PHILOSOPHY ASSIGNMENT

From Friedrich Nietzsche

The Genealogy of Morals

10.

The revolt of the slaves in morals begins in the very principle of resentment becoming

creative and giving birth to values — a resentment experienced by creatures who, deprived as

they are of the proper outlet of action, are forced to find their compensation in an imaginary

revenge. While every aristocratic morality springs from a triumphant affirmation of its own

demands, the slave morality says "no" from the very outset to what is "outside itself," "different

from itself," and "not itself”: and this "no" is its creative deed. This volte-face of the valuing

standpoint — this inevitable gravitation to the objective instead of back to the subjective — is

typical of resentment: the slave-morality requires as the condition of its existence an external and

objective world, to employ physiological terminology, it requires objective stimuli to be capable

of action at all — its action is fundamentally a reaction. The contrary is the case when we come

to the aristocrat's system of values: it acts and grows spontaneously, it merely seeks its antithesis

in order to pronounce a more grateful and exultant "yes" to its own self; — its negative

conception, "low," "vulgar," "bad," is merely a pale late-born foil in comparison with its positive

and fundamental conception (saturated as it is with life and passion), of "we aristocrats, we good

ones, we beautiful ones, we happy ones."

When the aristocratic morality goes astray and commits sacrilege on reality, this is

limited to that particular sphere with which it is not sufficiently acquainted — a sphere, in fact,

from the real knowledge of which it disdainfully defends itself. It misjudges, in some cases, the

sphere which it despises, the sphere of the common vulgar man and the low people: on the other

hand, due weight should be given to the consideration that in any case the mood of contempt, of

disdain, of superciliousness, even on the supposition that it falsely portrays the object of its

contempt, will always be far removed from that degree of falsity which will always characterize

the attacks — in effigy, of course — of the vindictive hatred and revengefulness of the weak in

onslaughts on their enemies. In point of fact, there is in contempt too strong an admixture of

nonchalance, of casualness, of boredom, of impatience, even of personal exultation, for it to be

capable of distorting its victim into a real caricature or a real monstrosity. Attention again should

be paid to the almost benevolent nuances which, for instance, the Greek nobility imports into all

the words by which it distinguishes the common people from itself; note how continuously a

kind of pity, care, and consideration imparts its honeyed flavor, until at last almost all the words

which are applied to the vulgar man survive finally as expressions for "unhappy," "worthy of pity

— and how, conversely, "bad," "low," "unhappy" have never ceased to ring in the Greek ear with

a tone in which "unhappy" is the predominant note: this is a heritage of the old noble aristocratic

morality, which remains true to itself even in contempt. The "well-born" simply felt themselves

the "happy"; they did not have to manufacture their happiness artificially through looking at their

enemies, or in cases to talk and lie themselves into happiness (as is the custom with all resentful

men) ; and similarly, complete men as they were, exuberant with strength, and consequently

necessarily energetic, they were too wise to dissociate happiness from action — activity becomes

in their minds necessarily counted as happiness—all in sharp contrast to the "happiness" of the

weak and the oppressed, with their festering venom and malignity, among whom happiness

appears essentially as a narcotic, a deadening, a quietude, a peace, a "Sabbath," an enervation of

the mind and relaxation of the limbs, — in short, a purely passive phenomenon. While the

aristocratic man lived in confidence and openness with himself, the resentful man, on the other

hand, is neither sincere nor naive, nor honest and candid with himself. His soul squints; his mind

loves hidden crannies, tortuous paths and back-doors, everything secret appeals to him as his

world, his safety, his balm; he is past master in silence, in not forgetting, in waiting, in

provisional self-depreciation and self-abasement. A race of such resentful men will of necessity

eventually prove more prudent than any aristocratic race, it will honor prudence on quite a

distinct scale, as, in fact, a paramount condition of existence, while prudence among aristocratic

men is apt to be tinged with a delicate flavor of luxury and refinement; so among them it plays

nothing like so integral a part as that complete certainty of function of the governing unconscious

instincts, or as indeed a certain lack of prudence, such as a vehement and valiant charge, whether

against danger or the enemy, or as those ecstatic bursts of rage, love, reverence, gratitude, by

which at all times noble souls have recognized each other. When the resentment of the

aristocratic man manifests itself, it fulfils and exhausts itself in an immediate reaction, and

consequently instills no venom: on the other hand, it never manifests itself at all in countless

instances, when in the case of the feeble and weak it would be inevitable. An inability to take

seriously for any length of time their enemies, their disasters, their misdeeds— that is the sign of

the full strong natures who possess a superfluity of molding plastic force, that heals completely

and produces forgetfulness: a good example of this in the modern world is Mirabeau, who had no

memory for any insults and meanness which were practiced on him, and who was only incapable

of forgiving because he forgot. Such a man indeed shakes off with a shrug many a worm which

would have buried itself in another; it is only in characters like these that we see the possibility

(supposing, of course, that there is such a possibility in the world) of the real "love of one's

enemies." What respect for his enemies is found, forsooth, in an aristocratic man- — and such a

reverence is already a bridge to love! He insists on having his enemy to himself as his

distinction. He tolerates no other enemy but a man in whose character there is nothing to despise

and much to honor! On the other hand, imagine the "enemy" as the resentful man conceives him

— and it is here exactly that we see his work, his creativeness; he has conceived "the evil

enemy," the "evil one," and indeed that is the root idea from which he now evolves as a

contrasting and corresponding figure a "good one," himself — his very self!

11.

The method of this man is quite contrary to that of the aristocratic man, who conceives

the root idea "good" spontaneously and straight away, that is to say, out of himself, and from

that material then creates for himself a concept of "bad"! This "bad" of aristocratic origin and

that "evil" out of the cauldron of unsatisfied hatred — the former an imitation, an "extra," an

additional nuance; the latter, on the other hand, the original, the beginning, the essential act in the

conception of a slave morality — these two words "bad" and "evil," how great a difference do

they mark, in spite of the fact that they have an identical contrary in the idea "good." But the idea

"good" is not the same: much rather let the question be asked, "Who is really evil according to

the meaning of the morality of resentment?" In all sternness let it be answered thus: — just the

good man of the other morality, just the aristocrat, the powerful one, the one who rules, but who

is distorted by the venomous eye of resentfulness, into a new color, a new signification, a new

appearance. This particular point we would be the last to deny: the man who learned to know

those "good" ones only as enemies, learned at the same time not to know them only as "evil

enemies," and the same men who inter pares 1 were kept so rigorously in bounds through

convention, respect, custom, and gratitude, though much more through mutual vigilance and

jealousy, these men who in their relations with each other find so many new ways of manifesting

consideration, self-control, delicacy, loyalty, pride, and friendship, these men are in reference to

what is outside their circle (where the foreign element, a foreign country, begins) , not much

better than beasts of prey, which have been let loose. They enjoy there freedom from all social

control, they feel that in the wilderness they can give vent with impunity to that tension which is

produced by enclosure and imprisonment in the peace of society, they revert to the innocence of

the beast-of-prey conscience, like jubilant monsters, who perhaps come from a ghostly bout of

murder, arson, rape, and torture, with bravado and a moral equanimity, as though merely some

wild student's prank had been played, perfectly convinced that the poets have now an ample

theme to sing and celebrate. It is impossible not to recognize at the core of all these aristocratic

races the beast of prey; the magnificent blonde bride, avidly rampant for spoil and victory; this

hidden core needed an outlet from time to time, the beast must get loose again, must return into

the wilderness — the Roman, Arabic, German, and Japanese nobility, the Homeric heroes, the

Scandinavian Vikings, are all alike in this need. It is the aristocratic races who have left the idea

"Barbarian" on all the tracks in which they have marched; nay, a consciousness of this very

barbarianism, and even a pride in it, manifests itself even in their highest civilization (for

example, when Pericles says to his Athenians in that celebrated funeral oration, "Our audacity

has forced a way over every land and sea, rearing everywhere imperishable memorials of itself

for good and for evil"). This audacity of aristocratic races, mad, absurd, and spasmodic as may

be its expression; the incalculable and fantastic nature of their enterprises,…their nonchalance

and contempt for safety, body, life, and comfort, their awful joy and intense delight in all

destruction, in all the ecstasies of victory and cruelty, — all these features become crystallized,

for those who suffered thereby in the picture of the "barbarian," of the "evil enemy," perhaps of

the "Goth" and of the "Vandal." The profound, icy mistrust which the German provokes, as soon

as he arrives at power, — even at the present time, — is always still an aftermath of that

inextinguishable horror with which for whole centuries Europe has regarded the wrath of the

blonde Teuton beast (although between the old Germans and ourselves there exists scarcely a

psychological, let alone a physical, relationship). I have once called attention to the

embarrassment of Hesiod, when he conceived the series of social ages, and endeavored to

express them in gold, silver, and bronze. He could only dispose of the contradiction, with which

he was confronted, by the Homeric world, an age magnificent indeed, but at the same time so

awful and so violent, by making two ages out of one, which he henceforth placed one behind the

other — first, the age of the heroes and demigods, as that world had remained in the memories of

the aristocratic families, who found therein their own ancestors; secondly, the bronze age, as that

corresponding age appeared to the descendants of the oppressed, spoiled, ill-treated, exiled,

enslaved; namely, as an age of bronze, as I have said, hard, cold, terrible, without feelings and

without conscience, crushing everything, and bespattering everything with blood. Granted the

1 A Latin term meaning “among equals.”

truth of the theory now believed to be true, that the very essence of all civilization is to train out

of man, the beast of prey, a tame and civilized animal, a domesticated animal, it follows

indubitably that we must regard as the real tools of civilization all those instincts of reaction and

resentment, by the help of which the aristocratic races, together with their ideals, were finally

degraded and overpowered; though that has not yet come to be synonymous with saying that the

bearers of those tools also represented the civilization. It is rather the contrary that is not only

probable— nay, it is palpable to-day: these bearers of vindictive instincts that have to be bottled

up, these descendants of all European and non-European slavery, especially of the pre-Aryan

population— these people, I say, represent the decline of humanity! These "tools of civilization"

are a disgrace to humanity, and constitute in reality more of an argument against civilization,

more of a reason why civilization should be suspected. One may be perfectly justified in being

always afraid of the blonde beast that lies at the core of all aristocratic races, and in being on

one's guard: but who would not a hundred times prefer to be afraid, when one at the same time

admires, than to be immune from fear, at the cost of being perpetually obsessed with the

loathsome spectacle of the distorted, the dwarfed, the stunted, the envenomed? And is that not

our fate? What produces today our repulsion towards "man"? — for we suffer from "man," there

is no doubt about it. It is not fear; it is rather that we have nothing more to fear from men ; it is

that the worm "man" is in the foreground and pullulates; it is that the "tame man," the wretched

mediocre and unedifying creature, has learnt to consider himself a goal and a pinnacle, an inner

meaning, an historic principle, a "higher man"; yes, it is that he has a certain right so to consider

himself, in so far as he feels that in contrast to that excess of deformity, disease, exhaustion, and

effeteness whose odor is beginning to pollute present-day Europe, he at any rate has achieved a

relative success, he at any rate still says "yes" to life.