GOSPEL OF HATE

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 7, Issue 111, 13 January 1915, Page 3

GOSPEL OF HATE

NIETZCHE Ai i D THE WAT. SI J PER MA X A(> NAEN S JO. The Louden Daily Express was among the first to point cut that the moral decadence of Germany, which has made- it a menace to the rest of Europe, may, be traced to the teachmgs cf Nietschs ('.’/rites Sidney Dark, in the Daily Express). Since my article on the oGspe! of Hate appeared its contention has been emphasised in other places by many distinguished writers, including' Mr. Thomas Hardy. 'Phis contention is now challenged by by Nietzcliean apologists, and it may be worth while to point out how Nietzche has affected the development of modern Geramny. Nietzche was of Polish descent, and he hated Prussia as all Poles hate it. He was by no means a militarist?. Pie Pie derided the idea of nationalism, yearned for the coming of the good European, desired by so different a person as Mr. Hiilaire Belloc. Still, for all Ibis, Nietzsche is the real father cf the Gospel cf hare, and is ultimately responsible for the Belgian barbarities, CO REUSED THINKER. He was essentially an anti-demo-crat. Like Carlyle, he was dazzled by the “strong man,” and he was persuaded that all human progress depends on the efforts of a few domin- ' ant personalities who should hold : their fellows in thrall and whose power should be unlimited. As is pointed out by Mr. Ernest ' Barker in an admirable twopenny pamphlet published by the Clarendon : Press, Nietzsche was a very confused I thinker at the best and his books are a mass cf contradictions. But he consistently declares that power is the one desirable possession, and that the necessity of the world is a race cf men with sufficient ability and sufficient determination to hold on to : power with a fixity of purpose uni trammeled by pity, and by a thorough hardness applied, first to themselves, j and then to everybody else. ■ Personally I have no sort of doubt i that Nietzsche’s teaching is utterly ; damnable, and the fact that he himi self recognised that Christianity was the great enemy of his gospel is its sufficient condemnation. But there is an elevation and a cold, detached dignity in Nietzsche that is certainly absent from the men who have popularised his doctrines and from the men who have put them into practice. Mr. Barker aptly quotes Luther’s saying, “The Word goes, into the ordinary man excellent and comes out of him fleshly.” Bernhard! paraphrased Nietzsche for the ordinary Germans, leaving out his anti-nationalism, and ■ ignoring his antii-Christianity. Tfreit--schke, the recognised prophet of modern Germany, for whom Nietzsche had a whole-hearted contempt, as boldly ..borrowed his ideas without acknowledgement. RELIGION OF POWER. Troitscnke wa sa remarkable person. i!e was a Saxon, but in his early manhood he became convinced that salvation could only come from the jackboots of the Prussian junker. His lectures, delivered in Berlin over a period of 20 years, developed the doctrine of power, accepted the immorality of the State taught by Machiavelli, and emphasised the supreme qualities of the Prussian Nietzsche’s Superman was for Trietscbke the Hohcnzollern, and he declared that the mission of Germany' was to plant the Hohenzolleru hoof on the neck, first of Europe, and finally of the world. Heuston Chamberlain, who, perhaps ■ next to Treitschke, has most influenced modern Germany also develops the Nietzschean idea along Me same particularist line. The Teuton, according to this most pernicious Englishman, who has lost his nationality, has always been, is, and must always remain, the Superman, and in order to maintain this egregious proposition he

attempts to prove, that every 111:111 who has done great service for humanity was really of Teuton birth. I am ready to admit that Nietzsche would have hated the whole spirit of modern Germany, would have de ncunced Bernhardi, and would have denounced Houston Chamberlain;. Nevertheless, he must bear the responsibility for the illusion held by his fellow-countrymen that they are a race above all ether races, freed from the “slave morality” which affects other men, and justified in employing fraud, deceit, and savagery in establishing their empire. FEMININE vices. The Gospel of the Uevii is naturally a gospel of lies, since the devil is the father of lies. The v» hole idea of the Superman is unadulterated nonsense. Mr. Bernard Shaw, who does net, 1 think, read German, wrote a play to explain Nietzsche- long before Nietzsches’ works were published in English by Dr. Oscar Levi. Mr. Shaw has a passion for explaining other people. He has explained Wagner, and Ibsen and Brieux, and his explanations are always comic. But bis “ Han and Superman” is an inspiration, for in it lie establishes they ih-ft that, if the Superman ever did appear within the glimpses of the niton, ha would necessarily be a querulous old woman. The German armies have been establishing the same fact. They have not been manly, to say nothing of

eupcrimwT - Them . i ::e ■ n Tilly femi 5. : ... ; ; ■ All. They e:e T: eem b They bii< ii d.. .■ 1: v..iils ;y. < > winger ia-.t vw aswciam wbh < .-.)•( u: -zeroes vornen. A lug „i ■ , . e ei , is o\ er-drosscu chonm ;b; ; ,;T ■ ■ acli as much im or .min., , .... . h ,uj step as a Brixtou hollo dew-. so the fll any little waddle lumw.-imiw} hy hobble-skirt. The Mißmin ci' the (sheer to the private is exactly ilia attitude cf Mrs. -Saddle's to the louginguouse servant. The .old Germany was ■ supremely masculine, (icethe was e nmu, for u is tiie first privilege ci a ran tc dream. The Kaiser Wilhelm D feminine- act feminine in >.b: erer modern sense, but feminine ns the word was nderstood in the, age of antimacassars and wax i!ewers. Perhaps nothing mom- hcrmr.ii'Ty summarise; th a gro it m '' ilki-dm; than that Bismarck him -or Tkwam have regarded Dan ten and too ykm -,i (bo Revolntirn as Eom'P.eiriniA m h . feminine, nml that be a pm-. ’wew thought cf pc'..a* ;-lx 511 y-:s)i ;i jI y • nLoam XVI. as every inch a man.