This _levelled-down_ species requires justification as soon as it is attained: its justification is that it exists for the service of a higher and sovereign race which stands upon it and can only be elevated upon its shoulders to the task which it is destined to perform. Not only a ruling race whose task would be consummated in ruling alone: but a race with _vital spheres_ of its own, with an overflow of energy for beauty, bravery, culture, and manners, even for the most abstract thought; a yea-saying race which would be able to allow itself every kind of great luxury--strong enough to be able to dispense with the tyranny of the imperatives of virtue, rich enough to be in no need of economy or pedantry; beyond good and evil; a forcing-house for rare and exceptional plants. 899. Our psychologists, whose glance dwells involuntarily upon the symptoms of decadence, lead us to mistrust intellect ever more and more. People persist in seeing only the weakening, pampering, and sickening effects of intellect, but there are now going to appear:-- New Cynics The union of intellectual barbarians Experimentalists superiority with well-being Conquerors and an overflow of strength. 900. I point to something new: certainly for such a democratic community there is a danger of barbarians; but these are sought only down below. There is also _another kind of barbarians_ who come from the heights: a kind of conquering and ruling natures, which are in search of material that they can mould. Prometheus was a barbarian of this stamp. 901. _Principal standpoint:_ one should not suppose the mission of a higher species to be the _leading_ of inferior men (as Comte does, for instance); but the inferior should be regarded as the _foundation_ upon which a higher species may live their higher life--upon which alone they _can stand._ The conditions under which a _strong, noble_ species maintains itself (in the matter of intellectual discipline) are precisely the reverse of those under which the industrial masses--the tea-grocers _à la_ Spencer--subsist. Those qualities which are within the grasp only of the _strongest_ and most _terrible_ natures, and which make their existence possible leisure, adventure, disbelief, and even dissipation--would necessarily ruin mediocre natures --and does do so--when they possess them. In the case of the latter industry, regularity, moderation, and strong "conviction" are in their proper place--in short, all "gregarious virtues": under their influence these mediocre men become perfect. 902. _Concerning the ruling types._ The shepherd as opposed to the "lord" (the former is only a means to the maintenance of the herd; the latter, the _purpose_ for which the herd exists). 903.