Nietzsche Preface Part 6 (Paraphrase—see previous short-forms)
I realize now that I was referring to N’s first two books, and that they were not actually his first two books—for some reason, the preface gave me the impression that this was his second book, after Human, All Too Human. This must have been the second book on this topic, maybe. I can’t quite figure it out because many of his books were published long after they were written, or became known long after, and it’s hard to disentangle the list. The out of order publication, and of course his later deterioration, inability to clarify or respond, and edits by others all seem pretty significant. It would be good to read them in the order they were written. I started Human, All Too Human, and probably should have done that first, but oh well. I only now realize the preface was 1887.
I also determined he must have read a great deal of Emerson by this time, and that’s why his conspicuous lack of commentary on Emerson and America is of interest to me. Emerson was a huge influence, almost certainly N’s greatest. Most people are still very skeptical of this, but being an Emerson fan, I can confirm how much of N’s work is unquestionably taken from Emerson (due to phrasing and combinations of unique concepts). Privately, he talked about Emerson quite a bit, and his influence, but not publicly. But Emerson pretty much formed the basis of his thought. I’m not sure if he was able to read everything Emerson wrote, but I find it weird he seems to be so down on England, while Emerson raved about England and wrote a whole book about England’s moral strength published in 1860. Plus, Emerson had gotten somewhat involved in campaigning for Lincoln in 1864, and I think it is weird that N has apparently little to say on that or Lincoln, as the topic was big in Europe. I’m not being America-centric and fixated on my own interests out of nowhere, but specifically because N was so obsessed with Emerson, especially at age 19, which would have been during the Civil War. Was he just incurious about what Emerson had to say after writing his major works in N’s childhood? Didn’t he wonder about the comparably lively world Emerson described?
Anyway, Part 6:
This problem of the value of pity and of the pity-morality (I am an opponent of the modern infamous emasculation of our emotions) seems at the first blush a mere isolated problem, a note of interrogation for itself; he, however, who once halts at this problem, and learns how to put questions, will experience what I experienced: —sense of potentiality seizes him like a vertigo, every species of doubt, mistrust, and fear springs up, the belief in — a new and immense vista unfolds itself before him, a morality, nay, in all morality, totters, --finally a new demand voices itself.
So he thought it was a relatively minor issue, or not central issue, and then he realized it opened up a real can of worms. All of morality appears suspect o corrupted, and once the disorientation fades, he feels a demand to get to the bottom of the matter an reconstruction the genealogy of morals—how they developed and became distorted. Notes that no one has ever bothered to look into this too deeply. (I’d say that’s false, but I get his point, and he probably didn’t have easy access to a compendium of existing critiques—still, it seems like quite a few theologians and preachers, at the very least, have dug into this stuff for a while, without just saying “God gave us morals! That’s all!”). Also, saying “the modern infamous emasculation” seems to suggest that this was already a much-discussed issue.
He says no one has really looked into whether a man considered good is of a higher value than one considered bad (by common judgement). He says he means higher value “with regard specifically to human progress, utility, and prosperity generally, not forgetting the future.” So, advancement is his standard. “What? Suppose the converse were the truth! What?” It was common at this time to do the double “What?” or, more, often the double “What!” This indicated that the idea would be met disbelief, similar to how we’d say “Really?”
Suppose there lurked in the “good man” a symptom of retrogression, such as a danger, a temptation, a poison, a narcotic, by means of which the present battened on the future! More comfortable and less risky perhaps than its opposite, but also pettier, meaner! So that morality would really be saddled with the guilt, if the maximum potentiality of the power and splendour of the human species were never to be attained?
Pretty straightforward: what if some of the traits we consider good have non-obvious downsides that make them complacent, not sufficiently interested in bettering the future, dragging humanity down from its max potential?
Nietzsche Preface Part 6 (Paraphrase—see previous short-forms)
I realize now that I was referring to N’s first two books, and that they were not actually his first two books—for some reason, the preface gave me the impression that this was his second book, after Human, All Too Human. This must have been the second book on this topic, maybe. I can’t quite figure it out because many of his books were published long after they were written, or became known long after, and it’s hard to disentangle the list. The out of order publication, and of course his later deterioration, inability to clarify or respond, and edits by others all seem pretty significant. It would be good to read them in the order they were written. I started Human, All Too Human, and probably should have done that first, but oh well. I only now realize the preface was 1887.
I also determined he must have read a great deal of Emerson by this time, and that’s why his conspicuous lack of commentary on Emerson and America is of interest to me. Emerson was a huge influence, almost certainly N’s greatest. Most people are still very skeptical of this, but being an Emerson fan, I can confirm how much of N’s work is unquestionably taken from Emerson (due to phrasing and combinations of unique concepts). Privately, he talked about Emerson quite a bit, and his influence, but not publicly. But Emerson pretty much formed the basis of his thought. I’m not sure if he was able to read everything Emerson wrote, but I find it weird he seems to be so down on England, while Emerson raved about England and wrote a whole book about England’s moral strength published in 1860. Plus, Emerson had gotten somewhat involved in campaigning for Lincoln in 1864, and I think it is weird that N has apparently little to say on that or Lincoln, as the topic was big in Europe. I’m not being America-centric and fixated on my own interests out of nowhere, but specifically because N was so obsessed with Emerson, especially at age 19, which would have been during the Civil War. Was he just incurious about what Emerson had to say after writing his major works in N’s childhood? Didn’t he wonder about the comparably lively world Emerson described?
Anyway, Part 6:
So he thought it was a relatively minor issue, or not central issue, and then he realized it opened up a real can of worms. All of morality appears suspect o corrupted, and once the disorientation fades, he feels a demand to get to the bottom of the matter an reconstruction the genealogy of morals—how they developed and became distorted. Notes that no one has ever bothered to look into this too deeply. (I’d say that’s false, but I get his point, and he probably didn’t have easy access to a compendium of existing critiques—still, it seems like quite a few theologians and preachers, at the very least, have dug into this stuff for a while, without just saying “God gave us morals! That’s all!”). Also, saying “the modern infamous emasculation” seems to suggest that this was already a much-discussed issue.
He says no one has really looked into whether a man considered good is of a higher value than one considered bad (by common judgement). He says he means higher value “with regard specifically to human progress, utility, and prosperity generally, not forgetting the future.” So, advancement is his standard. “What? Suppose the converse were the truth! What?” It was common at this time to do the double “What?” or, more, often the double “What!” This indicated that the idea would be met disbelief, similar to how we’d say “Really?”
Pretty straightforward: what if some of the traits we consider good have non-obvious downsides that make them complacent, not sufficiently interested in bettering the future, dragging humanity down from its max potential?