of the printing press drowns all other sounds1 is fatal to any noble mystery1 to any noble birth or rebirth4 ,that night1 at all events1 we can never pass through again1 and1 therefore1 ,christianity will probably never renew itself4 #fg ,a ,drug for ,diseased ,souls ,the utmost that can be expected is a restoration1 and in that direction we have gone already a long way4 ,for ,christianity is not now1 as it was at the beginning1 a spring of inspiration1 a thing spiritual1 spontaneous1 ,dionysian4 ,it is mainly a remedy1 or1 more often1 a drug for diseased souls2 and1 therefore1 to be husbanded strictly by the modern medicine men1 to be dispensed carefully1 and1 yes1 to be advertised as well6 ,its birth was out of an exuberance of spiritual life2 its restoration will be out of a hopeless debility and fatigue4 ,and1 therefore---- #fh ,the ,dogmatists ,all religions may be regarded from two sides2 from that of their creators1 and from that of their followers4 ,among the creators are to be numbered not only the founders of religion1 but the saints1 the inspired prophets and every one who has in some degree the genius for religion4 ,they are not distinguished by much reverence for dogma1 but by the religious feeling2 and when this emotion carries them away in its flood they often treat dogma in a way to make the orthodox gape with horror4 ,but1 in truth1 they do not themselves take much account of dogma2 every dogma is a crutch1 and they do not feel the need of one4 ,but the people who are not sustained by this inward spring of emotion1 who can never know what religion really is1 these need a crutch2 it is for them that dogma was designed4 ,and1 of course1 the real religious men see their advantage also in the adherence of the dogmatists1 the many2 for the more widely a religion is spread1 the more secure it becomes1 and the greater chance it has of enduring4 ,dogma1 then1 is religion for the irreligious4 ,to the saint religion is a thing inward and creative2 to the dogmatist it is a thing outward1 accomplished and fixed1 to which he may cling4 ,the former is the missionary of religion1 the latter1 its conserver4 ,the one is religious because he has religion1 the other1 because he needs it4 #fi ,the ,religious ,impulse ,the time comes in the history of a faith when the religious feeling dies1 and nothing is left but dogma4 ,the dogmatists then become the missionaries of religion4 ,the fount is dried up2 there is no longer an inward force seeking for expression2 there is only the fear of the dogmatist lest his staff1 his guide1 his horizon should be taken from him4 ,religion is then supported most frenziedly by the irreligious2 weakness then speaks with a more poignant eloquence than strength itself4 ,and that is what is happening with ,christianity4 ,its religious feeling is dead3 there has been no great religious figure in ,europe in our time4 ,and the ,church is now being defended on grounds neither religious nor theological1 but secular and even utilitarian4 ,the real religious impulse is now to be found in the movement outside1 and1 therefore1 against ,christianity4 ,but1 alas1 as ,nietzsche feared1 there may not after all be sufficient religion in the world to destroy religion4 #gj ,the ,decay of ,prophecy ,the past should be studied only in order to divine the future4 ,the new soothsayers should seek for omens1 not1 as their ancient brethren did1 in the stars and the entrails of animals1 but in the book of history1 past and becoming4 ,the new soothsayers1 for soothsaying has not died2 it has become popular--and degenerate4 ,every one may now foretell the future1 but no one may believe what is foretold4 ,and that is because the soothsayers do not themselves believe their auguries2 when they happen to speak the truth1 no one is more surprised than they4 ,but in the antique world the augurs had1 at any rate1 responsibility2 to foretell the future was not to them an amusement but a vocation4 ,to what is due the decay of the art of soothsaying8 ,partly1 no doubt1 to the dissemination of popular knowledge1 by which people have become less credulous2 partly to the scientific temper of those who1 had they lived in the old world1 would have been the soothsayers2 partly to other causes known to every one4 ,but1 allowing for these1 may there not be something due to the fact that people are no longer interested1 as they used to be1 in the future8 ,they know the past1 ah1 perhaps too well3 they have looked into it so long that at length they feel that the future holds nothing which it has not held1 that ,fate has now no fresh metamorphosis or apotheosis1 and that ,time must henceforth be content to plagiarize itself4 ,and so the future has lost the seduction which it once held for the noblest spirits4 ,it is true1 men still amuse themselves by guessing which of ,time's well-thumbed and greasy cards will turn up at the next deal1 or by playing at patience with the immemorial possibilities4 ,but that is not soothsaying1 nor is it even playing with the future3 it is playing with the past4 ,and the great modern discovery is not the discovery of the future1 but the discovery of the past4 ,and as with soothsaying1 so with prophecy4 ,if we could but look for a moment into the soul of an old prophet and see his deepest thoughts and visions1 what a conception of the future would be ours6 ,but that is impossible4 ,we cannot now understand the faith of the men who1 unmoved1 prophesied the advent of supernatural beings1 the ,christ or another2 to whom the future was a new world more strange than ,america was to ,columbus4 ,that attitude of mind has been killed2 and now comes one who says the belief in the future is a weakness4 ,would he1 perchance1 have said that to ,john the ,baptist1 the great modern of his time8 ,had he lived in that pre-,christian world1 would he have believed in the ,god in whom he now believes8 ,the orthodox ,christian here finds himself in a laughable dilemma4 ,admitting nothing wonderful in the future1 he is yet constrained to believe in a past wonderful beyond the dreams of poets or of madmen--a past in which supernatural beings1 miracles and portents were almost the rule4 ,and so the future is to him not even so wonderful as the past4 ,it is an expurgated edition of the past--an edition with the incidents and marvels left out1 a novel without a hero or a plot4 ,so1 for good or for evil1 we no longer believe in the future as we did3 it is steadily becoming less marvellous1 and1 therefore1 less seductive for us4 ,but1 without the bait of the strange and the new to lure it on1 must not humanity halt on its way8 ,can man act at all without believing in the future in some fashion8 ,must not things be foreseen before they can be accomplished8 ,is not soothsaying implicit in every deliberate act8 ,are not all sincere ideals involuntary auguries8 ,is it not the future rather than the prophecy which comes true8 ,did not the old prophecies come true because they were prophesied8 ,did not ,christ arise because ,he was foretold8 ,and are not the believers in the future1 then1 the creators of the future1 and the true priests of progress8 ,when we can envisage a future noble enough1 it will not then be weakness to believe in it4 #ga ,the ,great ,immoralists ,the morality of ,nietzsche is more strict and exacting than that of ,christianity4 ,when the ,christians argue against it1 therefore1 they are arguing in favour of a morality more comfortable1 pleasing and indulgent to the natural man2 consequently1 even on religious grounds1 of a morality more immoral4 ,what6 is ,nietzsche1 then1 the great moralist1 and are the ,christians the great immoralists8 ,this notion may appear to us absurd1 or merely ingenious1 but will it appear so to future generations8 ,will timidity1 conformity1 mediocrity1 judicious blindness1 unwillingness to offend1 be synonymous1 to them also1 with morality8 ,or will they look back upon ,christianity as a creed too indulgent and not noble enough8 ,as a sort of ,epicureanism1 for instance8 #gb ,the ,first and the ,last ,we all know what the weak have suffered from the strong2 but who shall compute what the strong have suffered from the weak8 ,the last shall be first2 but when they become first they become also the worst tyrants--impalpable1 anonymous and petty4 #gc ,humility in ,pride ,the pride of some gifted men is not pride in their person1 but in something within them1 of which they regard themselves the guardians and servants4 ,if there is dignity in their demeanour it is a reflected1 impersonal dignity4 ,just so a peasant might feel ennobled who guarded a king in danger and exile4 #gd ,the ,modern ,devil ,the devil is not wicked but corrupt1 in modern phraseology1 decadent4 ,the qualities of the medival devil1 rage1 cruelty1 hatred1 pride1 avarice1 are in their measure necessary to ,life1 necessary to virtue itself4 ,but corruption is wholly bad2 it contaminates even those who fight it4 ,hell relaxes3 ,mr4 ,shaw's conception is profoundly true4 ,but if the devil is corruption1 cannot the devil be abolished8 ,it is true1 ,man cannot extirpate cruelty1 hatred and pride without destroying ,life2 but ,life is made more powerful by the destruction of the corrupt4 ,god created ,man2 but it was ,man that created the devil4 #ge ,master and ,servant ,to summon out of the void a task1 and then incontinently to make of himself its slave3 that is the happiness of many a man4 ,a great means of happiness6 #gf ,criterions ,it is not expedient to choose on every occasion the higher rather than the lower1 for one may not be able to endure too much living on the heights4 ,if will and capacity were always equal6 ,then1 it is true1 there would not be any difficulty2 but ,life is ,life1 after all--that is1 our will is greater than our capacity4 ,on the other hand1 it is not well to develop equally all our faculties--the formula of the ,humanist--for among them there is a hierarchy1 and some are more worthy of development than others4 ,what course is left8 ,to act always in the interest of what is highest in us1 and when we partake of a lower pleasure to regard it as a form of sleep1 of necessary forgetting8 ,for even the mind must slumber occasionally if it is to remain healthy4 #gg ,intellectual ,prudence ,among athletes there is a thing known as over-training3 if it is persisted in it wrecks the body4 ,a similar phenomenon is to be found among thinkers3 thought too severe and protracted may ruin the mind4 ,was this the explanation of ,nietzsche's downfall8 ,certainly1 his intellectual health was that of the athlete who remains vigorous by virtue of a never-sleeping discipline1 who maintains his balance by a continuous effort4 ,this is perhaps the highest1 the most exquisite form of health1 but it is at the same time the most dangerous--a little more1 a little less1 and the engine of thought is destroyed4 ,it is important that the thinker should discover exactly how far he may discipline himself1 and how far permit indulgence4 ,what in the ordinary man--conscious of no secondary raison d'tre--is performed without fuss by the instincts1 must by him be thought out--a task of great peril4 #gh ,a ,dilemma ,to be a man is easy3 to be a purpose is more difficult2 but1 on the whole--easy4 ,in the first instance1 one has but to exist2 in the second1 to act4 ,but to unite man and purpose in the same person--to be a type--is both difficult and precarious4 ,for that a balance is imperative3 being and doing must be prevented from injuring each other3 action must become rhythm1 and rest1 a form of energy4 ,to be in doing1 to do in being--that is the task of the future man4 ,the danger of our being mere man is that mankind may remain forever stationary1 without a goal4 ,the danger of our being mere purpose is that our humanity may altogether drop out and nothing but the purpose be left4 ,and would not that defeat the purpose8 #gi ,dangers of ,genius ,why is it that so many men of genius have been destroyed by falling into chasms of desire which are safely trodden by common men8 ,is it because there is within the exceptional man greater compass1 and1 therefore1 greater danger8 ,the genius has left the animal further behind than the ordinary man2 indeed1 in the genius of the nobler sort there is an almost passionate avoidance and disavowal of the animal4 ,in this disavowal lie at once his safety and his danger3 by means of it he climbs to perilous heights1 and is also secure upon them4 ,but let him abrogate even once this denial of kinship1 and he is in the utmost danger4 ,he now finds himself stationed on the edge of a precipice up to which he seems to have climbed in a dream1 a dreadful dizziness assails him1 along with a mad desire to fling himself into the depths4 ,it was perhaps a leap of this kind that ,marlowe made1 and ,shelley4 ,meantime1 the ordinary man lives in safety at the foot of the precipice3 he is never so far above the animal as to be injured by a fall into animalism4 ,only to the noble does spiritual danger come4 #hj ,a ,strange ,failure ,he failed2 for the task was too small for him--a common tale among men of genius4 ,you have been unsuccessful in trivial things8 ,there is always a remedy left3 to essay the great4 ,how often has ,man become impotent simply because there was no task heroic enough to demand greatness of him6 #ha ,dangers of the ,spiritual ,if you are swept off your feet by a strongly sensuous book1 it is probably a sign that you have become too highly spiritualized4 ,for a sensualist would simply have enjoyed it1 while feeling1 perhaps1 a little bored and dissatisfied4 ,it was only a religious anchorite who could have lost his soul to ,anatole ,france's ,thas4 ,for the salvation of ,man it is more than ever imperative that a reconciliation should be effected between the spirit and the senses4 ,until it is1 the highest men--the most spiritual--will be in the very greatest peril1 and will almost inevitably be wrecked or frustrated4 ,it is for the good of the soul that this reconciliation must now be sought4 #hb ,again ,from the diabolization of the senses innumerable evils have flowed2 physical and mental disease1 disgust with the world1 cruelty towards everything natural4 ,but1 worst of all1 it has made sensuality a greater danger than it was ever before4 ,in the anchorite1 seeking to live entirely in the spirit1 and ignoring or chastising the body1 sensuality was driven into the very soul1 and there was magnified a hundredfold4 ,to the thinker avoiding the senses as much as possible--for he had been taught to distrust them--sensuality1 in the moments when he was brought face to face with it1 had acquired a unique seductiveness1 and had become a problem and a danger4 ,if he yielded1 it was perilous in a degree unknown to the average sensual man2 if he resisted1 a good half of his spiritual energy was wasted in keeping the senses at bay4 ,in either case1 the thinker suffered4 ,so that now it is the spirit that has become the champion of the senses1 but for the good of the spirit4 #hc ,god and ,animal ,until the marriage of the soul and the senses has been accomplished1 ,man cannot manifest himself in any new type4 ,what has been the history of humanity during the last two thousand years8 ,the history of humanity1 that is1 as distinct from the history of communities8 ,a record of antithetic tyrannies1 the spiritual alternating with the sensual2 an uncertain tussle between ,god and animal1 now one uppermost1 now the other2 not a tragedy--for in ,tragedy there is significance--but a gloomy farce4 ,and this farce must continue so long as the spirit contems sense as evil in itself--for neither of them can be abolished6 ,whether we like it or not1 the senses1 so long as they are oppressed and defamed1 will continue to break out in terrible insurrections of sensuality and excess1 until1 tired and satiated1 they return again under the tyranny of the spirit--at the appointed time1 however1 to revolt once more4 ,from this double cul de sac ,man can be freed only by a reconciliation between the two4 ,when this happens1 however1 it will be the beginning of a higher era in the history of humanity2 ,man will then become spiritual in a new sense4 ,spirit will then affirm ,life1 instead of1 as now1 slandering it2 existence will become joyful and tragic2 for to live in accordance with ,life itself--voluntarily to approve struggle1 suffering and change--is the most difficult and heroic of lives4 ,the softening of the rigour of existence1 its reduction and weakening by asceticism1 humility1 sin1 is the easier path2 narrow is the way that leads to ,nihilism6 ,the error of ,heine was that he prophesied a happier future from the reconciliation of the body and the soul3 his belief in the efficacy of happiness was excessive4 ,but this reconciliation is1 nevertheless1 of importance for nothing else than its spiritual significance3 by means of it ,man is freed from his labyrinth1 and can at last move forward--he becomes more tragic4 #hd ,ultimate ,pessimism ,to the most modern man must have come at some time the thought1 ,what if this thing spirit be essentially the enemy of the senses8 ,what if1 like the vampire1 it can live only by drinking blood8 ,what if the conflict between spirit and life is and must forever be an implacable and destructive one8 ,he is then for a moment a ,christian1 but with an added bitterness which few ,christians have known4 ,for if his thought be true1 then the weakening and final nullification of ,life must be our object4 ,to prove that the spirit and the senses are not eternally irreconcilable enemies is still a task4 ,those who believe they are1 do so as an act of faith3 their opponents are in the same case4 ,we should never cease to read spirit into ,life-affirming things1 such as pride1 heroism and love1 and to magnify and exalt these aspects of the spirit4 #he ,leisure and ,productiveness ,granted that the society which produces the highest goods in the greatest profusion is the best--let us not argue from this that society should be organized with the direct aim of producing goods4 ,for what if goods be to society what happiness is said to be to men--things to be attained only by striving for something else8 ,in all good things--whether it be in art1 literature or philosophy--there is much of the free1 the perverse1 the unique1 the incalculable4 ,in short1 good things can only be produced by great men--and these are exceptions4 ,the best we can do1 then1 is to inaugurate a society in which great men will find it possible to live1 will be even encouraged to live4 ,can a society in which rights are affixed to functions serve for that8 ,a function1 in practice1 in a democratic state--that will mean something which can be seen to be useful for today1 but not for tomorrow1 far less for any distant future4 ,the more subtle1 spiritual1 posthumous the activity of a man the less it will be seen to be a function4 ,art and philosophy arise when leisure and not work is the ruling convention4 ,it is true that artists and philosophers work1 and at a higher tension than other men2 but it is in leisure that they must conceive their works3 what obvious function do they then fulfil8 ,even the most harassed of geniuses1 even ,burns would never have become immortal had he not had the leisure to ponder1 dream and love4 ,idleness is as necessary for the production of a work of art as labour4 ,and with some men perhaps whole years of idleness are needed4 ,artists must always be privileged creatures4 ,it is privileges1 and not rights1 that they want4 #hf ,what is ,freedom8 ,the athlete1 by the disciplining of his body1 creates for himself a new world of actions2 he can now do things which before were prohibited to him2 in consequence1 he has enlarged the sphere of his freedom4 ,the thinker and the artist by discipline of a different kind are rewarded in the same way4 ,they are now more free1 because they have now more capacity4 ,there are people1 however1 who think one can be free whether one has the capacity for freedom or not--a characteristically modern fallacy4 ,but a man the muscles of whose body and mind are weak cannot do anything2 how can he be free8 ,the concept of ,freedom cannot be separated from that of ,power4 #hg ,freedom1 in the ,dance ,even the most unbridled dance is a form of constraint4 ,the completest freedom of movement is the reward of the severest discipline4 #hh ,a ,moral for ,moderns ,a spring gushed forth here on the airy height2 but the soil was not hard enough to retain it2 and the water sapped away among the soft moss4 ,one day a man came and laid down a hard channel for the spring4 ,imprisoned on both sides1 it now imperiously sought an outlet and--a miracle6--leapt glittering into the sunshine4 ,the history of ,freedom4 #hi ,the ,renaissance3 ,a ,thesis ,how unsatisfactory are those explanations of the ,renaissance which give as its cause the breaking up of the restrictive intellectual canons of the ,middle ,ages--as if a mere negation could explain such a unique creative era6 ,what has here to be discovered is how freedom and the capacity for freedom should have appeared at the same moment4 ,perhaps the ,middle ,ages have now been sufficiently reviled by the admirers of the ,renaissance2 perhaps that event owed more than we are willing to acknowledge to the centuries of medival repression and discipline4 ,during these centuries the human spirit had been confined in the granite channel cut for it by medival ,christianity1 a channel of which even the mouth was stopped4 ,in the fifteenth century the stream swept away every obstacle and leapt forth1 a brilliant cascade1 scattering almost pagan warmth and light4 ,the fall of ,constantinople and the other circumstances usually given as the explanation of this outburst were only its occasion2 the cause lay much deeper1 in the long storing up1 conserving and strengthening of human powers4 ,the freedom of which the ,renaissance was an expression was more1 then1 than the simple removal of restriction4 ,it was a freedom not political or moral1 but vital2 a positive enhancement if the natural power of man1 who could now do things which hitherto he could not do--an event in the history1 not merely of society1 but of ,man4 ,accordingly1 the freedom of the individual1 so dear to some moderns1 does not teach us much here4 ,it was not because freedom was given to them that men now created3 the freedom was claimed because they now possessed more power1 could do more1 and had1 therefore1 the right to a larger sphere of freedom4 ,the more naturally free--that is1 individually powerful--a people become1 the more they will demand and obtain of individual freedom2 but it is perhaps inexpedient to offer to a people individually weak any more freedom than they can use4 ,they are still at the disciplinary stage2 they are preparing for their renaissance2 and to the student of human culture the periods of preparation1 of unproductiveness1 are more worthy of consideration than the productive periods4 ,for in the future we must prepare for our eras of fruition1 and not leave them1 as in the past1 to pure chance4 ,at the ,renaissance1 however1 it was not even individual freedom in the modern democratic sense that was claimed and allowed2 it was at the most the freedom of certain individuals1 the naturally free1 the powerful4 ,not until a later time was this claim to be universalized by the unconditional theorists1 the generalizers sans distinction1 the egalitarians4 ,the ,french ,revolution was the ,renaissance rationalized and popularized4 #ij ,the ,unproductive ,periods ,without the ,middle ,ages the ,renaissance would have been impossible2 the one1 therefore1 was as necessary as the other2 and our reprobation of the former for its comparative sterility is entirely without justification4 ,if we happen to be living in an unproductive age1 it is our misfortune1 then2 but we are not entitled1 in contemplating this age1 to the luxury of condemnation1 reproof or scorn4 ,what we may demand of any period now is that it should be a period either of preparation or of fruition4 ,so the present era is1 after all1 deserving of condemnation1 but only because it is not an era of preparation--not for any other reason4 #ia ,duties of the ,unproductive ,the history of culture is the history of long ages of unproductiveness broken by short eras of production2 but unproductiveness is the rule4 ,the men born in barren periods have not1 then1 the right to bewail their lot3 we have not that right4 ,but what is of the first importance1 for the sake of culture1 is to find out what are the duties proper to men in a sterile age4 ,certainly their duty it is not to produce whether they are productive or not2 that can only result in abortions and painful caricatures3 does not contemporary literature demonstrate it8 ,the work that is born out of the poverty of the artist is1 as ,nietzsche pointed out1 decadent work1 and debases the spectator1 lowers his vitality4 ,what1 then1 are the tasks of a writer in an unproductive age8 ,to live sparely and conserve strength8 ,to make discipline more rigid8 ,to preserve and fortify the tradition of culture8 ,to render more accessible the sources from which creative literature draws its life1 so that the next generation may be better placed8 ,to observe vigilantly the signs of today--and not only of today8 ,it may be so2 but1 also1 when necessary1 to throw these prudent and preservative tasks to the winds and spend his last ounce of strength in battling with the demons who make a productive era forever impossible4 ,yes1 this last duty is for us today--the most important4 ,and1 we may depend1 it is the creators--those who produce what they should not--who will fight most bitterly on the opposite side4 #ib ,emancipation ,the rallying cry of the great writers of the last century was emancipation4 ,goethe1 ,heine and ,ibsen alike professed as their task the emancipation of man2 ,nietzsche1 their successor1 elevated the freed man1 the ,superman1 into an ideal1 in the pursuit of which it was necessary meantime that men should discipline themselves4 ,the later moderns1 our own contemporaries1 have belittled this freedom1 seeing in it nothing but a negation1 the freedom from some one thing or another4 ,but ,ibsen and ,heine1 these men of true genius1 who believed most sincerely that they were brave soldiers in the war of the liberation of humanity did not perhaps waste their powers in battling for a thing so trivial6 ,it is barely possible that they meant by emancipation something much more profound2 something spiritual and positive2 indeed1 nothing less than an enhancement of the powers of man6 ,certainly both poets looked forward to new developments of man3 ,heine with his happier and more perfect generations1 begot in free and voluntary embraces1 blossoming forth in a religion of joy2 ,ibsen with his perplexed figures painfully working their way out to ,freedom4 ,it was the task of us in this generation1 who should have been the heirs of this tradition1 but are not1 to supply the commentary to this noble vision1 to carry forward this religion of hope further and further4 ,but the cult of modernity has itself prevented this2 the latest theory has always seized us and exacted our belief for its hour2 the present has invariably triumphed2 and we have discarded the great work of last century before we have understood it4 ,heine has been seized mainly by the decadents2 his healthy and noble sensuousness1 his desire to restore the harmony between the senses and the soul1 as a means towards the emancipation of man1 and as nothing else1 has been perverted by them into worship of the senses for their own sake--a thing which to ,heine would have seemed despicable4 ,ibsen has fallen among the realists and propagandists2 all the spiritual value of his work has for this age been lost--and what a loss6--his battle to deliver man from his weakness and inward slavery has been reduced --it is no exaggeration--to a battle to deliver the women of the middle classes from their husbands4 ,the old story of emanation has been again repeated1 with the distinction that here there is no trace left of the original source except negative ones6 ,well1 we have to turn back again1 our task1 second to none in grandeur1 before which we may well feel abashed1 is still the same as that of ,goethe1 ,ibsen and ,nietzsche1 the task of emancipation4 ,to restore dignity to literature1 indeed1 it would be necessary to create such a task if it did not already exist4 #ic ,genealogy of the ,moderns ,this is what has happened4 ,the conventional moderns of our time are the descendants not of ,heine and ,ibsen1 but of the race against which the poets fought4 ,they live unthinkingly in the present1 just as their spiritual ancestors lived unthinkingly in the past4 ,but slavery to the past has long ago fallen into the second place among dangers to humanity3 it is slavery to the present that is now by far the greatest peril4 ,not because they broke the tyranny of the past1 but because they had an ideal in the future are the great fighters of last century significant4 ,to think of them as iconoclasts is to mistake for their aim the form of their activity3 the past lay between them and their object3 on that account alone did they destroy it4 ,but the great obstacle now is the domination of the present2 and were the demi-gods of last century alive today1 they would be fighting precisely against you1 my dear moderns1 who live so complacently in your provincial present1 making of it almost a cult4 ,to be a modern in the true sense1 however1 is to be a fore-runner2 there is in this age1 an age of preparation1 no other test of the modern4 ,to believe that there are still potentialities in man2 to have faith that the elevation of the type ,man is possible1 yes1 that the time is ripe to prepare for it2 and to write and live in and by that thought3 this is to be modern4 #id ,domination of the ,present ,to be modern in the accepted1 intellectually fashionable sense3 what is that8 ,to propagate always the newest theory1 whatever it be2 to be the least possible distance behind the times1 behind the latest second of the times1 whether they be good or bad2 and1 of course1 to assume one is in the circle and to adopt the tone of the circle3 in short1 to make ideas a matter of fashion1 to choose views as a well-to-do woman chooses dresses--to be intellectually without foundation1 principles or taste4 ,how did this convention arise8 ,perhaps out of lack of leisure3 superficiality is bound to engulf a generation who abandon leisure4 ,but to be enslaved to the present in this way is the most dangerous form of superficiality3 it is to be ignorant of the very thing that makes ,man significant1 and with idiotic cheerfulness and unconcern to render his existence meaningless and trivial4 ,in two ways' can ,man become sublime2 by regarding himself as the heir of a great tradition3 by making of himself a fore-runner4 ,both ways are open to the true modern1 and both must be followed by him4 ,for the past and the future are greater than the present3 the sense of continuity is necessary for human dignity4 ,the men of this age1 however1 are isolated--to use an electrical metaphor--from the current of ,humanity3 they have become almost entirely individuals1 temporal units1 men2 what has been the outcome8 ,inevitably the loss of the concept ,man1 for ,man is a concept which can be understood only through the contemplation on a grand scale of the history of mankind4 ,man ceases to be dramatic when there are no longer spectators for the drama of ,humanity4 ,the present generation have1 therefore1 no sentiment of the human sublime2 they see that part of the grand tragedy which happens to pass before them1 but without caring about what went before or what will come after1 without a clue1 however poor1 to the mystery of existence4 ,they know men only1 the men of their time4 ,they are provincial--that is1 lacking the sentiment of ,man4 ,how much decadence may not be traced to this6 ,in ,art1 the conventions of ,realism and of stheticism have arisen4 ,the first is just the portrayal of present-day men as present-day men2 nothing more1 therefore1 than contemporary art2 an appendage of the present1 a triviality4 ,the second has as its creed enjoyment of the moment2 and if it contemplates the past at all1 it is with the eyes of the voluptuous antiquary--but a collector is not an heir4 ,art has in our time1 both in theory and in practice1 become deliberately more fleeting4 ,in morality1 there is ,humanitarianism1 or1 in other words1 the conviction that the suffering of today is the most important thing1 coupled with the belief that there is nothing at present existing which can justify and redeem this suffering3 therefore1 unconditional pity1 alleviation1 the greatest happiness of the greatest number4 ,modern pessimism1 which springs from the same source1 is the obverse of this belief4 ,it1 also1 regards only the present1 and says1 perhaps with truth1 that it1 at any rate1 is not noble enough to deserve and demand the suffering necessary for its existence--consequently1 all life is an error6 ,all these theories1 however1 are breaks with the spiritual tradition of emancipation2 they are founded on the magnification of the temporary--of that which only in a present continually carried forward seems to be important4 ,this judgment of ,life with the eyes of the present1 this narrowest and most false of interpretations3 how has it confused and finally stultified the finest talents of our time6 ,the modern man is joyless2 his joylessness has arisen out of his modernity2 and now to find forgetfulness of it he plunges more madly than before--into modernity6 ,for his own sake1 as much as for that of ,humanity1 it is our duty to free him from his wheel4 ,one can live with dignity only if one have a sense of the tragedy of ,man4 ,it is the first task of the true modern to destroy the domination of the present4 #ie ,encyclopdists ,strange that the great dramatic poets of modern times have had a weakness for turning their tragedies into encyclopdias6 ,consider ,faust and ,brand1 for instance4 ,is it that the sentiment of the eternal was already beginning to weaken in ,goethe and ,ibsen8 ,were they overburdened by their own age8 ,their world was too much with them2 and so they did not reach the highest peaks of tragedy3 they were not universal4 #if ,what is ,modern ,it is time we erected a standard whereby to test what is modern4 ,to be an adherent of all the latest movements--that is at most to be anarchistic1 eclectic1 inconsistent--call it what you will4 ,futurism1 ,realism1 ,feminism1 ,traditionalism may be all of them opposed or irrelevant to modernity4 ,it is not sufficient that movements should be new--if they are ever new2 the question is1 ,to what end are they8 ,if they are movements in the direction of emancipation1 the elevation of the type ,man1 then they are modern2 if they are not1 then they are movements to be opposed or ignored by moderns4 ,if modernism be a vital thing it must needs have roots in the past and be an essential expression of humanity1 to be traced1 therefore1 in the history of humanity3 in short1 it can only be a tradition4 ,the true modern is a continuator of tradition as much as the ,christian or the conservative3 the tine fight between progress and stagnation is always a fight between antagonistic traditions4 ,to battle against tradition as such is1 therefore1 not the task of the modern2 but rather to enter the conflict--an eternal one--for his tradition against its opposite3 ,nietzsche found for this antithesis the symbolism of ,dionysus and ,apollo4 ,does such a tradition of modernity exist8 ,is there a modern spirit not dependent upon time and place1 and in all ages modern8 ,if there is--and there is--the possession of it in some measure will alone entitle us to the name of moderns1 give us dignity and make the history of ,man once more dramatic and tragical4 ,it is a pity that some historian has not yet traced1 in its expression in events1 the history of this conflict--a task requiring the deepest subtlety and insight4 ,meantime1 for this tradition may be claimed with confidence such events as ,greek ,tragedy1 most of the ,renaissance1 and the emancipators of last century4 ,these are triumphant expressions of the modern spirit1 but that spirit is chiefly to be recognized as a principle not always triumphant or easy of perception1 constantly struggling1 assuming many disguises and tirelessly creative4 ,it is not1 indeed1 only a tradition of persons1 of dogmas1 or of sentiments3 it is a principle of ,life itself4 ,this conception1 it is true1 is grand1 and even terrifying--a disadvantage in this age4 ,but is there any other which grants modernity more than the status of an accident of time and fashion8 #ig ,how ,we ,shall ,be ,known ,in an age it is not always what is most characteristic that survives3 posterity will probably know us not by our true qualities1 but by the exceptions to them4 ,the present-day writers in ,english who will endure after their age has passed are probably ,joseph ,conrad1 ,w4 ,h4 ,hudson1 and ,hillaire ,belloc for a few of his essays and lyrics--none of them representative1 none of them modern4 ,they might have been born in any era3 they are in the oldest tradition4 ,the most striking characteristic of our time1 however1 is its lack of a tradition4 ,the sentiment of transiency is our most deeply rooted sentiment3 it is the very spirit of the age4 ,but by its essential nature it cannot hope to endure1 to be known by future generations2 for we shall not produce immortal works until we become interested in some idea long enough to be inspired by it1 and to write monumentally and surely of it4 ,we hold our ideas by the day2 but for a masterpiece to be born1 an idea must have taken root and defied time4 ,permanence of form1 moreover1 would seriously embarrass a modern writer1 who wishes to change with the hour1 and does not want his crotchets of yesterday to live to be refutations of his fads of today4 ,thus we are too fleeting to make even our transitoriness eternal4 ,the very sentiment of immortality has perished amongst us1 and we actually prefer that our work should die--witness the ,futurists6 ,the most self-conscious heirs of modernity1 these propounded the theory that it is better that works of art should not endure3 well1 in that case1 their own creations have been true works of art6 ,nevertheless1 all they did in this theory was to erect into a system the shallowness1 provinciality and frivolousness of the present--and thereby to proclaim themselves the enemies of the future4 ,,iv ,,art ,,and ,,literature #ih ,psychology of ,style ,there are writers with a style--it may be either good or bad--and writers with no style at all1 who just write badly4 ,what quality or combination of qualities is it which makes a writer a stylist8 ,style probably arises out of a duality2 the association in a writer of the scribe and the spectator4 ,the first having set down his thought1 the second goes aside1 contemplates it1 as things should be contemplated1 from a distance1 and and asks1 ,how does this strike me8 ,how does it look1 sound1 move8 ,and he suggests here a toning down of colour1 there an acceleration of speed1 somewhere else1 it may be1 an added lucidity1 for clearness is an sthetic as well as an intellectual virtue4 ,the writer without style1 however1 just writes on without second thought2 the spectator is altogether lacking in him2 he cannot contemplate his work from a distance1 nor1 indeed1 at all4 ,this explains the unconsciousness and innocence in bad writing--not in bad style1 which is neither unconscious nor innocent6 ,the stylist1 on the other hand1 is always the actor to his own spectator2 he must get his effect2 even ,truth he uses as a means to his effect4 ,if a truth is too repulsive1 he throws this or that cloak over it2 if it is uninteresting1 he envelops it in mysticism 7mysticism is simply an artist's trick72 in a word1 he stheticizes1 that is1 falsifies everything1 to please the second person in his duality1 the spectator4 ,even if he gets his effects by moderation of statements1 he is to be distrusted1 for it is the moderation and not ,truth that is aimed at4 ,and1 then1 his temptation to employ metaphors1 to work up an interesting madness1 to rhapsodize--these most potent means to great effects1 these falsifications6 ,well1 are we to assent1 then1 to the old philosophic prejudice against style and refuse to believe any philosopher who does not write badly8 #ii ,modern ,writing ,the greatest fault of modern style is that it is a smirking style4 ,it fawns upon the reader1 it insinuates1 it has the manner of an amiable dog4 ,if it does something smart1 it stops immediately1 wags its tail1 and waits confidently for your approval4 ,you will guess now why those little regiments of dots are scattered so liberally over the pages of the best-known ,english novelist4 ,it is ,h4,g4 ,wells's style wagging its tail4 #ajj ,the ,precise ,there have been writers--there are writers--whose only title to fame is an interesting defect4 ,they are unable to write soundly1 and this inability1 being abnormal1 is more interesting than sound writing1 which is only normal4 ,for to limp or to hop on one leg is never pedestrian--what do ,i say8--is not even pedestrian4 #aja ,paradox ,what is paradox8 ,the bull raised to a form of literary art8 #ajb ,the ,platitude ,there should be no platitudes in the works of a sincere author4 ,a platitude is an idea not understood by its writer--in one word1 a shibboleth4 #ajc ,praise8 ,it is usual to extol the industry of those realists who put everything into their books1 but they should rather be censured for their want of taste4 ,the truth is that they lack the selective faculty--lack1 that is1 art4 ,afraid to omit anything from their reproductions of existence--lest they omit what is most significant--they include all3 the easiest course4 ,the easiest course1 that is--for the writers4 #ajd ,hostility of ,thinkers ,when a thinker has a world of thought of his own1 he generally becomes cold towards other thinkers1 and to none more than to him whose star is nearest his own4 ,it is necessary1 therefore1 that he should read1 above all1 the philosopher whose thought most closely resembles his1 for to him he is most likely to be unjust4 ,we are the most hostile to those who say what we say1 but say it in a way we do not like4 #aje ,the ,twice ,subtle ,the thinker who has been twice subtle arrives at simplicity4 ,and in doing so he has1 at the same time1 discovered a new truth4 ,but this other thinker has possessed simplicity from the beginning4 ,has he also possessed this truth8 ,at any rate1 he does not know it4 #ajf ,mastery of ,one's ,thoughts ,one should know how to keep one's thoughts at a distance4 ,the ,french can do this1 and1 therefore1 write at once wittily and profoundly of serious things4 ,but the ,germans live1 perhaps1 too near their thoughts1 and are possessed by them3 hence1 their obscurity and heaviness4 ,wit--lightness of hand--shows that one is master of one's thought1 and is not mastered by it4 ,nevertheless1 the thoughts of the ,germans may be the mightier4 ,in this matter the complete thinker should be able to become ,french or ,german as occasion demands4 #ajg ,psychologists ,the keenest psychologists are those who are burdened with no social mission and get along with a minimum of theory4 ,joseph ,conrad1 for instance1 is infinitely more subtle in his analysis of the human mind and heart than is ,h4 ,g4 ,wells or ,john ,galsworthy4 ,he has the happy unconcern and detachment of a connoisseur in humanity1 of one who experiences the same fine interest in an unusual human situation as the dilettante finds in some recondite trifle4 ,henry ,james carried this attitude to a high degree of refinement4 ,he walked among men and women as a botanist might walk among a collection of specimens1 dismissing the ordinary with the assured glance of an expert1 and lingering only before the distinctive and the significant4 ,should we who nurse a mission deplore the spirit in which these disinterested observers enter into their task8 ,by no means4 ,but for them1 certain domains of human nature would never have been discovered1 and we should have been correspondingly the losers4 ,for we revolutionists must know the human kind before we can alter them4 ,the non-missionary is as necessary as the missionary1 and to none more than to the missionary4 #ajh ,realism ,novels which take for their subject-matter mere ordinary1 pedestrian existence--and of this kind are three-fourths of present-day novels -are invariably dull in one of two ways4 ,in the first instance1 they are written by pettifogging talents to whom only the ordinary is of interest1 by people1 that is to say1 who are incapable of writing a book that is not dull4 ,in the other1 they are written by men generally of considerable1 sometimes of brilliant1 ability1 who1 misled by a theory1 concern themselves laboriously with a domain of life which they dislike and which even bores them4 ,but if the writer is bored1 how much more so must be the reader6 ,in short1 the realist theory produces bad books because it forces the writer to select subjects the only emotion towards which it is possible to feel is boredom4 ,and great art may arise out of hate1 grief1 even despair1 but never out of boredom4 #aji ,fate and ,mr4 ,wells ,fate has dealt ironically with ,h4 ,g4 ,wells4 ,it has turned his volumes of fiction into prophecies1 and his volumes of prophecies into fiction4 #aaj ,mr4 ,g4 ,k4 ,chesterton ,a man's philosophy may be uninteresting1 although he writes about it in an interesting manner4 ,just as the many write dully about interesting things1 so a few write interestingly about dull things4 ,and ,mr4 ,chesterton is one of these4 ,equality is a dull creed1 ,christianity is a dry bone1 tradition is wisdom for ants and the ,chinese4 ,but ,mr4 ,chesterton is a very interesting man4 ,how is it possible for an interesting man to have an uninteresting philosophy8 ,is this simply the last paradox of a master of paradox8 ,mr4 ,chesterton's most charming quality is a capacity for being surprised4 ,he writes paradoxically1 because to him everything is a paradox--the most simple thing1 the most uninteresting thing4 ,and that is his weakness1 as well as his strength4 ,he has found the common things so wonderful that he has not searched for the uncommon things4 ,the average man is to him such a miracle1 that he will not admit the genius is a far greater miracle4 ,the theories he finds established1 ,christianity1 equality1 democracy1 traditionalism1 interest him so much that he has not gone beyond them to inquire into other theories perhaps more interesting4 ,and this1 because he lacks intellectual curiosity1 along with that which frequently accompanies it1 subtlety of mind4 ,for the intellectually curious man is precisely the man who is not interested in things1 or1 at any rate1 is interested in them only for a little1 and then passes on or burrows deeper to find something further4 ,one dogma after another he studies and deserts1 this faith--- less searcher1 this philanderer1 this philosopher2 and that which leads him on is the hope that at last he will find something to interest him for an eternity4 ,perhaps it is this dissatisfaction of the mind which has always driven men to seek knowledge2 perhaps1 if all mankind had been like ,mr4 ,chesterton1 we should not have had even ,christianity1 equality1 democracy and the other theories which he holds and adorns4 ,for ,mr4 ,chesterton's impressions are all first impressions4 ,like his own deity1 he sees everything for the first time always4 ,and he lacks1 therefore1 the power1 called vision1 of seeing into things3 the outside of things is already sufficiently interesting to him4 ,he possesses imagination1 however1 and kindly and grotesque fancies which he hangs on the ear of the most common clodhopper of a reality4 ,in fantasy he reaches greatness4 ,but his philosophy is not interesting4 ,it is himself that is interesting4 #aaa ,nietzsche ,nietzsche loved ,man1 but not men3 in that love were comprehended his nobility and his cruelty4 ,he demanded that men should become ,man before they asked to be loved4 #aab ,strindberg ,this writer1 despite his genius1 earnestness and courage1 arouses in us a feeling of profound disappointment4 ,nor is the cause very far to seek4 ,for along with earnestness and courage in a writer we instinctively look for nobility and joy3 if the latter qualities are absent we feel that the raison d'tre of the former is gone1 and that earnestness and courage divorced from nobility and joy are aimless1 wasted1 almost inconceivable4 ,and in ,strindberg they are so divorced4 ,a disappointed courage2 an ignoble earnestness6 ,these are his pre-eminent qualities4 ,and with them he essayed tragedy--the form of art in which nobility and joy are most required6 ,as a consequence1 the problems which he treats are not only treated inadequately2 the inadequacy1 when we stop to reflect upon it1 absolutely amazes us4 ,his crises are simply rows4 ,his women1 when they are angry1 are intellectual fishwives2 and--more disgusting still--so are his men4 ,all his characters1 indeed1 intellectual and talented as they are1 move on an amazingly low spiritual plane4 ,the worst in their nature comes to light at the touch of tragedy1 and an air of sordidness surrounds all4 ,posterity will not tolerate this low tragedy1 this tragedy without a raison d'tre1 this drama of the dregs4 #aac ,dostoieffsky ,dostoieffsky depicted the subconscious as conscious2 that was how he achieved his complex and great effects4 ,for the subconscious is the sphere of all that is most primeval1 mysterious and sublime in man2 the very bed out of which springs the flower of tragedy4 ,but did ,dostoieffsky do well to lay bare that world previously so reverently hidden1 and to bring the reader behind the scenes of tragedy8 ,the artist will deny it--the artist who always demands as an ingredient in his highest effects mystery4 ,for how can mystery be retained when the very realm of mystery1 the subconscious1 is surveyed and mapped8 ,in ,dostoieffsky's imperishable works the spirit of full tragedy is perhaps never evoked4 ,what he provides in them1 however1 is such a criticism of tragedy as is nowhere else to be found4 ,his genius was for criticism2 the artist in him created these great figures in order that afterwards the psychologist might dissect them4 ,and so well are they dissected1 even down to the subconsciousness1 that1 to use a phrase of the critics1 we know them better than the people we meet4 ,well1 that is precisely what we object to--as lovers of art6 #aad ,again ,not only is ,dostoieffsky himself a great psychologist2 all his chief characters are great psychologists as well4 ,raskolnikoff1 for instance1 ,porphyrius ,petrovitch1 ,svidragaloff1 ,prince ,muishkin1 walk through his pages as highly self-conscious figures1 and as people who have one and all looked deeply into the shadowy world of human motives1 and have generalized4 ,the crises in ,dostoieffsky's books are1 therefore1 of a peculiarly complex kind4 ,it is not only the human passions and desires that meet one another in a conflict more or less spontaneous2 the whole wealth of psychological observation and generalization of the conflicting character is thrown into their armoury1 and with that1 too1 they do battle4 ,the resulting effect is more large1 rich and subtle than anything else in modern fiction1 but also1 if the truth must be told1 more impure1 in the artistic sense1 more sophisticated4 ,sometimes1 so inextricably are passion and psychology mingled1 that the crises are more like the duels of psychologists than the conflicts of human souls4 ,in the end1 one turns with relief to the pure tragedy of the classical writers1 the tragedy which is not brought about by people who act like amateur psychologists4 #aae ,tolerance of ,artists ,no matter what their conscious theories may be1 all artists are unconsciously aristocratic1 and even intolerant in their attitude to other men4 ,they are more blind than most people to the raison d'tre of the politician1 the business man and the philosopher--these unaccountable beings who will not acknowledge the primacy of ,creation and ,beauty4 ,but at last they magnanimously conclude that these exist to form their audience1 not the subject-matter of their art--that is the modern fallacy6 #aaf ,climate ,there are natures exquisitely sensitive to their human environment4 ,this man depresses them1 they feel the vitality ebbing out of them in his presence2 that other brings exhilaration1 at the touch of his mind their powers increase and become creative4 ,it is a question of atmosphere4 ,the first has a wintry1 grey soul2 the latter carries a sun--their sun--in his bosom4 ,and these artists require sunlight and soft air1 before the flowers and fruit can hang from their boughs4 ,every artist of this type should go to ,italy or ,france and live there2 or1 failing that1 create for himself an ,italy or ,france of friends4 ,others require the tempest with its lowering skies4 ,but that is easier to seek2 they can generally find it within themselves4 #aag ,sensibility ,it may be wisdom for the man of action to smother his griefs1 and follow resolutely his course4 ,but with the artist it is different4 ,he should not close his heart against sorrow1 for sorrow is of use to him2 his task is to transfigure it2 thus he makes himself richer4 ,every conquest of suffering which is attained by isolating the pang makes the artist poorer2 the part of him so isolated dies3 he loses bit by bit his sensitiveness1 and how much does his sensitiveness mean to him6 ,the artist is more defenceless than other men1 and he must be so4 ,for his sensitiveness should be such that the faintest rose-leaf of emotion or thought cannot touch his heart without evoking in him infinite delight or pain2 and1 at the same time1 he should be able to respond to the great tempests and terrible moods of life4 ,great strength1 great love1 great productiveness1 these are required if he is to endure his sensitiveness2 alas1 for him1 if he have them not6 ,then he must suffer and suffer1 until he has cut off one by one the sources of his suffering1 until he has mutilated and lamed what is most godlike in him1 and has made himself ordinary at last--or a ,schopenhauerian4 #aah ,the ,artist's ,enemy ,i waited once beside a lake1 created surely to mirror ,innocence1 so pure it was4 ,the passage of a butterfly over it or the breath of a rose-leaf's fall was enough to stir its surface1 infinitely delicate and sensitive4 ,yet tempests did not affright it1 for it laughed and danced beneath the whip of the fiercest storm4 ,and it could bury1 as in a bottomless tomb1 the stones thrown at it by the most spiteful hands2 to these1 indeed1 it responded with a ,puck-like radiating smile that spread until it broke in soft laughter upon its marge4 ,so strong and delicate it lay1 and yet1 it seemed1 so defenceless4 ,yet what could harm it8 ,storm1 shower1 sunshine1 and darkness alike but ministered to it1 and even the missiles of its enemies were lost in its boundless security4 ,it seemed invulnerable4 ,i returned years later1 and looked once1 looked and fled4 ,for the lake had grown old1 blind and torpid1 so that even the light lay dead in it4 ,then ,i noticed that on every side1 almost invisible1 there were innumerable black streams oozing--infection6 ,the tragedy of the artist4 #aai ,uniformity ,in the mien of children there is sometimes to be noted a natural nobility and pride2 they walk with the unconscious grace of conquerors4 ,but this grace and freedom soon disappear1 and when the child has become man there is nothing left of them3 his bearing is as undistinguished as his neighbour's4 ,nowhere1 now1 is nobility of presence and movement to be found1 except among children1 the chieftains of half-barbarous peoples1 and some animals4 ,the farther man departs from the animal the less dignified he becomes1 and the more his appearance conforms to a common level3 indeed1 civilization seems1 on one side1 to be a labourious attempt to arrive at the undistinguished and indistinguishable4 ,is ,man1 then1 the mediocre animal par excellence8 ,only1 perhaps1 under an egalitarian rgime4 ,wherever a hierarchy exists in ,europe there is more of nobility of demeanour than elsewhere4 ,equality and humility are the great fosterers of the mediocre3 and not only1 alas6 of the mediocre in demeanour4 ,who can tell how many proud1 graceful and gallant thoughts and emotions have been killed by shame--the shame which the egalitarians and the humble have heaped upon them8 ,and how much ,art1 therefore1 has lost8 ,certainly1 in the minds of children there are many brave1 generous and noble thoughts which are never permitted to come to maturity4 ,ye must become as little children----4 #abj ,immortality of the ,artist ,an artist one day forgot ,death1 so entirely had he become ,life's1 rapt in a world of living contemplation2 and1 established there1 he created a form4 ,that hour was immortal1 and1 therefore1 the form was immortal4 ,this is the timelessness of true art-work2 they are fashioned in eternity1 as ,blake said1 and so speak to the eternal in ,man4 #aba ,the ,descent of the ,artist ,at the beginning of his journey he climbed daringly1 leaping from rock to rock1 exuberant1 tireless1 until he reached what he thought was his highest peak4 ,then began his descent1 and1 lo1 immediately great weariness fell upon him4 ,a friend of his wondered1 ,is he going downhill because he is tired8 ,or is he tired because he is going downhill8 #abb ,apropos the ,cynic ,he wrote with an assumption of extreme heartlessness1 and the public said1 ,how tender his heart must be when he hides it under such a disguise6 ,but what he was hiding all the time was his lack of heart4 #abc ,artist and ,philosopher ,in all ages the philosophers have pardoned the artists their lack of depth1 on account of their divine love of the beautiful4 ,in our time1 however1 this only reason for pardoning them has disappeared1 and they are now entirely deserving of condemnation4 ,for the realists abjure equally thought--interpretation1 and beauty--selection4 ,to be an eye1 with a fountain pen attached to it2 that is their aim1 successfully attained1 alas6 ,a single eye and not a single thought3 the definition of the realist4 #abd ,an ,evil ,art is at the present day far too easy for comprehension1 far too obvious4 ,our immediate task should be to make it difficult1 and the concern of a dedicated few4 ,thus only shall we win back reverence for it4 ,when it is reverenced1 however1 it will then be time to extend its sway2 but not until then4 ,art must be approached with reverence1 or not at all4 ,a democratic familiarity with it--such as exists among the middle classes1 not among the working classes1 in whom reverence is not yet dead--is an abomination4 #abe ,modern ,art ,themes ,how sordid are the themes which modern art has chosen for itself6 ,the loss of money or of position1 poverty1 social entanglements--the little accidents which a thinker laughs at6 ,are modern artists as bourgeois as this8 ,a coterie of shop-keepers8 ,tragic art has no concern with the accidental3 that is the sphere of comedy4 ,tragedy should move inevitably once it has begun to revolve2 it is beyond fashion1 universal1 essential2 ,fate1 not ,circumstance1 is its theme4 ,the presence of the accidental in a tragedy is sufficient to condemn it4 ,for it is the inevitable1 the ,fate in ,tragedy1 that makes of it a heroic and joyful thing4 ,it cannot be improvised like ,comedy4 ,it demands in its creator a sense of the eternal1 just as ,comedy1 on the other hand1 demands an exquisite appreciation of temporal fashion4 ,tragedy is the greater art2 ,comedy1 perhaps1 the more difficult4 ,our modern tragedies1 however1 are mainly about accidents1 and very mean accidents2 they are improvised misfortunes and their effect is depressing4 #abf ,the ,illusionists ,how shallow are most artists6 ,how childish6 ,how subject to illusion6 ,this novelist at the end of his novels leaves his characters in a ,utopia1 from which all sorrow and trial have been banished1 a condition absolutely unreal1 contemptible and absurd4 ,and all his readers admire without thinking1 and call the author profound6 ,he is not profound1 but shallow and commonplace4 ,except for his gift of mimicry1 which he calls ,art1 he is just an average man4 ,and1 moreover1 he is tired3 the happy ending is his exhaustion speaking through his art1 his will to stagnation and surrender4 ,works of art should only end tragically1 or enigmatically1 as in ,a ,doll's ,house1 or at the gateway of a new ideal1 as in ,an ,enemy of the ,people4 #abg ,majorities and ,art ,when it is said that in modern society poetic tragedy is out of season and cannot succeed1 an assumption is made which on literary grounds can never be admitted4 ,it is that majorities count in literature as in politics2 that ,brand was a failure and ,a ,doll's ,house a success4 ,but from another point of view1 ,brand was the success1 ,a ,doll's ,house the failure4 ,and the whole problem drama a failure with it1 and all the realistic schools1 as well--a failure6 ,this is certainly how the future historian of literature will regard it4 ,our era with its depressing masterpieces will be called the barren era1 because the grand exception1 great art1 has not bloomed in it1 because even our critics have judged contemporary art by a criterion of success instead of the eternal spiritual criterion3 their championship of problem art proves it6 ,in the meantime1 then1 realism is considered the thing1 and people speak pityingly of poetic tragedy4 ,only those forms of art which can survive in the struggle for existence are counted good--so deeply1 so unwisely have we drunk at the ,darwinian spring6 #abh ,the ,decay of ,man ,the aim of ,art was once to enrich existence by the creation of gods and demi-gods2 it is now to duplicate existence by the portrayal of men4 ,art has become imitation1 ,realism has triumphed4 ,and how much has materialism had to do with this6 ,in an age lacking a vivid ideal of ,man1 men become interesting4 ,the eyes of the artist1 no longer having an ideal to feed upon1 are turned towards the actual1 and imitation succeeds creation4 ,every one busies himself in the study of men1 and ,art becomes half a science1 the artists actually collecting their data1 as if they were professors of psychology6 ,theories glorifying men are born1 and the cult of the average man arises1 which is nothing but the exaltation of men at the expense of ,man4 ,in due time all ideals perish1 only an inspiration towards averageness remains1 and equality is everywhere enthroned4 ,art has no longer a heaven to fly to1 there to create loftier heavens4 ,in despair1 she descends to earth and the ordinary1 and for her salvation must find the ordinary interesting1 must make the ordinary interesting4 ,realism arises when ideals of ,man decay3 it is the egalitarianism of ,art4 #abi ,a ,new ,valuation ,but why do ideals of ,man decay--why did the ideal of ,man decay8 ,because there were no longer examples to inspire the artists in the creation of their grand1 superhuman figures4 ,suspicion1 envy1 equality--call it what you will--had become strong3 the great man could no longer fight it and remain great4 ,by the radicals the genius was regarded as an insult to the remainder of mankind4 ,and how ordinary he was1 this genius1 compared with the grand figures of the time of the ,renaissance2 that time when men were weighed and valued1 when elevation and inequality were acknowledged and acted upon1 and ,man became greater in stature1 with ,art his ,will to ,greatness6 ,well1 we must weigh men again2 we must deny equality2 we must affirm aristocracy--in everything but commerce and production1 where democracy is really a return to the aristocratic tradition4 ,and1 you artists1 you must turn from men to ,man1 from ,realism to ,myth4 ,and if you can find in your age no example to inspire you to the creation of a great ideal of ,man1 then become your own examples6 ,man must be born again1 if you would enter into your heaven4 #acj ,the ,man and the ,hour ,a4 ,let people say about aristocracy what they will1 it remains true that ,man generally is equal to the event4 ,events are the true stepping-stones on which ,man rises to higher things4 ,b4 ,ah6 you are not speaking of ,man1 but of men1 of the many4 ,the great man1 however1 does not require an event to call his greatness forth4 ,he is his own event--and also that of others6 #aca ,the ,lover to the ,artists ,love idealizes the object4 ,if you would create an ideal ,art1 must you not1 then1 learn to love8 ,and that you are ,realists--does it not prove that you have not ,love8 #acb ,origin of the ,tragic ,here is yet another guess at the origin of the tragic3 ,a man is told of some calamity1 altogether unexpected1 the engulfing of a vessel by the sea1 an avalanche which wipes out a town1 or a fire in which a family of little ones perish1 leaving the father and mother unharmed and disconsolate2 and at once the very grandest feelings awaken within him1 he finds himself enlarged spiritually1 and life itself is enriched for him--the people in the vessel and in the town1 the children and the parents of the children1 are raised to a little more than human elevation by the favouritism of calamity4 ,next day he hears that the news was false1 and immediately1 along with the feeling of relief1 he experiences an unmistakable disappointment and loss2 for all those grand emotions and the contemplation of life in that greater aspect are snatched from him6 ,perhaps in primitive times1 when the means of disseminating news were more untrustworthy than they are today1 disappointments of this kind would occur very often2 and one day some rude poet1 having noted the elevation which calamity brings1 would in luxurious imagination invent a calamity1 in order to experience at will this enlargement of the soul4 ,but a tale of calamity1 being invented1 would inevitably please the poet's hearers1 both for the feelings it aroused and the grand image of ,man it represented4 ,so much for the origin and persistence--not the meaning--of the tragic4 #acc ,tragedy and ,comedy ,tragedy is the aristocratic form of art4 ,in it the stature of ,man is made larger4 ,the great tragic figures are superhuman1 unapproachable3 we do not sorrow with them1 but for them1 with an impersonal pity and admiration4 ,and that is because ,man1 and not men1 is represented by them3 idealization and myth are1 therefore1 proper to their delineation4 ,but ,comedy is democratic4 ,its subject is men1 the human-all-too-human1 the unrepresentative3 it belittles men in a jolly egalitarianism4 ,this static fraternity1 this acceptance of men as they are1 is resented by the aristocratic natures1 who would make ,man nobler2 but to the average men it is flattering1 for it proclaims that the great are absurd even as they1 it unites men in a brotherhood of absurdity4 ,thus1 all comedy is an involuntary satire1 all tragedy an involuntary idealization of men4 ,tragedy is the supreme affirmation of ,life1 for it affirms ,life even in its most painful aspects1 struggle1 suffering1 death2 so that we say1 ,yes1 this1 too1 is beautiful6 ,that was the raison d'tre of classical tragedy--and not ,nihilism6 ,well1 in which of these forms1 ,tragedy or ,comedy1 may our hopes and visions of the ,future best be expressed8 ,surely in that which idealizes ,man and says ,yea to suffering1 ,tragedy1 the dynamic form of ,art4 #acd ,super-,art ,in the works of some artists everything is on a slightly superhuman scale4 ,the figures they create fill us with astonishment2 we cannot understand how such unparalleled creatures came into being4 ,when we contemplate them1 in the works of ,michelangelo or of ,nietzsche1 there arise unvoluntarily in our souls sublime dreams of what ,man may yet attain4 ,our thoughts travel into the immeasurable1 the undiscovered1 and the future becomes almost an intoxication to us4 ,in ,nietzsche1 especially1 this attempt to make ,art perform the impossible--this successful attempt to make ,art perform the impossible--is to be noted in every book1 almost in every word4 ,for he strains language to the utmost it can endure2 his words seem to be striving to escape from the bonds of language1 seeking to transcend language4 ,it is my ambition1 he says in ,the ,twilight of the ,idols1 to say in ten sentences what every one else says in a whole book--what every one else does not say in a whole book4 ,in the same way1 when in his first book he wrote about ,tragedy1 he raised it to an elevation greater than it had ever known before1 except1 perhaps1 in the works of schylus2 when1 in his essay upon ,schopenhauer as ,educator1 he adumbrated his conception of the philosopher1 philosophy seemed to become a task for the understandings of gods2 and when1 having criticized the prevailing morality1 he set up another1 it seemed to his generation an impossible code for human beings1 a code cruel1 over-noble4 ,finally1 when he wrote of ,man1 it was to create the ,superman4 ,he touched nothing which he did not ennoble4 ,and1 consequently1 in ,art his chosen form was ,myth2 he held it beneath the nobility of great art to create anything less than demi-gods2 religion and art were in him a unity4 ,in super-art1 in these works of ,leonardo and ,michelangelo1 of schylus and ,nietzsche1 ,man is incited again and again to surpass himself1 to become more than human4 #ace ,love ,poetry ,love poetry1 so long as it glorifies ,love1 is supremely worthy of our reverence4 ,everything that idealizes and transfigures ,love1 making it more desirable and full even of transcendental meaning1 is of unquestionable advantage to mankind2 on the other hand1 a crudely physiological statement1 even though this may be formally true1 serves neither ,love nor ,life4 ,it is assuredly not the function of art to treat ,love in this way4 ,on the contrary1 amatory poetry by its idealization allures to ,love2 this is true even of such of it as is tragic3 we are prepared by it to experience gladly even the suffering of ,love4 ,the only poetry that is noxious is that which bewails the vanity of ,love1 and that in which a deliberate sterility is adumbrated4 ,these are decadent4 #acf ,literature and ,literature ,literature that is judged by literary standards merely is not of the highest rank4 ,for the greatest works are themselves the standards by which literature is judged4 ,how1 then1 are they to be valued8 ,by a standard outside of literature1 by their consonance with that which is the raison d'tre of literature8 ,in them a far greater problem than any literary problem faces us1 the problem1 ,why does literature exist8 ,what is the meaning of literature8 ,through whole generations men forget this problem1 and literature becomes to them a specialized form of activity to be pursued for its own sake1 a part of ,man's soul1 thrown off and become static and separate1 with a sterile life of its own4 ,the more shallow theory and practice of literature then come into being2 ,realism and ,art for ,art's sake flourish4 ,but the eternal question always returns again1 ,why does literature exist8 ,what is its meaning8 ,and1 then1 the possibility of another blossoming of literature is not far away4 #acg ,the ,old ,poet ,an old poet who had lived in the good days when poets were makers--of moralities and gods1 among other things--lately re-visited the earth1 and after a study of the very excellent exercises in literature to be found in our libraries1 delivered himself thus3-- ,how has our power decayed6 ,into litterateurs have we declined who were creators4 ,perish all literature that is only literature6 ,poets live to create gods2 to glorify gods should all their arts of adornment and idealization be used4 ,but ,i see here adornment without the object worthy of adornment2 beautification for the sake of beautification2 ,art for ,art's sake4 ,these artists are only half artists4 ,they have surely made ,art into a game4 ,the critics did not understand him1 and1 therefore1 disagreed4 ,the artists thought he was mad1 besides knowing nothing of sthetics4 ,the moral fanatics acclaimed him vociferously1 mistaking him for a popular preacher4 ,only a philosophico-artistic dilettante listened attentively1 and said1 a little patronizingly1 ,he is wrong1 but he is more right than wrong4 #ach ,the ,old ,gods ,perhaps there is too much made of anthropomorphism4 ,man's first gods were not human gods2 they were stars1 animals1 plants and the like4 ,it was not until he became an artist that he made gods after his own form3 anthropomorphism is just an artistic convention6 ,for gods are in their content superhuman4 ,there has never been a man like ,jehovah or ,zeus or ,odin4 ,the essential thing in them is that they embody an ideal1 a fiction1 adumbrating something more than ,man4 ,religion is poetry in the grand style1 and1 as poetry1 must have its conventions4 #aci ,the ,old ,poets ,in primitive times the poet was far more both of an inventor and a liar than he is at present4 ,for many centuries the lies of the poets have been innocent lies1 a convention merely1 and to be recognized as such before sthetic enjoyment can begin4 ,but the lies the old poets told were believed literally--as they were meant to be6 ,yes1 the poet at the beginning was just a liar1 a great liar4 ,how else1 if he had not deceived ,man1 could he have peopled the heavens with ,man's deities8 ,and as the father of whole families of gods1 he has done more to decide the fate of ,humanity than all the philosophers1 heroes and martyrs4 ,these are only his servants1 who explain war or die for his fictions4 ,and not merely error1 as ,nietzsche held1 but lying has from the earliest times been the most potent factor of progress4 ,but not all lying2 only the lies told out of great love have been creative and life-giving4 ,art1 imagination1 prophecy1 hallucination1 ecstasy1 vision--all these were united in the first poets1 the true creators4 #adj ,the ,creator ,redivivus ,the only modern who has dared to be a poet through and through1 that is1 a liar in the noble and tragic sense1 is the author of the ,superman4 ,in ,nietzsche1 again1 after centuries of divine toying1 the poet has appeared in his great rle of a creator of gods1 a figure beside whom the poet seems like nothing more than the page boy of the ,muse4 #ada ,literature as ,praise ,a4 ,would you erase from the book of literature all that is not idealization and myth1 you neo-moderns8 ,would you deprive us of all the charming1 serious1 whimsical1 and divinely frivolous works which are human-all-too-human8 ,b4 ,if we could--a thousand times no6 ,we would only destroy what defames ,life4 ,all that praises ,life1 all that enchants to ,life1 we would cherish as things holy4 ,idealization1 it is true1 is the highest form of praise1 because it arises out of ,love2 but there are other forms4 ,modern ,realism1 however1 is a calumny against ,life4 crasez l'infme6 #adb ,the ,poet ,speaks ,how unhappy must all those poor mortals be who are not poets6 ,they feel and cannot express4 ,they are dumb when their soul would utter its divinest thoughts4 ,cloddish and fragmentary1 they are scarcely human1 these poor mortals6 ,for one must be a poet to be altogether human4 ,yes6 in the ideal society of the future every one will be a poet1 even the average man6 #adc ,myth ,the worst evil of our time is this1 that there is nothing greater than the current average existence to which man can look2 ,religion has dried up1 ,art has decayed from an idealization of life into a reflection of it4 ,in short1 ,art has become a passive thing1 where once it was the great stimulus to ,life4 ,the idealization and enchantment which the moderns have so carefully eliminated from it was precisely its raison d'tre4 ,and modern ,art1 which sets out to copy life1 has forgotten ,art altogether1 its origin1 its meaning and its end4 ,against this aimless ,realism1 we must oppose idealization1 and especially that which is its highest expression1 ,myth4 ,and let no one say that it is impossible at this stage in ,man's history to resuscitate ,myth4 ,the past has certainly lost its mystery for us1 and it was in the past1 at the source of ,humanity1 that the old poets set their sublime fictions4 ,but the future is still ours1 and there1 at ,man's goal1 our myths must be planted4 ,and thither1 indeed1 has set the great literature of the last hundred years4 ,faust1 ,mephistopheles1 ,brand1 ,peer ,gynt1 ,zarathustra--there were no greater figures in the literature of the last century--were all myths1 and all forecasts of the future4 ,the soil out of which literature grows1 then1 has not yet been exhausted6 ,if we but break away from ,realism1 if we make ,art symbolic1 if we bring about a marriage between ,art and ,religion1 ,art will rise again4 ,that this is possible1 we who have faith in the ,future must believe4 ,v ,,creative ,,love #add ,creative ,love ,to us who nourish hopes for the future of ,man1 the important distinction to be drawn in ,love is not that between the sacred and the profane4 ,we ask1 rather1 ,is our ,love creative or barren8 ,that ,love should bring happiness1 or union1 or fulfilment1 seems to us not such a very great matter6 ,the will to create something1 out of oneself1 not oneself1 whether it be in bodies1 or in ,art or ,philosophy--that is the thing for ever worthy of our reverence4 ,there is another ,love2 that whose end is enjoyment4 ,it is the enemy of creative ,love4 ,it is the ,love which1 in various forms1 is known as ,liberalism1 or ,humanitarianism1 or the greatest happiness of the greatest number4 ,sympathy is its central dogma2 and it is never tired of exalting itself at the expense of the other ,love1 which it calls cruel1 senseless and unholy4 ,but the same blasphemy is here repeated that ,socrates once was guilty of and afterwards so divinely atoned4 ,for it is not creative ,love1 but sympathetic ,love1 that is unholy4 ,this would spare the beloved the pangs of love1 even if1 in doing so1 it had to sacrifice the fruits of love4 ,it springs from disbelief in existence4 ,life is suffering1 it cries1 suffering must be alleviated1 and1 therefore1 ,life must be abated1 weakened and lamed6 ,and this love is barren4 ,but creative ,love does not bring enjoyment1 but rapture and pain4 ,it is the will to suffer gladly2 it finds relief from the pains of existence1 not in alleviation1 but in creation4 ,this ,love is1 indeed1 a ,siren--we would not mitigate the awfulness of that symbol--luring ,man to peril1 perhaps to shipwreck4 ,yet1 by the holiest law of his being1 he listens1 he follows4 ,and1 if his ears have been sealed by reason he unseals them again1 he listens with his very soul1 yielding to that which is for him certainly danger1 perhaps ,death1 knowing that1 even in ,death1 he will be affirming ,life in the highest4 ,this ,love1 the earnest of future greatness1 this terrible1 unconditional and innocent thing1 we cannot but reverence4 #ade ,where ,man is ,innocent ,there is one region in ,man where innocence and a good conscience still reign--in the unconscious4 ,love and the joy in ,love are of the unconscious4 ,the rapture which ,love brings is neither1 as ,schopenhauer said1 merely a device to ensure the propagation of mankind1 nor the race rejoicing in and through the individual to its own perpetuation2 but the joy of unconscious ,man1 still innocent as before the ,fall1 with a good conscience enjoying the anticipatory rapture of new life4 ,the instincts believe in ,life entirely without questioning2 doubt and guilt are simply not present in their world3 it is reflection that makes sinners of us all4 ,the thoughts that come to us in the season of ,love--we do not need to search in metaphysical heavens for their source4 ,they arise from the very well spring1 the very central ego of ,man1 out of the unconscious1 the innocent1 the real4 ,poetry1 in that which is incomprehensible and mystical in it1 arises from this also4 ,so there is hope still for ,man1 all ye who believe not in primal depravity6 ,the real man is even now innocent3 ,original ,sin is only mind deep1 conscience deep4 ,the instincts still behave as if ,life-defaming doctrines were not3 they have not yet begun to mourn at the ,spring and exult at the ,autumn4 ,and in the ecstasies of creative ,love1 whether it be of persons or of things1 they continue to celebrate1 without misgiving1 their jubilee4 #adf ,a ,criterion ,to find out whether a thing is decadent or no1 let us henceforth put this question1 ,does it spring from creative ,love8 ,is the ,will to suffering incarnate in it1 or the will to alleviate suffering8 ,how much must by this standard be condemned6 ,humanitarianism and its child1 ,reform1 or the desire to alleviate others' pain2 stheticism and its step-brother1 ,realism1 or the wish to alleviate one's own3 these spring from the same source--a dearth of ,love4 ,for creative ,love would enjoin1 not sympathy with suffering1 but the will to transcend suffering2 not reform1 whose aim is happiness1 but revolution1 whose aim is growth2 not ,art for ,art's sake1 an escape from ,life into a stationary sthetic world1 but the creation1 out of ,life1 of ever new ,art2 not ,realism or the need to find men interesting2 but idealization1 or the desire to make men interesting4 ,john ,galsworthy and ,oscar ,wilde alike are decadent for this reason1 that they lack ,love4 ,the real difference between them is that the one is a ,collectivist1 and sympathizes with the people1 and the other is an ,individualist1 and sympathizes with himself4 ,but both degrade ,love to the level of ,hedonism2 both rebel against the cruelty of ,love1 desiring a ,love which will not hurt1 and1 therefore1 must be barren4 ,but wherever peoples1 faiths or arts decay1 the decay of ,love--this strong1 energetic ,love--has come first4 ,the current frivolousness about intellectual matters1 the philandering of the literary coquettes1 springs simply from a lack of ,love4 ,for the great problems demand passion for their comprehension1 and our intellectuals dislike passion4 ,in politics and in religion it is the same3 creative ,love has everywhere disappeared to be replaced by barren ,sympathy4 ,but is it possible by preaching to increase ,love8 ,can it be willed into power8 ,well1 praise may call it forth4 #adg ,love at the ,renaissance ,how may a great creative age like the ,renaissance be interpreted on the hypothesis of ,love8 ,shall it yet be found that the mainspring of the ,renaissance was a newly discovered love of ,life and1 therefore1 of ,man8 ,in the ,middle ,ages that part of ,life1 then called ,god1 had become isolated and abstract1 and was worshipped to the detriment of all other ,life2 while ,man was neglected where he was not belittled4 ,thus1 a strong current of ,man's love was diverted away from ,man altogether1 and the earth became dark and sterile4 ,how was the earth to recapture its love again1 and drink back into itself its rapture and creativeness8 ,by a marriage in which ,god and the ,universe were made one flesh2 by the incorporation of ,god into ,life1 and1 therefore1 into ,man4 ,hence arose the ,pantheism of the ,renaissance4 ,to love ,life with a good conscience1 to love ,life unconditionally1 it was necessary to call ,life ,god4 ,out of this ,love sprang not only the art but the science of the ,renaissance4 ,for ,man once more became interested in himself1 and1 from himself1 in ,life2 ultimately discoveries were made and more than one ,new ,world was brought to light4 ,perhaps it is the defect of all theistic1 objective theologies that they become1 sooner or later1 barren4 ,only by being translated into the subjective do they regain their creative power3 ,pantheism is the remedy for ,theism4 ,yet to ,theism we owe this1 that it lent intensity and elevation to ,love4 ,the ,love of the ,pantheists of the ,renaissance was not ordinary human ,love2 it united in a unique emotion the love that had formerly been given to ,man along with that which had formerly been given to ,god4 ,it loved ,man as ,god should be loved--a dangerous thing4 ,but out of this love of ,god in ,man it created1 nevertheless1 something great1 somewhat less than the one1 somewhat more than the other--the demi-god4 ,the ,renaissance was the age of the demi-gods4 #adh ,sympathy ,sympathy is ,love bereft of his bow and arrows--but still blind4 #adi ,a ,self-,evident ,proposition ,this is certain1 that ,god is ,love4 ,how1 else1 could ,he have created the ,universe8 #aej ,god is ,love ,when ,jesus said1 ,god is ,love1 ,he denned a religion of ,becoming4 ,was it not necessarily so8 ,for ,love is not something which may choose to create2 it must create1 it is fundamentally the will and the power to create4 ,and ,eternal ,love1 or ,god1 is1 therefore1 eternal creation1 eternal change1 eternal ,becoming4 ,consequently1 there is no ultimate goal1 no ,perfection1 except that which is realized at every moment in the self-expression of ,love4 ,a vision8 ,a nightmare8 ,well1 it depends whether one is in favour of ,life1 or of ,death2 whether one lives1 or is lived4 ,and1 therefore1 whether religion is subjective1 or objective8 ,whether ,god is within us1 or outside us8 ,for so long as ,god is within us1 we must create4 ,that should be our ,becoming6 #aea ,love and ,mr4 ,galsworthy ,the art of ,mr4 ,galsworthy is such an ambiguous thing--half impersonal portrayal1 half personal plea1 the ,art pour l',art of a social reformer--and the subjects he chooses are so controversial--the abuses of society--that it is hard to place him as an artist4 ,when ,the ,dark ,flower appeared1 however1 we thought we had him4 ,here was a great subject to his hand1 an artist's question at last1 ,love4 ,alas6 even in writing about it1 he could not altogether exclude the reformer4 ,well1 that itself1 perhaps1 told us something6 ,however that may be1 we do get here ,mr4 ,galsworthy's conception of ,love4 ,it is an inadequate conception1 a realist's conception3 ,love1 with the meaning left out4 ,the ardours1 the longing1 the disappointment and anguish--all the symptoms--of ,love are given2 but not a hint that ,love has any significance beyond the emotions it brings3 that which redeems ,love1 creation1 is ignored altogether6 ,mr4 ,galsworthy has seen that ,love is cruel1 but he has not seen beyond the cruelty3 it is the ultimate thing to him4 ,well1 that is perhaps the most that could be expected of a humanitarian trying to comprehend ,love6 ,in this book are all the symptoms of ,humanitarianism--pity for every one1 reform of institutions1 suffering always considered the sufficient reason for abolishing or palliating things3 a creed thrice inadequate1 thrice shallow1 thrice blind4 ,love would find relief from suffering in creation4 ,but one feels that ,mr4 ,galsworthy would abolish ,life if he could4 ,humanitarianism unconsciously seeks the annihilation of ,life1 for in ,life suffering is integral4 #aeb ,mr4 ,thomas ,hardy ,in ,mr4 ,hardy's conception of ,love1 unlike ,mr4 ,galsworthy's1 the contingency of creation is never absent2 but to him creation is not a justification of the pangs of ,love4 ,it is an intensification of them2 it is ,love's last and worst indignity4 ,but even when ,love does not bestow this ultimate insult of creation1 it cannot resist the satisfaction of torturing its victims2 it is wanton and irrelevant in its distribution of pain4 ,mr4 ,hardy's books are filled with the torments of ,love4 ,was it not fitting that he should aim his main indictment of ,life against it1 seeing that it is the trick whereby the blunder of ,life is perpetuated8 ,and so ,mr4 ,hardy is certainly a decadent2 but he is a great decadent--one of those who by the power of their denial of ,life seem to make ,life more profound and tragic1 and inspire the healthy artists to an even greater love and reverence for it4 ,he is great1 however1 not by his theories1 but by his art4 ,the contrast between the sordidness of his thought and the splendidness of his art fills us sometimes with amazement4 ,he sets out in his books to prove that ,life is a mean blunder2 and1 in spite of himself1 the tragedy of this blunder becomes in his hands splendid and impressive1 so that ,life is enriched even while it is defamed4 ,art1 which is necessarily idealization and glorification1 triumphs in him over even his most deeply founded conscious ideas4 ,in all his greater books1 it refutes his pessimism and turns his curses into involuntary blessings4 ,so divine is ,art6 #aec ,mr4 ,george ,moore ,in writing about ,love1 ,mr4 ,moore falls into the same realistic error as ,mr4 ,galsworthy3 he writes about its manifestations without knowledge of that which gives them meaning and connection4 ,love to him is just certain sensations--and not only ,love1 but everything else4 ,art is a sensation2 religion1 a sensation2 the soul1 a sensation4 ,take out of his books sensation1 and there will be little of account left4 ,he knows the religious feeling1 but not religion3 he always confounds spirituality with refined sensualism4 ,so he knows the sensation of ,love1 but not ,love4 ,but ,mr4 ,moore is learned in the senses3 he knows them in everything but their purity4 ,yes1 even sensuality is in his books corrupted4 ,how true this is we realize when in ,evelyn ,innes he compares one of his characters to a faun4 ,we are almost distressed at this1 for we feel that the word is not only coarsened1 but used with a wrong meaning altogether3 we feel that ,mr4 ,moore is incapable of understanding what a faun is6 ,these sophisticated1 scented and somewhat damaged voluptuaries of his1 in whose conversation there is always an atmosphere of expensive feminine lingerie1 and who know women so intimately2 how perverted must be the taste which can compare them with the hardy1 nimble1 unconscious creatures of ancient ,greece6 ,but ,mr4 ,moore is much nearer in temper to ,oscar ,wilde than to the realists4 ,he is an sthete essentially1 and a realist only in the second place1 and only because he is an sthete4 ,the province of selected exquisite beauty had been exhausted by ,wilde and his school2 so ,mr4 ,moore turned to the squalid1 the commonplace and the diseased in ,life1 there to find his sthetic emotion4 ,this explains the curious effect at once of colour and of drabness in his books4 ,he is a perverted ,wilde2 doubly a decadent4 #aed ,mr4 ,bernard ,shaw ,both the strength and the weakness of ,mr4 ,shaw spring from a defect--his lack of ,love4 ,freedom from illusion is his strength4 ,he possesses common sense minus common sentiment2 that1 and probably nothing more2 and that gives to his thought an appearance of subtlety1 though it is not really subtle4 ,thus1 his common sense tells him that ,love is essentially creation4 ,he sees through the illusions which ,love spins round its purpose1 because he does not see these illusions at all4 ,love1 indeed1 is known to him in all but its illusions2 but who knows ,love that knows not ,love's illusions8 ,still1 it is to his honour that he has conceived ,love as creation4 ,his weakness consists in that his attitude to ,love is purely intellectual4 ,he lacks ,love more than any other man of his time4 ,in grappling with the great problems of existence1 it is not ,love but the very absence of ,love that has been his most useful weapon2 and so he has seen much1 but grasped nothing1 created nothing4 ,and because he has never loved1 he can never be called an artist4 ,for how can one who has not loved idealize8 ,and how can one who has not idealized be an artist8 ,in ,mr4 ,shaw1 ,nature has gone out of her way to create the very antithesis of the artist4 ,what ,nietzsche said about ,socrates is true of ,mr4 ,shaw even in a higher degree2 that his reason is stronger than his instincts1 and has usurped the place of his instincts4 ,without ,love1 he yet affirms creation4 ,what can be his reason for doing so8 ,why should he wish ,life to persist if he does not love ,life8 ,is it in order that people might still converse wittily1 and the epigram might not die8 ,or so that exceptional men might experience forever the joy of intellectual conflict1 the satisfaction found in the ruthless exposure of fallacy and weakness1 and the proud feeling of mental power8 ,we know that ,mr4 ,shaw regards the brain as an end--the purpose of ,life being to perfect a finer and finer brain--and we know1 too1 that to ,mr4 ,shaw the highest joy the brain can experience is not that of knowing1 but of fighting4 ,knowledge to him is a weapon with which to wage war4 ,does he desire ,life to continue so that controversy might continue8 ,well1 let us look1 then1 for some other reason for his praise of ,love4 ,he himself lacks ,love3--,can it be that he praises it for the same reason for which the ,christian praises what he is not but would fain be8 ,and his love of ,love is then something pathetic1 founded on unselfishness8 ,and himself1 a ,romantic8 #aee ,mr4 ,h4 ,g4 ,wells ,how much has ,mr4 ,wells's scientific training had to do with his conception of ,love8 ,as a student of biology1 it was natural he should see ,love as sex4 ,in all his theories1 indeed1 there is more of the scientist than of the artist4 ,scientific certainly1 is his simple acceptance of sex as a fact1 and his unhesitating association of it with generation1 and of both with ,love4 ,the innocence of the scientist and not of the artist is his1 an innocence ,darwinian1 not ,goethean4 ,and so1 although his purpose is fine--to restore in his books an innocent conception of sexual ,love--in doing so1 his biology always runs away with his art4 ,for he would render sex significant by reading it into all creation1 as the meaning of creation2 thus making the instrument more than the agent1 the very meaning of the agent6 ,but this robs both creation and sex of their significance4 ,the way to restore an innocent conception of sexual ,love is by reading creation into it1 by seeing it as part of the universal ,becoming1 by carrying it away on the great purifying stream of ,becoming4 ,in spite of his genius1 and still more of his cleverness1 ,mr4 ,wells here began at the wrong end4 ,but it is doubtful whether any one in this generation has sufficient artistic power and elevation to express in art this conception of ,love4 ,within the limits of ,realism1 especially of physiological ,realism1 it certainly cannot be expressed4 ,nothing less than the symbolic may serve for it4 #aef ,the ,idealism of ,love ,the writer who discovered that love idealizes the object might have pushed his discovery a little further2 for it is no less true that love idealizes the subject4 ,none knows better than the poets how to take advantage of this self-idealization3 one has only to read their love poems to find out how much more is said about the poet's beautiful feelings than about the object which presumably evoked them4 ,heine1 particularly1 was a shameless offender in this way4 ,a woman was to him simply an excuse for seeing himself in imagination in a romantic attitude4 ,but even with the others who appear less obtrusive and more disinterested the implication is the same4 ,how elevated and even divine we must be1 they seem to say1 when we can feel in this manner2 and how happy1 when we are privileged to love an object of such loveliness6 ,yes6 love has such power that it idealizes everything--even the subject6 #aeg ,love and ,becoming ,the great ,heraclitus propounded the doctrine of ,becoming4 ,everything changes1 is built up and dissolved2 stability is only a little sluggishness in the flux of things4 ,zeus1 the great child1 the divine artist1 constructs and destroys at his pleasure and for his amusement3 all the worlds are his playthings4 ,this conception of the ,universe is innocent and beautiful1 an artist's conception2 but it is at the same time terrifying4 ,and that because all meaning is left out of it2 for all things without meaning1 no matter how beautiful they may be1 are in the end terrifying4 ,nietzsche1 the modern counterpart of ,heraclitus1 re-affirmed this doctrine2 but he coupled with it the idea of creative ,love3 that is his chief distinction4 ,certainly1 those who do not comprehend ,nietzsche's ,love do not comprehend ,nietzsche4 ,it is the key to his religion of ,becoming4 ,becoming without ,love is meaningless2 ,love without ,becoming is meaningless4 ,but1 united1 each gives its meaning to the other1 each redeems the other4 ,but have things a meaning in themselves8 ,is it not ,man that forever interprets and interprets8 ,very well4 ,but is not a thing incomplete without its interpretation8 ,is not its interpretation a part of it8 #aeh ,static ,values ,stagnant waters become noisome after a while4 ,and stagnant values8 ,certainly within these eternal pools not a few repulsive things have been born3 in ,perfection1 ,sin2 in ,justice1 ,guilt4 ,it was when human judgments were apotheosized and became ,eternal ,justice that guilt was insinuated into the core of ,life4 ,a falsehood1 a presumption6 ,what man found necessary at one moment in his history for his preservation1 that1 forsooth1 was a law governing the spheres1 the everlasting edict of ,god ,himself4 ,and when ,life did not operate in conformity with this law1 it was ,life that must needs be guilty--a very ingenious method of world-vilification6 ,it was human vanity that created the eternal verities4 ,and how much have we suffered from them6 ,for the deification of ,things meant the diabolization of ,man1 nay1 of ,life itself4 ,the metaphysician who created ,heaven created ,hell at the self-same moment2 but1 ever since1 it has been ,hell that has given birth to the metaphysicians4 ,being condemns ,becoming1 and pollutes all ,life with sin4 ,so in the pools of ,being we can no longer cleanse ourselves1 and our preference for a doctrine of ,becoming may be at bottom a hygienic preference4 #aei ,the ,god of ,becoming ,love is the ,god of ,becoming4 ,all the other gods are static gods1 changeless for yesterday1 today and tomorrow4 ,but ,love belongs altogether to the future4 ,it is the deity of those who would create a future4 #afj ,utopias ,it is sympathy that has built the ,utopias4 ,on every one of them is written1 ,conflict and suffering are bad4 ,utopia is nothing but a place where men are happy1 like how many heavens1 an ideal of exhaustion4 ,the thing that is omitted from it is always ,love1 for ,love would shatter all ,utopias and leave them behind4 ,in ,nowhere ,man no longer creates1 but enjoys4 ,but creation and pain go hand in hand2 for what is creation8 ,the dissolution of the outworn1 the birth of the new2 a continuous fury in which the throes of death and of life are mingled4 ,and ,love calls ,man to that fate4 ,what we need is an ideal of energy4 ,but that must needs be an ideal of ,man1 not of ,society2 for ,man is the dynamic1 ,society the static4 ,utopia is a goal1 but the ,superman is a goal beyond a goal2 for1 once attained1 he is naught but the arrow to shoot into his future4 ,to attain the ,superman is to surpass the ,superman4 ,only ideals of this kind are unassailable by ,love4 #afa ,primacy of ,things ,if we aim at a state of society in which static values1 as far as we can know them1 are conformed with1 we aim at a state in which the creative impulse will not only be needless1 but harmful4 ,for does not belief in absolute values necessarily imply belief in a ,utopia8 ,and therefore in something antagonistic to ,love8 ,the metaphor of static ,perfection1 lovely as it is1 has perhaps ruled us too long1 and it is time we superseded it by another4 ,or is it still1 as it has always been1 a crime to substitute one metaphor for another8 ,even if it is ,love that drives us on8 ,progress conceived as a discovery of the unknown instead of as a pursuit of ,perfection--might not that take us a long way8 ,did ,nietzsche1 perhaps1 create his ,superman1 and give him his hardness and lightness for no other purpose than to carry out that task8 ,perfection is something that we have yet to discover6 ,in this conception of progress all ,utopias are transcended1 all goals renounced1 yet a set of values1 a morality1 is retained4 ,the morality might be judged by the criterion1 ,does it aid us in our quest8 ,a future of discovery1 of creation and change1 not of enjoyment3 what a task for energetic ,love does that open out6 ,the ,superman is a goal1 but what is the ,superman's goal8 ,the ,superman is something that must be surpassed6 #afb ,perfection ,when men write largely of ,perfection1 as if it were a concept every one could understand1 we are entitled to ask what exactly they mean4 ,do they mean a sort of synthesis or hotchpotch of the virtues in which they believe8 ,does ,x believe in a ,christian and ,y in a ,nietzschean perfection8 ,as a rule1 conceptions of ,perfection are offshoots of the morality prevalent at any given time4 ,and1 for action1 people's conception of ,perfection is much more important than ,perfection itself4 ,therefore1 let us ceaselessly repeat1 ,perfection is something still to be discovered6 ,as for the current conception1 is conflict an ingredient in it1 or rest8 ,is it an ideal of ,life1 or a thing impossible1 self-contradictory1 static1 an eternal stick with which to chastise existence8 ,the first question to be asked4 #afc ,goals ,when people speak of the unthinkableness of eternal ,becoming which has no goal in ,being1 what they express is their longing for rest4 ,it is unendurable1 they feel1 that ,life1 creation1 change1 should travel on their way forever3 at the very thought their minds become tired1 and ,being is conjured up4 ,hitherto1 our goals have not been resting stages1 but eternal termini4 ,but a true goal should not be a cul-de-sac1 but the peak from which to descry our next goal4 ,and so on eternally8 ,well1 why not8 ,finality was born when the mind became weary at the thought of eternal ascent and found refuge in that of eternal rest4 ,we have not fully learned yet how to live3 struggle is still with us an argument against ,life4 ,what we need is perhaps a few re-incarnations6 ,when we have learned to live1 however1 we shall welcome struggle as a necessary part of ,life1 and ,becoming will be as desirable to us as ,being now4 ,and not till then shall we be fit for immortality4 #afd ,love and ,sympathy ,love and ,hatred are not the true opposites1 but ,love and ,sympathy4 ,love is creation1 that is to say1 strife3 a battle between the inanimate not yet dead1 and the living still unborn4 ,and it is also1 therefore1 the hatred of the one for the other4 ,true1 this hatred may not be of individuals but of things2 but does that make it any more harmless8 ,it is nave democratic prejudice to think that hatred of things is less wicked than hatred of individuals2 the very opposite is the case6 ,the former is a thousand times more dangerous and destructive than the latter1 which1 indeed1 is little more than an idiosyncrasy4 ,hatred is contained in and is an aspect of ,love2 it is ,love seen as destruction4 ,well1 only ,love has a right to ,hatred1 for only ,love can create4 ,sympathy1 however1 would maintain in existence what should be dead1 and would bid what should be living remain forever unborn4 ,for in death and in birth alike there is pain4 ,sympathy--that is1 ,sympathy with the necessary suffering of existence--is a far greater danger than ,hatred4 #afe ,the ,humanitarians ,hatred only to things1 not to men2 ,love only to men1 not to things3 the formula of the half-and-half4 #aff ,love and the ,virtues ,love is the mother of all the harder virtues1 and that because she requires them4 ,for how without them could she suffer to create1 and endure the pain of ,becoming8 ,everything dynamic must become virtuous4 ,the soft1 hedonistic1 and degenerate in morality1 however1 arise from ,sympathy4 ,sympathy needs the comfortable virtues2 it seeks the static1 for movement is pain1 and pain1 of the devil--if ,sympathy will admit a devil6 ,its virtues are all in bad training4 #afg ,the ,other ,side ,he ceaselessly groaned that he was weary of life and wished to be rid of it2 but all the time it was life that wished to be rid of him4 #afh ,love and ,danger ,the fear that danger might perish--the immortal fear of ,nietzsche--need cause us no anxiety1 could we but believe that creative ,love will continue to exist4 ,for ,love is the great source of danger1 and of the heroic in action and thought4 ,if military wars were to disappear from the earth1 danger need not be diminished2 it might become emancipated and voluntary3 it might be raised from a common necessity to an individual task4 ,perhaps in the distant future nations will become more pacific1 men more war-like2 peace will be maintained among nations in order that individuals may have a free arena in which to carry on their great contests--without powder1 as ,nietzsche said4 ,the battles1 born of ,love1 of the ,brands and ,zarathustras1 not those of the ,napoleons3 that is what creative ,love would envisage6 ,but this prophecy has not sufficient foundation as yet1 alas1 to be called even a conjecture6 #afi ,fellowship and ,love ,fellowship is of two kinds3 that which is inspired by ,sympathy1 and that which is an expression of ,love4 ,men unite for the mere satisfaction which union brings1 or for that which is found in the struggle for more remote things--an aspiration or a vision4 ,this latter thing1 impractical and paradoxical1 which lends ,man what nobility he has--it was ,love that gave it to him4 ,fellowship is the sublime attempt to complete the figure of ,man4 ,my friend is he who possesses the qualities which ,i lack and most need3 in that sense1 he creates me4 ,fellowship should enrich all who partake of it1 make their highest qualities productive1 and throw bridges over the chasms of their defects4 ,but the association of men for mere enjoyment is not worthy the name of ,friendship4 ,sympathy is its parent4 #agj ,the ,paradox ,it is possible to live nobly without ,happiness1 but not without ,love4 ,love1 however1 confers the highest happiness4 ,is it because ,love is indifferent to ,happiness that ,happiness flutters around it1 and caresses it with its wings8 #aga ,moral ,indignation ,we should altogether eschew moral censoriousness in our contemplation of ,life1 for it is merely destructive4 ,to destroy that which we cannot re-create in a better form is a crime4 ,only ,love should condemn1 for only ,love can create4 ,to bring the good into existence1 or prepare the way of those who can create the good--that should be our only form of condemnation4 ,in what consists the passion of the moral fanatic8 ,in respect for the law1 that it should not be violated4 ,so he would extirpate whatever does not conform1 even though thus he should destroy all life1 and have no power to create it anew4 ,no wonder he is gloomy3 the vulture is not a bird of cheerful mien4 #agb ,morality and ,love ,into what a dilemma falls the poor lover of life who goes to make the choice of morality6 ,he sees that both great types of morality1 the humanitarian and the military1 the ,hedonistic and the ,spartan1 lead in the end to ,nihilism1 the one by liquefying1 the other by hardening4 ,the former becomes too sensitive to endure ,life2 the latter1 too insensible to feel it4 ,yet they were to serve ,life2 but they soon forgot the purpose for which they were formed2 they exalted themselves as something higher than ,life2 they become absolute1 and a stumbling-block to existence4 ,and this was because they were not founded in the beginning upon the very principle of ,life1 which is ,love1 but upon accidentals4 ,the conflict between ,morality and ,love has accordingly been a conflict between the forces of ,death and of ,life3 for works without ,love are dead4 ,morality should be but the discipline which ,love imposes upon itself in order to create4 ,it should crown all the virtues which oppose a gallant and affirmative countenance to suffering and change1 such as heroism1 fortitude1 joy1 temperance4 ,this morality is the antithesis of the humanitarian morality sprung from ,sympathy4 #agc ,paradise ,regained ,if ,life is but an expression of creative ,love1 then a morality founded upon ,love must be the only true morality4 ,and1 moreover1 in it ethics and the instincts are reconciled2 innocence is grasped4 #agd ,love and ,knowledge ,if in all ,life there is change1 creation1 ,becoming1 and if in our lives we know these things only in the interpretation of them which we call ,love1 must not ,love be a necessary part of our knowledge of ,life8 ,observation1 investigation and the weighing of results may tell us much about ,life1 and show it to us in many aspects1 but it does not give us immediate knowledge4 ,is it possible to know ,life8 ,if ,life be the expression of ,love----6 ,upon that if depends everything4 ,for if it is justified1 then we have within us the clue to the riddle of existence4 ,perhaps here we discern the faint struggling for birth of that undiscovered faculty of the mind of which men speak4 ,the comprehension of ,life through ,love6 ,the profoundest of intuitions8 ,the maddest of dreams8 #age ,proverb and ,commentary ,love is blind1 but it is with excess of light4 #agf ,bad ,thoughts ,she was as perfect as a drop of dew or a beam of light2 a pure thought of ,god1 delicate1 spontaneous and finished4 ,there was nothing misshapen in body or soul2 ,love did well to create such a being4 ,but the others1 the crooked1 blind and defiled6 ,are these the bad thoughts of ,god8 ,from whence do they come8 ,whither do they go8 ,conceived in darkness1 born for destruction8 #agg ,love and ,sympathy ,we must not think of ,love as a mere concept4 ,for it is something more real than ,life itself3 the very ,life of ,life1 the very soul of ,becoming4 ,it is a force both spiritual and physical1 but transcending the distinction of spiritual and physical4 ,we must not conceive ,love as a thing akin to ,sympathy4 ,it is not humanitarian or even human2 it is a force as unsullied by humanity as the mountain winds or the tides of the ocean4 ,nevertheless1 it is within ,man1 just as it is within the stars and seas2 a great creative1 destructive1 transforming and purifying force2 beyond ,good and ,evil as the dew and the lightning are4 ,this is the power that is known by ,man in his moments of love4 ,he is then free to create and enjoy1 as if he were re-born1 with a will new1 joyful and innocent4 ,but seldom does he attain this knowledge3 his moments of exultation are brief4 ,yet ,love has not on that account lost any of its potence4 ,man may decay and become corrupt2 but ,love remains unalterable1 forever pure1 incapable of corruption4 #agh ,multum in ,parvo ,you are but a drop in the ocean of ,life4 ,true3 but it is in the ocean of ,life6 #agi ,love and the ,senses ,when one loves1 the distinction between soul and body is passed4 ,in ,love alone is the dream of ,goethe1 ,heine1 and the moderns realized3 here the reconciliation of the spirit and the senses is celebrated in perfect innocence4 ,for ,love irradiates and makes fragrant the body in which it dwells1 and raises it aloft to sit by its brother the soul4 #ahj ,love and ,innocence ,life takes us back to its bosom when we love4 ,the heavens1 the earth and the race of men no longer appear things external and hostile1 against which we must arm ourselves4 ,we return from exile in personality2 our thought sweeps to the farthest horizons1 and plunges into the deepest gulfs of existence1 at home in all places4 ,the external is no longer external3 we contemplate it from the inside1 we gaze through its eyes4 ,for the very principle of ,life1 of which all living things are the expression1 has been apprehended by us4 ,our personality has been emancipated4 ,this feeling of universal comprehension is called ,innocence4 #aha ,love and the ,fall ,has the fable of the ,fall still another interpretation for us8 ,was the ,fall of ,man the fall from ,love8 ,when the feeling of universal comprehension was lost1 personality in the individualistic sense arose4 ,and ,sin was the child of this ,individualism4 ,to the first man bereft of ,love1 the earth assumed a terrible mien2 nature glared at him with a million baleful eyes3 he became an outcast in his home4 ,no longer knowing the earth or other men1 he experienced terror1 hatred and despair4 ,to protect himself against existence1 he created ,love's substitute1 morality4 ,and with morality arose sin1 and perished innocence4 #ahb ,love and its ,object ,nietzsche's psychology was wrong when he spoke of ,love as a narrowly egoistic thing isolating two people and making them indifferent to every one else4 ,there is too much of the philosopher and too little of the psychologist in this observation4 ,for mankind cannot be loved1 ,life cannot be loved1 until ,one has been loved4 ,only lovers can generate such wealth of life that it overflows1 enriching their friends1 their enemies1 all the world4 ,to love one is to love all4 #ahc ,freedom in ,love ,in true love there is a feeling of entire freedom4 ,is it because the lovers have by a divine chance found their true path1 have become a pulse in the very heart of ,life8 ,if ,love is the principle of ,life1 then in ,love alone is perfect freedom4 ,ethics and instinct become one4 ,this is the road that leads beyond good and evil3 ,man must learn to love4 #ahd ,love and the ,sensualists ,on those who affirm ,life as innocent and holy1 there is an obligation laid4 ,their lives must be innocent3 ,life must be to them a sustained act of worship4 ,how many of them have been lacking just here6 ,heine failed1 in spite of his real nobility4 ,goethe1 however1 attained unity and sincerity2 and ,nietzsche was a figure of beautiful integrity and innocence4 ,they were neither of them mere writers4 ,nor must we be3 there is upon us the compulsion to prove that a life of innocence is possible4 ,and as a first step1 we must separate ourselves from those who1 before they have sought innocence1 praise the senses4 ,for they confuse and defile everything4 #ahe ,free ,will ,only those who have knowledge of ,becoming can know what the freedom of the will is4 ,freedom--that is to will ,becoming with all its suffering1 voluntarily to go on the way which ,fate and the highest ,life direct us4 ,slavery--that is to deny ,becoming1 to cling to the static1 and to be dragged along the stream of change4 ,to be dragged1 not to remain stationary2 for men by taking thought cannot gain immunity from change4 ,their will and their desires avail them nothing4 ,for the stream of ,becoming is unchangeable in its power4 ,it is ,man that changes4 ,when he affirms ,becoming1 he is enlarged2 when he denies it1 he is straitened4 #ahf ,tragedy1 ,life and ,love ,in the highest ,life two qualities are always to be found together1 exuberance and suffering4 ,life is founded on this paradox1 which is fundamental2 for in the emotion of ,love we are most conscious of it4 ,love is the most joyful and most suffering thing3 its plenitude of joy is so great that it can endure gladly the worst griefs4 ,and tragedy is the truest expression in art of ,life and of ,love2 for its characteristic1 too1 is a ,joy triumphing over ,fate4 ,,vi ,,the ,,tragic ,,view #ahg ,life as ,expression ,schopenhauer interpreted life as the expression of a ,will to ,live4 ,nietzsche showed with profound truth that beneath this will there was something more fundamental1 the ,will to ,power4 ,have we here got to the foundation1 or shall we find that underlying the ,will to ,power there is something more fundamental still8 ,why do all living things strive for power8 ,is it1 indeed1 power that they desire in their striving1 power for the sake of power8 ,that which everything by a law of its being searches for is expression3 the ,will to ,power is merely an outcome of that search4 ,for seeing that the sun of created ,life is split up into individuals1 related and yet diverse1 the expression of one unit is bound to collide with that of another1 and the outcome is a conflict4 ,life1 therefore1 is essentially something that injures itself1 and injures itself the more the more powerful it is2 in a word1 ,life is essentially tragic4 ,most people1 however1 live in illusion1 knowing nothing of this4 ,the philosophers1 and1 before them1 the priests1 were those who perceived that ,life was of this nature2 but1 alas1 from the truth they drew the immediate and not the more profound conclusion4 ,they sought1 unconscious ,hedonists1 a palliative for ,life1 and contemned expression1 which they saw was the cause of suffering4 ,these were the creators of that morality which has prevailed to our own day2 a morality antagonistic to ,life1 anti-tragic1 negative4 ,all the systems which have been created in this way are colossal panaceas and remedies3 they are not fundamental4 ,there were others1 however1 who saw as the priests did that ,life was tragic1 but who at the same time affirmed it4 ,these were the tragic poets4 ,they were more deeply versed in ,life than the priests3 tragic art is more profound than morality4 ,for morality is based on the belief that man desires above everything else ,happiness4 ,but ,tragedy has perceived that this is not so4 ,man will express himself1 it proclaims1 whatever the outcome1 whether it be joy or suffering4 ,since then morality has sunk deep into ,life1 and there is now almost a second instinct in man striving against expression4 ,consequently there are many existences passed without expression2 sometimes even in a resolute struggle against it1 as in the case of innumerable religious men and ascetics4 ,to some men it seems that their spirit has been lying frozen and dead within them1 until one day an influence touches them1 and they feel an imperious desire to express themselves1 to create4 ,this influence is nothing else than ,love1 which is the desire for expression itself4 ,when its rule is recognized and obeyed ,life reaches its highest degree of joy and of pain1 and becomes creative4 ,this is the state which is glorified by the tragic poets4 ,to those who affirm1 it is the highest condition of ,life4 #ahh ,self-,expression ,self-expression is something infinitely more subtle than the moderns conceive4 ,this man studied to express himself3 he investigated his ego1 and thereby cut himself off from ,life more completely than any anchorite1 for the anchorite had at least heaven in addition to himself4 ,this neo-anchorite1 however1 turned his eyes deliberately inward and strove to find expression for what he discovered there1 but for nothing more4 ,thus he became his own prison4 ,eventually he turned out an sthete4 ,this other man found that his thoughts and desires flew away from him as irrevocably as a flock of wild birds and became lost or strangers4 ,he seemed constrained to express everything not himself1 everything foreign1 remote and as exalted2 but in the end he discovered that it was himself he had expressed4 ,thy true being1 said ,nietzsche1 lies not deeply hidden in thee1 but an infinite height above thee1 or at least above that which thou dost commonly take to be thyself4 #ahi ,life as a ,value ,those who say that the belief in ,life as a value is not a belief which will arouse the heroic passions and make men die for it1 use a form of reasoning1 at any rate1 which is erroneous4 ,they first confuse the ideal of more complete existence with the more complete existence of an individual1 and then demonstrate that this individual will not lay down his life for the sake of his more complete existence6 ,but ,life as an ideal is just as impersonal as any other ideal1 whether it be ,justice or ,perfection or ,renunciation4 ,true1 it has not yet become static1 but on that account its attraction is only the stronger2 it arouses our very love4 ,and men will die for what they love3 they will die for ,life4 #aij ,hebbel's ,theory of ,tragedy ,hebbel's theory of ,tragedy is noble and profound4 ,not in the misdirection of wills does he find the source of the tragic1 but in the core of the will itself1 in the inexorable expression and collision of wills4 ,this conception raises ,tragedy from a mere consequence and punishment of sin to an expression of ,life itself1 to the most profound and essential expression of ,life4 ,and this is just and worthy of ,tragedy4 ,for the character of ,tragedy is not negative and condemnatory1 but deeply affirmative and joyous4 ,how shallow then must be the theories which would deny ,tragedy to the good1 to those whose wills are highly directed6 ,tragedy is not a punishment4 ,the more noble man becomes the more tragic he will also become4 #aia ,tragic ,philosophy ,the belief1 against which ,nietzsche declaimed1 that ,reason brings ,happiness has become to the modern man second nature1 so that now the notions of ,reason and ,happiness are indissolubly connected in his mind4 ,any argument for a tragic view of ,life must therefore appear1 first of all1 unreasonable2 for ,happiness as an end is the only reason that will be acknowledged4 ,it remains for us to show that ,happiness is itself unreasonable1 an impossibility1 a chimera4 ,there is no ,happiness as an end4 ,reason does not bring ,happiness1 nor does virtue1 nor does asceticism1 nor does comfort4 ,happiness is an accident4 ,and not even a modern can make accidents happen6 ,to this modern world1 with its belief in ,happiness1 ,nietzsche was bound to appear unreasonable1 for he brought with him not only a tragic conception of ,life1 but a tragic philosophy4 ,a tragic philosophy--the marriage of ,knowledge and ,tragedy3 nothing could have seemed more irrational to modern ,europe than that6 #aib ,tragedy and ,arguments ,those who desire to restore a tragic conception of ,life should not use these arguments3 that ,happiness is a condition which1 if it were possible of realization1 would become intolerable1 producing its opposite1 unhappiness2 or that only when the individual renounces ,happiness does ,happiness become his4 ,these are the statements of a ,hedonism once removed4 ,the argument for the tragic view should be founded on considerations altogether irrelevant to ,happiness4 ,it should not care enough about ,happiness even to disdain it4 #aic ,morality and ,happiness ,philosophers have from the beginning acknowledged that ,happiness is not won by seeking for it1 but by striving for other things4 ,this1 however1 has not prevented them from proclaiming ,happiness as the goal of ,man and as the deliberate object of ethics4 ,contradiction upon contradiction6 ,if the individual cannot by taking thought capture ,happiness1 is it conceivable that a community can1 or the human race1 in toto8 ,to throw a net round this mirage compounded of desire and fancy--surely ,reason was itself the most unreasonable thing to attempt that4 ,and1 after all1 does ,man desire ,happiness8 ,tragedy denies it4 #aid ,end or ,effect ,one may possess all the virtues save ,love1 and remain unhappy4 ,love1 however1 brings ,happiness with it as the sun brings light4 ,is ,happiness1 then1 the end of morality8 ,or an effect of ,love8 #aie ,superiority ,in order to despise enjoyment1 one need only be supremely happy or supremely wretched4 #aif ,beauty and ,tragedy ,in every beautiful face there is nobility1 strength and a touch of sadness--the seal of tragedy is upon it4 ,to make ,life beautiful1 then1 would be to make it tragic8 ,nay1 rather let us say that to make ,life tragic is to make it beautiful4 ,supreme beauty is but the expression in which are comprised in a miracle of unity the sorrow and the joy of ,tragedy4 ,for in the most radiant manifestation of ,beauty there is a brooding solemnity2 in the most sorrowful there is triumph4 #aig ,experimenting in ,life ,the aim of the sthetes was without enduring ,tragedy to enjoy ,beauty4 ,to that end they devised their creed of experimentation in ,life3 they wished to know all the joys of the soul and of the senses without inconvenience to themselves4 ,perceiving that ,love and ,beauty bring suffering in their train1 they decided to take the initiative against them1 in other words1 to experience them4 ,all they experienced1 however1 was--their experiences4 ,that1 indeed1 was all they desired3 their experimenting in ,life was escaping from ,life4 ,without the courage to accept ,life with the ,dionysians or to renounce it with the ascetics1 they hit upon the plan of stealing a march upon it4 ,well1 it was certainly not upon ,life that they stole a march6 #aih ,christian and ,dionysian ,the ,christian and the ,dionysian are both of them step-children and solutions of ,pessimism4 ,a gloomy and realistic view of the world was necessary before either of them could be born4 ,in ,christianity ,pessimism was translated into symbols4 ,original ,sin and transgression against ,god--these were the theological counterparts of the pessimist's suffering1 the tyranny of the ,will4 ,how did ,christianity find relief from this fundamental pessimism8 ,by a pathetic illusion in which mankind were transformed into erring children1 who1 however1 were forgiven by an indulgent ,father4 ,here suffering was still an argument against ,life1 and a palliative was sought and found4 ,the ,dionysian1 however1 affirmed ,life in the very tragicality of its aspect1 and1 by so doing1 achieved a victory over it4 ,in short1 to the ,dionysian ,life is a tragedy2 to the ,christian it is a pathetic tale with a happy ending4 #aii ,history of the ,dionysian ,in the beginning he possessed innocence3 the world appeared to him as beautiful1 ,man as good1 and the future as immeasurable4 ,the great illusion of ,rousseau was his--a natural man himself1 believing in the natural man1 a romanticist1 a credulous1 not too sincere1 beautiful soul--a youth with the qualities of youth4 ,but a day came when unwillingly and painfully his soul forced his eyes open and compelled them to look1 and he saw without illusion2 the cruelty beneath smiling ,appearance1 the red claw1 and conscienceless1 inappeasable appetite4 ,looking at ,man he found him a powerless little creature1 condemned to a few years in this world1 cut off by ,death1 and even during his life circumscribed by invincible limitation4 ,nevertheless1 this man disdained to hide his head in the sands of illusion2 and immediately he became altogether more worthy of respect1 more real1 almost sublime4 ,a noble resignation to ,life now characterized him2 the classical writers1 especially the ,greeks with their naturalistic pessimism1 seemed to him the highest thing2 and he accepted the theory of ,original ,sin4 ,all honour to him when he reached1 after a painful journey1 this spare but real conclusion6 ,all honour to this pessimist who would not deceive himself6 ,one day1 however1 the thought came to him1 ,even if pain and necessity be the truths of ,life6 ,there is something within me which can turn these1 also1 to account6 ,i can transfigure them4 ,pain1 ,struggle1 ,change--these will no longer enslave me2 for these shall be my slaves6 ,at that moment he became a ,dionysian3 he had turned the corner of pessimism1 and had gained freedom4 ,original ,sin was no longer true for him2 for a new truth had dawned in whose light the old was quenched4 ,from an illusive freedom in the beginning1 through bondage to necessity1 to a new freedom--the history of the ,dionysian4 ,the pessimist is more profound than the natural man1 but the ,dionysian is the most profound of all4 ,he burrows deeper than pessimism itself2 he grows1 the most happy of men1 out of the very soil of pessimism4 #bjj ,tragic ,affirmation ,to feel happy at this moment--is not that to approve of your whole life1 of its suffering1 conflict1 ennui and scepticism no less than its victories and festivals8 ,this moment is what it is by virtue of these experiences2 justify it and you justify them4 ,the physical agony which left its mark upon you2 the anguish of bereavement and of disillusionment2 the cynicism with which you consoled yourself2 the years when you lived altogether bereft of hope2 your most profound and most petty thoughts and actions2 your meanest1 bitterest and noblest experiences3 all these are unconsciously affirmed in your affirmation of this moment4 ,let them be affirmed consciously6 ,or is your soul afraid to go as far as your will8 ,looking back now with new eyes over your life1 you find that precisely what you cannot do is to repent--least of all of your sins and griefs6 ,for to repent is to will ,life to be other than ,life1 and essentially not to affirm4 ,he who contemplates his life thus1 perhaps understands for the first time what is the meaning of ,tragedy4 #bja ,mastery and ,tragedy ,the desire of ,man to subjugate ,nature and ,fate and obtain mastery over his resources--perhaps it is as well that this is meantime unattainable6 ,for ,man's spirit is not yet noble enough for him to use his power aright3 he would use it1 if he could grasp it now1 as a means to ,happiness6 ,our first duty is to fight the idea of ,happiness1 to make ,man tragic4 ,once ,man wills ,tragedy1 however1 the more mastery he acquires the better4 #bjb ,the ,hidden ,faculty ,when we speak hopefully of the discovery of still undiscovered faculties in ,man1 to what do we look forward8 ,in plain terms1 how do we expect this faculty to be of use to us8 ,in bringing about ,happiness8 ,it is almost a tragedy--it is a tragedy without the nobility--that in our time the most beautiful1 heroic and powerful things have to bow their heads and become slaves to this weak and pathetic tyrant1 ,happiness4 ,should we then oppose the addition of one more divine power to the imprisoned8 ,well1 a hope consoles us4 ,for the discovery of a new faculty in ,man will not make him more happy1 but simply more powerful2 his self-expression in action will be the more complete2 the essential conflict of ,life will be magnified2 ,life will become more tragic4 ,so think well1 you votaries of ,happiness1 before you bring to life another power of the tragic creature1 ,man4 ,far better for your ends if you could but succeed in killing some of those he already possesses4 ,but have you not sometimes tried to do that8 #bjc ,the ,other ,side ,and yet ,man cannot create without ,happiness4 ,the soul that lives in shadow becomes unhealthy and sterile3 sunshine is after all the great health-bringing and fructifying thing4 ,happiness does make a man nobler2 more ready to generosity and heroism2 more careless of enjoyment4 ,happiness6 ,but what is ,happiness8 ,the ,happiness that is essential to the best life is a state of the soul3 this is doubtless that which ,goethe and ,heine praised4 ,but the other1 the ,happiness of the utilitarian1 is an effect of calculated action1 the reward of a sort of ethical thrift4 ,the first1 however1 is independent of calculation1 and even a little scornful of it2 for in its confidence and plenitude it dares to put out on the gloomiest seas4 ,it is not unrelated to ,love1 this effect of an affirmative attitude to ,life4 ,when people praise ,happiness1 how one desires to believe it is this that they praise4 #bjd ,the ,two ,species ,the few have a conception of ,life different from that of the many4 ,to the latter still pertain such notions as do as you would be done by1 and so forth4 ,they understand a morality but not the end of morality4 ,the few1 however1 who understand both the morality and the reason for it1 who have a conception of ,life more difficult and unyielding1 seem to the many cold and a little inhuman4 ,the lives of the latter1 on the other hand1 appear to the few as a naively happy1 narrow and absurd form of existence4 #bje ,nietzsche ,what was ,nietzsche1 that subtlest of modern riddles8 ,first1 a great tragic poet3 it was by a divine accident that he was at the same time a profound thinker and the deepest psychologist4 ,but his tragic affirmative was the core of his work1 of which thought and analysis were but outgrowths4 ,without it1 his subtlety might have made him another ,pascal4 ,the ,will to ,power1 which makes suffering integral in ,life2 the ,order of ,rank whereby the bulk of mankind are doomed to slavery2 the ,superman himself1 that most sublime child of ,tragedy2 and the last affirmation1 the ,eternal ,recurrence3 these are the conceptions of a tragic poet4 ,it is1 indeed1 by virtue of his tragic view of ,life that ,nietzsche is for us a force of such value4 ,for only by means of it could modern existence1 sunk in scepticism1 pessimism and the greatest happiness of the greatest number1 be re-created4 ,for the last two centuries ,europe has been under the domination of the concept of ,happiness as progress4 ,altruism1 the ideology of the greatest happiness of the greatest number1 altruism as a means of universalizing ,happiness1 was preached in the eighteenth century2 until after a while it was seen by such clear-sighted observers as ,voltaire that men did not obey this imperative of altruism2 therefore they were condemned3 the moral indignation of the eighteenth century1 the century of censoriousness par excellence1 was the result4 ,first1 an impossible morality was demanded1 and for the attainment of an unattainable ideal2 then ,man was condemned because he failed to comply with it1 because he was ,man4 ,thus in the end the ideal of the greatest happiness worked out in pessimism3 ,life became hideous and1 worst of all1 immoral1 to the utilitarian1 when it was seen that altruism and happiness are alike impossible4 ,schopenhauer is here the heir of ,voltaire3 the moral condemnation of the one has become in the other a condemnation of ,life itself1 more profound1 more poetical1 more logical4 ,altruism has in ,schopenhauer deepened into ,pity2 for ,pity is altruism bereft of the illusion of ,happiness4 ,how was ,man to avoid now the almost inevitable bourne of ,nihilism8 ,by renouncing altogether ,happiness as a value2 by restoring a conception of ,life in which ,happiness was neither a positive nor a negative standard1 but something irrelevant1 an accident3 in short1 by setting up a tragic conception of ,life4 ,this was the task of ,nietzsche3 in how far he succeeded how can we yet say8 #bjf ,again ,nietzsche loved not goodness but greatness3 the ,true1 the ,great and the ,beautiful4 ,was not this the necessary corollary of his sthetic evaluation of ,life8 #bjg ,sacrifices ,the first of the first fruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the ,lord thy ,god4 ,thus spoke the oldest reverence4 ,we should not scoff at this feeling but rather try to understand it2 for it is only too rare in our time4 ,what was its meaning to the rulers of ,israel8 ,gratitude1 a beautiful1 affirmative thing4 ,to enrich ,life with our highest gifts1 which we freely offer in thanksgiving for what ,life has given us1--that should be our form of sacrifice4 ,and we should perform it gladly1 with festive1 overflowing heart1 not with sullen and conscientious face1 as if ,life were a usurer4 #bjh ,our ,poverty ,the spiritual poverty of modern life is appalling2 and all the more because men are unconscious of it4 ,prayer was in former times the channel whereby a profound current of spiritual life flowed into the lives of men and enriched them4 ,this source of wealth has now almost ceased1 and ,man has become less spiritual1 more impoverished4 ,we must seek a new form of prayer4 ,better not live at all than live without reverence and gratitude6 ,let our sacramental attitude to ,life be our form of prayer4 ,let us no longer desire to live when that has perished4 #bji ,finis ,to abjure half measures and to live resolutely in the ,whole1 the ,full1 the ,beautiful4--,,goethe4 ,to try to see in all things necessity as beauty4--,,nietzsche4 ,,the ,,end