Page:Nietzsche the thinker.djvu/417

Rh rank among men and wants to give equal freedom to all, he says that the thoughts turn rather on the degree of power that one or another person may exercise over others or over all, i.e. or how far a sacrifice of freedom and virtual enslavement may be the basis for the bringing forth of the higher type. Put in the crudest way, to what extent could we sacrifice the development of humanity to the end of bringing a higher type than man into existence? His concept, or rather image (Gleichniss), for such a type is "superman" Another statement of the problem, put in the form of the demand, is; "To bring forth beings who stand elevated above the whole race of man, and to sacrifice one's kind to this end." Taking this literally, a new species is suggested, and countenance is lent to the view that Nietzsche conceived of an evolution in the future like that which Darwin is supposed to have proved in the past, namely, of a new biological type. But there is reason to doubt whether Nietzsche had anything so definite as this in mind. The whole question as to his relation to Darwinism is a mooted point. He may himself have had different attitudes at different times—that of criticism becomes marked toward the end of his life. The view that seems to me most reasonable is that he finally settled down to thinking of supermen simply as extraordinary specimens of men, who, however, if favored, instead of being fought as they commonly are, might lead to a considerable modification of the human type—one so great that, speaking in literary and fluid rather than scientific fashion, the result might be called a new species. He expressly says in one of his later books, "Not what shall take the place of humanity in the successive order of beings is the problem I propose—man is an end; but what type of man we shall train, shall wish for as one of higher value, worthier of life, surer of the future. The more valuable type has often enough existed, but as a happy chance, an exception, never as something willed. Instead of this it has been something feared, almost the fearful thing—and from motives of fear the contrasted type has been willed, trained, attained: man the domestic animal, the social animal, the sick animal—the Christian." In the following paragraph, he speaks of the higher