_Beyond Good and Evil,_ then, together with its sequel, _The Genealogy of Morals,_ and the two little volumes, _The Twilight of the Idols_ and the _Antichrist_ (published in 1889 and 1894 respectively), must be regarded as forming part of the general plan of which _The Will to Power_ was to be the _opus magnum._ Unfortunately, _The Will to Power_ was never completed by its author. The text from which this translation was made is a posthumous publication, and it suffers from all the disadvantages that a book must suffer from which has been arranged and ordered by foster hands. When those who were responsible for its publication undertook the task of preparing it for the press, it was very little more than a vast collection of notes and rough drafts, set down by Nietzsche from time to time, as the material for his chief work; and, as any liberty taken with the original manuscript, save that of putting it in order, would probably have resulted in adding or excluding what the author would on no account have added or excluded himself, it follows that in some few cases the paragraphs are no more than hasty memoranda of passing thoughts, which Nietzsche must have had the intention of elaborating at some future time. In these cases the translation follows the German as closely as possible, and the free use even of a conjunction has in certain cases been avoided, for fear lest the meaning might be in the slightest degree modified. It were well, therefore, if the reader could bear these facts in mind whenever he is struck by a certain clumsiness, either of expression or disposition, in the course of reading this translation. It may be said that, from the day when Nietzsche first recognised the necessity of making a more unequivocal appeal to his public than the _Zarathustra_ had been, that is to say, from the spring of 1883, his work in respect of _The Will to Power_ suffered no interruption whatsoever, and that it was his chief preoccupation from that period until his breakdown in 1889. That this span of six years was none too long for the task he had undertaken, will be gathered from the fact that, in the great work he had planned, he actually set out to show that the life-principle, "Will to Power," was the prime motor of all living organisms. To do this he appeals both to the animal world and to human society, with its subdivisions, religion, art, morality, politics, etc. etc., and in each of these he seeks to demonstrate the activity of the principle which he held to be the essential factor of all existence.