Part Nine of Beyond Good and Evil, titled
"What is Noble,"
begins with Section 257,
discussing the pathos of distance.
Nietzsche notes that every enhancement of the type
'man' has always been the work of an aristocratic,
dominating society.
That is, mankind as a type, as a species,
has only advanced
through the imposition of order
by barbarian tribes, by warriors
conquering more peaceful people
settled in the lowlands.
The deeper meaning of this fact for Nietzsche
is that the exterior
pathos of distance present in the political
and social order of a conquering
race of people
is necessary for the interior
pathos of distance, for the psychological deepening
and spiritual advance of the human being.
Man only learns to overcome himself
in such a social order.
He makes the further historical claim
that higher civilizations have always emerged
from this type of conquest by fiercer,
less civilized, less tamed peoples.
The noble caste, he says, has always at first been
the barbarian or warrior caste.
That is because members of this group
are more human, more natural
and as a result, more fully beastly.
Section 258 contrasts corrupt
with healthy aristocracies.
Not all corruptions are alike, Nietzsche says.
A healthy aristocracy, unlike the French aristocracy
prior to the Revolution,
does not experience itself as a function
or an ornament of anything else.
Rather, a healthy aristocracy
sees itself as the meaning and justification
of its entire social order.
And this means accepting the fact
that lower orders in the society
must live their lower,
more wretched lives precisely
in order to enable the greatness
and the glory of the superior class.
Every healthy
aristocratic class, Nietzsche says,
is possessed of a fundamental faith
that society does not exist
for the sake of society itself,
but for the sake of this superior class.
The justification of the whole
is its highest members.
He uses this metaphor of the sun
seeking vines of Java,
which reach the sunlight at the canopy of the jungle
by growing round and round tall trees until,
he says, they can unfold their flowers in happiness
in full view of the sun.
Section 259 discusses the prospect of a truce or of peace
between strong individuals.
We can envision a situation
in which strength, recognizing strength
like itself,
might agree
to a mutual refraining from injury and aggression.
But this standoff-peace cannot be
made the organizing principle of an entire society,
as has been attempted in modern Europe.
When it's extended to all of society,
it becomes a principle of decay.
In this section, Nietzsche gives us
a very powerful quote, defining the will to power.
He says,
"life is essentially
appropriation, injury
and overpowering of what is alien and weaker."
He employs an organic metaphor:
we might observe that in the human body,
if it is a living body,
the parts of the body cooperate
and refrain from mutual injury.
But in order for the entire body to live,
it must subdue,
kill and eat what is alien to itself,
what is outside of itself.
It must, Nietzsche says, become "an
incarnate will to power" if it is to live.
Modern Europeans resist this truth
most of all, Nietzsche says,
the truth that exploitation is not a corruption
or a degradation of life.
It is life itself. Life *is* will to power.
This brings us to the end of section 259.
The next section, section 260, will introduce
the terms "master morality" and "slave morality."
We'll look at that in the next video.
Thanks for watching today. Goodbye.