Friedrich Nietzsche, Fighter for Freedom
GA 5
Part IV. The Personality of Friedrich Nietzsche, A Memorial Address
Address Given in Berlin on September 13, 1900
[ 1 ] it is strange that with the infatuation for Nietzsche in our day, someone must appear whose feelings, no less than those of many others, are drawn to the particular personality, and yet who, in spite of this, must constantly keep before him the deep contradictions which exist between this type of spirit, and the ideas and feelings of those who represent themselves as adherents of his world conception. Such a one who stands apart must, above all, beware of the contrast between the relationship of those contemporaries to Nietzsche a decade ago as the night of madness broke over the “fighter against his time” and what existed when death took him from us on the 25th of August, 1900. It seems as if the complete opposite has happened from what Nietzsche prophesied in regard to his effect on his contemporaries in the last days of his creative work. The first part of his book, in which he tried to recoin the values of thousands of years, his Antichrist, lay completed at the onset of his illness. He begins with the words, “This book belongs to the very few; perhaps not even one of these is yet living. There may be those who understand my Zarathustra; how could I confuse myself with those for whom ears are growing already today? Only the day after tomorrow belongs to me. Some of my readers will be born posthumously.” At his death it seemed as if the “day after tomorrow” had already come. One must call into this apparent “day after tomorrow” the words of Zarathustra: “You say you believe in Zarathustra? But of what importance is Zarathustra? You are my believers, but of what importance are all believers? Now I exhort you to lose me and to find yourselves; and only when you have denied me will I return to you.” Who would dare to say whether Nietzsche, were he to live today in fresh creativity, would look with greater pleasure upon those who revere him with doubts, or upon others? But it must be permitted, especially today, to look back, beyond these present-day admirers, to the time when he felt himself alone and misunderstood in the midst of the spiritual life surrounding him, when some people lived who felt it blasphemous to be called his “believers,” because he appeared to them to be a spirit whom one could not encounter importunately with a “yes” or “no,” but like an earthquake in the realm of the spirit, which stirs up questions for which premature answers can only be like unripe fruits. But ten years ago, more moving than the news of his death today, two pieces of news which followed closely upon each other, came to the “ears” which had “grown” for the Nietzsche admirers of that time. The first concerned the cycle of lectures which Georg Brandes had held about the world conception of Nietzsche at the University of Copenhagen in the year 1888. Nietzsche felt this recognition to be one which had come forth from “single ones” which were “born posthumously.” He felt himself jerked out of his loneliness in a way which was in harmony with his spirit. He did not want to be evaluated; he wanted to be “described,” characterized. And soon upon this news followed the report that his mind, tom from its loneliness, had succumbed to the frightful destiny of spiritual darkness.
[ 2 ] And, while he himself could no longer contribute, his contemporaries had the leisure to sharpen the outlines of his picture. Through the observation of his personality, the picture of the time could imprint itself ever more clearly for them; the picture of the time, from which his spirit rises like a Böcklin figure. The worlds of his soul ideals could be illuminated by the light which the spiritstars of the second half of the nineteenth century cast upon them. In full clarity stood the points in which he was truly great. But these also overshadowed the reason why he had to wander in loneliness. The nature of his being led him over, heights of spirit life. He stepped forth like one to whom only the essentials of mankind's development are of concern. But this essential touched him as much as others are touched in their soul by only the most intimate situations. Just as the souls of others are burdened directly by only the most immediate personal experiences, so the great questions of culture, the mighty needs for knowledge of his age, decisively passed through his soul. What permeated only the heads of many of his contemporaries, became for him a personal affair of the heart.
[ 3 ] Greek culture, Schopenhauer's world conception, Wagner's music dramas, the knowledge of the more recent natural science, aroused in him such personal, deep feelings as would have been aroused in others only by the experiences of a strong, passionate love. What the entire age lived through in hopes and doubts, in temptations and joys of knowledge, Nietzsche experienced in his special way on his lonesome heights. He found no new ideas; but he suffered and rejoiced in the ideas of his time in a way different from that of his contemporaries. It was their task to give birth to the ideas; before him arose the difficult question, How can one live with these ideas?
[ 4 ] His educational path had made Nietzsche a philologist. He had penetrated so deeply into the world of Greek spiritual culture that his teacher, Ritschl, could recommend him with these words to the University of Basel, which engaged the young scholar before he had taken his doctorate: Friedrich Nietzsche is a genius and is able to do whatever he puts his mind to. He may well have achieved excellent results in the sense of the requirements made of philologists. But his relationship to Greek culture was not only that of a philologist. He did not live in ancient Greece in thought alone; with his whole heart he was deeply engrossed in Greek thinking and feeling. The bearers of Greek culture did not remain the object of his studies; they became his personal friends. During the first period of his teaching activity in Basel, he worked out a book about the philosophers of the tragic age before Socrates. It was published among his posthumus works. He does not write like a scholar about Thales, Heraclitus and Parmenides; he converses with these figures of antiquity as with personalities with whom his heart is closely connected. The passion which he feels for them makes him a stranger to the Western culture, which according to his feelings, since Socrates has taken paths other than those of ancient times. Socrates was Nietzsche's enemy because he had dulled the great tragic fundamental moods of his predecessors. The instructive mind of Socrates strove toward an understanding of reality. He desired reconciliation with life through virtue. But there is nothing, according to Nietzsche, which can degrade mankind more than the acceptance of life as it is. Life cannot reconcile itself with itself; man can only bear this life if he creates over and above it. Before Socrates, the Greeks understood this. Nietzsche believed that he found their fundamental mood expressed in these words which, according to legend, the wise Silenus, the companion of Dionysus, gave as answer to the question, What is best for mankind: “Miserable creation of a moment, children of accident and travail, why do you force me to tell you what is not the most profitable for you to hear? What is the very best for you is not attainable by you; that is, not to be born, not to exist, to be nothing. But the second best for you is to die soon.” Ancient Greek art and wisdom sought consolation in the face of life. The servants of Dionysus did not wish to belong to this community of life, but rather to a higher one. For Nietzsche this was expressed in their culture. “In song and dance, the human being expresses himself as a member of a higher community; he has forgotten how to walk and how to speak, and he is about to fly, to dance into the air.” There are two paths for man which lead him over and above existence; in a blessed enchantment, as if in an opium dream, he can forget existence and, “singing and dancing,” feel himself at one with a universal soul; or he can look for his satisfaction in an ideal picture of reality as if in a dream which flutters gently above existence. Nietzsche characterizes these two paths as the Dionysian and the Apollonian soul conditions. But the more recent culture since Socrates has looked for reconciliation with existence, and thereby has lowered the value of mankind. It is no wonder that with such feelings, Nietzsche felt lonely in this more recent culture.
[ 5 ] Two personalities seemed to pull him out of this state of loneliness. On his life path he encountered Schopenhauer's conception of the worthlessness of existence, and Richard Wagner. The position he took in relation to these two clearly illuminated the being of his spirit. Toward Schopenhauer he felt a devotion more intimate than can be imagined. And yet Schopenhauer's teachings remained almost without importance for him. The wise one from Frankfurt had innumerable disciples who accepted faithfully what he had to say. But Nietzsche never was one of these believers. At the same time that he sent his pean of praise, Schopenhauer als Erzieher, Schopenhauer as Educator, into the world, he wrote secretly for himself his serious doubts about the philosopher's ideas. He did not look up to him as to a teacher; he loved him like a father. He felt the heroic quality of his thoughts even when he did not agree with them. His relationship to Schopenhauer was too intimate to necessitate an external faith in him or an outer confession. He loved his “educator” so much that he attributed his own thoughts to him in order to be able to revere them in another. He did not want to agree with a personality in his thoughts; he wanted to live in friendship with another. This desire also attracted him to Richard Wagner. What then were all those figures of pre-Socratic Greek culture with whom he had wished to live in friendship? Indeed, they were mere shadows from a far distant past. And Nietzsche aspired to life, to the direct friendship of tragic human beings. Greek culture remained dead and abstract for him, despite all the life his fantasy tried to breathe into it. The Greek intellectual heroes remained for him a yearning; for him Richard Wagner was a fulfillment which tried to re-awaken the old world of Greece within his personality, his art, his world conception. Nietzsche spent most glorious days when from Basel he was allowed to visit the Wagner couple on their Triebschen estate. What the philologist had looked for in spirit, to breathe Greek air, he believed he found here in reality. He could find a personal relationship to a world which previously he had sought in ideas. He could experience intimately what he could otherwise only have conjured before himself in thought. To him the Triebschen idyll was like home. How descriptive are the words with which he describes his feelings in regard to Wagner: “A fruitful, rich, stirring life, quite different and unheard of in more mediocre mortals! For this reason he stands there rooted deeply in his own strength, with his gaze over and above all that is ephemeral; eternal in the most beautiful sense.”
[ 6 ] In Richard Wagner's personality Nietzsche believed he had the higher worlds, which could make life as bearable for him as he imagined it to be in the sense of the ancient Greek world conception. But precisely here did he not commit the greatest error in his sense? Indeed he sought in life for what, according to his assumptions life could not offer. He wanted to be above life; and with all his strength he threw himself into the life that Wagner lived. For this reason it is understandable that his greatest experience had to be his deepest disappointment at the same time. To be able to find in Wagner what he was searching for, he had first to magnify the true personality of Wagner to an ideal picture. What Wagner could never be, Nietzsche had made out of him. He did not see and revere the true Wagner; he revered his image, which towered far above reality. Then when Wagner had achieved what he aspired, when he had reached his goal, Nietzsche felt the disharmony between his impression and the true Wagner. And he separated from Wagner. But only he interprets this separation psychologically correctly who recognizes that Nietzsche did not separate from the true Wagner, because he never was his follower; he only saw his deception clearly. What he had looked for in Wagner, he could never find in him because that had nothing to do with Wagner; it had to be freed from all reality as a higher world. Then Nietzsche later characterized the necessity of his apparent separation from Wagner. He says that what in his younger years he had heard in Wagner's music had absolutely nothing to do with Wagner. “When I described the Dionysian music, I described what I had heard; instinctively I had to translate and transfigure everything into the new spirit which I bore within me. The proof of this, as strong as proof as can be, is my book, Wagner in Bayreuth; in all psychologically decisive places one can place my name, or the name Zarathustra wherever the text uses the name Wagner. The complete picture of the dithyrambic artist is the picture of the pre-existentialist poet of Zarathustra, drawn with profound depth, and without really touching the reality of Wagner for a single moment. Wagner himself had an idea of this; he did not recognize himself in the book.”
[ 7 ] In Zarathustra Nietzsche sketches the world for which he had searched in vain in Wagner, separated from alt reality. He placed his Zarathustra ideal in a different relationship to reality than his own earlier ideals. He had had bad experiences in his direct turning away from existence. He must have done injustice to this existence, and for this reason it had avenged itself so bitterly against him; this idea gained the upper hand within him more and more. The disappointment which his idealism had caused him, drove him into a hostile mood toward all idealism. During the time following his separation from Wagner, his works become accusations against ideals. “One error after another is placed upon ice; the ideal is not refuted—it freezes to death.” Thus in 1888 he expresses himself about the goal of his book which had appeared in 1878, Menschliches, Allzumenschliches, Human, All Too Human. After this Nietzsche looks for refuge in reality; he deepens himself in the more recent natural science, in order that through it he can gain a true guide to reality. All worlds beyond this world, which lead human beings away from reality, now become abominable, remote worlds for him, conceived out of the fantasy of weak human beings, who do not have sufficient strength to find their satisfaction in immediate, fresh existence. Natural science has placed the human being at the end of a purely natural evolution. Through the fact that the latter has conceived the human being out of itself, all that is below him has taken on a higher meaning. Therefore, man should not deny its significance and wish to make himself an image of something beyond this world. He should understand that he is not the meaning of a super-earthly power, but the “meaning of this earth.” What he wishes to attain above what exists, he should not strive for in enmity against what exists. Nietzsche looks within reality itself for the germ of the higher, which is to make reality bearable. Man should not strive toward a divine being; out of his reality he should bring forth a higher way of existence. This reality extends over and above itself. Humanity has the possibility to become superhumanity. Evolution has always been. The human being should also work at evolution. The laws of evolution are greater, more comprehensive than all that has already been developed. One should not only look upon that which exists, but one must go back to primeval forces which have engendered the real. An ancient world conception questioned how “good and evil” came into the world. It believed that it had to go behind existence in order to discover “in the eternal” the reasons for “good and evil.” But with the “eternal,” with the “beyond,” Nietzsche had also to reject the “eternal” evaluation of “good and evil.” Man has come into existence through the natural; and “good and evil” have come into existence with him. The creation of mankind is “good and evil.” And deeper than the created is the creator. The “human being” stands “beyond good and evil.” He has made the one thing to be good, the other to be evil. He may not let himself be chained through his former “good and evil.” He can follow further the path of evolution which he has taken till now. From the worm he has become a human being; from man he can develop to the superman. He can create a new good and evil. He may “reevaluate” present day values. Nietzsche was torn from his work on Umwertung aller Werte, Transvaluation of All Values, through his spiritual darkness. The evolution of the worm to the human being was the idea which he had gained from the more recent natural science. He himself did not become a scientist; he had adopted the idea of evolution from others. For them it was a matter of the intellect; for him it became a matter of the heart. The others waged a spiritual battle against all old prejudices. Nietzsche asked himself how he could live with the new idea. His battle took place entirely within his own soul. He needed the further development to the superman in order to be able to bear mankind. Thus, by itself, in lonely heights, his sensitive spirit had to overcome the natural science which he had taken into himself. During his last creative period, Nietzsche tried to attain from reality itself what earlier he thought he could gain in illusion, in an ideal realm. Life is assigned a task which is firmly rooted in life, and yet leads over and above this life. In this immediate existence one cannot remain standing in real life, or in the life illuminated by natural science. In this life there also must be suffering. This remained Nietzsche's opinion. The “superman” is also a means to make life bearable. All this points to the fact that Nietzsche was born to “suffer from existence.” His genius consisted in the searching for bases for consolation. The struggle for world conceptions has often engendered martyrs. Nietzsche has produced no new ideas for a world conception. One will always recognize that his genius does not lie in the production of new ideas. But he suffered deeply because of the thoughts surrounding him. In compensation for this suffering he found the enraptured tones of his Zarathustra. He became the poet of the new world conception; the hymns in praise of the “superman” are the personal, the poetic reply to the problems and results of the more recent natural science. All that the nineteenth century produced in ideas, would also have been produced without Nietzsche. In the eyes of the future he will not be considered an original philosopher, a founder of religions, or a prophet; for the future he will be a martyr of knowledge, who in poetry found words with which to express his suffering.
6. Die Persönlichkeit Friedrich Nietzsches — Eine Gedächtnisrede
[ 1 ] Seltsam, innerhalb der Schwärmerei für Nietzsche in unseren Tagen, muss jemand erscheinen, der mit seinen Gefühlen nicht weniger als viele andere zu der eigenartigen Persönlichkeit hingezogen wird und der sich dennoch den tiefen Widerspruch unablässig vor Augen halten muss, welcher besteht zwischen der Art dieses Geistes und den Ideen und Empfindungen derer, die sich wie Bekenner seiner Weltanschauung gebärden. Ein solch abseits Stehender muss vor allen Dingen des Gegensatzes gedenken in dem Verhältnis der Zeitgenossen zu Nietzsche vor einem Jahrzehnt, als die Nacht des Wahnsinns über den «Kämpfer gegen seine Zeit» hereinbrach, und demjenigen, das bestand, als ihn am 25. August 1900 der Tod von uns nahm. Scheint doch das völlige Gegenteil bei dem eingetreten zu sein, was Nietzsche über seine Wirkung bei den Zeitgenossen in den letzten Tagen seines Schaffens vorausgesagt hat. Der erste Teil des Buches, durch das er die Werte von Jahrtausenden umzuprägen gedachte, sein «Antichrist», lag bei seiner Erkrankung fertig vor. Er hebt mit den Worten an: «Dies Buch gehört den Wenigsten. Vielleicht lebt selbst noch keiner von ihnen. Es mögen die sein, welche meinen Zarathustra verstehn: wie durfte ich mich mit denen verwechseln, für welche heute schon Ohren wachsen? — Erst das Übermorgen gehört mir. Einige werden posthum geboren.» Es war, als ob bei seinem Tode das «Übermorgen» schon da gewesen wäre. Man muss in dieses scheinbare «Übermorgen» die Zarathustra-Worte hineinrufen: «Ihr sagt, ihr glaubt an Zarathustra? Aber was liegt an Zarathustra? Ihr seid meine Gläubigen: aber was liegt an allen Gläubigen! — - — Nun heiße ich euch, mich verlieren und euch finden; und erst, wenn ihr mich alle verleugnet habt, will ich euch wiederkehren.» Ob Nietzsche, wenn er heute in frischem Schaffen noch lebte, mit größerem Wohlgefallen auf diejenigen blicken würde, die ihn zweifelnd verehren, oder auf andere — wer dürfte wagen, das zu entscheiden. Aber erlaubt muss es sein, gerade heute über die Köpfe seiner gegenwärtigen Verehrer hinweg auf die Zeit zu blicken, in der er sich einsam und unverstanden fühlte inmitten des ihn umgebenden Geisteslebens und in der einige lebten, die es als eine Blasphemie empfunden hätten, sich seine «Gläubigen» zu nennen, weil er ihnen als ein Geist erschienen ist, dem man nicht aufdringlich mit einem «Ja» oder «Nein» begegnet, sondern wie ein Erdbeben im Reiche des Geistes, das aufrüttelt zu Fragen, für welche vorzeitige Antworten nur unreifen Früchten gleichen könnten. Viel erschütternder, als die Nachricht von seinem Tode jetzt, trafen vor etwas mehr als zehn Jahren die «Ohren», die den damaligen Nietzsche-Verehrern «gewachsen» waren, zwei Nachrichten, die sich in nicht allzu großer zeitlicher Entfernung folgten. Die eine betraf einen Zyklus von Vorlesungen, den Georg Brandes über die Weltanschauung Nietzsches an der Universität in Kopenhagen im Jahre j88 8 gehalten hat. Nietzsche empfand diese Anerkennung als eine solche, wie sie von den «Einigen» ausgehen musste, die «posthum geboren» werden. Er empfand sich aus seiner Einsamkeit in einer Art gerissen, die seinem Geiste entsprach. Er wollte nicht gewertet: er wollte «beschrieben», charakterisiert sein. Und bald auf diese Nachricht folgte die andere, dass der also seiner Einsamkeit entrissene Geist dem furchtbaren Schicksal geistiger Umnachtung verfallen sei.
[ 2 ] Und während er selbst nicht mehr mitwirken konnte, hatten die Zeitgenossen Muße, die Umrisse seines Bildes zu schärfen. Durch die Betrachtung seiner Persönlichkeit konnte sich ihnen das Zeitbild immer mehr ausprägen, von dem sein Geist wie eine Böcklinsche Gestalt sich abhebt. Es durften die Ideenwelten in seiner Seele beleuchtet werden mit dem Lichte, das die Geistes-Sterne von der zweiten Jahrhundert-Hälfte auf sie warfen. Da trat mit völliger Klarheit hervor, worinnen er eigentlich groß ist. Es trat aber auch hervor, warum er so einsam wandeln musste. Seine Wesensanlage führte ihn über Höhen des Geisteslebens. Er schritt dahin wie einer, den nur das Wesentliche der Menschheitsentwicklung etwas angeht. Aber dieses Wesentliche berührte ihn so, wie andere Menschen nur die intimsten Angelegenheiten ihrer Seele. Wie auf den Gemütern anderer nur ganz persönliche Erlebnisse lasten, so unmittelbar, so einschneidend zogen durch seine Seele die großen Kulturfragen, die gewaltigen Erkenntnis-Bedürfnisse seines Zeitalters. Was viele seiner Zeitgenossen mit dem Kopfe allein durchlebten, das wurde ihm eine persönliche Herzenssache.
[ 3 ] Die griechische Kultur, die Weltanschauung Schopenhauers, das Musikdrama Wagners, die Erkenntnisse der neueren Naturwissenschaften lösten bei ihm Gefühle aus, so persönlich, so tief wie bei anderen die Erlebnisse einer starken Liebesleidenschaft. Was das ganze Zeitalter an Hoffnungen und Zweifeln, an Versuchungen und Erkenntnisfreuden durchlebte, das durchlebte Nietzsche in einsamer Höhe auf seine besondere Art. Er fand keine neuen Ideen: aber er litt und freute sich an den Ideen seiner Zeit in einer Weise, die unterschieden war von der seiner Zeitgenossen. Ihnen war es auferlegt, die Ideen zu gebären: vor ihm erstand die schwere Frage: wie lässt sich mit diesen Ideen leben?
[ 4 ] Sein Bildungsgang hatte Nietzsche zum Philologen gemacht. Er hatte sich in die große Welt der griechischen Geisteskultur so vertieft, dass sein Lehrer Ritschl ihn der Universität Basel, die den jungen Gelehrten berief, bevor er Doktor geworden war, mit den Worten empfehlen durfte: Friedrich Nietzsche kann alles, was er will. — Er leistete wohl im Sinne der Anforderungen, die man an Philologen stellt, das Vorzüglichste. Aber sein Verhältnis zur griechischen Kultur war nicht nur das eines Philologen. Er lebte nicht bloß mit dem Geiste im alten Hellas; er ging mit seinem Herzen völlig in griechischem Denken und Fühlen auf Die griechischen Kulturträger blieben nicht die Gegenstände seines Studiums; sie wurden seine persönlichen Freunde. In der ersten Zeit seiner Basler Lehrtätigkeit arbeitete er eine Schrift über die Philosophen des tragischen Zeitalters vor Sokrates aus. Sie ist aus seinem Nachlasse veröffentlicht worden. Er schreibt nicht wie ein Gelehrter über Thales, Heraklit und Parmenides; er unterredet sich mit diesen Gestalten der Vorzeit wie mit Persönlichkeiten, denen sein Herz intim zugetan ist. Die Leidenschaft, die er für sie empfindet, lässt ihn zum Fremdling werden in der abendländischen Kultur, die, nach seiner Empfindung, seit Sokrates andere Wege eingeschlagen hat als in jenen alten Zeiten. Sokrates wird Nietzsches Feind, weil er die große tragische Grundstimmung seiner Vorgänger abgestumpft hat. Der lehrhafte Geist des Sokrates strebte nach dem Begreifen der Wirklichkeit. Er wollte die Versöhnung mit dem Leben durch die Tugend. Nichts aber kann, im Sinne Nietzsches, den Menschen mehr herabziehen als die Hinnahme des Lebens, wie es ist. Das Leben kann nicht mit sich selbst versöhnen. Der Mensch kann dies Leben nur ertragen, wenn er über dasselbe hinausschafft. Das haben die Griechen vor Sokrates begriffen. Ihre Grundstimmung glaubte Nietzsche ausgedrückt zu finden in den Worten, die nach der Sage der weise Silen, der Begleiter des Dionysus, auf die Frage zur Antwort gab, was für die Menschen das Beste sei. «Elendes Eintagsgeschlecht, des Zufalls Kinder und der Mühsal, was zwingst du mich, dir zu sagen, was nicht zu hören für dich das Ersprießlichste ist? Das allerbeste ist für dich gänzlich unerreichbar: nicht geboren zu sein, nicht zu sein, nichts zu sein. Das zweitbeste aber ist für dich — bald zu sterben.» Einen Trost gegenüber dem Leben suchte die alte griechische Kunst und Weisheit. Nicht dieser Lebensgemeinschaft wollten die Dionysusdiener angehören, sondern einer höheren. Das drückte sich für Nietzsche in ihrem Kultus aus. «Singend und tanzend äußert sich der Mensch als Mitglied einer höheren Gemeinsamkeit: Er hat das Gehen und Sprechen verlernt und ist auf dem Wege, tanzend in die Lüfte emporzufliegen.» Zwei Wege hat der Mensch, die ihn über das Dasein hinwegführen: er kann in seliger Verzauberung, wie in einem Rauschzustand, das Dasein vergessen, und «singend und tanzend» sich mit der Allseele eins fühlen; oder er kann an einem Idealbild der Wirklichkeit, wie an einem Traum, der leicht über das Dasein hinweghuscht, seine Befriedigung suchen. Als dionysischen und apollinischen Stimmungszustand charakterisiert Nietzsche diese beiden Wege. Die neuere Kultur hat aber, seit Sokrates, die Versöhnung mit dem Dasein gesucht, und dadurch den Menschenwert erniedrigt. Kein Wunder, dass Nietzsche sich mit solchen Gefühlen einsam in dieser neueren Kultur fühlte.
[ 5 ] Zwei Persönlichkeiten schienen ihn aus dieser Einsamkeit zu reißen. Schopenhauers Anschauung von dem Unwert des Daseins und Richard Wagner begegneten ihm auf seinem Lebenswege. Wie er sich zu beiden stellte, beleuchtet hell das Wesen seines Geistes. Zu Schopenhauer empfand er eine Hingebung, wie sie inniger nicht zu denken ist. Und doch blieb ihm dessen Lehre fast bedeutungslos. Der Frankfurter Weise hat unzählige Anhänger gehabt, die gläubig hinnahmen, was er gesagt hat. Nietzsche gehörte unter diese Gläubigen wohl nie. In derselben Zeit, in der er seinen Hymnus «Schopenhauer als Erzieher» in die Welt hinaussandte, schrieb er sich insgeheim seine schweren Bedenken gegen des Philosophen Ansichten auf. Nicht wie zu einem Lehrer blickte er zu ihm auf; er liebte ihn wie einen Vater. Er empfand das Heroische seiner Gedanken auch da, wo er ihnen nicht zustimmte. Sein Verhältnis zu Schopenhauer war zu intim, um den äußeren Glauben an ihn, das Bekenntnis zu ihm nötig zu haben. Er liebte seinen «Erzieher» so, dass er die eigenen Gedanken ihm beilegte, um sie bei einem anderen verehren zu können. Er wollte nicht in Gedanken mit einer Persönlichkeit übereinstimmen; er wollte in Freundschaft mit einem andern leben. — Dieser Wille zog ihn auch zu Richard Wagner. Was waren doch alle die Gestalten des vorsokratischen Griechentums, mit denen er hatte in Freundschaft leben wollen? Es waren doch nur Schatten aus einer fernen Vergangenheit. Und Nietzsche strebte nach Leben, nach der unmittelbaren Freundschaft tragischer Menschen. Tot und abstrakt blieb ihm die griechische Kultur bei allem Leben, das ihr seine Phantasie einzuhauchen versuchte. Eine Sehnsucht blieben ihm die griechischen Geistesheroen, eine Erfüllung war ihm Richard Wagner, der ihm in seiner Persönlichkeit, in seiner Kunst, in seiner Weltanschauung die alte Griechenwelt wieder zu erwecken schien. Nietzsche verlebte die herrlichsten Tage, wenn er von Basel aus das Wagnersche Ehepaar auf dessen Triebschener Landgut aufsuchen durfte. Was der Philologe im Geiste gesucht hatte, griechische Luft zum Atmen, hier glaubte er sie in Wirklichkeit zu finden. Er konnte ein persönliches Verhältnis finden zu einer Welt, die er vordem in der Vorstellung gesucht hatte. Er konnte intim erleben, was er sich sonst nur in Gedanken hätte vorzaubern können. Wie seine Heimat empfand er das Triebschener Idyll. Wie bezeichnend sind die Worte, mit denen er dieses sein Empfinden in bezug auf Wagner umschreibt: «Ein fruchtbares, reiches, erschütterndes Leben, ganz abweichend und unerhört unter mittleren Sterblichen! Dafür steht er auch da, festgewurzelt durch eigne Kraft, mit seinem Blick drüber hinweg über alles Ephemere, und unzeitgemäß im schönsten Sinne.»
[ 6 ] In Richard Wagners Persönlichkeit glaubte Nietzsche die höheren Welten zu haben, die ihm das Leben so erträglich machen konnten, wie er sich das im Sinne der alten griechischen Weltanschauung dachte. Hat er aber damit nicht gerade in seinem Sinne den größten Irrtum begangen? Er hatte ja im Leben gesucht, was seinen Voraussetzungen nach das Leben nie bieten konnte. Über das Leben wollte er hinaus; und er stürzte sich mit aller Kraft in das Leben, das Wagner lebte. Es ist deshalb begreiflich, dass sein größtes Erlebnis zugleich seine bitterste Enttäuschung werden musste. Um in Wagner finden zu können, was er suchte, musste er sich die wirkliche Persönlichkeit Wagners erst zum Idealbild vergrößern. Was Wagner nie hat sein können, das hat Nietzsche aus ihm gemacht. Er hat nicht den wirklichen Wagner gesehen und verehrt, er hat sein die Wirklichkeit weit überragendes Bild verehrt. Als dann Wagner erreicht hatte, was er erstrebte, als er an seinem Ziele angekommen war: da empfand Nietzsche die Disharmonie zwischen seinem und dem wirklichen Wagner. Und er fiel von Wagner ab. Psychologisch richtig deutet aber nur der diesen Abfall, der sagt: Nietzsche ist nicht von dem wirklichen Wagner abgefallen, denn er war ja niemals dessen Anhänger; er wurde sich nur klar über seine Täuschung. Was er in Wagner gesucht hatte, das konnte er in ihm nimmermehr finden; das hatte mit Wagner nichts zu tun, das musste als eine höhere Welt von aller Wirklichkeit losgelöst werden. Nietzsche hat dann später die Notwendigkeit seines scheinbaren Abfalles von Wagner selbst gekennzeichnet. Er spricht aus, dass, was er «in jungen Jahren bei Wagnerscher Musik gehört habe, nichts überhaupt mit Wagner zu tun» habe. «Dass wenn ich die dionysische Musik beschrieb, ich das beschrieb, was ich gehört hatte, dass ich instinktiv alles in den neuen Geist übersetzen und transfigurieren musste, den ich in mir trug. Der Beweis dafür, so stark als nur ein Beweis sein kann, ist meine Schrift 9Wagner in Bayreuth:: an allen psychologisch entscheidenden Stellen ist nur von mir die Rede, man darf rücksichtslos meinen Namen, oder das Wort 9Zarathustra: hinstellen, wo der Text das Wort Wagner gibt. Das ganze Bild des dithyrambischen Künstlers ist das Bild des präexistenten Dichters des 9Zarathustra: mit abgründlicher Tiefe hingezeichnet, und ohne einen Augenblick die Wagnersche Realität auch nur zu berühren. Wagner selbst hatte einen Begriff davon; er erkannte sich in der Schrift nicht wieder.»
[ 7 ] Im «Zarathustra» zeichnete Nietzsche die Welt, die er bei Wagner vergebens gesucht hatte, losgelöst von aller Wirklichkeit. In ein anderes Verhältnis setzte er sein «Zarathustra-Ideal» zur Wirklichkeit als seine früheren Ideale. Er hatte ja mit der unmittelbaren Abkehr von dem Dasein schlechte Erfahrungen gemacht. Dass er diesem Dasein doch unrecht getan haben müsse und dass es sich deshalb so bitter an ihm gerächt habe, diese Vorstellung gewann in ihm immer mehr die Oberhand. Die Enttäuschung, die ihm sein Idealismus bereitet hatte, trieb ihn in eine feindliche Stimmung gegenüber allem Idealismus hinein. Seine Werke in der Zeit nach seinem Abfall von Wagner werden zu Anklagen gegen die Ideale. «Ein Irrtum nach dem andern wird gelassen aufs Eis gelegt, das Ideal wird nicht widerlegt — es erfriert.» So spricht er sich 1888 über das Ziel seines 1878 erschienenen Werkes «Menschliches, Allzumenschliches» aus. Nietzsche sucht zunächst Zuflucht bei der Wirklichkeit. Er vertieft sich in die neuere Naturwissenschaft, um durch sie eine echte Führerin in die Wirklichkeit zu gewinnen. Alle jenseitigen Welten, die den Menschen von dieser wurde sie Herzensangelegenheit. Die anderen führten den Geisteskampf gegen alte Vorurteile. Nietzsche fragte sich: Wie er mit der neuen Idee leben könne. Sein Kampf spielte sich ganz in seiner Seele ab. Er brauchte die Weiterentwicklung zum Übermenschen, um den Menschen zu ertragen. So hatte sein sensitives Gemüt auf einsamer Höhe für sich die Naturerkenntnisse zu überwinden, die er in sich aufgenommen hatte. In seiner letzten Schaffensepoche sucht Nietzsche aus der Wirklichkeit selbst zu gewinnen, was er früher in der Illusion, in einem idealen Gebiet zu erreichen glaubte. Das Leben erhält eine Aufgabe, die fest in dem Leben wurzelt und doch über dieses Leben hinausführt. Man kann in dem unmittelbaren Dasein, im wirklichen Leben nicht stehen bleiben; auch nicht in dem von der Naturwissenschaft durchleuchteten. Auch an diesem Leben muss gelitten sein. Das blieb Nietzsches Meinung. Auch der «Übermensch» ist ein Mittel, das Dasein zu ertragen. Das alles weist darauf hin, dass Nietzsche zum «Leiden am Dasein» geboren war. In dem Aufsuchen nach Trostgründen bestand sein Wirklichkeit abführen, werden ihm nunmehr zu verabscheuungswürdigen Hinterwelten, erzeugt aus der Phantastik schwacher Menschen, die nicht Kraft genug haben, ihre Befriedigung aus dem unmittelbaren frischen Dasein zu holen. Die Naturwissenschaft hat den Menschen an das Ende einer rein natürlichen Entwicklung gestellt. Alles, was unter ihm ist, hat dadurch, dass es den Menschen aus sich erzeugte, einen höheren Sinn bekommen. Der Mensch soll nun nicht diesen seinen Sinn verleugnen und sich zum Abbild eines Jenseitigen machen wollen. Er soll begreifen, dass er nicht der Sinn einer überirdischen Macht, sondern der «Sinn der Erde» ist. Was er über das erstreben will, was da ist, soll er nicht in Feindschaft gegen das Daseiende erstreben. In der Wirklichkeit selbst sucht Nietzsche auch die Keime zu dem Höheren, das die Wirklichkeit erträglich machen soll. Nicht einem göttlichen Wesen nachstreben soll der Mensch; aus seiner Wirklichkeit heraus soll er sich eine höhere Daseinsweise gebären. Diese Wirklichkeit selbst trägt über sich hinaus; das Menschentum vermag zum Übermenschentum zu werden. Entwicklung ist immer gewesen. Entwicklung soll auch der Mensch treiben. Die Gesetze der Entwicklung sind größer, umfassender als alles, was sich schon entwickelt hat. Man muss nicht allein hinschauen auf das, was da ist; man muss auf die Urkräfte zurückgehen, welche das Wirkliche erzeugt haben. Eine alte Weltanschauung hat geforscht, wie «Gut und Böse» in die Welt gekommen sind. Sie glaubte, hinter das Dasein zurückgehen zu müssen, um «im Ewigen» die Gründe für «Gut und Böse» zu entdecken. Aber mit dem «Ewigen», mit dem «Jenseitigen» musste Nietzsche auch die «ewige» Geltung von «Gut und Böse» von sich weisen. Der Mensch ist durch Natürliches geworden; und mit ihm sind «Gut und Böse» geworden. Menschenschöpfung ist «Gut und Böse». Und tiefer als das Geschaffene ist der Schöpfer. Der «Mensch» steht «jenseits von Gut und Böse». Er hat das eine zum Guten, das andere zum Bösen gemacht. Er darf sich nicht fesseln lassen durch sein bisheriges «Gut und Böse». Er kann den Weg der Entwicklung weiter schreiten, den er bisher gegangen ist. Er ist aus dem Wurm zum Menschen geworden; er kann vom Menschen zum Übermenschen werden. Er kann ein neues Gutes und Böses schaffen. Er darf die gegenwärtigen Werte «umwerten». Aus der Arbeit an seiner «Umwertung aller Werte» ist Nietzsche durch die geistige Umnachtung gerissen worden. Entwicklung des Wurmes zum Menschen war die Vorstellung, die er aus der neueren Naturwissenschaft gewonnen hat. Er wurde nicht selbst zum Forscher; er hat die Idee der Entwicklung von anderen übernommen. Ihnen war sie Vernunftangelegenheit. Ihm Genie. Der Kampf um Weltanschauungen hat oft Märtyrer erzeugt. Nietzsche hat keine neuen Weltanschauungsideen hervorgebracht. Man wird immer mehr erkennen, dass sein Genie nicht in der Produktion neuer Gedanken liegt. Er hat aber an den Gedanken seiner Umwelt tief gelitten. Er hat für diese Leiden die hinreißenden Töne seines «Zarathustra» gefunden. Er wurde zum Dichter der neuen Weltanschauung; die Hymnen auf den «Übermenschen» sind die persönliche, die dichterische Antwort auf die Fragen und Erkenntnisse der neueren Naturwissenschaft. Alles, was das neunzehnte Jahrhundert an Ideen hervorgebracht hat, wäre auch ohne Nietzsche da. Er wird der Zukunft nicht ein origineller Philosoph, nicht ein Religionsstifter oder Prophet sein; er wird ihr ein Märtyrer der Erkenntnis sein, der in der Dichtung Worte fand, um zu sagen, was er litt.
6 The personality of Friedrich Nietzsche - A memorial speech
[ 1 ] It must seem strange, within the enthusiasm for Nietzsche in our days, that someone whose feelings are no less drawn to this peculiar personality than many others, and who must nevertheless constantly bear in mind the deep contradiction that exists between the nature of this spirit and the ideas and feelings of those who behave like confessors of his world view. Such an outsider must above all remember the contrast between the relationship of his contemporaries to Nietzsche a decade ago, when the night of madness fell upon the "fighter against his time", and that which existed when death took him from us on August 25, 1900. The complete opposite seems to have happened to what Nietzsche predicted about his effect on his contemporaries in the last days of his work. The first part of the book through which he intended to reshape the values of millennia, his "Antichrist", was ready when he fell ill. He begins with the words: "This book belongs to the very few. Perhaps none of them are alive yet. They may be those who understand my Zarathustra: how could I confuse myself with those for whom ears are already growing today? - Only the day after tomorrow belongs to me. Some are born posthumously." It was as if the "day after tomorrow" had already been there when he died. You have to shout the words of Zarathustra into this apparent "day after tomorrow": "You say you believe in Zarathustra? But what is there in Zarathustra? You are my believers: but what is there in all believers! - - Now I bid you lose me and find you; and only when you have all denied me will I return to you." Whether Nietzsche, if he were still alive today in fresh creativity, would look with greater pleasure on those who doubtfully venerate him or on others - who would dare to decide that? But it must be permitted, especially today, to look over the heads of his current admirers to the time when he felt lonely and misunderstood in the midst of the spiritual life surrounding him and when some lived who would have considered it blasphemous to call themselves his "believers" because he appeared to them as a spirit who is not met with an intrusive "yes" or "no", but like an earthquake in the realm of the spirit, which shakes up questions for which premature answers could only resemble unripe fruit. Much more shocking than the news of his death now, a little over ten years ago, the "ears" of the Nietzsche admirers of the time were struck by two pieces of news that followed each other at not too great a distance in time. One concerned a cycle of lectures given by Georg Brandes on Nietzsche's world view at the University of Copenhagen in 1988. Nietzsche perceived this recognition as the kind that had to come from the "some" who are "born posthumously". He felt torn from his solitude in a way that corresponded to his spirit. He did not want to be evaluated: he wanted to be "described", characterized. And this news was soon followed by the other, that the spirit, thus torn from his solitude, had fallen into the terrible fate of mental derangement.
[ 2 ] And while he himself could no longer participate, his contemporaries had the leisure to sharpen the outlines of his image. By observing his personality, they were able to increasingly shape the image of his time, from which his spirit stands out like a Böcklinian figure. The worlds of ideas in his soul could be illuminated with the light cast on them by the spiritual stars of the second half of the century. Then it emerged with complete clarity in what he was actually great. But it also emerged why he had to walk so lonely. His nature took him to the heights of spiritual life. He walked along like one who was only concerned with the essentials of human development. But these essentials touched him as other people only touched the most intimate matters of their souls. Just as only very personal experiences weigh on the minds of others, so directly, so incisively did the great cultural questions, the enormous cognitive needs of his age run through his soul. What many of his contemporaries lived through with their heads alone, became a matter close to his heart.
[ 3 ] Greek culture, Schopenhauer's world view, Wagner's musical drama, the findings of the newer natural sciences triggered feelings in him that were as personal, as deep as the experiences of a strong passion for love in others. Nietzsche lived through the hopes and doubts, the temptations and the joys of knowledge that the entire age had experienced in his own special way, in solitary heights. He found no new ideas: but he suffered and rejoiced in the ideas of his time in a way that was different from that of his contemporaries. It was incumbent upon them to give birth to ideas: the difficult question arose before him: how to live with these ideas?
[ 4 ] His educational background had made Nietzsche a philologist. He had immersed himself in the great world of Greek intellectual culture to such an extent that his teacher Ritschl was able to recommend him to the University of Basel, which appointed the young scholar before he had become a doctor, with the words: Friedrich Nietzsche can do anything he wants. - In terms of the demands placed on philologists, he probably did the most excellent work. But his relationship to Greek culture was not just that of a philologist. He did not merely live with his mind in ancient Hellas; his heart was completely absorbed in Greek thought and feeling The Greek cultural figures did not remain the objects of his studies; they became his personal friends. In the first period of his teaching activity in Basel, he wrote a treatise on the philosophers of the tragic age before Socrates. It was published from his estate. He did not write about Thales, Heraclitus and Parmenides like a scholar; he conversed with these figures of the past as if they were personalities to whom his heart was intimately attached. The passion he feels for them makes him a stranger in Western culture, which, according to his perception, has taken a different path since Socrates than in those ancient times. Socrates becomes Nietzsche's enemy because he has blunted the great tragic mood of his predecessors. The doctrinaire spirit of Socrates strove to understand reality. He wanted reconciliation with life through virtue. But nothing, in Nietzsche's sense, can drag people down more than accepting life as it is. Life cannot be reconciled with itself. Man can only endure this life if he excretes over it. The Greeks understood this before Socrates. Nietzsche believed to find their basic sentiment expressed in the words that, according to legend, the wise Silen, the companion of Dionysus, gave in answer to the question of what was best for mankind. "Wretched, one-day-old, children of chance and toil, why do you force me to tell you what is most profitable for you not to hear? The very best is utterly unattainable for you: not to be born, not to be anything. But the second best thing for you is to die soon." Ancient Greek art and wisdom sought a consolation in the face of life. The servants of Dionysus did not want to belong to this community of life, but to a higher one. For Nietzsche, this was expressed in their cult. "Singing and dancing, man expresses himself as a member of a higher community: he has forgotten how to walk and speak and is on the way to flying up into the air dancing." Man has two ways of transcending existence: he can forget existence in blissful enchantment, as if in a state of intoxication, and "singing and dancing" feel at one with the All-Soul; or he can seek satisfaction in an ideal image of reality, as in a dream that flits lightly across existence. Nietzsche characterizes these two paths as Dionysian and Apollonian moods. Since Socrates, however, modern culture has sought reconciliation with existence, thereby degrading human worth. No wonder Nietzsche felt lonely in this newer culture with such feelings.
[ 5 ] Two personalities seemed to pull him out of this loneliness. Schopenhauer's view of the unworthiness of existence and Richard Wagner met him on his path through life. The way he related to both sheds light on the nature of his mind. He felt a devotion to Schopenhauer that could not have been more intimate. And yet his doctrine remained almost meaningless to him. The Frankfurt sage had countless followers who faithfully accepted what he said. Nietzsche was probably never one of these believers. At the same time that he sent his hymn "Schopenhauer as Educator" out into the world, he secretly wrote down his grave misgivings about the philosopher's views. He did not look up to him like a teacher; he loved him like a father. He felt the heroism of his thoughts even where he disagreed with them. His relationship with Schopenhauer was too intimate to need an outward belief in him, a commitment to him. He loved his "educator" in such a way that he attached his own thoughts to him in order to be able to venerate them in someone else. He did not want to agree in thought with one personality; he wanted to live in friendship with another. - This will also drew him to Richard Wagner. What were all the figures of pre-Socratic Greece with whom he had wanted to live in friendship? They were just shadows from a distant past. And Nietzsche strove for life, for the immediate friendship of tragic people. Greek culture remained dead and abstract to him, despite all the life that his imagination tried to breathe into it. The Greek intellectual heroes remained a longing for him, a fulfillment was Richard Wagner, who seemed to reawaken the old Greek world in his personality, in his art, in his world view. Nietzsche spent the most wonderful days when he was allowed to visit the Wagner couple on their Triebschen estate from Basel. What the philologist had sought in his mind, Greek air to breathe, he believed he found here in reality. He could find a personal relationship to a world that he had previously sought in his imagination. He could experience intimately what he could otherwise only have conjured up in his mind. He felt the idyll of Triebschen like his home. How characteristic are the words with which he describes this feeling in relation to Wagner: "A fruitful, rich, shattering life, quite different and unheard of among middle mortals! But he also stands there, firmly rooted by his own strength, with his gaze transcending everything ephemeral, and untimely in the most beautiful sense."
[ 6 ] In Richard Wagner's personality, Nietzsche believed he had the higher worlds that could make life as bearable for him as he imagined it to be in the sense of the old Greek world view. But did he not commit the greatest error in his sense? After all, he had sought in life what, according to his assumptions, life could never offer. He wanted to go beyond life; and he threw himself with all his strength into the life that Wagner lived. It is therefore understandable that his greatest experience was also his bitterest disappointment. In order to find what he was looking for in Wagner, he first had to enlarge Wagner's real personality into an ideal image. What Wagner could never be, Nietzsche made of him. He did not see and venerate the real Wagner, he venerated his image, which far surpassed reality. When Wagner had achieved what he was striving for, when he had reached his goal, Nietzsche felt the disharmony between his and the real Wagner. And he fell away from Wagner. However, only those who say that Nietzsche did not fall away from the real Wagner are psychologically correct in their interpretation of this apostasy, for he was never Wagner's follower; he only realized that he had been deceived. What he had sought in Wagner, he could never find in him; it had nothing to do with Wagner, it had to be detached from all reality as a higher world. Nietzsche later characterized the necessity of his apparent apostasy from Wagner himself. He stated that what he had "heard in Wagnerian music in his younger years had nothing at all to do with Wagner". "That when I described Dionysian music, I was describing what I had heard, that I instinctively had to translate and transfigure everything into the new spirit I carried within me. The proof of this, as strong as proof can be, is my writing 9Wagner in Bayreuth:: in all psychologically decisive passages there is only talk of me, one may ruthlessly put my name, or the word 9Zarathustra:, where the text gives the word Wagner. The whole picture of the dithyrambic artist is the picture of the pre-existent poet of 9Zarathustra: drawn with abysmal depth, and without even touching Wagner's reality for a moment. Wagner himself had an idea of it; he did not recognize himself in the writing."
[ 7 ] In "Zarathustra", Nietzsche drew the world that he had sought in vain in Wagner, detached from all reality. He placed his "Zarathustra ideal" in a different relationship to reality than his earlier ideals. After all, he had had bad experiences with directly turning away from existence. That he must have done this existence an injustice and that it had therefore taken such bitter revenge on him, this idea increasingly gained the upper hand in him. The disappointment that his idealism had caused him drove him into a hostile mood towards all idealism. His works after his break with Wagner became accusations against ideals. "One error after another is calmly put on ice, the ideal is not refuted - it freezes." This is how he expresses himself in 1888 about the goal of his work "Menschliches, Allzumenschliches", published in 1878. Nietzsche initially seeks refuge in reality. He immerses himself in the newer natural sciences in order to gain a genuine guide to reality through them. All the otherworldly worlds, which people of this became a matter close to his heart. The others fought the intellectual battle against old prejudices. Nietzsche asked himself: how he could live with the new idea. His struggle took place entirely within his soul. He needed to develop into a superhuman in order to endure man. In this way, his sensitive mind had to overcome the knowledge of nature that he had absorbed for himself at a solitary height. In his last creative epoch, Nietzsche sought to gain from reality itself what he had previously believed he could achieve in illusion, in an ideal realm. Life is given a task that is firmly rooted in life and yet leads beyond this life. One cannot remain in the immediate existence, in real life; not even in the life illuminated by natural science. This life must also be suffered. That remained Nietzsche's opinion. The "superman" is also a means of bearing existence. All of this indicates that Nietzsche was born to "suffer from existence". In his search for consolation, his reality insisted on leading him away, now becoming despicable background worlds, created from the fantasies of weak people who do not have enough strength to get their satisfaction from their immediate, fresh existence. Natural science has placed man at the end of a purely natural development. Everything that is below him has been given a higher meaning by the fact that it produced man from itself. Man should not now deny this meaning and want to make himself the image of something beyond. He should understand that he is not the meaning of a supernatural power, but the "meaning of the earth". What he wants to strive for above that which is there, he should not strive for in hostility to that which exists. In reality itself, Nietzsche also seeks the germs of the higher that is to make reality bearable. Man should not strive after a divine being; out of his reality he should give birth to a higher way of being. This reality itself carries beyond itself; humanity is capable of becoming superhumanity. Development has always been. Man should also develop. The laws of development are greater, more comprehensive than everything that has already developed. One must not only look at what is there; one must go back to the primal forces that created the real. An old worldview investigated how "good and evil" came into the world. It believed that it had to go back behind existence in order to discover the reasons for "good and evil" "in the eternal". But with the "eternal", with the "beyond", Nietzsche also had to reject the "eternal" validity of "good and evil". Man has become through the natural; and "good and evil" have become with him. Human creation is "good and evil". And the Creator is deeper than the created. The "human being" is "beyond good and evil". He has made the one good and the other evil. He must not allow himself to be shackled by his previous "good and evil". He can continue on the path of development that he has followed so far. He has gone from worm to man; he can go from man to superman. He can create a new good and evil. He can "revaluate" the present values. Nietzsche was torn from his work on his "revaluation of all values" by mental derangement. The development of the worm into a human being was the idea he gained from recent natural science. He did not become a researcher himself; he adopted the idea of development from others. For them it was a matter of reason. To him it was genius. The struggle for worldviews has often produced martyrs. Nietzsche did not produce any new worldview ideas. One will increasingly recognize that his genius does not lie in the production of new thoughts. But he suffered deeply from the thoughts of his environment. He found the captivating tones of his "Zarathustra" for this suffering. He became the poet of the new world view; the hymns to the "superman" are the personal, the poetic answer to the questions and findings of the newer natural sciences. Everything that the nineteenth century produced in terms of ideas would also be there without Nietzsche. He will not be an original philosopher, a founder of religion or a prophet for the future; he will be a martyr of knowledge who found words in poetry to say what he suffered.