That which is most sorely afflicted to-day is the instinct and will of _tradition_: all institutions which owe their origin to this instinct, are opposed to the tastes of the age.... At bottom, nothing is thought or done which is not calculated to tear up this spirit of tradition by the roots. Tradition is looked upon as a fatality; it is studied and acknowledged (in the form of "heredity"), but people will not have anything to do with it. The extension of one will over long periods of time, the selection of conditions and valuations which make it possible to dispose of centuries in advance--this, precisely, is what is most utterly anti-modern. From which it follows, that disorganising principles give our age its specific character. 66. "Be simple"--a demand which, when made to us complicated and incomprehensible triers of the heart and reins, is a simple absurdity.... Be natural: but even if we are unnatural--what then? 67. The means employed in former times in order to arrive at _similarly constituted_ and lasting types, throughout long generations: entailed property and the respect of parents (the origin of the faith in gods and heroes as ancestors). Now, the _subdivision of property_ belongs to the opposite tendency. The centralisation of an enormous number of, different interests in one soul: which, _to that end,_ must be very strong and mutable. 68. Why does everything become _mummery._--The modern man is lacking in unfailing instinct (instinct being understood here to mean that which is the outcome of a _long period of activity in the same occupation_ on the part of one family of men); the incapability of producing anything perfect, is simply the result of this lack of instinct: one individual alone cannot make up for the schooling his ancestors should have transmitted to him. What a morality or book of law creates: that deep instinct which renders _automatism_ and perfection possible in life and in work. But now we have reached the opposite point; yes, we wanted to reach it--the most extreme consciousness, through introspection on the part of man and of history: and thus we are practically most distant from perfection in Being, doing, and willing: our desires--even our will to knowledge--shows how prodigiously decadent we are. We are striving after the very reverse of what _strong races_ and _strong natures_ will have--understanding is an _end_.... That Science is possible in the way in which it is practised to-day, proves that all elementary instincts, _the instincts which ward off danger and protect life,_ are no longer active. We no longer save, we are merely spending the capital of our forefathers, even in the way in which we _pursue knowledge_. 69. _Nihilistic trait_. _(a)_ In the _natural sciences_ ("purposelessness"), causality, mechanism, "conformity to law," an interval, a remnant.