The Will to Power

Book Two: A Criticism of the Highest Values That Have Prevailed Hitherto
II: Criticism of Morality

§259   A point of view: in all valuations there is a definite purpose: the preservation of an individual, a community, a race, a state, a church, a belief, or a culture. Thanks to the fact that people forget that all valuing has a purpose, one and the same man may swarm with a host of contradictory valuations and therefore invite a host of contradictory impulses. This is the expression of disease in man as opposed to the health of animals, in which all the instincts answer certain definite purposes.

This creature full of contradictions, however, has in his being a grand method of acquiring knowledge: he feels the pros and cons, he elevates himself to Justice — that is to say, to the ascertaining of principles beyond the valuations good and evil.

The wisest man would thus be the richest in contradictions; he would also be gifted with mental antennae wherewith he could understand all kinds of men; and with it all he would have his great moments, when all the chords in his being would ring in splendid unison — the rarest of accidents even in us! A sort of planetary movement.

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