lower sorts of humanity, practising the willing blindness and deafness of the wise.[1] Further, they may concede to themselves a right to exceptional actions, as exercise in self-control and in the use of freedom; they may put themselves in circumstances where they are obliged to be hard;[2] they may win surplus power and self-confidence by all kinds of asceticism; they may school themselves in fine obedience and in the fixed sense of differences of rank among men, altogether outgrowing the idea that what is right for one is allowable for another and ceasing to emulate virtues that belong to others than themselves.[3] Their manner of life will vary from that of the "industrial masses" (the business and working class). Industrious habits, fixed rules, moderation in all things, settled convictions—in short, the "social virtues"—are indeed best for men at large; in this way they reach the perfection of their type. But for the exceptional men whom Nietzsche covets to see, other things are good: leisure, adventure, unbelief [as ordinarily understood], even excess—things that, if allowed to average natures, would cause their undoing. The very discipline that strengthens a strong nature and fits it for great undertakings undermines and shatters weaker men—"doubt," la largeur de cœur, experiment, independence.[4]
So may higher men educate themselves. And yet to create the whole set of conditions which accident sometimes provides for the appearance of great individuals, would require, Nietzsche remarks, an iron-hardness, "iron men," such as have never existed. Practically higher natures can only train themselves, utilize any existing situation, and wait for developments.[5] Wars will probably come willy-nilly, and though Nietzsche has little interest in ordinary wars, serving as they do only national
- ↑ Werke, XII, 123-4, § 243.
- ↑ Nietzsche uses the word Barbar here; he has in mind, as he elsewhere explains, not barbarians such as we ordinarily fear, namely, those coming up from the lower ranks of society, but conquering, ruling natures descending from above, of whom Prometheus is a type (Will to Power, § 900).
- ↑ Will to Power, § 921.
- ↑ Ibid., §§ 901, 904. The (or an) element of danger in Nietzsche's teaching is that those reading him may not make these distinctions—that one who is only an average man may think himself ah exception and the weak imagine themselves strong.
- ↑ Ibid., § 908.
