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First EssayGood and Evil, Good and Bad10
The slave revolt in morality begins when the resentment itself becomes creative and gives birth to values: the resentment of those beings who are prevented from a genuinely active reaction and who compensate for that with a merely imaginary vengeance. While all noble morality grows out of a triumphant self-affirmation, slave morality from the start says No to what is "outside," "other," "a non-self". And this No is its creative act. This transformation of the glance which confers value - this necessary projection towards what is outer instead of back into itself—that is inherent in resentment: in order to arise. Slave morality always requires first an opposing world, a world outside itself. Psychologically speaking, it needs external stimuli in order to act at all. Its action is basically reaction.
The reverse is the case with the noble method of valuing: it acts and grows spontaneously. It seeks its opposite only to affirm itself even more thankfully, with even more rejoicing. Its negative concept of "low," "common," "bad" is only a pale contrasting image after the fact in relation to its positive basic concept, intoxicated with life and passion, "We are noble, good, beautiful, and happy!" When the noble way of evaluating makes a mistake and abuses reality, that happens with reference to the sphere which it does not know well enough, indeed, the sphere it has strongly resisted learning the truth about: under certain circumstances it misjudges the sphere it despises - the sphere of the common man, the low people.
On the other hand, we should consider that even assuming that the effect of contempt, of looking down or looking superior, falsifies the image of the person despised, such distortion will fall short by a long way of the distortion with which the repressed hatred and vengeance of the powerless man mistakenly assaults his opponent - naturally, in effigy. In fact, in contempt there is too much negligence, too much dismissive ness, too much looking away and impatience, all mixed together, even too much feeling of joy, for it to be capable of converting its object into a truly distorted monster.
We should not fail to hear the almost benevolent nuances which for a Greek noble, for example, lay in all the words with which he set himself above the lower people - how a constant type of pity, consideration, and forbearance is mixed in there, sweetening the words, to the point where almost all words which refer to the common man finally remain as expressions for "unhappy," "worthy of pity" (compare deilos [cowardly], deilaios [lowly, mean], poneros [oppressed by toil, wretched], mochtheros [suffering, wretched]—the last two basically designating the common man as a slave worker and beast of burden). On the other hand, for the Greek ear the words "bad," "low," "unhappy" have never stopped echoing a single note, one tone colour, in which "unhappy" predominates. That is the inheritance of the old, noble, aristocratic way of evaluating, which does not betray its principles even in contempt.
(Philologists might recall the sense in which oizuros [miserable], anolbos [unblessed], tlemon [wretched], dustychein [unfortunate], xymfora [misfortune] were used). The "well born" felt that they were "the happy ones"; they did not have to construct their happiness artificially first by looking at their enemies, or in some circumstance to talk themselves into it, to lie to themselves (the way all men of resentment habitually do). Similarly they knew, as complete men, overloaded with power and thus necessarily active, they must not separate action from happiness. They considered being active necessarily associated with happiness (that`s where the phrase eu prattein [do well, succeed] derives its origin) - all this very much the opposite of "happiness" at the level of the powerless, the oppressed, those festering with poisonous and hostile feelings, among whom happiness comes out essentially as a narcotic, an anesthetic, quiet, peace, "Sabbath", relaxing the soul, stretching one`s limbs, in short, as something passive.
While the noble man lives for himself with trust and candour (gennaios, meaning "of noble birth" stresses the nuance "upright" and also probably "naïve"), the man of resentment is neither upright nor naïve, nor honest and direct with himself. His soul squints. His spirit loves hiding places, secret paths, and back doors. Everything furtive attracts him as his world, his security, his refreshment. He understands about remaining silent, not forgetting, waiting, temporarily diminishing himself, humiliating himself. A race of such men will necessarily end up cleverer than any noble race. It will value cleverness to a very different extent, that is, as a condition of existence of the utmost importance; whereas, cleverness among noble men easily acquires a delicate aftertaste of luxury and sophistication about it. Here it is not nearly so important as the complete certainly of the ruling unconscious instincts or even a certain lack of cleverness, something like brave recklessness, whether in the face of danger or of an enemy, or wildly enthusiastic, sudden fits of anger, love, reverence, thankfulness, and vengefulness, by which in all ages noble souls have recognized each other.
The resentment of the noble man himself, if it comes over him, consumes and exhausts itself in an immediate reaction and therefore does not poison. On the other hand, in countless cases it just doesn`t appear, whereas in the case of all weak and powerless people it is unavoidable. The noble man cannot take his enemies, his misfortunes, even his bad deeds seriously for very long - that is the mark of a strong, complete nature, in whom there is a surplus of plastic, creative, healing power, which also can make one forget (a good example for that from the modern world is Mirabeau, who had no memory of the insults and maliciousness people directed at him, and who therefore could not forgive, because he just forgot). Such a man with one shrug throws off him all those worms which eat into other men. Only here is possible (provided that it is at all possible on earth) the real "love for one`s enemy." How much respect a noble man already has for his enemies! And such a respect is already a bridge to love . . . In fact, he demands his enemy for himself, as his mark of honour. Indeed, he has no enemy other than one who has nothing to despise and a great deal to respect! By contrast, imagine for yourself "the enemy" as a man of resentment conceives him - and right here we have his action, his creation: he has conceptualized "the evil enemy,: "the evil one," and as a fundamental idea - and from that he now thinks his way to an opposite image and counterpart, a "good man" - himself!
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