We have lent new colours to things, we are constantly painting them anew – but what is our more youthful artistry when compared with the glorious palette of those Old Masters! I mean those men of old, ancient mankind.

  153

  Homo Poeta

  ‘To the extent that it is finished, I have single-handedly made this tragedy of tragedies; I have entangled morality with existence so tightly that only a god could unravel them again – as Horace demands!19 Now in the fourth act I have killed all the gods – in the name of morality! What is to become of the fifth act? Where am I to find a tragic resolution? Should I begin to consider a comic resolution?’20

  154

  Different Degrees to Which Life Is Precarious

  You know what you experience; you run through life like a drunken man, and occasionally tumble down some stairs. Thanks to your drunkenness, though, you do not break a limb: your muscles are too limp and your head too confused to find the bricks of these stairs as hard as we others do! For us, life is much more precarious: we are made of glass – woe to us if we’re jostled! And all is lost if we fall!

  155

  What We Lack

  We love greatness in nature and it is we who have discovered it; that is because we have no conception of human greatness. With the Greeks it was the reverse: their sense of nature was different from ours.

  156

  The Most Influential

  When a man resists the whole spirit of his age, stops it at the gate and calls it to account, that must exert an influence! Whether that is his intention is of no consequence; the thing is that he can.

  157

  Mentiri

  Take care! He reflects: soon he will have a lie ready. Whole nations exist at this stage of civilization. After all, consider what the Romans meant by the word mentiri!21

  158

  An Inconvenient Quality

  To find everything deep is an inconvenient quality: it makes us constantly strain our eyes, and in the end we always find more than we wish.

  159

  Every Virtue Has Its Time

  He who is inflexible nowadays often feels remorse because of his honesty; for inflexibility and honesty are virtues which belong to different ages.

  160

  In Dealings with Virtues

  One can be undignified and fawning even towards a virtue.

  161

  To the Enthusiasts of the Present Age

  The ex-priest and the ex-convict are always making false faces; what they want is a face without a past.

  But have you ever seen men who know that their faces are a mirror of the future, and who are so polite to you who are enthusiasts of ‘the present age’ that they make a false face without a future?

  162

  Egoism

  Egoism is the law of perspective for our sensibilities, according to which things close at hand seem large and important, while at a greater distance everything seems to diminish in size and importance.

  163

  After a Great Victory

  The best thing about a great victory is that it deprives the victor of the fear of defeat. ‘Why not be defeated for once?’, he says to himself, ‘I am now rich enough for that.’

  164

  Those Who Seek Repose

  I recognize the spirits which seek repose by the many dark objects with which they surround themselves: those who want to sleep darken their chambers, or crawl into a cave.

  A hint for those who do not know what they really seek the most, and would like to know!

  165

  Of the Happiness of the Renouncers

  Those who have thoroughly denied themselves something for a long time will almost imagine, when they accidentally encounter it again, that they have discovered it – and what happiness there is in being a discoverer! Let us be wiser than the snakes that lie too long in the same sun.

  166

  Always in Our Own Company

  Everything in nature and history which is my sort of thing speaks to me, praises me, urges me on and comforts me – other things I either do not hear, or immediately forget. We are always only in our own company.

  167

  Misanthropy and Love

  We speak of having had enough of men only when we can no longer digest them, although our stomachs are full of them. Misanthropy is the result of an all too greedy philanthropy and ‘anthropophagy’ – but who told you to swallow men like oysters, my dear Prince Hamlet?

  168

  Of an Invalid

  ‘He is in a bad way!’ What does he lack? ‘He suffers from a hunger for praise, and finds no nourishment for it.’ Inconceivable! All the world is celebrating him, and sustaining him in both word and deed! ‘Yes, but he has a bad ear for praise. When a friend praises him it sounds to him as if the friend is praising himself; when an enemy praises him, it sounds to him as if the enemy wished to be praised for it; when someone else praises him – and he is so famous that few remain! – it offends him that they wish to be neither his friend nor his enemy. He always says, ‘What do I care for someone who is able to do justice to me!’

  169

  Avowed Enemies

  Bravery before the enemy is one thing, and bravery elsewhere is another; one can be bold, clear and decisive in public and still be cowardly, confused and indecisive in private. That was how Napoleon judged the ‘bravest man’ he knew, Murat22 – from which it follows that avowed enemies may be indispensable to some men, if they are to rise to the level of their own virtue, virility and cheerfulness.

  170

  With the Crowd

  So far he has run with the crowd and is its panegyrist; but one day he will be its opponent! For he follows it in the belief that his laziness would not be disappointed: he has not yet learned that the crowd is not lazy enough for him, that it always presses forward, that it does not allow anyone to stand still! And he is so very fond of standing still!

  171

  Fame

  When the gratitude of many to one casts off all shame, the result is fame.

  172

  The Corrupter of Taste

  A: ‘You are a corrupter of taste – everybody says so!’ B: ‘But of course! I corrupt everyone’s taste for his party – and no partisan forgives me for that.’

  173

  Being Profound and Being Thought Profound

  Whoever knows that he is profound strives for clarity; whoever would like the crowd to think he is profound strives for obscurity. The reason for this is that the crowd thinks something is profound whenever it cannot see to the bottom of it; it is afraid of the water and hates to get its feet wet.

  174

  Aloof

  Parliamentarianism, that is, public permission to choose between five basic political opinions, curries favour with the crowd who would like to seem independent and individual, and like to fight for their opinions. In the end, it is immaterial whether the herd is required to have one opinion, or permitted to have five.

  Whoever deviates from those five public opinions, and holds himself aloof from them, always has the whole herd against him.

  175

  Of Eloquence

  Who has possessed the most convincing eloquence thus far? The drumbeat; and as long as kings have this at their command, they will always be the best orators and popular agitators.

  176

  Pitiable

  Poor reigning princes! Suddenly all their rights are turning into claims, and as soon as they do, they begin to sound like pretensions! And if they say ‘we’, or ‘my people’, wicked old Europe smiles. Truly, a master of ceremonies of the modern world would not stand on ceremony with them; perhaps he would decree, ‘Les souverains rangent aux parvenus.’23

  177

  On the ‘Educational System’

  In Germany, superior men lack a great means of education: the laughter of superior men; these do not laugh in Germany.

  178

  For Moral Enlightenment

  The Germans must be talked out of their Mephistopheles, and their Faust as well. These are two moral prejudices against the value of knowledge.

  179

  Thoughts

  Thoughts are the shadows of our feelings – always darker, emptier and simpler than these.

  180

  A Good Time for Free Spirits

  Free spirits take liberties even with regard to science, and for the time being with impunity – as long as the Church is still standing! To that extent, this is a good time for them.

  181

  Preceding and Following

  A: ‘Of the two, one always precedes and the other always follows, wherever destiny may lead them. And yet the latter is superior to the other both in intellect and virtue.’ B: ‘And yet? And yet? That is said for the others’ benefit; not for mine, not for ours! Fit secundum regulam.’24

  182

  In Solitude

  When you live alone you do not speak too loudly, nor do you write too loudly, for fear of that hollow reverberation: criticism by the nymph Echo.

  And all voices sound so differently in solitude!

  183

  The Music of the Best Future25

  For me, the foremost musician would be the one who was only acquainted with the sorrow of the most profound joy, and no other sorrow; there has never been such a musician.

  184

  Justice

  Better to let oneself be robbed than to surround oneself with scarecrows – that is my taste. And it is, above all, a matter of taste – nothing more!

  185

  Poor

  Today he is poor, not because everything has been taken away from him, but because he has thrown everything away. What does it matter to him? He is accustomed to finding things.

  It is the poor who misunderstand his voluntary poverty.

  186

  Bad Conscience

  Everything he does now is good and proper – and yet he has a bad conscience about it all. For the exceptional is his task.

  187

  Offensiveness in the Presentation

  This artist offends me by the way in which he presents his ideas, his very good ideas: so broadly and emphatically, and with such crude rhetorical tricks, as if he were addressing the mob. After devoting some time to his art we always feel as if we have been in ‘bad company’.

  188

  Work

  How close are we now to work and worker, even the most leisurely among us! The royal courtesy in the words ‘we are all workers’26 would have been cynical and indecent under Louis XIV.

  189

  The Thinker

  He is a thinker: that is to say, he knows how to make things simpler than they are.

  190

  Against Praise

  A: ‘We are only praised by our equals!’ B: ‘Yes! And he who praises you is saying, “You are my equal!” ’

  191

  Against Many a Defence

  One injures a cause in the most perfidious manner by deliberately defending it with erroneous reasons.

  192

  The Good-Natured

  With regard to the good-natured, people whose countenances beam with benevolence, what is it that distinguishes them from other people? What we observe is that they feel comfortable in the presence of a new person, and are quickly enamoured of him; they are therefore well disposed towards him, and their initial judgement is, ‘I like him.’ In such people there seems to follow, one after another: the desire to appropriate (they are not too particular about the person’s worth), rapid appropriation, pleasure in ownership, and then action for the benefit of their new piece of property.

  193

  Kant’s Joke

  Kant wished to prove in a way that affronted ‘all the world’ that ‘all the world’ was right – that was his secret joke. He wrote against the scholars on behalf of popular prejudice, but for the scholars and not for the people.

  194

  The ‘Candid’

  That man probably always acts from ulterior motives; for he is always telling us what they are, and is even generous in doing so.

  195

  Laughable!

  Look at that! He is running away from people – but they follow him anyway, because he is running in front of them – they are such sheep!

  196

  Our Sense of Hearing and Its Limits

  We only hear the questions we are able to answer.

  197

  So Be Careful!

  There is nothing we so gladly share with others than the seal of secrecy – together with what lies under it.

  198

  Chagrin of the Proud

  A proud man is chagrined even at those who help him along; he casts an evil eye even at the horses of his own carriage.

  199

  Generosity

  With the rich, generosity is often just a kind of shyness.

  200

  Laughter

  Laughter means: to gloat, but with a good conscience.

  201

  Applause

  In applause there is always some kind of noise; even when we applaud ourselves.

  202

  A Spendthrift

  He still does not have the poverty of the rich man who has already counted his treasure – he expends his spirit with the foolishness of a natural spendthrift.

  203

  Hic Niger Est27

  Usually he has no thoughts at all – but in exceptional circumstances he has vile ones.

  204

  Beggars and Courtesy

  ‘When there is no doorbell, there is no rudeness in knocking on the door with a stone’ – so think all beggars and needy people, but nobody seems to agree with them.

  205

  Need

  Need is regarded as the cause of coming into being; in truth, it is often only the effect of having come into being.

  206

  During the Rain

  It rains, and I think of all the poor people who now crowd together with their many cares, and no means of concealing them, each of them ready and willing to wound the other to give themselves a pathetic sense of well-being, even in bad weather.

  This, only this, is the poverty of the poor!

  207

  The Envier

  That is an envier – one hopes that he has no children; he would be envious of them, because he can no longer be a child.

  208

  A Great Man!

  Just because someone is ‘a great man’, we may not infer that he is a man; he may be just a boy, or a chameleon of indeterminate age, or a bewitched female.

  209

  One Way of Asking for Reasons

  There is a way of asking us for our reasons which not only makes us forget our best reasons and leaves us dumbfounded, but even awakens in us a defiance and antipathy towards reason in general: a favourite trick of tyrannical men!

  210

  Moderation in Diligence

  You must not wish to surpass the diligence of your father – that makes you sick.

  211

  Secret Enemies

  To have a secret enemy – that is a moral luxury which even the most high-minded of us can ill afford.

  212

  Not Letting Oneself Be Deceived

  His intellect has bad manners, is hasty and always stammers with impatience; so that we hardly suspect how deep-breathed and broad-chested the soul is in which it is housed.

  213

  The Way to Happiness

  A sage asked of a fool what the way to happiness was. The fool immediately answered as if he had been asked the way to the next town. ‘Admire yourself and live on the street!’ ‘Wait,’ cried the sage, ‘that is asking too much. It is enough just to admire yourself!’ The fool replied: ‘But how can you constantly admire unless you constantly despise?’