The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche — Nietzsche — John Shaqi
The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche
Nietzsche · en
Nietzsche denies absolutely that there is inherent in mankind a
yearning to gather into communities. There is, he says, but one primal
instinct in human beings (as there is in all other animals), and that
is the desire to remain alive. All those systems of thought which
assume the existence of a "natural morality" are wrong. Even the
tendency to tell the truth, which seems to be inborn in every civilized
white man, is not "natural," for there have been--and are today--races
in which it is, to all intents and purposes, entirely absent.[8] And so
it is with the so-called social instinct. Man, say the communists, is
a gregarious animal and can be happy only in company with his fellows,
and in proof of it they cite the fact that loneliness is everywhere
regarded as painful and that, even among the lower animals, there is an
impulse toward association. The facts set forth in the last sentence
are indisputable, but they by no means prove the existence of an
elemental social feeling sufficiently strong to make its satisfaction
an end in itself. In other words, while it is plain that men flock
together, just as birds flock together, it is going too far to say
that the mere joy of flocking--the mere desire to be with others--is
at the bottom of the tendency. On the contrary, it is quite possible
to show that men gather in communities for the same reason that deer
gather in herds: because each individual realizes (unconsciously,
perhaps) that such a combination materially aids him in the business of
self-protection. One deer is no match for a lion, but fifty deer make
him impotent.[9]
Nietzsche shows that, even after communities are formed, the strong
desire of every individual to look out for himself, regardless of
the desires of others, persists, and that, in every herd there are
strong members and weak members. The former, whenever the occasion
arises, sacrifice the latter: by forcing the heavy, killing drudgery
of the community upon them or by putting them, in time of war, into
the forefront of the fray. The result is that the weakest are being
constantly weeded out and the strongest are always becoming stronger
and stronger. "Hence," says Nietzsche, "the first 'state' made its
appearance in the form of a terrible tyranny, a violent and unpitying
machine, which kept grinding away until the primary raw material, the
man-ape, was kneaded and fashioned into alert, efficient man."