People used to believe in ‘the soul’ as they believed…

People used to believe in ‘the soul’ as they believed in grammar and the grammatical subject: people said that ‘I’ was a condition and ‘think’ was a predicate and conditioned — thinking is an activity and a subject must be thought of as its cause. Now, with admirable tenacity and cunning, people are wondering whether they can get out of this net — wondering whether the reverse might be true: that ‘think’ is the condition and ‘I’ is conditioned, in which case ‘I’ would be a synthesis that only gets produced through thought itself.

Chapter III: What is Religious, Aphorism 54

Other Beyond Good and Evil Quotes

It is some basic certainty which the noble soul has about itself, something which does not allow itself to be sought out or found or perhaps even to be lost. The noble soul has reverence for itself. - View Quote Details on It is some basic certainty which the noble soul has…
The sage as astronomer. — If you still experience the stars as something “over you,” you still don’t have the eyes of a knower. - View Quote Details on The sage as astronomer. — If you still experience the…
In a man devoted to knowledge, pity seems almost ridiculous, like delicate hands on a cyclops. - View Quote Details on In a man devoted to knowledge, pity seems almost ridiculous,…
Die Eitelkeit Andrer geht uns nur dann wider den Geschmack, wenn sie wider unsre Eitelkeit geht. - View Quote Details on Die Eitelkeit Andrer geht uns nur dann wider den Geschmack,…
One seeks a midwife for his thoughts, another someone to whom he can be a midwife: thus originates a good conversation. - View Quote Details on One seeks a midwife for his thoughts, another someone to…
There is a great ladder of religious cruelty, and, of its many rungs, three are the most important. People used to make human sacrifices to their god, perhaps even sacrificing those they loved the best… Then, during the moral epoch of humanity, people sacrificed the strongest instincts they had, their ‘nature,’ to their god; the joy of this particular festival shines in the cruel eyes of the ascetic, that enthusiastic piece of ‘anti-nature.’ Finally: what was left to be sacrificed? In the end, didn’t people have to sacrifice all comfort and hope, everything holy or healing, any faith in hidden harmony or a future filled with justice and bliss? Didn’t people have to sacrifice God himself and worship rocks, stupidity, gravity, fate, or nothingness out of sheer cruelty to themselves? To sacrifice God for nothingness — that paradoxical mystery of the final cruelty has been reserved for the race that is now approaching: by now we all know something about this. - View Quote Details on There is a great ladder of religious cruelty, and, of…
So you want to live ‘according to nature?’ Oh, you noble Stoics, what a fraud is in this phrase! Imagine something like nature, profligate without measure, indifferent without measure, without purpose and regard, without mercy and justice, fertile and barren and uncertain at the same time, think of indifference itself as power — how could you live according to this indifference? Living — isn’t that wanting specifically to be something other than this nature? Isn’t living assessing, preferring, being unfair, being limited, wanting to be different? And assuming your imperative to ‘live according to nature’ basically amounts to ‘living according to life’ — well how could you not? Why make a principle out of what you yourselves are and must be? - View Quote Details on So you want to live ‘according to nature?’ Oh, you…
One has only seen little of life, if one hasn’t also seen the hand that mercifully — kills. - View Quote Details on One has only seen little of life, if one hasn’t…
The Jews — a people “born for slavery” as Tacitus and the whole ancient world says, “the chosen people” as they themselves say and believe — the Jews achieved that miracle of inversion of values thanks to which life on earth has for a couple of millennia acquired a new and dangerous fascination — their prophets fused “rich”, “godless”, “evil”, “violent”, “sensual” into one and were the first to coin the word “world” as a term of infamy. It is in this inversion of values… that the significance of the Jewish people resides: with them there begins the slave revolt in morals. - View Quote Details on The Jews — a people “born for slavery” as Tacitus…
Ober Das, was “Wahrhaftigkeit” ist, war vielleicht noch Niemand wahrhaftig genug. - View Quote Details on Ober Das, was “Wahrhaftigkeit” ist, war vielleicht noch Niemand wahrhaftig…