If one wish to see a _negative_ Arian religion, which is the product of the _ruling_ classes, one should study Buddhism. It is quite in the nature of things that we have no Arian religion which is the product of the _oppressed_ classes; for that would have been a contradiction: a race of masters is either paramount or else it goes to the dogs. 146. Religion, _per se,_ has nothing to do with morality; yet both offshoots of the Jewish religion are _essentially_ moral religions--which prescribe the rules of living, and procure obedience to their principles by means of rewards and punishment. 147. _Paganism--Christianity.--Paganism_ is that which says yea to all that is natural, it is innocence in being natural, "naturalness." _Christianity_ is that which says no to all that is natural, it is a certain lack of dignity in being natural; hostility to Nature. "Innocent":--Petronius is innocent, for instance. Beside this happy man a Christian is absolutely devoid of innocence. But since even the _Christian_ status is ultimately only a natural condition, the term "Christian" soon begins to mean the _counterfeiting of the psychological interpretation._ 148. The Christian priest is from the root a mortal enemy of sensuality: one cannot imagine a greater contrast to his attitude than the guileless, slightly awed, and solemn attitude, which the religious rites of the most honourable women in Athens maintained in the presence of the symbol of sex. In all non-ascetic religions the procreative act is _the_ secret _per se_: a sort of symbol of perfection and of the designs of the future: re-birth, immortality. 149. Our belief in ourselves is the greatest fetter, the most telling spur, and the _strongest pinion._ Christianity ought to have elevated the innocence of man to the position of an article of belief--men would then have become gods: in those days believing was still possible. 150. The egregious _lie_ of history: as if it were the _corruption_ of Paganism that opened the road to Christianity. As a matter of fact, it was the enfeeblement and _moralisation_ of the man of antiquity. The new interpretation of natural functions, which made them appear like _vices,_ had already gone before! 151. Religions are ultimately wrecked by the belief in morality. The idea of the Christian moral God becomes untenable,--hence "Atheism,"--as though there could be no other god. _Culture_ is likewise wrecked by the belief in morality. For when the necessary and only possible conditions of its growth are revealed, nobody _will_ any longer countenance it (Buddhism). 152. _The physiology of Nihilistic religions._--All in all, the _Nihilistic_ religions are _systematised histories of sickness_ described in religious and moral terminology. In pagan cultures it is around the interpretation of the great annual cycles that the religious cult turns; in Christianity it is around a cycle of _paralytic phenomena._ 153.