Nietzsche on Revolution

Since I tend to beat up on Nietzsche quite a bit, and in consideration of my being one fair and balanced hombre, I thought I would quote a passage in which old Fritz is 'spot on':

A delusion in the theory of revolution. — There are political and social fantasists who with fiery eloquence invite a revolutionary overturning of all social orders in the belief that the proudest temple of fair humanity will then rise up at once as though of its own accord. In these perilous dreams there is still an echo of Rousseau's superstition, which believes in a miraculous primeval but as it were buried goodness of human nature and ascribes all the blame for this burying to the institutions of culture in the form of society, state and education. The experiences of history have taught us, unfortunately, that every such revolution brings about the resurrection of the most savage energies in the shape of the long-buried dreadfulness and excesses of the most distant ages: that a revolution can thus be a source of energy in a mankind grown feeble but never a regulator, architect, artist, perfector of human nature….(Human, All Too Human, vol. I, sec. 463, tr. Hollingdale)

This unambiguous take-down of Rousseau's conceit according to which man is by nature good but corrupted by society and the state is something the Nietzsche-lovers on the Left should carefully consider.

Nietzsche and National Socialism

Was Nietzsche a proto-Nazi? Did he lay the philosophical foundations for Nazi ideology? That would be a hard case to make given the elements in Nietzsche's thinking that are antithetical to National Socialism. To mention one such element, there is Nietzsche's oft-expressed hostility to socialism. There are, however, passages in Nietzsche which aid and abet the Nazi mindset. They ought not be ignored. A good example is Gay Science #325 (Kaufmann tr. emphasis in original):

Continue reading “Nietzsche and National Socialism”

For the New Year: Looking Away Shall Be My Only Negation

Nietzsche

One of the elements in my personal liturgy is a reading of the following passage every January 1st. I must have begun the practice in the mid-70s. My copy of The Gay Science was purchased in Boston and is dated 15 September 1974. (You mean to tell me that when you buy books, you do not note where you bought them, and when, and in whose presence?)

Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science, Book Four, #276, tr. Kaufmann:

For the new year. — I still live, I still think: I still have to live, for I still have to think. Sum, ergo cogito: cogito, ergo sum. Today everybody permits himself the expression of his wish and his dearest thought: hence I, too, shall say what it is that I wish from myself today, and what was the first thought to run across my heart this year — what thought shall be for me the reason, warranty, and sweetness of my life henceforth. I want to learn to see more and more as beautiful what is necessary in things; then I shall be one of those who makes things beautiful. Amor fati: let that be my love henceforth! I do not want to wage war against what is ugly. I do not want to accuse. Looking away shall be my only negation. And all and all and on the whole: someday I wish to be only a Yes-sayer.

(Amor fati: love of fate.)