Book Two: A Criticism of the Highest Values That Have Prevailed Hitherto
IV: How Virtue Is Made to Dominate§313 We should begin to entertain doubts concerning a man if we heard that he required reasons in order to remain respectable: we should, in any case, certainly avoid his society. The little word “for” in certain cases may be compromising; sometimes a single “for“ is enough to refute oneself. If we should hear, in course of time, that such an aspirant for virtue was in need of bad reasons in order to remain respectable, it would not tend to increase our respect for him. But he goes further; he comes to us and tells us quite openly: “You disturb my morality with your disbelief, Mr. Sceptic; so long as you cannot believe in my bad reasons, that is to say, in my God, in a disciplinary Beyond, in free will, etc. you put obstacles in the way of my virtue –.” Moral: sceptics must be suppressed: they prevent the moralisation of the masses.