Friedrich Nietzsche: Daybreak

Daybreak is, like The Gay Science, an aphoristic work. Nietzsche's "middle period" is like this, with single pages, paragraphs or even sentences forming the structure of his thought instead of consistent essays. It may perhaps be what Nietzsche did best. He was an acute watcher of humanity and spent much of his time making observations on the little habits we have and the background tendencies in our minds when we go about what is usually viewed as 'simple living'. Whereas his essays can be on the whole more difficult to swallow due to many of the assumptions he makes, his aphorism tend to be better expressions both of the nature of the operation of his mind and of his abilities as a writer. And so, here are aphorisms on random subjects.

On democracy:

Aphorism 188, on 'intoxication': "The people is the last virgin soil in which this glittering weed can still thrive. – What? And is it to them that politics are to be entrusted? So that they can make of them their daily intoxication?"

Nietzsche's hatred of Christianity was never as deep as his hatred of democracy. In fact, passages sometimes seem to suggest that the biggest problem with Christianity is that it has an inherently democratic tendency: the equality of all souls before God argues that we are all spiritually equal, and if that is so we should all be temporally equal as well. What, though, is the problem with democracy? The problem is that not all men are created equal: there are men who seek lives worth living, and those whom are useless because they seek nothing more than an end to their pain and discomfort. They do this either through spiritual sedation or through intoxication of the crudest kind. They also far outnumber the men worth having around. If, therefore, you give everyone a voice in a democracy, it is inevitable that the "flies of the marketplace" will throw their hats into the ring for their kind of useless preoccupations and drugs: they will seek an end to discomfort (through equal treatment, equal conditions, etc) and an increase in useless amusements and distractions so as to inject some sort of value into their empty lives (after all, if you render your life completely sedate it will become extremely boring, so you have to do something to keep from atrophying as a self). As a result the politics of these people becomes a reflection of who they are: it is a stage show that the audience seeks with all its might to believe is real, while their own lives are empty and meaningless. The same could be said for most things the 'rabble' clings to.

Aphorism 265: "If a people’s imagination grows weak there arises in it the inclination to have its legends presented to it on the stage: it can now endure these crude substitutes for imagination."

Why is it, though, that people become dependent on false shows in the first place? For Nietzsche it is a given fact that many, in fact most, people simply cannot tolerate reality as it really is. In some form or another this had been his view since his first book, The Birth of Tragedy. In that work he cites the tragic play as a way of confronting the horror of real life (represented by Dionysus) without destroying one's self, through use of a veil of illusion (represented by Apollo). Though he dropped the metaphysical aspects of that argument as well as the Schopenhauerian and Wagnerian interests he had early on, his view that reality sucked for most stayed. The average man cannot deal with reality because he lacks the spiritual strength. Reality offers him no special place, it gives no refuge, no comforts, it only sits coldly and quietly. Such a desolation could kill most people, and so they have to find a way to deal with it. A strong person (or a strong people, as described in this aphorism and as the prime Nietzschean example would be the Greeks) is able to live through the life without meaning by generating meaning: one finds freedom and accepts it, making what one wills of it. This is what imagine is in this case: the ability to create a sense of one's self and one's place without simple rejecting the 'facts of the matter'. Now not everyone has much of an imagination, as already stated. When these people get into positions of power, as they do in a democracy, they will take their way as the best way and enforce it with the rule of law. People will see the sideshows and false theatrics of the weak man as the way of all men, and over time even the senses of the stronger men will be dulled by, so to speak, the 'banging of drums over the finesse of the violin'.

On capitalism:

Aphorism 206: "Are you accomplices in the current folly of the nations – the folly of wanting above all to produce as much as possible and to become as rich as possible? What you ought to do, rather, is to hold up to them the counter-reckoning: how great a sum of inner value is thrown away in pursuit of this external goal! But where is your inner value if you no longer know what it is to breathe freely?"

Here is no uncommon opinion about capitalism, and not a new one either: Marx had of course written on 'alienation' decades before. In this particular case, however, the argument develops that distinct Nietzsche hue. The clamoring for possessions and money is like the clamoring of anything that weak people tend to value: it is either for sedation or intoxication, in other words a way to hide from reality behind something else. Buying lots of things will not cure your problems, but it will alleviate the symptoms. For a time. And at great cost. A materialistic system tends, after a while, to start spitting out materialistic people. People associate themselves with things, allow themselves to be identified with things (here we're going into 20th century Existentialist territory). Those things give us a place in the world and a concrete feeling of power: I amthat powerful thing which you see, which has all this. This is, of course, a lie and not reflective of reality. While we are busy associating ourselves with objects, we continue to exist on the inside as real people, though we try to hide it. Yet as we strive to become the power expressed by things, we in fact do start to become those things, to our detriment. We become enslaved by our possessions. They become an obsession to the detriment of a life lived with meaning. We refuse to reflect on who we are without the false context we have created: in fact, we cannot. The self is utterly enslaved by the possession of things. If a man is to be a real man of power, however, an independent man, one who can live on one's own and achieve everything one is capable of, one cannot be tied down by such trivial things.

On overthrowing the world order:

Aphorism 534: "(L)et us take care not to exchange the state of morality to which we are accustomed for a new evaluation of things head over heels and amid acts of violence – no, let us continue to live in it for a long, long time yet – until, probably a long while hence, we become aware that the new evaluation has acquired predominance within us and that the little doses of it to which we must from now on accustom ourselves have laid down a new nature in us."

People sometimes like to accuse Nietzsche of seeking to subvert morality, of supporting fascist-style movements or anarchistic movements (which are, of course, as opposite as one can get) or generally seeking to mess up things and make everyone miserable. This is not so. In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Zarathustra does not go around trying to incite rebellions. He seeks those who will become higher men and will change the course of history. Not the higher men themselves, for they don't exist yet. Nietzsche saw around him a society utterly steeped in its prevailing sense of morality, a system that could not and should not be changed in a day. To do so would indeed be chaos. Upon reflection, however, it would also be doomed to failure. For while there are always people angry and in some cases ready to start a fight, that does not in any way exempt them from their historical circumstances. This is perhaps his one great beef with society: not that most people had a 'slave morality' (in a sense this is a good thing, as it gives the lower classes a sense of worth without necessitating temporal power), but that the slave morality was at the top of the power structure, dictating down even to those who should be able to do better. In one form or another this concerned Nietzsche for most of his writing career, becoming more explicit as he goes on. It is reflected in the subject of the fourth book of Thus Spoke Zarathustra, where Zarathustra must confront his final sin: pity for the higher man. Higher men, even where they do exist, do not know of their own potential or uniqueness, and so nothing comes of them. For that reason one cannot simply tell them to rise up and take what's theirs. The goal is not to recreate the state but to recreate the minds of men in terms of a different perspective, one that understands the way of life Nietzsche advocates. This can be used as a way of explaining some of his methods of writing as well: he wants not to use flat proofs in the style of the time, but to shock you, to throw you off guard, and basically to get you to think in a new way. If he can do this, if he can start to shift the minds of men, then over time the tides will change and a revolution may become completely unnecessary.

On reading Nietzsche:

Aphorism 454: "Digression – A book such as this is not for reading straight through or reading aloud but for dipping into, especially when out walking or on a journey; you must be able to stick your head into it and out of it again and again and discover nothing familiar around you."

Aphorisms, by their very nature, are dense and filled with meaning in every gap and syllable. One cannot read an aphorism once and have the story. One cannot read a book by Nietzsche and have a good idea of his philosophy, no matter what book it is. That is why I recommend reading Nietzsche as follows: read Zarathustra. It will be odd, unfamiliar, very strange in tone and tempo. The style is unusual and it makes wild claims out of nowhere. It is completely bewildering. However, every so often you find a line or paragraph that seems to click on some unknown level. A sentence just makes sense. You also have a vague idea of the Nietzschean attitude, one that is, in a word, whimsical. Then I usually recommend The Gay Science or some other set of aphorisms, where one gets more dense sets of ideas and observations. Again they are often intentionally obscure and misleading, but they still sometimes ring true, and over time a sense of Nietzschean direction is formed. One can start to see how he is writing and the general themes are starting to make shape. Now perhaps read a more straightforward work like The Anti-Christ or Beyond Good and Evil and one sees his theories start to present themselves. They are more straightforward, as I said, but with no prior preparation one will likely be thrown off by some of his more outlandish claims or his extremely unconventional style and lack of scholarly method. But if one is aware of the way he likes to do things, his love of flourish and proclamation, one can make sense of the essay-style works. Finally, go back to Zarathustra. Now it is a completely different book. The message is clearer, the goals of Zarathustra have become more obvious, and we can see the Nietzschean mission in a broad sense. And then...then you start getting into details. In other words: it will take a while. Even at this point one will still likely miss much of the symbolism and countless references, and if none of Nietzsche's journals or letters have been consulted one cannot really claim to have a complete picture, as his life and works were not only mirrors but in a sense the very same thing. His books were the center of his life, and they reflected both himself and his ideal of himself. So read slowly, and read carefully. But don't make analyzing it your sole job: for then you've only become a philologist, and lord knows how boring Nietzsche finds those fellows.

On women:

Aphorism 346: "'Woman is our enemy' – out of the man who says that to other men there speaks an immoderate drive which hates not only itself but its means of satisfaction as well."

Even after reading an excessive amount of Nietzsche, one of the prickliest spots to negotiate is his position on women. One thing that seems very clear in his writings is his hatred of feminism. Women should not strive to be the equals of men. He says this many times. Another quote, perhaps considered the masterstroke in pinning Nietzsche as misogynist, is the speech in Zarathustra "On Little Old and Young Women." Let's take some choice quotes, shall we?

"Everything about woman is a riddle, and everything about woman has a solution: it is called pregnancy.
"For woman man is a means: the end is always the child. But what is woman for man?
"The true man wants two things: danger and play. Therefore he wants woman as the most dangerous plaything.
"Man should be trained for war and woman for the recreation of the warrior: all else is folly."

And of course, at the end of the speech comes the classic line:

"'Give me, woman, your little truth!' I said. And thus spoke the little old woman:
'You go to women? Do not forget the whip!'"

Ouch. There are a couple responses, the first being that this is not to be taken literally. Since we are talking about Nietzsche, we should probably give this argument more credit than it is usually given. Not everything he says about women seems so ridiculous, and given the general tone of Zarathustra, we can probably doubt that this should be taken literally. In addition, the second part I quoted is often said to be mocking Zarathustra himself. Here I will give more of that section:

"Then (after his speech) the little old woman answered me: 'Zarathustra has said many fine things, especially for those who are young enough for them.
"It's strange, Zarathustra knows little about woman, and yet he is right about them! Is this because with woman nothing is impossible?
"And now accept as thanks a little truth! I am surely old enough for it!
Swaddle it up and hold its mouth: otherwise it will scream too loudly, this little truth.'"

And the rest is already above.

Even if one agrees with the second response made above, that it is Zarathustra who is made a joke of here, it seems to be a stretch to make. Of course with Nietzsche anything is possible (as with women apparently), but in philosophy one is not expected to have to make jumps at all, and outside of philosophy many are not quite smart enough to make those jumps. Is there a more secure way to defend Nietzsche, then?

I would argue that perhaps there is. Here is another section from the same speech, and it will help to tie in the excerpt from Daybreak that started this:

"Let the beam of a star shine through your love! Let your hope say: 'May I bear the übermensch!'
"In your love let their be courage! With your love you should go forth to him who inspires you with fear!
"Let there be honor in your love! Little does woman understand of honor otherwise. But let this be your honor: always to love more than you are loved, and never to be second."

What I would argue here is that Nietzsche's conception of a woman's best role is as a counterpart to a man. What that means is that woman does not function alone. Woman works as a part of something else. We are taking here the old idea of motherliness and giving it a twist with the will to power. A woman loves, and through loving she binds with something else to create. The goal of woman and man, then, is the same: both seek to create something greater than themselves. The woman's way of doing this is through the 'womanly functions' such as love, commitment, and children. The man's is through the classic fare: power and glory. Is this a seriously old view? Absolutely. I would say it's probably at best a slightly modified version of the Greek conception of a woman's role, which would make sense since Nietzsche also adores the classic Greek conception of manly men pre-Socrates. Is this agreeable now? No. Nietzsche, as stated before, is no feminist. He is not, however, a misogynist either. Greek men were supposed to respect women. Women had a place that was their own. The evolution of feminist ideas since ancient times has of course radically shifted that view, but Nietzsche is no fan of modern times either. He did, however, respect women. The aphorism in Daybreak gives us clarification. Man should not despise or look down upon woman, as woman is a complement to man. She is not a man, but she is also not nothing. Far from it. She is half of a whole, and te man is not complete without her. Also needing to be added at this point is perhaps the most often used piece of evidence in favor of Nietzsche:



The woman is Lou Salome, one of the most liberated women of her time, with a whip. The man on the far right is Nietzsche. What exactly to make of this (not to mention Nietzsche's love for Salome) isn't entirely clear. Is it truth or mockery? If it is mockery, is it innocent or cruel mockery? But those questions sum up much of the debate around this issue. So what I would say is, no matter how old-sounding and crude Nietzsche's views may seem, he only had respect for women themselves. And I think that in his writings he meant to express that, but did it as clearly as he expressed anything else really controversial. So don't take it personally. He's a perspectivist, after all: "I may perhaps be more readily permitted to utter a few truths about 'women as such': assuming it is now understood from the outset to how great an extent these are only - my truths. -" (Beyond Good and Evil, Aph. 231)