Friedrich
Nietzsche
Beyond Good and Evil
[This document, which has
been prepared by Ian Johnston of
Vancouver Island University, Nanaimo, BC, has certain copyright restrictions.
For information, please consult Copyright.
Editorial comments and translations in square brackets and italics are by Ian
Johnston; comments in normal brackets are from Nietzsche's text. Last
revised in January 2009]
Part
Four
Aphorisms and Interludes
63
Whoever
is fundamentally a teacher takes all things seriously only in relation to his
students—including even himself.
64
“Knowledge
for its own sake,”—that is the ultimate snare which morality sets: with that
one gets fully entangled once again in morality.
65
The
charm of knowledge would be slight, if there were not so much embarrassment to
overcome on the route to knowledge.
65a
Man
is most dishonest in relation to his god: he is not permitted to sin!
66
The
inclination to diminish oneself, to rob oneself, to let oneself be deceived and
exploited could be the embarrassment of a god among men.
67
Love
of one man is a barbarity: for it is practised at the expense of all the rest.
Also the love for God.
68
“I
have done that” says my memory. I could not have done that—says my pride and
remains implacable. Finally—my memory gives up.
69
One
has watched life badly if one has not also seen the hand which, in a considerate
manner—kills.
70
If
a person has character, he still has his typical experience, which always
repeats itself.
71
The
wise man as astronomer—so long as you still feel the stars as something
“above you,” you still lack the eye of a man who knows.
72
It’s
not the strength but the duration of the lofty sensation that makes lofty
people.
73
Whoever
attains his ideal, in the act of doing just that goes beyond it.
73a
Some
peacocks hide their peacock’s tails from all eyes—and call that their pride.
74
A
man with genius is unendurable if he does not possess at least two things in
addition: gratitude and cleanliness.
75
The
degree and type of the sexuality of a man extend all the way to the ultimate
peak of his spirit.
76
Under
conditions of peace the warlike man attacks himself.
77
With
their principles people want to tyrannize their habits or justify them or honour
them or abuse them or hide them:—two men with the same principles probably
want them for fundamentally different things.
78
Anyone
who despises himself nonetheless still respects himself as the one doing the
despising.
79
A
soul which knows that it is loved but which does not love itself reveals its
bottom layers—its deepest stuff comes up.
80
A
matter which is explained ceases to concern us.—What does that god mean who
advised “Know thyself”? Does that not perhaps mean “Stop being concerned
about yourself! Become objective!”—And Socrates? —And the “scientific
man”?—
81
It
is dreadful to die of thirst in the sea. Must you then salt your truth so much
that it can no longer—quench your thirst?
82
“Pity
for everyone”—that would hard and tyrannical for you, my neighbour.
83
Instinct—when
the house is burning, people forget even their noonday meal.—Indeed, but
people later haul it out of the ashes.
84
Woman
learns to hate to the extent that she forgets how to enchant.
85
The
same emotional affects in men and women have, nonetheless, a different tempo.
That’s the reason man and women do not cease misunderstanding each other.
86
Behind
all personal vanity women themselves still have their impersonal contempt—for
“woman.”
87
Bound
heart, free spirit.—When one binds one’s heart firmly and keeps it
imprisoned, one can provide one’s spirit many freedoms: I have said that
already once. But people do not believe me, provided that they do not already
know it. . . .
88
We
begin to mistrust very clever people when they become embarrassed.
89
Dreadful
experiences lead one to wonder whether the person who undergoes them is not
something dreadful.
90
Heavy,
melancholy men become lighter precisely through what makes other people heavy,
through hate and love, and for a while come to their surface.
91
So
cold, so icy that we burn our fingers on him! Every hand that grasps him pulls
back!—And for that very reason some assume he’s glowing hot.
92
For
the sake of his good reputation who has not once—sacrificed himself?
93
In
affability there is no hatred for humanity, but for that very reason there is
too much contempt for humanity.
94
Maturity
in a man: that means having found once again that seriousness which man had as a
child, in play.
95
For
someone to be ashamed of his immorality: that is a step on the staircase at the
end of which he is also ashamed of his morality.
96
People
should depart from life in the way Odysseus separated from Nausikaa—blessing
it rather than in love with it.*
97
What?
A great man? I always see only the actor of his own ideal.
98
If
we train our conscience, it will kiss us at the very moment it bites us.
99
The
disappointed man speaks:—“I listened for the echo, and I heard only
praise—”
100
We
all present ourselves to ourselves as more simple than we are: in this way we
give ourselves a rest from our fellow human beings.
101
Today
a man with knowledge might easily feel like god transformed into an animal.
102
To
discover that one is loved in return should really bring the lover down about
his beloved. “How’s that? Is this person modest enough to love even you? Or
stupid enough? Or—or—. . .”
103
The
danger in happiness—“Now everything is turning out the best for me; now I
love every destiny:—Who feels like being my destiny?”
104
It
is not their love of humanity but the impotence of their love of humanity that
prevents today’s Christians—from burning us.
105
For
the free spirit, the “pious man of discovery”—the pia fraus [pious
fraud] is even more contrary to his taste (against his “piety”)
than the impia fraus [impious fraud]. Hence his deep lack of
understanding of the church, the sort that is associated with the type “free
spirit,”—his unfreedom.
106
Thanks
to music the passions enjoy themselves.
107
Once
the decision has been made, to shut your ears even to the best counterarguments:
a sign of a strong character. Also an occasional will to stupidity.
108
There
are no moral phenomenon at all, but only a moral interpretation of phenomena. .
. .
109
The
criminal is often enough not equal to his action: he diminishes and disparages
it.
110
The
lawyers for a criminal are rarely sufficiently artistic to turn the beautiful
terror of his action to the benefit of the person who did it.
111
Our
vanity is most difficult to injure at the very point where our pride has just
been hurt.
112
Anyone
who feels himself predestined to observe and not to believe finds all those who
believe too noisy and pushy: he fends them off.
113
“Do
you want to win him over for yourself? Then make yourself embarrassed in front
of him.—”
114
The
immense expectation concerning sexual love and the shame in this expectation
ruin all perspective in women from the beginning.
115
Where
the game has neither love nor hate, woman plays indifferently.
116
The
great epochs of our lives occur when we acquire the courage to rename our evil
quality our best quality.
117
The
will to overcome an emotional affect is ultimately only the will of another
emotional affect or of several other emotional affects.
118
There
is an innocence in admiration: such innocence belongs to the man who does not
yet have any idea that he, too, could at some point be admired.
119
The
disgust with filth can be so great that it prevents us from cleansing
ourselves—from “justifying” ourselves.
120
Sensuality
often makes the growth of love too fast, so that the root remains weak and easy
to rip out.
121
There’s
something fine about the fact that God learned Greek when he wanted to become a
writer—and that he did not learn it better.
122
To
be happy over praise is with some men only a courtesy of the heart—and exactly
the opposite of vanity of the spirit.
123
Even
concubinage has been corrupted—by marriage.
124
The
man who still rejoices while being burned at the stake is not triumphing over
the pain but over the fact that he feels none of the pain which he expected. A
parable.
125
When
we have to change our minds about anyone, we hold the awkwardness which he has
thus created for us very much against him.
126
A
people is nature’s detour to produce six or seven great men.—Yes, and then
to get around them.
127
Science
offends the modesty of all real women. With it they feel as if someone wanted to
peek under their skin—or even worse, under their dress and finery.
128
The
more abstract the truth you wish to teach, the more you must still seduce the
senses to it.
129
The
devil has the widest perspective for God; that’s why he keeps himself so far
away from Him—for the devil is the oldest friend of knowledge.
130
What
someone is begins to show itself when his talent subsides—when he stops
showing what he can do. Talent is also finery, and finery is also a
hiding place.
131
The
sexes deceive themselves about each other: this happens because basically they
honour and love only themselves (or, to put the matter more pleasantly, only
their own ideal—). Hence the man wants the woman to be peaceful—but woman,
like a cat, is essentially not peaceful, however much she may have
practised an appearance of peacefulness.
132
People
are best punished for their virtues.
133
The
man who does not know how to find the way to his own ideal lives more
carelessly and impudently than the man without an ideal.
134
All
credibility, all good conscience, all appearance of the truth come only from the
senses.
135
Pharisaism
is not degeneration in a good man: a good part of it is rather the condition of
all being-good.*
136
One
man seeks a midwife for his ideas, another seeks someone whom he can help:
that’s how a good conversation arises.
137
By
associating with scholars and artists one easily makes mistakes in reverse
directions: behind a remarkable scholar we not infrequently find an average
human being, and behind an average artist we often find—a very remarkable
human being.
138
We
act while awake as we do in a dream: we invent and fabricate the person with
whom we associate—and then we immediately forget the fact.
139
In
revenge and love woman is more barbaric than man.
140
Advice
as riddle:—“If the bond is not to break—you must first
bite down on it.”
141
The
lower abdomen is the reason man does not so easily consider himself a god.
142
The
most demure saying I have ever heard: “In true love it’s the soul which
envelops the body.”*
143
What
we do best our vanity wishes to value as the thing which is most difficult for
us. The origin of many a morality.
144
When
a woman has scholarly inclinations, then something is usually wrong with her
sexuality. Infertility itself tends to encourage a certain masculinity of taste,
for man is, if I may say so, “the infertile animal.”
145
In
comparing man and woman in general we can say that woman would not have the
genius for finery if she did not have the instinct for the secondary
role.
146
Anyone
who fights with monsters should make sure that he does not in the process become
a monster himself. And when you look for a long time into an abyss, the abyss
also looks into you.
147
From
an old Florentine novella, and in addition from life: buona femmina e mala
femmina vuol bastone [the good and the bad woman wants a stick]. Sacchetti,
Nov. 86.
148
To
seduce a neighbour into a good opinion and, beyond that, to believe faithfully
in this opinion of one’s neighbour: who can match women in performing this
trick?—
149
What
an age finds evil is commonly an anachronistic echo of what previously was found
to be good—the atavism of an older ideal.
150
Around
the hero everything becomes a tragedy, around the demi-god everything becomes a
satyr play, and around God everything becomes —what? Perhaps a “world”?—
151
Having
a talent is not enough: one must also have your permission to have it—isn’t
that so, my friends?
152
“Where
the tree of knowledge stands is always paradise”: that’s what the oldest and
the most recent serpents declare.
153
What
is done out of love always happens beyond good and evil.
154
Objections,
evasions, cheerful mistrust, and love of mockery are indications of health:
everything absolute belongs with pathology.
155
A
sense of tragedy ebbs and flows with sensuality.
156
With
individuals madness is something rare—but with groups, parties, peoples, and
ages it’s the rule.
157
The
thought of suicide is a strong consolation: with it people get through many an
evil night.
158
Not
only our reason but also our conscience submits to our strongest drive, the
tyrant in us.
159
People
must repay good and bad things, but why directly to the person who does
good or bad things to us?
160
We
don’t love our knowledge enough any more, once we have communicated it.
161
Poets
are shameless about their experiences: they exploit them.
162
“The
one next to us is not our neighbour but our neighbour’s
neighbour”—that’s how every people thinks.
163
Love
brings to light the high and the hidden characteristics of the person who
loves—what is rare and exceptional about him: to that extent it easily
misleads us about what is normal in him.
164
Jesus
said to his Jews: “The law was for slaves—love god as I love him, as his
son! What do we sons of God have to do with morality!”’
165
Concerning
every party: a shepherd must still always have a bell wether—or
he himself must from time to time be a wether.
166
People
do lie with their mouths, but by the way they shape their mouths in doing so
they nonetheless still speak the truth.
167
With
hard people intimacy is shameful thing—and something precious.
168
Christianity
gave Eros poison to drink—but he didn’t die from that. He degenerated into a
vice.*
169
To
talk a lot about oneself can also be a means of hiding oneself.
170
In
praise there is more pushiness than in blame.
171
Pity
in a man of knowledge seems almost laughable, like soft hands on a Cyclops.*
172
From
love of humanity people sometimes embrace anyone (because they cannot embrace
everybody): but that’s something they cannot reveal to this anyone. . . .
173
A
man does not hate so long as he still rates something low, but only when he
rates something equal or higher.
174
You
utilitarians, you also love everything useful only as a cart to
carry your inclinations—and you too find the noise of its wheels really
unbearable?
175
Ultimately
one loves one’s desires and not the object one desires.
176
The
vanity of others offends our taste only when it offends our vanity.
177
Concerning
what “truthfulness” perhaps no one has yet been sufficiently truthful.
178
We
do not believe in the foolishness of clever men: what a loss of human rights!
179
The
consequences of our actions grab us by the hair, extremely indifferent to
whether we have “improved” in the meantime.
180
There
is an innocence in lying which is the sign of good faith in something.
181
It
is inhuman to bless where a man is cursed.
182
The
familiarity of a superior person embitters, because it cannot be returned.
183
“Not
that you lied to me but that I no longer believe you has shaken me.”—
184
There
is a high-spirited goodness which looks like malice.
185
“I
dislike him.”—Why?—“I’m no match for him.”—Has a human being ever
answered in this way?
Notes
. . . Nausikaa: a young princess in
Homer’s Odyssey. [Back
to Text]
Pharisaism: hypocritical observance of
religious or moral laws. [Back
to Text]
Nietzsche
quotes the French: “Dans le véritable amour c’est l’âme, qui enveloppe
le corps.” [Back
to Text]
Eros: in Greek mythology the god
of erotic love. [Back to Text]
Cyclops: in Greek mythology a giant, one-eyed, cannibal monster. [Back to Text]
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