Page:A biographical dictionary of modern rationalists.djvu/315

 NIETZSCHE

NIGHTINGALE

Christian stories into astral and other myths (as Professor Drews describes in his Witnesses to the Historicity of Jesus, 1912). Deported from Poland for his assiduous Eationalist lecturing, he passed to Austria, and there narrowly escaped a sentence of ten years in prison. He was allowed to return to Poland in 1906, and he has con tinued to be the leading active Eationalist in a backward land. He edits Myse Niepodlegla, has written many works, and is an excellent orientalist.

NIETZSCHE, Friedrich Wilhelm,

German writer. B. Oct. 15, 1844. Ed. Pforta elementary school, and Bonn and Leipzig Universities. Son of a Protestant clergyman, Nietzsche applied himself to philology and philosophy, and soon came to reject all religious beliefs. In 1869 he was appointed extraordinary professor of classical philology at Basle University, and from 1870 to 1879 he was ordinary pro fessor. His Birth of Tragedy (1872) opened the series of his brilliant works ; and in Human, All-Too-Human (3 parts, 1878-80) he inaugurated the mordant and unsys tematic gospel for which he is known all over the world. At first he was enthusiastic for Wagner, on artistic grounds, but the apparent approach to Christianity of the great composer [See WAGNER] turned him into a bitter opponent. He was compelled by trouble with his eyes and brain to resign his professorship in 1877, and after that date he lived mainly in Switzerland and Italy. The stream of fiery and often paradoxical utterances which one may call his message culminates in his Thus Spake Zarathustra (4 parts, 1883-91), Beyond Good and Evil (1886), and Genealogy of Morals (1887). Nietzsche is fierce against all religion, but particularly against Chris tianity, the moral standards of which he derides constantly. He was a man of refined and most sober character, and those who seek to connect any form of disorder with his stern and eloquent call to men to be masters of themselves and their destinies betray a ludicrous ignorance (see Miigge s 557

Friedrich Nietzsche, 1909, and the various English translations of his works). Poor health, overstrain, and the use of soporifics led in 1889 to mental disease, from which he never recovered. The suggestion that he was earlier insane is absurd. His art was superb, and his sentiments need only patient consideration. D. Aug. 25, 1900.

NIEUWENHUIS, Domela Ferdinand,

Dutch writer. B. May 3, 1848. He was a Lutheran minister for eight years, but in 1877 he announced that he was com pelled to abandon Christianity, and he became one of the most active nationalists of Holland. He contributed to advanced periodicals, and in 1879 founded the Rationalist- Socialist periodical, Recht voor Allen. Nieuwenhuis has written a large number of Eationalist works (chiefly The Religion of Reason and The Religion of Humanity), and has maintained a high standard of work and character. For many years he was a Socialist member of the Dutch Parliament, and he led the party in Holland and edited the Socialist paper.

NIGHTINGALE, Florence, O.M.,

reformer. B. May 12, 1820. Ed. in her father s house. As her parents were rich, Miss Nightingale had an excellent educa tion ; but she chafed at the limitations of the sphere marked out for women in her time, and in 1844 she began to take an interest in hospital work. She visited the hospitals of France, Germany, and Ireland, and in 1853 she was appointed Super intendent of a Hospital for Invalid Gentle women at London. In the following year the Crimean War offered her a great opportunity, and, settling at Scutari, she worked for two years with such devotion, skill, and power of organization that the sufferings of the wounded were incalculably reduced. At the close of the war the nation subscribed 50,000 for a Nightin gale School for Nurses. Her health was seriously affected, but she carried on her beneficent work for a further fifty years. 558