The greatness of an artist is not to be measured by the beautiful feelings which he evokes: let this belief be left to the girls. It should be measured according to the extent to which he approaches the grand style, according to the extent to which he is capable of the grand style. This style and great passion have this in common--that they scorn to please; that they forget to persuade: that they command; that they will.... To become master of the chaos which is in one; to compel one's inner chaos to assume form; to become consistent, simple, unequivocal, mathematical, law--this is the great ambition here. 277 A preference for questionable and terrible things is a symptom of strength; whereas the taste for pretty and charming trifles is characteristic of the weak and the delicate. 287 Art is the great means of making life possible, the great seducer to life, the great stimulus of life. Art is the only superior counter-agent to all will to the denial of life; it is _par excellence_ the anti-Christian, the anti-Buddhistic, the anti-Nihilistic force. 290 Quanta of power alone determine rank and distinguish rank: nothing else does. 295 It is necessary for _higher_ men to declare war upon the masses! In all directions mediocre people are joining hands in order to make themselves masters. Everything that pampers, that softens, and that brings the "people" or "woman" to the front, operates in favour of universal suffrage--that is to say, the dominion of _inferior_ men. 297 Woman has always conspired with decadent types,--the priests, for instance,--against the "mighty," against the "strong," against _men._ Women avail themselves of children for the cult of piety, pity, and love:--the _mother_ stands as the symbol of _convincing_ altruism. 300 It is _necessary_ to show _that a counter-movement is inevitably associated_ with any increasingly economical consumption of men and mankind, and with an ever more closely involved "machinery" of interests and services. I call this counter-movement the _separation of the luxurious surplus of mankind:_ by means of it a stronger kind, a higher type, must come to light, which has other conditions for its origin and for its maintenance than the average man. My concept, my metaphor for this type is, as you know, the word "Superman." 305 Readers are beginning to see what I am combating--namely, _economic_ optimism: as if the general welfare of everybody must necessarily increase with the growing self-sacrifice of everybody. The very reverse seems to me to be the case, _the self-sacrifice of everybody amounts to a collective loss;_ man becomes _inferior_--so that nobody knows what end this monstrous purpose has served. 306-307