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SURVIVAL

RIDE

MANUAL
FOR THE

THE

ARISTOCRATS
OF THE SOUL

TIGER

JULIUS EVOLA

Contents
gre

by Edizioni

Part 1: Orientations
ized ίη any form
.g, recording, or
;sion ίη writing

1

1. The Modern World and Traditional Man
2. The End of a Cycle-"Ride the Tiger"

Part 2:

Ιη

2
8

the World Where God IS Dead

15

3. European Nihilism-The Dissolution of Morals
16
4. From the Precursors of Nihilism to the "Lost Youth"
la.-

and the Protest Movement
20
5. Disguises of European NihilismThe Socioeconomic Myth and the Protest Movement
6. Active Nihilism-Nietzsche
34
7. "Being Oneself"
41

s.

8. The Transcendent Dimension"Life" and "More Than Life"
2003012871

47

9. Beyond Theism and Atheism
54
10. Invulnerability-Apollo and Dionysus

60

11. Acting without Desire-The Causal Law

68

Part 3: The Dead End of Existentialism

77

12. Being and Inauthentic Existence
78
13. Sartre: Prisoner without Walls
83
14. Existence, 'Ά Project Flung into the World"
hich granted
.rk οη this

27

86

15. Heidegger: "Retreating Forwards" and "Being-for-Death"Collapse of Existentialism

95

Part 4: Dissolution of the lηdίνίdual

105

16. The Dual Aspect of Anonymity
106
17. Destructions and Liberations ίη the New Realism
112
18. The "Animal Ideal"-The Sentiment of Nature
120

Part 5: Dissolution of Consciousness and Relativism
19. The Procedures of Modern Science
20. Covering

υρ

130

Nature-Phenomenology

137

Part 6: The Realm of ArtFrom "Physical" Music to the Drug Regime

..

21. The Sickness of European Culture
153
22. Dissolution ίη Modern Art

150

23. Modern Music and Jazz
159
24. Excursus οη Drugs
166

Part 7: Dissolution

ίη

the Social Realm

172
25. States and Parties-Apoliteia
26. Society-The Crisis of Patriotic Feeling
27. Marriage and the Family
185
28. Relations between the Sexes
195

Part 8: The Spiritual Problem

207

29. The "Second Religiosity"
208
30. Death-The Right over Life
218
Notes

229

Index

239

129

171

177

149

12

m

e

129

RIDE

ΤΗΕ

TIGER

149

,,-'

11.ΉV d

---------------

---

-

-

--

1
The Modern World
and Traditional Man

This book sets out to study some οί the ways ίη which the present age
appears essentially as an age οί dissolution. At the same time, it addresses
the questioR οί what kind οί conduct and what form οί existence are
appropriate under the circumstances for α particular human type.
This restriction must be kept ίη mind. What Ι am about to say does
not concern the ordinary man οί our day. Οη the contrary, Ι have ίη
mind the man who finds himself involved ίη today's world, even at
its most problematic and paroxysmal points; yet he does not belong
inwardly to such a world, nor will he give ίη to it. He feels himself, ίη
essence, as belonging to a different race from that οί the overwhelming
majority οί his contemporaries.
The natural place for such a man, the land ίη which he would not
be a stranger, is the world οί Tradition. Ι use the word tradition ίη a
special sense, which Ι have defined elsewhere. 1 It differs from the common usage, but is close to the meaning given to it by Rene Guenon ίη
his analysis οί the crisis οί the modern world. 2 lη this particular meaning, a civilization or a society is "traditional" when it is ruled by principles that transcend what is merely human and individual, and when
all its sectors are formed and ordered from above, and directed to what
is above. Beyond the variety οί historical forms, there has existed an
essentially identical and constant world οί Tradition. Ι have sought elsewhere to define its values and main categories, which are the basis for
any civilization, society, or ordering οί existence that calls itself normal
ίη a higher sense, and is endowed with real significance.
Everything that has come to predominate ίη the modern world is
the exact antithesis οί any traditional type οί civilization. Moreover, the

2

--------------------------------------------------------------------The Modern World and Traditional Man

3

circumstances make it increasingly unlikely that anyone, starting from
the values οί Tradition (even assuming that one could still identify and
adopt them), could take actions or reactions οί a certain efficacy that
would provoke any real change ίη th~ current state οί affairs. After the
last worldwide upheavals, there seems to be ηο starting point either for
nations or for the vast majority οί individuals-nothing ίη the institutions and general state οί society, nor ίη the predominant ideas, interests, and energies οί this epoch.
Nevertheless, a few men exist who are, so to speak, still οη their
feet among the ruins and the dissolution, and who belong, more or less
consciously, to that other world. Α little group seems willing to fight on,
even ίη lost positions. So long as it does not yield, does not compromise
itself by giving ίη to the seductions that would condition any success it
might have, its testimony is valid. For others, it is a matter οί completely
isolating themselves, which demands an inner character as well as privileged material conditions, which grow scarcer day by day. ΑΙΙ the same,
this is the second possible solution. Ι would add that there are a very few
ίη the intellectual field who can still affirm "traditional" values beyond
any immediate goal, so as to perform a "holding action." This is certainly useful to prevent current reality from shutting οίί every horizon,
not only materially but also ideally, and stifling any measures different
from its own. Thanks to them, distances may be maintained-other
possible dimensions, other meanings οί life, indicated to those able to
detach themselves from looking only to the here and nQ.w.
But this does not resolve the practical, personal problem-apart from
the case οί the man who is blessed with the opportunity for material isolation-of those who cannot or will not burn their bridges with current
life, and who must therefore decide how to conduct their existence, even
οη the level οί the most elementary reactions and human relations.
This is precisely the type οί man that the present book has ίη mind.
Το him applies the saying οί a great precursor: "The desert encroaches.
Woe to him whose desert is within!"3 He can ίη truth find ηο further support from without. There ηο longer exist the organizations and
institutions that, ίη a traditional civilization and society, would have
allowed him to realize himself wholly, to order his own existence ίη a
clear and unambiguous way, and to defend and apply creatively ίη his

4

Orientations

own environment the principal values that he recognizes within himself. Thus there is ηο question of suggesting to him lines of action that,
adequate and normative ίη any regular, traditional civilization, can ηο
longer be so ίη an abnormal one-in an environment that is utterly different socially, psychically, intellectually, and materially; ίη a climate of
general dissolution; ίη a system ruled by scarcely restrained disorder,
and anyway lacking any legitimacy from above. Thence come the specific problems that Ι intend to treat here.
There is an important point to clarify at the outset regarding the
attitude to be taken toward "survivals." Even now, especially ίη Western
Europe, there are habits, institutions, and customs from the world of
yesterday (that is, from the pourgeois world) that have a certain persistence. Ιη fact, when crisis is mentioned today, what is meant is precisely
the bourgeois world: it is the bases of bourgeois civilization and society
that suffer these crises and are struck by dissolution. This is not what Ι
call the world of Tradition. Socially, politically, and culturally, what is
crashing down is the system that took shape after the revolution of the
Third Estate and the first industrial revolution, even though there were
often mixed υρ ίη it some remnants of a more ancient order, drained of
their original vitality.
What kind of relationship can the human type whom Ι intend to
treat here have with such a world? This question is essential. Οη it
depend both the meaning to be attributed to the phenomena of crisis
and dissolution that are ever more apparent today, and the attitude to
be assumed ίη the face of them, and toward whatever they have not yet
undermined and destroyed.
The answer to this question can οηlΥ be negative. The human type
Ι have in mind has nothing to do with the bourgeois world. He must
consider everything bourgeois as being recent and antitraditional, born
from processes that ίη themselves are negative and subversive. Ιη many
cases, one can see ίη the present critical phenomena a kind of nemesis or rebound effect.4 Although Ι cannot go into details here, it is the
very forces that, ίη their time, were set to work against the previous,
traditional European civilization that have rebounded against those
who summoned them, sapping them ίη their turn and carrying to a
further degree the general process of disintegration. This appears very

clearly, for e
relationship
the successi,
and liberalis
revolution si
ter, having Ι
eradicating t
Ιη view ι
the solution
world, defen
currents of d
mate or rein
tional values
Ιη the fi
clearer evef)
wars and th
self-deceptio
formations ti
The energies
liberation, aJ
yesterday's V\
to those stru
has made th(
the second ρ
be inadmissil
traditional ν~
values, but tl
Thus to]
ιη any way V\
with the inte
a feeble gras]
them and dr.
mise. Ι say 'Ά
to the residu~
attack-in sc
rently mount,

.

The Modern World and Traditional Man
ο.

himη that,
can ηο
rly difo.ate οί
>order,
le speng the
Testern
)fld οί
persisecisely
.ociety
what Ι
vhat is
ofthe
ewere
ned οί
end to
Οη it
f crisis
ude to
tot yet
n type
~ must
, born
many
: nem. is the
γlOUS,

those
g to a
'S very

5

clearly, for example, ίη the socioeconomic field, through the obvious
relationship between the bourgeois revolution οί the Third Estate and
the successive socialist and Marxist movements; through democracy
and liberalism οη the one hand, and socialism οη the other. The first
revolution simply prepared the way for the second, whereupon the latter, having let the bourgeoisie perform that function, aimed solely at
eradicating them.
Ιη view οί this, there is one solution to be eliminated right away:
the solution οί those who want to rely οη what is left οί the bourgeois
world, defending and using it as a bastion against the more extreme
currents οί dissolution and subversion, even ίΕ they have tried to reanimate or reinforce these remnants with some higher and more traditional values.
Ιη the first place, considering the general situation that becomes
clearer every day since those crucial events that are the two world
wars and their repercussions, to adopt such an orientation signifies
self-deception as to the existence οί material possibilities. The transformations that have already taken place go too deep to be reversible.
The energies that have been liberated, or which are ίη the course οί
liberation, are not such as can be reconfined within the structures οί
yesterday's world. The very fact that attempts at reaction have referred
to those structures alone, which are void οί any superior legitimacy,
has made the subversive forces all the more vigorous and aggressive. Ιη
the second place, such a path would lead to a c~mpromise that would
be inadmissible as an ideal, and perilous as a tactic. As Ι have said, the
traditional values ίη the sense that Ι understand them are not bourgeois
values, but the very antithesis οί them.
Thus to recognize any validity ίη those survivals, to associate them
ίη any way with traditional values, and to validate them with the latter
with the intentions already described, would be either to demonstrate
a feeble grasp οί the traditional values themselves, or else to diminish
them and drag them down to a deplorable and risky form οί compromise. Ι say "risky" because however one attaches the traditional ideas
to the residual forms οί bourgeois civilization, one exposes them to the
attack-in some respects inevitable, legitimate, and necessary-currently mounted against that civilization.

ι

Ι

!

6

Orientations

One is therefore obliged to turn to the opposite solution, even ίί
things thereby become still more difficult and one runs into another
type οί risk. It is good to sever every link with all that which is destined sooner or later to collapse. The problem will then be to maintain
one's essential direction without leaning οη any given or transmitted
form, including forms that are authentically traditional but belong to
past history. Ιη this respect, continuity can οηlΥ be maintained οη an
essential plane, so to speak, as an inner orientation οί being, beside the
greatest possible externalliberty. As we shall soon see, the support that
the Tradition can continue to give does not refer to positive structures,
regular and recognized by some civilization already formed by it, but
rather to that doctrine that contains its principles οηlΥ ίη their superior, preformal state, anterior to th~ particular historical formulations:
a state that ίη the past had ηο pertinence to the masses, but had the
character οί an esoteric doctrine.
For the rest, given the impossibility οί acting positively ίη the sense οί
a real and general return to the normal system, and given the impossibility, within the climate οί modern society, culture, and customs, οί molding one's whole existence ίη an organic and unitary manner, it remains
to be seen οη what terms one can accept situations οί utter dissolution
without being inwardly touched by them. What ίη the current phasewhich is, ίη the last analysis, a transitional one-can be chosen, separated from the rest, and accepted as a free form οί behavior that is not
outwardly anachronistic? Can one thus measure oneself against what is
most advanced ίη contemporary thought and lifestyle, while remaining
inwardly determined and governed by a completely different spirit?
The advice "Don't go to the place οί defense, but to the place οί
attack," might be adopted by the group οί differentiated men, late children οί the Tradition, who are ίη question here. That is to say, it might
be better to contribute to the fall οί that which is already wavering and
belongs to yesterday's world than to try to prop it up and prolong its
existence artificially. It is a possible tactic, and useful to prevent the
final crisis from being the work οί the opposition, whose initiative one
would then have to suffer. The risks οί such a course οί action are more
than obvious: there is ηο saying who will have the last word. But ίη the

present epoch then
advantage that it ο]
The basic ideas
summarized as folll
The significan<
people deplore tod;
object οί the destru
But measured agair
first negation οί a v
the crisis οί the m(
"negation οί a neg~
own way, is positive
ίη the nothingness t
rebellion, and "pr01
generations; or ίη th.
the organized system
ίη question here it m
become the premise j

The Modern World and Traditional Man

tion, even if
into another
vhich is desto maintain
transmitted
l1t belong to
ained οη an
~, beside the
,upport that
~ structures,
:d by it, but
their supermulations:
Jut had the
the sense of
impossibills, of mold• it remains
dissolution
nt phaseDsen, sepathat is not
rιst what is
remaining
pirit?
le place of
, late chilγ, it might
rering and
.rolong its
:event the
iative one
. are more
But ίη the

7

present epoch there is nothing that is not risky. This is perhaps the one
advantage that it offers to those who are still οη their feet.
The basic ideas to be drawn from what has been said so far can be
summarized as follows:
The significance of the crises and the dissolutions that so many
people deplore today should be stated, indicating the real and direct
object οί the destructive processes: bourgeois civilization and society.
But measured against traditional values, these latter were already the
first negation οί a world anterior and superior to them. Consequently
the crisis οί the modern world could represent, ίη Hegel's terms, a
"negation οί a negation," so as to signify a phenomenon that, ίη its
own way, is positive. This double negation might end ίη nothingnessίη the nothingness that erupts ίη multiple forms οί chaos, dispersion,
rebellion, and "protest" that characterize many tendencies of recent
generations; or ίη that other nothingness that is scarcely hidden behind
the organized system οί material civilization. Alternatively, for the men
ίη question here it might create a new, free space that could eventually
become the premise for a future, formative action.

2
The End of a Cycle
"Ride the Tiger"
•
The idea just mentioned refers to a perspective that does not really enter
into the argument οί this book, because it is not concerned with inner,
personal behavior, but with oute1'"circumstances; not with present-day
reality, but with an unpredictable future upon which one's own conduct
should ίη ηο wise depend.
This is a perspective already alluded to, which sees that the present
time may, ίη the last analysis, be a transitional epoch. Ι will say οηlΥ a
little about it before approaching our principal problem. The reference
point here is given by the traditional doctrine οί cycles and by the idea
that the present epoch, with all its typical phenomena, corresponds to
the terminal phase οί a cycle.
The phrase chosen as the title οί this book, "ride the tiger," may
serve as a transition between what has been said hitherto, and this
other order οί ideas. The phrase is a Far Eastern saying, expressing the
idea that ίί one succeeds ίη riding a tiger, not οηlΥ does one avoid having it leap οη one, but ίί one can keep one's seat and not fall off, one
may eventually get the better οί it. Those who are interested may be
reminded οί a similar theme found ίη the schools οί traditional wisdom,
such as the ''ox-herding'' episodes οί ]apanese Zen; while ίη classical
antiquity there is a parallel ίη the trials οί Mithras, who lets himself be
dragged by the bull and will not let go until the animal stops, whereupon Mithras kills it.
This symbolism is applicable at various levels. First, it can refer to
a line οί conduct ίη the interior, personal life; then to the appropriate
attitude ίη the face οί critical, historical, and collective situations. Ιη
the latter case, we are interested ίη the relation οί the symbol to the

8

doctrine οί cycles, w
and the particular as
Ages." This is a teacl
cal traits ίη the East ~
caught an echo οί it.)
Ιη the classical w
gressive descent fron
Age. Ιη the correspo
Kali Yuga (Dark Ag
a climate οί dissolu1
lective, material, pS)
check by a higher la,
state οί freedom anc
for this situation, sa~
Kali is a female divil
οί the world and οί 1
as a goddess οί sex a
ing," that is, latent ίl
to be completely aw:
Everything ροίη
reached ίη recent tin
ety οί the West, fron
It is not too forced :
present epoch stand:
which everything tu
made many centuri
strangely timely tod
above regarding the
associated here witl
Ιη fact, the texl
also declare that tht
forces were more ο
celled ίη the final a
ferent human type
Not οηlΥ that, but ~
circumstances, such

The End of α Cycle

cle

"
loes not really enter
Incerned with inner,
ot with present-day
1 one's own conduct
;ees that the present
ch. Ι will say on1y a
b1em. The reference
c1es and by the idea
ena, corresponds 10
ride the tiger," may
l hitherto, and this
ying, expressing the
does one avoid hav.nd not fall off, one
~ interested may be
traditiona1 wisdom,
1; whi1e ίη c1assica1
who 1ets himself be
llima1 s1ops, whereFirst, it can refer 10
1 to the appropriate
ective situations. Ιη
f the symbo1 10 the

9

doctrine of cyc1es, with regard 10 both the genera1 structure of his10ry
and the particu1ar aspect of it that refers 10 the sequence of the "Four
Ages." This is a teaching that, as Ι have shown e1sewhere,! bears identica1 traits ίη the East and ίη the ancient West. (Giambattista Vico simp1y
caught an echo of it.)
Ιη the c1assica1 wor1d, it was presented ίη terms of humanity's progressive descent from the Go1den Age 10 what Hesiod called the Iron
Age. Ιη the corresponding Hindu teaching, the fina1 age is called the
Ka1i Yuga (Dark Age). Its essentia1 qua1ity is emphatically said 10 be
a c1imate of disso1ution, ίη which all the forces-individua1 and co11ective, materia1, psychic, and spiritua1-that were previous1y he1d ίη
check by a higher 1aw and by influences of a superior order pass in10 a
state of freedom and chaos. The texts of Tantra have a striking image
for this situation, saying that it is the time when Ka1i is "wide awake."
Ka1i is a fema1e divinity symbo1izing the e1ementary, primordia1 forces
of the wor1d and of 1ife, but ίη her "lower" aspects she is a1so presented
as a goddess of sex and orgiastic rites. Ιη previous ages she was "sleeping," that is, 1atent ίη the 1atter aspects, but ίη the Dark Age she is said
10 be comp1ete1y awake and active. 2
Everything points 10 the fact that exact1y this situation has been
reached ίη recent times, having for its epicenter the civi1ization and society of the West, from which it has rapid1y spread over the who1e p1anet.
It is not 100 forced an interpretation to 1ink this with the fact that the
present epoch stands under the zodia~a1 sign of Aquarius, the waters ίη
which everything turns 10 a fluid and form1ess state. Thus predictions
made many centuries ago-for these ideas go back that far-appear
strange1y time1y 1oday. One finds here an ana10gy 10 what Ι have said
above regarding the prob1em of what attitude is proper 10 the fina1 age,
associated here with riding the tiger.
Ιη fact, the texts that discuss the Ka1i Yuga and the Age of Ka1i
a1so dec1are that the norms of 1ife, va1id during epochs ίη which divine
forces were more or 1ess a1ive and active, must be considered as cancelled ίη the fina1 age. During the 1atter there 1ives an essentially different human type who is incapab1e of following the ancient precepts.
Not on1y that, but because of the different historica1 and even p1anetary
circumstances, such precepts, even if followed, wou1d not yie1d the same

10

Orientations

results. For this reason, different norms apply, and the rule οί secrecy is
lifted from certain truths, a certain ethic, and particular "rites" to which
the rule previously applied οη account οί their dangerous character and
because they contravened the forms οί a normal existence, regulated by
the sacred tradition. Νο one can fail to see the significance οί this convergence οί views. Ιη this as ίη other points, my ideas, far from having a
personal and contingent character, are essential1y linked to perspectives
already known to the world οί Tradition, when abnormal situations ίη
general were foreseen and analyzed.
We shal1 now examine the principle οί "riding the tiger" as applied
to the external world and the total environment. lts significance can
be stated as follows: ~hen a cycle οί civilization is reaching its end, it
is difficult to achieve anything by resisting it and by directly opposing
the forces ίη motion. The current is too strong; one would be overwhelmed. The essential thing is not to let oneself be impressed by the
omnipotence and apparent triumph οί the forces οί the epoch. These
forces, devoid οί connection with any higher principle, are ίη fact οη
a short chain. One should not become fixated οη the present and οη
things at hand, but keep ίη view the conditions that may come about
ίη the future. Thus the principle to fol1ow could be that οί letting the
forces and processes οί this epoch take their own course, while keeping
oneself firm and ready to intervene when "the tiger, which cannot leap
οη the person riding it, is tired οί running." The Christian injunction
"Resist not evil" may have a similar meaning, ίί taken ίη a very particular way. One abandons direct action and retreats to a more internal
position.
The perspective offered by the doctrine οί cyclical laws is implicit
here. When one cycle closes, another begins, and the point at which
a given process reaches its extreme is also the point at which it turns
ίη the opposite direction. But there is still the problem οί continuity
between the two cycles. Το use an image from Hoffmansthal, the positive solution would be that οί a meeting between those who have been
able to stay awake through the long night, and those who may appear
the next morning. But one cannot be sure οί this happening. lt is impossible to foresee with certainty how, and οη what plane, there can be any
continuity between the cycle that is nearing its end and the next one.

Thereforc
have an :
mean to!
term, shc
lacking rl
a new ml
after us,
results οι
BefoI
maybeu:
concerns
zations, e
the crisis
that mod
measure
see there.
life that ]
tive orga
wondere(
revival aI
lt is i
a propos
"intel1ec1
note tha1
least paI
to ηοη-Ε
this, hov
between
one is m(
οη existe
is now f(
influenc(
"modern
forms οί
steadily]
"colonia

The End of α Cycle

nd the rule of secrecy is
rticular "rites" to which
langerous character and
existence, regulated by
,ignificance of this coη­
ideas, far from having a
ly linked to perspectives
abnormal situations ίη
,ng the tiger" as applied
:πt. Its significance can
)η is reaching its end, it
1d by directly opposing
ιg; one would be overelf be impressed by the
:es of the epoch. These
)rinciple, are ίη fact οη
οη the present and οη
s that may come about
ld be that of letting the
η course, while keeping
iger, which cannot leap
he Christian injunction
if taken ίη a very par:reats to a more internal
cyclical laws is implicit
and the point at which
point at which it turns
: problem of continuity
~offmansthal, the posi~η those who have been
those who may appear
• happening. It is impos: plane, there can be any
• end and the next one.

11

Therefore the line of conduct to be followed ίη the present epoch must
have an autonomous character and an immanent, individual value. Ι
mean to say that the attraction of positive prospects, more or less shortterm, should not play an important part ίη it. They might be entirely
lacking right up to the end of the cycle, and the possibilities offered by
a new movement beyond the zero point might concern others coming
after us, who may have held equally firm without awaiting any direct
results or exterior changes.
Before leaving this topic and resuming my principal argument, it
may be useful to mention another point connected to cyclicallaws. This
concerns the relationship between Western civilization and other civilizations, especially those of the East. Among those who have recognized
the crisis of the modern world, and who have also abandoned the idea
that modern civilization is the civilization par excellence, the zenith and
measure of all others, some have turned their eyes to the East. They
see there, to a certain degree, a traditional and spiritual orientation to
life that has long ceased to exist ίη the West as the basis for the effective organization of the various realms of existence. They have even
wondered whether the East might furnish useful reference points for a
revival and reintegration of the West.
It is important to have a clear view of the domain to which such
a proposition might apply. If it is simply a matter of doctrines and
"intellectual" contacts, the attempt is legitimate. But one should take
note that valid examples and pQints of reference are to be found, at
least partially, ίη our own traditional past, without having to turn
to non-European civilizations. Not much is to be gained by any of
this, however. It would be a matter of conversations at a high level
between isolated individuals, cultivators of metaphysical systems. If
one is more concerned with real influences that have a powerful effect
οη existence, one should have ηο illusions about them. The East itself
is now following ίη our footsteps, ever more subject to the ideas and
influences that have led us to the point at which we find ourselves,
"modernizing" itself and adopting our own secular and materialistic
forms of life. What is still left of Eastern traditions and character is
steadily losing ground and becoming marginalized. The liquidation of
"colonialism" and the material independence that Eastern peoples are

12

Orientations

acquiring vis-a-vis Europe are closely accompanied by an ever more
blatant subjection to the ideas, the mores, and the "advanced" and
"progressive" mentality οί the West.
Based οη the doctrine οί cycles, it may be that anything οί value
from the point οί view οί a man οί Tradition, either ίη the East or
elsewhere, concerns a residual legacy that survives, υρ to a point, not
because it belongs to areas that are truly untouched by the principle οί
decline, but merely because this process is still ίη an early phase there.
For such civilizations it is οηlΥ a matter οί time before they find themselves at the same point as ourselves, knowing the same problems and
the same phenomena οί dissolution under the sign οί "progress" and
modernity. The tempo may even be much faster ίη the East. We have
the example οί China, which in-two decades has traveled the whole way
from an imperial, traditional civilization to a materialistic and atheist
communist regime-a journey that the Europeans took centuries to
accomplish.
Outside the circles οί scholars and specialists ίη metaphysical
disciplines, the "myth οί the East" is therefore a fallacy. "The desert
encroaches": there is ηο other civilization that can serve as support;
we have to face our problems alone. The οηlΥ prospect offered us as a
counterpart οί the cyclicallaws, and that οηlΥ hypothetical, is that the
process οί decline οί the Dark Age has first reached its terminal phases
with us ίη the West. Therefore it is not impossible that we would also be
the first to pass the zero point, ίη a period ίη which the other civilizations, entering later into the same current, would find themselves more
or less ίη our current state, having abandoned-"superseded"-what
they still offer today ίη the way οί superior values and traditional forms
οί existence that attract us. The consequence would be a reversal οί
roles. The West, having reached the point beyond the negative limit,
would be qualified to assume a new function οί guidance or command,
very different from the material, techno-industrial leadership that it
wielded ίη the past, which, once it collapsed, resulted οηlΥ ίη a general
leveling.
This rapid overview οί general prospects and problems may have
been useful to some readers, but Ι shall not dwell further οη these matters. As Ι have said, what interests us here is the field οί personal life;

and from that ρο!
certain experien(
ferent from whal
porarιes, we nee,
anything the futt

The End

more
" and
va1ue
ast or
Lt, not
ip1e of
there.
themLS and
" and
: have
leway
ttheist
'ies to
ysica1
desert
:ψοrt;

lS as a
.at the
)hases

lso be
vi1izamore
-what
forms
sa1 of
1imit,
nand,
:hat it
enera1
r

have

: matt11ife;

ο( α

Cycle

13

and from that point of view, ίn defining the attitude to be taken toward
certain experiences and processes of today, having consequences different from what they appear to have for practically all our contemporaries, we need to estab1ish autonomous positions, independent of
anything the future may or may not bring.

-0Ιπ

PART

2

the World
Where God
IS Dead

όr

=

3
European Nihilism
The Dissolution of Morals
For the symbolic expression οί the complex process that has led to the
present situation οί crisis ίη matters οί morals and the vision οί life, the
best formulation is that οί Nietz~che: "God is dead."l
For our purposes, we can take Nietzsche's theme as our point οί
departure, because it has lost nothing οί its validity and relevance. It
has been rightly said that Nietzsche's personality and thought also have
a symbolic character. Robert Reininger writes: "This is a struggle for
the sake οί modern man, that man who ηο longer has any roots ίη the
sacred soil οί tradition, wavering ίη search οί himself between the peaks
οί civilization and the abysses οί barbarism, trying to find a satisfactory
meaning for an existence completely left to itself."2
Friedrich Nietzsche is the one who best foresaw ''European nihilism" as a future and a destiny "which proclaims itself everywhere by
the voice οί a thousand signs and a thousand presages." The "great
event, obscurely suspected, that God is dead," is the principle οί the
collapse οί all values. From this point, morality is deprived οί its sanction and "incapable οί maintaining itself," and the interpretation and
justification formerly given to all norms and values disappear.
Dostoyevsky expressed the same idea ίη the words, 'Ίί God does
not exist, everything is permitted."3
"The death οί God" is an image that characterizes a whole historical process. The phrase expresses "unbelief turned to daily reality," a
desacralization οί existence and a total rift with the world οί Tradition
that, beginning ίη the West at about the period οί the Renaissance and
humanism, has increasingly assumed the character οί an obvious and
irreversible state οί affairs for present-day humanity. This state is ηο

16

less real where it ί
and surrogates οί
We must disti:
elementary fact is
human life loses ~
ments οί nihilism
rendered indepenc
the sole authority
first phenomenon
it from consciousr
principle descends
rationalistic phase
which, incidentall
speculative philosc
theory οί the catej
mous morality."
But once mon
tive relationship c
invulnerable ίουηl
"autonomous mOI
tance to any natul
shalt" that is a mc
where one tries to
tify that content, .
capable οί thinkin
Kantian ethics. Ir
does not imply th,
premises that dep(
state οί affairs ίη ~
The phase οί ι
defined by utilitat
absolute basis for
what is left οί mOI
advantage and for
already visible beh
nal restraint, every

European Nihilism

L

)rals
ι!

has led to the
ision of life, the

as our point of
nd relevance. It
ought also have
s a struggle for
ιηΥ roots ίη the
:ween the peaks
Id a satisfactory
~uropean

nihileverywhere by
~s." The "great
principle of the
ived of its sanc~rpretation and
ιppear.

,
ι

'Ίf

God does

whole historilaily reality," a
rld of Tradition
enaissance and
ιn obvious and
rhis state is ηο

17

less real where it is ηο! yet clearly visible, owing to a regime of doubles
and surrogates of the "God who is dead."
We must distinguish various stages of the process ίη question. The
elementary fact is a fracture οί an ontological character, through which
human life loses any real reference to transcendence. ΑΙΙ the developments of nihilism are already virtually contained ίη this fact. Morality
rendered independent from theology and metaphysics and founded οη
the sole authority of reason-so-called "autonomous" morality-is the
first phenomenon to take shape after the death of God, trying to hide
ί! from consciousness. When the level of the sacred is lost, the absolute
principle descends to the level οί pure human morality. This defines the
rationalistic phase οί the "stoicism οί duty" and οί "moral fetishism,"
which, incidentally, is one οί the characteristics οί Protestantism. Ιη
speculative philosophy, this phase has as its sign οτ symbol the Kantian
theory of the categorical imperative, ethical rationalism, and "autonomous morality."
But once morality has lost its root, which is the original and effective relationship οί man with a higher world, ί! ceases to have any
invulnerable foundation, and the critics soon have the better of it. Ιη
"autonomous morality," which is secular and rational, the οηlΥ resistance to any natural impulse is an empty and rigid command, a "thou
shalt" that is a mere echo οί the ancient, living law. Then at the ροίη!
where one tries to give this "thou shalt" some firm content and to justify that content, the ground gives way._ There is ηο support for those
capable οί thinking it through to the end. This is already the case with
Kantian ethics. Ιη reality, there is ηο "imperative" at this stage that
does not imply the presumed, axiomatic value οί certain unexplained
premises that depend simply οη a personal equation or οη the accepted
state οί affairs ίη a given society.
The phase οί dissolution that follows that of ethical rationalism is
defined by utilitarian οτ "social" ethics. Renouncing any intrinsic οτ
absolute basis for "good" and "evil," the justification proposed for
what is left of moral norms is whatever suits the individual for his own
advantage and for his material tranquility ίη sociallife. But nihilism is
already visible behind this morality. When there is ηο longer any internal restraint, every action and behavior appears licit so long as the outer

μι

18

1n the World Where God Is Dead

sanctions of society's laws can be avoided, or if one is indifferent to
them. Nothing any 10nger has an intrinsic norm and an imperative character. lt is just a matter of adjusting to society's codes, which take the
place of the superseded laws οί religion. After Puritanism and ethical
rigorism, this is the orientation of the bourgeois world: toward social
idols and conformism founded οη convenience, cowardice, hypocrisy,
or inertia. But the individualism of the end of the nineteenth century
marked ίη its turn the beginning of an anarchic dissolution that rapidly
spread and intensified. It had already prepared the chaos hiding behind
the faςade οί apparent orderliness.
The previous phase, limited ίη its extent, had been that οί the
Romantic hero: the man who feels himself alone ίη the face of divine
indifference, and the superior individual who despite everything reaffirms himself ίη a tragic context. He breaks accepted laws, but not ίη
the sense of denying their validity; rather, he claims for himself exceptional rights to what is forbidden, be it good or ίΙl. The process exhausts
itself, for example, ίη a man like Max Stirner, who saw ίη all morality the ultimate form οί the divine fetish that was to be destroyed. He
denounced the "beyond" that exists within man and that tries to give
him rules as being a "new heaven" that is merely the insidious transposition οί the external, theological beyond, which has been negated. 4 With
this conquest of the "interior god" and the exaltation of the "Unique"
that is free from rules and "rests its cause οη nothingness," opposing
itself to every value and pretense οί society, Stirner marks the end of
the road trodden by the nihilistic social revolutionaries (to whom the
term nihilism was originally applied)-but trodden ίη the name of utopian social ideas ίη which they always believed: ideas such as "justice,"
"liberty," and "humanity," as opposed to the injustice and tyranny that
they saw ίη the existing order.
Turning to Nietzsche, the European nihilism that he predicted as
a general, not just a sporadic, phenomenon attacks not οηlΥ the field
of morality ίη a strict sense, but also that of truth, of worldviews, and
of ends. The "death οί God" is associated with this 10ss οί any meaning to life, any superior justification for existence. Nietzsche's theme
is well known: that a need for evasion and a surrender οί life have
brought about the invention of a "world of truth" or a "world of val-

ues" separate from,
ized as false and wo
of being, goodness,
world of becoming,
structed world diss
sion. Nietzsche reve;
human"-and irrati
spirit" and "immon
"superior" and "spi
ίη most cases as the
Οη these term~
or rejected from th
"God" and "truth"
conclusion is that "
to be." This is wha
is the beginning of
devoid of any meal
and restraints hav4
find a parallel ίη Ι
invented God just
"alienation of the
by Sartre, when h
the sense οί being
it says that even ί]
reduced to itself ίη
itself that could gi
Thus there ar,
moral rebellion. Τ
had implicitly nou
type of man, they
sense, whose chie!
nality of the hum:

European Nihilism

19

ues" separate from, and ίη opposition to, this world, now characterized as false and worthless. Another world has been inνented: a world
οί being, goodness, and spirit as a negation or condemnation οί the
world οί becoming, οί the senses, and οί liνing reality. But that constructed world dissolνed, once it was discoνered that it was an ίΙΙυ­
sion. Nietzsche reνealed its genesis and pointed out its human-"all toο
human" -and irrational roots. His contribution to nihilism as a "free
spirit" and "immoralist" has been precisely his interpretation οί certain
"superior" and "spiritual" νalues not οηlΥ as simple νital impulses, but
ίη most cases as the results οί a "decadent" and enfeebled life.
Οη these terms, all that remains real is what had been negated
or rejected from the point οί νiew οί that other, "superior" world οί
"God" and "truth"-the world οί what ought to be, not οί what is. The
conclusion is that "what ought to be is not; what is, is what ought not
to be." This is what Nietzsche called the "tragic phase" οί nihilism. It
is the beginning οί the "misery οί man without God." Existence seems
deνoid οί any meaning, any goal. While all imperatiνes, moral νalues,
and restraints haνe fallen away, so haνe all supports. Once more we
find a parallel ίη Dostoyeνsky, where he makes Kiriloν say that man
inνented God just to be able to go οη liνing: 5 God, therefore, as an
"alienation οί the 1." The terminal situation is giνen ίη drastic form
by Sartre, when he declares that "existenkalism is not an atheism ίη
the sense οί being reduced to proνing that God does not exist. Rather
it says that eνen ίί God existed, nothing would change." Existence is
reduced to itself ίη its naked reality, without any reference point outside
itself that could giνe it a real meaning for man.
Thus there are two phases. The first is a sort οί metaphysical or
moral rebellion. The second is the phase ίη which the νery motiνes that
had implicitly nourished that rebellion giνe way and dissolνe. For a new
type οί man, they are empty. That is the nihilistic phase ίη the proper
sense, whose chief theme is the sense οί the absurdity, the pure irrationality οί the human condition.

4
From the Precursors
of Nihilism to the
"Lost Youth" and
the Protest Movement

Α

current of thought and a "historiography" exist that represent this
process of rebellion and dissolution, or at least its first phases, as having been something positive and as a victory. It is another aspect of
contemporary nihilism, whose undeclared basis is a sort of "shipwreck
euphoria." It is well known that the phases of dissolution, beginning
with illuminism and liberalism and proceeding gradually to immanentist historicism (first "idealistic," then materialist and Marxist), have
been interpreted and celebrated as those of the emancipation and reaffirmation of man, of progress of the spirit, and of true "humanism."
We shall see later how Nietzsche's program for the postnihilist period
arose, ίη its worse aspects, out of this very mentality. For the present,
there is just one point to be made.
Νο God has ever controlled man. Divine despotism is a fantasy,
and so is most of that to which, ίη the illuminist and revolutionary
interpretation, the world of Tradition owes its ordering from above
and its orientation toward the above, its hierarchical system, its various forms of legitimate authority and sacral power. No-the true and
essential foundation of this whole system is the particular inner structure, the capacity of recognition, and the various inborn interests of a
type of man who nowadays has virtually disappeared. Man, at a given
moment, wanted to "be free." He was allowed to be so, and he was
allowed to throw οΗ the chains that did not bind him so much as sustain him. Thereupon he was allowed to suffer all the consequences of
20

his liberation, fo
"God is dead" (ο
tence becomes th
everything is allo
is known ίη the ]
objectively "beyo
Ιη recent timl
the existential an
and shaken only
relevance for gen
dealing with "prc
alist pathos of ye
incongruous. For
sidered it a natur;
it not to be orderl
most bearable an
its counterpart aI
and more reducec
solution of any u
process is a regil
deceptive for not
summarizes it wl

Religion is the c
οί

the people; a

was that an

ορί

the people, oh.
another opium

But once this
assemblage to cc
the denial of ever
senselessness of a
tential theme of n
whole system of 1
new, earthbound
occur forms of θ

From the Precursors of Nihilism to the "Lost Youth"

resent this
es, as hav, aspect οί
shipwreck
beginning
lmmanenxist), have
1 and reaflmanism."
list period
le present,

his liberation, following ineluctably up to his present state ίη which
"God is dead" (or "God has withdrawn," as Bernanos says), and existence becomes the field of absurdity where everything is possible and
everything is allowed. Nothing has acted ίη all of this but the law that
is known ίη the Far East as the law of actions and reactions, which is
objectively "beyond good and evil" and beyond any petty morality.
Ιη recent times, the fracture has extended from the moral plane to
the existential and ontological. Values that were previously questioned
and shaken only by a few precursors ίη relative isolation now lose all
relevance for general consciousness ίη everyday life. One is ηο longer
dealing with "problems" but with a state of affairs ίη which the immoralist pathos οί yesterday's rebels seems increasingly old-fashioned and
incongruous. For some time, a good part οί Western humanity has considered it a natural thing for existence to lack any real meaning, and for
it not to be ordered by any higher principle, arranging their lives ίη the
most bearable and least disagreeable way they can. Οί course this has
its counterpart and inevitable 'consequence ίη an inner life that is more
and more reduced, formless, feeble, and elusive, and ίη a growing dissolution οί any uprightness and character. Another aspect of the same
process is a regime οί compensations and anesthetics that is ηο less
deceptive for not being recognized as such. Α character ίη Hemingway
summarizes it when he says:
Religion is the opium
οί

a fantasy,
olutionary
~om above
Ω, its varile true and
lner struc:erests οί a
ι at a given
nd he was
IlCh as susquences οί

21

οί

the people ... And

ΠΟ'Σ,

economics is the opium

the people; along with patriotism ... What about sexual intercourse;

was that an opium of the people? ... But drink was a sovereign opium of
the people, oh, an excellent opium. Although some prefer the radio,
another opium of the people, a cheap one ... 1

But once this sensation occurs, the faςade may start to waver, the
assemblage to collapse, and the dissolution οί values is followed by
the denial of everything one has resorted to ίη order to make up for the
senselessness οί a life henceforth reduced to itself. Then comes the existential theme οί nausea and disgust, οί the void that is sensed behind the
whole system οί bourgeois life, the theme οί the absurdity οί the whole
new, earthbound "civilization." Where the sensation is most acute there
occur forms οί existential trauma and states that have been called "the

μ

22

1n the World Where God Is

Deαd

spectrality of eνents," "the degradation of objectiνe reality," "existential
alienation." One also notices that the sporadic experiences of intellectuals and artists of the past become modes of behaνior occurring ίη the
natural course of things for certain groups of the younger generation.
ΟηΙΥ yesterday it was a matter of writers, painters, and "damned
poets" liνing οη the edge, often alcoholics, mingling their talents with
the climate of existential dissolution and with irr~tional rebellion against
established νalues. Typical ίη this regard is the case of Rimbaud, whose
extreme form of rebellion was the renunciation of his own genius,
poetic silence, and immersion ίη practical actiνity. Another is the case
of Lautreamont, driνen by existential trauma to the morbid exaltation
of eνil, horror, and formless elementarity (Maldoror, the personage of
his poems, says that Tιe has "receiνed life like a wound, and forbidden
the suicide from curing his injury"). Then there are those isolated indiνiduals giνen to adνenture, like ]ack London and the early Ernst ]ίinger,
who seek new horizons οη distant lands and seas; while for the others
eνerything seems ίη order, safe and sound, as under the banner of science they hymn the triumphal march of progress, scarcely troubled by
the noise of anarchist bombs.
Already after World War Ι, processes of this type had begun to
spread, announcing the final phases of nihilism. At first such harbingers remained at the margins of life, οη the frontier-zone of art. The
most significant and radical of them all was perhaps Dadaism, the end
result of the deepest impulses that had nourished the νarious moνe­
ments of aνant-garde art. But Dadaism negated the νery categories of
art, showing the transition to the chaotic forms of a life depriνed of any
rationality, any restraint, any coherence; it was not just the acceptance
but the exaltation of the absurd and the contradictory, of nonsense and
pointlessness taken just as they are.
Surrealism took υρ some similar themes, ίη part, when it refused
to adapt life to the "derisory conditions of all existence down here."
Sometimes the path was ίη fact followed to the νery end, as with
the suicide of surrealists like Vache, Creνel, and Rigault; the latter
reproached the others for being able to do nothing but literature and
poetry. Indeed, when the young Andre Breton declared that the simplest
surrealist act would be to go out into the street and shoot passersby
22
i

-

at rand,
World'
to pract
οηlΥ ρο

solutior
Wit
and wi1
was effI
a youth
inauthe:
sign of 1
Οη

young r
like str:
and figl
where (
thingίη a jus1
rifice of
νalues c
not to tl
Ιίοη is a
Thii
logs the
rubble].
νandalii

to their
More siJ
Beat get
tial posi
is merel
cold anI
pseudomeaninj
less ragt
charactι

From the Precursors of Nihilism to the "Lost Youth"

23

at random,2 he was anticipating what happened more than once after
Wor1d War Π, when some οί the younger generation passed from theory
to practice. ΒΥ absurd and destructive actions, they sought to attain the
on1y possib1e meaning οί existence, after rejecting suicide as the radica1
solution for the metaphysically abandoned individual.
With the further traumatization brought about by Wor1d War Π,
and with the collapse οί a new set οί fa1se va1ues, the same current
was effective1y diffused ίη characteristic and endemic fashion among
a youth that regarded itself as burned-out or 10st. Its broad margin οί
inauthenticity, pose, and caricature does not 1essen its va1ue as a 1iving
sign οί the times now approaching their fina1 nadir.
Οη the one hand there were the "rebe1s without a cause," the "angry
young men" with their rage and aggression ίη a wor1d where they fe1t
1ike strangers, where they saw ηο sense, ηο va1ues worth embracing
and fighting for. As we have seen, that was the 1iquidation, ίη the wor1d
where God is dead, οί those previous forms οί revo1t that, despite everything-and even ίη utopian anarchism-still had a fundamenta1 be1ief
ίη a just cause to defend, at the price οί any destruction and at the sacrifice οί one's own 1ife. "Nihi1ism" there referred to the negation οί the
va1ues οί the wor1d and οί the society against which one was rebelling,
not to those οί the rebe1s themse1ves. But ίη its current forms, the rebe11ίοη is a sheer, irrationa1 movement "without a flag."
This trend appeared with the "teddy boys," with their German ana10gs the Halbstarken, and the generazione deUe macerie [generation οί
rubb1e]. Their sty1e was one οί aggressive protest, expressed through
vanda1ism and 1aw1ess actions va1ued as "pure acts" ίη co1d witness
to their otherness. Ιη the Slavic countries there were the "hoo1igans."
More significant was the American counterpart, the "hipsters" and the
Beat generation. Rather than intellectua1 attitudes, these were existentia1 positions 1ived out by the young, οί which a certain type οί nove1
is mere1y a reflection. Compared to the British types, they were more
co1d and unadorned, more corrosive ίη their opposition to everything
pseudo-order1y, rationa1, and coherent-everything that was "square,"
meaning solid, justified, and safe. They showed "a destructive, voice1ess rage," as somebody put it, a contempt for "those incomprehensib1e
characters who are capab1e οί being serious1y invo1ved with a woman, a

existentia1
intellectu:ing ίη the
teration.
. "damned
l1ents with
.onagainst
,ud, whose
ιτη genιus,

is the case
exa1tation
rsonage οί
forbidden
11ated indinst Jίinger,
the others
lner οί sciroub1ed by
Ι

begun to
.ch harbin)f art. The
m, the end
.ous moveItegories οί
ived οί any
acceptance
nsense and
it refused
Dwn here."
.d, as with
; the 1atter
:rature and
:he simp1est
t passersby

1

\

L

24

job, a cause" (Norman Podhoretz). 3 The absurdity οί what is considered
normal, "the organized insanity οί the normal world," seemed all the
more evident to the hipsters ίη the climate οί industrialization and frenetic activity that, despite all the triumphs οί science, was meaningless.
Alienation from their surroundings, absolute refusal to collaborate or
to have any defined position ίη society were the rule ίη this milieu,
which did not οηlΥ include the young, and which recruited its members
not οηlΥ from the lower classes but from all sociallevels, including the
wealthy. Some preferred a new form οί nomadic existence; others, to
live at the most elementary level. The methods used by the hipsters to
survive the existential void through strong sensations included alcohol, sex, negro jazz, high speed, drugs, and even acts οί gratuitous
criminality like those suggestetl ίη Breton's surrealism. They did not
fear experiences οί any kind, but sought them out to "receive tremendous blows οη their own selves" (Norman Mailer). The books οί Jack
Kerouac and the poetry οί Allen Ginsberg were inspired ίη part by this
climate. 4
But it had already been announced by some authors who were
rightly called the Walt Whitmans, not οί the optimistic and hopeful
world οί the young American democracy, but οί a world ίη collapse.
Beside Dos Passos and others οί the same group, the early Henry Miller
may be called the spiritual father οί the currents under discussion. It
has been said οί him that he is "more than a writer or an artist, a kind
οί collective phenomenon οί his epoch-an incarnate and vociferous
phenomenon, a raw manifestation οί the anguish, the furious despair,
and the infinite horror extending behind the crumbling faςade."5 It is
the sense οί a tabula rasa, the cosmic silence, the void, the end οί a
whole epoch, "ίη a prophet who proclaims the end οί a world at the
very moment when it is flowering and radiating, at the apogee οί its
grandeur and its pestilential contagion."
Miller himself wrote these characteristic words: "From the beginning it was never anything but chaos: it was a fluid which enveloped
me, which Ι breathed ίη through the gills."6 'Ά stone forest the center
οί which was chaos"7 is the sensation οί the ambience ίη which today's
man moves. "Sometimes ίη the dead center, ίη that very heart οί chaos,
Ι danced or drank myself silly, or Ι made love, or Ι befriended someone,

Ι

-

1

1n the World Where God 1s Dead

or Ι planned a new
and bewildering."g
Α

partly conveJ
Hermann Hesse ρυ
feel burned by a d
surroundings. Α w
sations, a rage aga
and a wish to dest
or myself-and to
Ι have always mOS1
complacent health
the mediocre, norn
enfants de l'absura
not fought .... Η:
are more than any
the senselessness ο
to us that God has
are not embittered;
When we were bor
The heritage (
been translated, ίι
forms οί life as it
any social-revoluti.
can change things.
als who condemn ]
"Work, read, prep.
ηο thanks, that's n
the end result at w~
after its triumph, a
it quite plain after 1
has betrayed its οι
conformism, more
It is not neces:
traumatized existe
οί modern progre!
value as symptom.

From the Precursors of Nihilism to the "Lost Youth"

dered
11 the
d fregless.
lte or
lilieu,
nbers
19 the

rs, to
ers to
alcotitous
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Υ this

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5

It is

1 οί a
at the
οί its

)eglll:loped
:enter
)day's
:haos,
leone,

25

or Ι planned a new life, but it was all chaos, all stone, and all hopeless
and bewildering."8
Α partly convergent testimony from another direction is that which
Hermann Hesse puts into the mouth οί one οί his characters: "I'd rather
feel burned by a diabolic pain than to live ίη these sanely temperate
surroundings. Α wild desire flares υρ ίη me for intense emotions, sensations, a rage against this whole toneless, flat, normal, sterilized life,
and a wish to destroy something-perhaps a warehouse, a cathedral,
or myself-and to commit outrageous follies .... This ίη fact is what
Ι have always most hated, abhorred, and cursed: this satisfaction, this
complacent healthiness, this plump bourgeois optimism, this life οί
the mediocre, normal, common man."9 Paul van den Bosch, ίη his Les
enfants de /'absurde, wrote: "We are the ghosts οί a war that we have
not fought .... Having opened our eyes οη a disenchanted world, we
are more than any others the children οί the absurd. Οη certain days,
the senselessness οί the world weighs οη us like a deformity. It seems
to us that God has died οί old age, and we exist without a goal. ... We
are not embittered; we start from zero. We were born among the ruins.
When we were born, the gold was already transmuted into lead."lO
The heritage οί the precursors οί European nihilism has largely
been translated, ίη these movements οί ruined youth, into the crude
forms οί life as it is lived. Αη important trait here is the absence οί
any social-revolutionary motive and the belief that ηο organized action
can change things. That is the difference from the l~ft-wing intellectuals who condemn bourgeois society, and from the nihilists οί the past.
"Work, read, prepare ίη groups, believe, then have your back brokenηο thanks, that's not for me," says one οί Kerouac's characters. This is
the end result at which the "revolution" οί the left has practically arrived
after its triumph, after passing the phase οί simple revolt. Camus made
it quite plain after the period οί his communist illusions: The revolution
has betrayed its origins with the constitution οί new yokes and a new
conformism, more obtuse and absurd than ever.
It is not necessary to dwell any further οη these testimonies οί a
traumatized existence, nor οη those whom one might call the "martyrs
οί modern progress." As Ι have said, all that interests us here is their
value as symptomatic indices οί the times. The forms mentioned here

=
26

1n the World Where God Is Dead

have also degenerated into extravagant and ephemeral fashions. But
there is ηο denying the causal and necessary connection that unites
them to the world where "God is dead" and ηο substitute has yet been
found for him. When these forms pass, others οί the same type will
certainly crop up, according to circumstances, until the present cycle
is exhausted.

Ει

The S
and tl

It is an important
shown such indiffel
it is time to broadc
evasion and anestb
the meaning οί exi
.
.
ern SOClOeconomlc
οί Marxist-commu
within the orbit οΙ
proportions than tt.
acute and undisgui:
Ι have already ~
is the interpretatior
the processes that ι::
ress. This basis is e
ίη that οί communj
relationship, which
It is easier to f
the communist my
explicit reference t(
the communist my
the phenomena οί :
phenomena are re4

lions. But
h.at unites
.s yet been
type will
:sent cycle

5

Disguises of
European Nihilism
The Socioeconomic Myth
and the Protest Movement

It is an important fact that some οί the young people ίη crisis have
shown such indifference to the prospects οί social revolution. But now
it is time to broaden our horizons by showing the particular type οί
evasion and anesthetization, οη the part οί a humanity that has lost
the meaning οί existence, that lurks behind the varieties οί the modern socioeconomic myth, both that οί Western "prosperity" and that
οί Marxist-communist ideology. Ιη both cases, we still find ourselves
within the orbit οί nihilism, and a nihilism οί far more spectacular
proportions than those οί the extremist groups where the crisis remains
acute and undisguised. 1
Ι have already shown that the actual basiS"Of the myth ίη question
is the interpretation, οη the part οί a well-organized historiography, οί
the processes that prepared for European nihilism as constituting progress. This basis is essentially identical both ίη the "Western" myth and
ίη that οί communism. But the two οί them are ίη a kind οί dialectical
relationship, which reveals their true existential significance.
It is easier to find the elements that betray this ultimate sense ίη
the communist myth, because οί its blatant coarseness and its more
explicit reference to the basic motive: the economy. As is well known,
the communist myth takes the form οί a violent polemic against all
the phenomena οί spiritual crisis that Ι have treated υρ to now. These
phenomena are recognized, certainly, but are blamed οη bourgeois

27

=
28

1n the World Where God 15 Dead

decadence, the fin de siecle, and anarchic individualism: the symptoms
of bourgeois elements alienated from reality. These are supposed to be
the terminal stages of decomposition of a doomed economic system,
that of capitalism. The crisis is thus presented exclusively as one of values and ideals serving as superstructure to that system, which, having become hypocritical and deceptive, have nothing more to do with
the practical conduct of individuals or with the driving forces of the
epoch. Humanity's existentiallesion is generally explained as an effect
of material, economic organization ίη a society such as the capitalist
one. The true remedy, the start of a "new and authentic humanism," a
human integrity and a "happiness never known before," would then be
furnished by the setting υρ of a different socioeconomic system, by the
abolition of capitalism, aoo by the institution of a communist society
of workers, such as is taking place ίη the Soviet area. Karl Marx had
already praised ίη communism "the real appropriation of the human
essence οη the part of man and for the sake of man, the return of man
to himself as a social being, thus as a human man,"2 seeing ίη it the
equivalent of a perfect naturalism and even a true humanism.
Ιη its radical forms, wherever this myth is affirmed through the
control of movements, organizations, and people, it is linked to a corresponding education, a sort of psychic lobotomy intended methodically
to neutralize and infantilize any form of higher sensibility and interest,
every way of thought that is not ίη terms of the economy and socioeconomic processes. Behind the myth is the most terrible void, which
acts as the worst opiate yet administered to a rootless humanity. Yet
this deception is ηο different from the myth of prosperity, especially
ίη the form it has taken ίη the West. Oblivious of the fact that they are
living οη a volcano, materially, politically, and ίη relation to the struggle for world domination, Westerners enjoy a technological euphoria,
encouraged by the prospects of the "second industrial revolution" of
the atomic age.
Ι have mentioned a type of dialectic that leads to the demolition
of this theory from the inside, insofar as ίη the communist world the
myth has drawn most of its energy from a misrepresentation. The idea
of states ίη which "individual" problems and "decadent" crises ηο lοη­
ger exist is presented as something οηlΥ to be attained ίη the future,

whereas thes
and the Νοη
the moment
proletarian h
Western soci
a climate of ]
plentiful, eas
does not con
lege of an U]
property of a
same, and ίη
sions the so-,
At all evc
economic idl
misery can b
rial want, ar
tem. Theyas
proletariat tl
nomic condit
dom from w
of existence.
can be lacki1
is ηο correla
lowest and d
human happ
well-being th
epochs of ma
Toynbee has
and spiritual
that awaken~
not paradoxi
difficult for b
attenuate an,
to prove him
ter ίη such si
natural selec1

Disguises of European Nihilism

mptoms
ed to be
system,
e οί valch, havdo with
:8 οί the
ιη effect
apitalist
rιism," a
Ι then be
1, by the
t society
.arx had
: human
l οί man
ίη it the
lugh the
a correIodically
interest,
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ility. Yet
Ipecially
theyare
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tion" οί
molition
'orld the
rheidea
; ηο lοη­
: future,

29

whereas these are the very conditions that already obtain ίη the West
and the Nordic countries. It is the fascination οί a goal that vanishes at
the moment one reaches it. Ιη fact, the future socioeconomic ideal οί
proletarian humanity already exists, spiritually bought and paid for, ίη
Western society, where, to the shame οί Marx and Engels' prognosis,
a climate οί prosperity has spread to vast social strata ίη the form οί a
plentiful, easy, and comfortable existence-a condition that Marxism
does not condemn as such, but οηlΥ because it thinks οί it as the privilege οί an upper class οί capitalist "exploiters," not as the common
property οί a homogenized society. But the horizons are essentially the
same, and ίη regard to recent developments, we shall see what conclusions the so-called protest movement has drawn from them.
At all events, the error and the illusion are the same ίη both socioeconomic ideologies, namely the serious assumption that existential
misery can be reduced to suffering ίη one way or another from material want, and to impoverishment due to a given socioeconomic system. They assume that misery is greater among the disinherited or the
proletariat than among those living ίη prosperous or privileged economic conditions, and that it will consequently diminish with the "freedom from want" and the general advance οί the material conditions
οί existence. The truth οί the matter is that the meaning οί existence
can be lacking as much ίη one group as ίη the other, and that there
is ηο correlation between material and spiritual misery. ΟηΙΥ to the
lowest and dullest levels οί society can one Ρre;;ιch the formula for all
human happiness and wholeness as the well-named "animal ideal," a
well-being that is little better than bovine. Hegel rightly wrote that the
epochs οί material well-being are blank pages ίη the history book, and
Toynbee has shown that the challenge to mankind οί environmentally
and spiritually harsh and problematic conditions is often the incentive
that awakens the creative energies οί civilization. 3 Ιη some cases, it is
not paradoxical to say that the man οί good will should try to make life
difficult for his neighbor! It is a commonplace that all the higher virtues
attenuate and atrophy under easy conditions, when man is not forced
to prove himself ίη some way; and ίη the final analysis it does not matter ίη such situations ίί a good number fall away and are lost through
natural selection. Andre Breton was right when he wrote that "we must

•
30 1n the World Where God Is Dead

prevent the artificial precariousness of social conditions from concealing the real precariousness of the human condition."
But to avoid straying too far from my argument, the point is that the
most acute forms οί the modern existential crisis are appearing today at
the margin of a civilization of prosperity, as witness the currents ίη the
new generation that have been described. One sees there rebellion, disgust, and anger manifesting not ίη a wretched and oppressed subproletariat but often ίη young people who lack nothing, even ίη millionaires'
children. And among other things it is a significant fact, statistically
proven, that suicide is much rarer ίη poor countries than ίη rich ones,
showing that the problematic life is felt more ίη the latter than ίη the
former. Blank despair can occur right up to the finishing-post οί socioeconomic messianism, asin the musical comedy about a utopian island
where they have everything, "fun, women, and whiskey," but also the
ever-recurrent sense οί the emptiness οί existence, the sense that something is still missing.
There exists, therefore, ηο correlation, except possibly a negative
one, between the meaning of life and conditions οί economic wellbeing. There is a famous example, not recent but from the traditional
world, οί the Buddha Shakyamuni. He who οη a metaphysical plane
radically denounced the emptiness οί existence and the deceptions οί
the "god of life," pointing out the way of spiritual awakening, was not
a victim οί oppression and hunger, not a representative οί social strata
like the plebeians οί the Roman empire, to whom the revolutionary
sermons οί Christianity were first addressed; no, he was οί the race
of princes, ίη all the splendor οί his power and all the fullness οί his
youth. The true significance οί the socioeconomic myth, ίη any οί its
forms, is as a means οί internal anesthetization or prophylaxis, aimed
at evading the problem οί an existence robbed οί any meaning and at
consolidating ίη every way the fundamental insignificance οί modern
man's life. We may therefore speak either οί an opiate that is much more
real than that which, according to the Marxists, was fed to a humanity as yet unillumined and unevolved, mystified by religious beliefs, or,
from another point οί view, οί the organized method οί an active nihilism. The prospects ίη a goodly part οί today's world are more or less
those that Zarathustra attributed to the "last man": "The time is near

οί

the most
last man "c
happiness, 1
where life ί1
Ιη this
heavy with
It took its J
the wake ο]
there is a b
between thl
capitalist w
letarian re,
realized, ίη;
tem, being;
geois: the v
But alongsil
lng power (
to destroy a
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vidual ίη cc
expensive,
that this evl
freedom. TJ
ings οί the
tionary Ma
a "global Ρ
lacks any h
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outsiders, ο
World (ίη w
being the ΟΙ
nothingnes!
ground,'" ο
selves frene1
way the gen
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1m conceal-

lt is that the
ng today at
rents ίη the
)ellion, disd subprolelillionaires'
statistically
ι rich ones,
than ίη the
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)ut also the
that some-

. a negative
Iomic welltraditional
rsical plane
'ceptions σί
ng, was not
ocial strata
volutionary
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η any οί its
axis, aimed
ning and at
οί modern
muchmore
D a human; beliefs, or,
lctive nihilnore or less
:ime is near

Disguises of European Nihilism
οί

31

the most despicable οί men, who can ηο longer despise himself," the
last man 'Όί the tenacious and pullulating race." "We have invented
happiness, say the last men with a wink," having "abandoned the lands
where life is hard."4
lη this context, there is another more recent phenomenon that is
heavy with significance: that οί the so-called global protest movement.
It took its rise ίη part from the order οί ideas already mentioned. lη
the wake οί theories such as Marcuse's, it came to the conclusion that
there is a basic similarity, ίη terms σί technological consumer society,
between the system οί advanced communist countries and that οί the
capitalist world, because ίη the former, the original impulse οί the proletarian revolution is much diminished. This impulse has now been
realized, inasmuch as the working class has entered the consumer system, being assured οί a lifestyle that is ηο longer proletarian but bourgeois: the very thing whose absence was the incentive for revolution.
But alongside this convergence there has become visible the conditioning power σί one and the same "system," manifesting as the tendency
to destroy all the higher values οί life and personality. At the level more
or less corresponding to the "last man" foreseen by Nietzsche, the individual ίη contemporary consumer society reckons that it would be too
expensive, indeed absurd, to do without the comfort and well-being
that this evolved society offers him, merely for the sake οί an abstract
freedom. Thus he accepts with a good grace all the leveling conditionings οί the system. This realization has cau~ed a bypassing οί revolutionary Marxism, now deprived σί its original motive force, ίη favor σί
a "global protest" against the system. This movement, however, also
lacks any higher principle: it is irrational, anarchic, and instinctive ίη
character. For want σί anything else, it calls οη the abject minorities σί
outsiders, οη the excluded and rejected, sometimes even ση the Third
World (ίη which case Marxist fantasies reappear) and ση the blacks, as
being the οηlΥ revolutionary potential. But it stands under the sign οί
nothingness: it is a hysterical "revolution σί the void and the 'underground,'" οί "maddened wasps trapped ίη a glass jar, who throw themselves frenetically against the walls." lη all οί this it confirms ίη another
way the general nihilistic character οί the epoch, and indeed οη a much
larger scale, for the current protest is ηο longer that οί the individuals

•
32 1n the World Where God 1s Dead

and small groups mentioned earlier, whose intellectuallevel was indubitably higher. 5
Another point should be mentioned, at least cursorily, ίη the current climate of dissolution. The collapse of superstructures-of all that
can henceforth only be regarded as superstructures-did not manifest
only ίη the sociological form of denouncing the lies and hypocrisy of
bourgeois life (as ίη Max Nordau, or as ίη the words of Relling to
Gregers ίη Ibsen: "Why do you use that odd word 'ideals'? We have our
own perfectly good word: 'lies"')6 or ίη moral and philosophical nihilism. It is prolonged and completed today by means of a science that,
though false and contaminating if applied to men of other times and
other civilizations, has the power of persuasion when applied to traumatized modern man; this science is none other than psychoanalysis. The
impassioned effort of that philosopher who sought out the secret origin,
the "genealogy" of predominant moral values at the very roots of all
those vital impulses that morality avoids or condemns, who sought thus
to "naturalize" morality by denying it any autonomous or preeminent
dignity, this impassioned effort has given place to the cold, cynical, and
"scientific" methods of "depth psychology," of the exploration of the
subconscious and the unconscious. Ιη the latter, the irrational subsoil
of existence, it has recognized the motive force essential to the whole
life of the soul; from that it deduces the proofs that make an illusion
of the upper world of moral and social conscience with all its values,
all its inhibitions and prohibitions, and its hysterical will to dominate.
Meanwhile, ίη the subterranean zone nothing is at work but a mess of
compulsions toward pleasure and death: Lustprinzip and Todestrieb?
This, as everyone knows, is the essence of Freudianism. Other psychoanalytic currents that diverge ίη part from Freud are not substantially different. The evident theme ίη all of them is the regression to the
psychic subsoil, together with a profound traumatization of the human
personality. It is one further aspect of contemporary nihilism, and,
moreover, the symptom of a sickly consciousness, too weak to hold ίη
check the lower regions of the soul with their so-called archetypes, and
which might well be compared to Goethe's "world of the Mothers."g
It is hardly worth pointing out how these destructions converge
with the atmosphere of another typical genre of contemporary litera-

ture, ίη
with th;
absurd 4
the actu
foundat
filled da
Thi~

speculat
Ι wish ι
truth di
more de
Europe2
death oJ

Disguises of European Nihilism

33

ture, ίη which the sense οί the "spectrality οί existence" is associated
with that οί an obscure, incomprehensible destiny, a fatality, and an
absurd condemnation hanging over man's eternal solitude, taken to be
the actual human condition. It is like the sense οί an incomprehensible
foundation οί human life that fades into impenetrable and anguishfilled darkness.
This theme, shown ίη its typical form by Kafka, is not foreign to
speculative existentialism, to which Ι shall return ίη due course. What
Ι wish to underline at this point is that we are not dealing with a
truth discovered by someone who "has been able to feel more and see
more deeply"; it is merely what is perceived ίη the very atmosphere οί
European nihilism, and οί a humanity that has taken shape after the
death οί God.

6
Active Nihilism
Nietzsche
We can now return to the problem that really interests us. Ιη all the
critical situations treated υρ to now, their predominant trait is that of
being the obje,fts, indeed the victims, of the destructive processes set ίη
motion: processes which are simply suffered by current humanity. This
holds good both for those who have adapted to a life based οη nothing and lacking any true direction, helping themselves with a system of
anesthetics and surrogates, and eventually resorting to the surviving
forms of a secure bourgeois existence, and for those who feel the existential crisis of modern man ίη all of their being, and are consequently
driven toward the kinds of revolt or risky existence that were mentioned
above.
This applies, therefore, to the vast majority of our contemporaries.
Ιη contrast, there is a different and much smaller category of modern
men who, instead of submitting to the nihilist processes, seek to accept
them actively. Ιη particular, there are those who not οηlΥ admit that
the processes of dissolution are irreversible and that there is ηο going
back, but who would not want to follow that path even if it existed.
They willingly accept their condition of being without support or roots.
Then the problem arises of how far the negative can be transformed
into something positive.
Το someone who has the necessary character to assume such an
attitude, the possibility opens of a new interpretation of the adventure
of mankind wanting to be free, and of the crisis that is the consequence
of this adventure. Thus arises the idea of a trial, and of destructions
that are simply the consequence of not being equal to it, or as one might
say, not being equal to one's own action. Those who are interested may

34

Active Nihilism

35

recall the ancient myths concerning an audacious sacrilege ίη which it
is not the sacrilege ίη itself that brings about the ruin οί some symbolic
personage, but lack οί the necessary dignity or strength to accomplish
an act that frees one from the divine bonds.
The special human type who concerns us here and who partially fits
the category ίη question may adopt the same point οί view. As we recall,
his differentiated character consists ίη facing the problems οί modern
man without being a "modern man" himself; he belongs to a different
world and preserves within himself a different existential dimension.
Unlike the others, his problem is not the dramatic search for a basis (ίη
principle, he already possesses one), but that οί his own expression and
confirmation ίη the modern epoch, ίη his life here and now.
With this human type ίη mind, let us examine the theme οί "positive
nihilism," or, ίί one prefers, the transition to the postnihilist stage. Since
it is better to do so from a standpoint inside the modern world, rather
than outside it, we can take as a provisional basis some οί Nietzsche's
fundamental ideas, to test their solidity. We may find, ίη fact, that the
more recent exponents οί modern thought have gone little further than
Nietzsche ίη their search for a new meaning οί life, despite all that is
inconsistent and negative ίη his philosophy.
Nietzsche considered himself "the first perfect nihilist ίη Europe,
because he has already overcome nihilism, having lived it ίη his soulhaving it behind himself, beneath himself, outside himself."l Having
seen that "nihilism is the final, logical conclusion οί our great values
and ideals," and having asserted that "we must pass through this nihilism ίη order to grasp the true nature οί the 'values' οί the past,"2 he
nevertheless considered nihilism as "a pathological, transitional stage"3
and proclaimed the "countermovement" that was destined to supplant
it, without giving up the ground already won.
Nietzsche showed that the point at which one realizes that "God is
dead," that the whole world οί "spirit," οί good and evil, is only an illusion, and that the only true world is that which was negated or rejected
ίη the name οί the former, is the crux οί a decisive test. "The weak shatter, the strong destroy what does not shatter them, while those stronger
still go beyond the values that once served them."4 Nietzsche calls this
the "tragic phase" οί nihilism, which leads to a reversal οί perspectives;

36 1n the World Where God 15 Dead

nihilism at this point appears as a sign of strength, signifying "that the
power to create, to will, has developed far enough that one has ηο further need for this general interpretation (of existence), of this introduction of a meaning (into it)."S ''1t is a measure of one's strength of will
to know how far one can do without a meaning to things, how far one
can bear to live ίη a meaningless world: for then one will organize part
of it."6 Nietzsche calls this positive pessimism, or "the pessimism of
strength,"7 and makes it the premise of a higher ethic. ''1f at first man
needed a god, now he is thrilled with a universal, godless disorder, with
a world of chance, where the fearful, the ambiguous, and the seductive
are part of his very existence." Ιη this world once again made "pure"
and uniquely itself he stands erect, "conqueror of God and of nothingness."8 The probtem of the meaning of life is thus resolved with the
affirmation that life is and can be a value ίη itself.
This brings us to the precise point made above. The significance
of all the crises of recent times can be summarized as follows: a man
wanted to be free, for whom a life of freedom could spell only ruin. Το
say "God is dead" is only an emotional way of stating the basic fact
of the epoch. But Nietzsche himself remarks that having "killed God,
wasn't that perhaps rather too grand of us? Shouldn't we become gods
ίη order to be worthy of it?"9 After recognizing that "nothing exists,
all is permitted,"lO and the "freedom of the spirit," the inevitable consequence is the challenge: "Now prove the nobility of your nature."
Α famous passage of Zarathustra gives the most pregnant formulation to the essence of the crisis. 'Ύου call yourself free? Let me hear
your ruling thoughts, and not that you have escaped bondage. Are you
one who deserved to escape from it? There are many who threw away
their only worth when they threw away their servitude. Free from what?
Why should Zarathustra care? Your eyes should answer plainly: free
{or what?"ll And Zarathustra warns that it will be terrible to be alone,
without any laws from above oneself, alone with one's own freedom
ίη a desert place and an icy air, judge and avenger of one's own law.
For him who only acquires any worth by serving, for him who had ίη
his bonds not a cause of paralysis but a support, solitude appears as a
curse; he loses courage and his initial pride deflates. These are the sentiments, continues Zarathustra, that then assail the free man, and that

Active Nihilism

37

will not fail to kill him ίί he does not kill them first. Ιη precise terms,
and from a higher point οί view, this is the essential ground οί modern
man's unhappiness.
Dos1Oyevsky points out the same thing ίη analogous fashion: it is
Kirilov's doctrine. The framework is identical: "Man only invented
God so that he could live without killing himself. And this is the history οί mankind from its origins υρ 10 the present day," says Kirilov. 12
The implication is plain: it is a necessity for man to have a center, a
basic value. When he did not find it within himself, he placed it outside
himself, projecting it onto God, whom he supposed to exist, certainly,
but incarnated ίη an ''other,'' and faith ίη this other provisionally solved
the existential problem. Naturally this is not really, as Kirilov says, the
whole meaning οί the history οί mankind; it is only that οί the devotional phase οί a theistic religion, a phase that already represents a disintegration οί the world οί Tradition and precedes the critical point
οί metaphysical breakdown οί which Ι have spoken. The eyes οί the
"free man" Kirilov are open: "Ι don't want to believe. Ι know that God
doesn't exist, and can't exist." The consequence is therefore "If God
does not exist, Ι am God .... Το recognize that there is ηο God and not
10 recognize at the same time that one has become God is an absurdity
and an incongruity, because otherwise one would not fail to kill oneself." One can dispense with the suicide that is an obsession οί Kirilov's
lucid folly, and speak simply οί breakdown, disintegration, becoming
10st ίη meaninglessness. Ιη the face οί this situatiq.n, terror and anguish
arise: ''He's like a wretch who has received a legacy but takes fright and
won't set his hand to it, because he doesn't think himself worthy οί it."
We should not take seriously the act with which Kirilov thinks he can
destroy his terror ίη the face οί the divine legacy that he should accept,
demonstrating at the same time "his divinity." And we can set aside all
this emphatic talk οί God and being God, ίοι the real problem posed
here is one οί values, and οί "being free for what?"
Nothing better characterizes failure ίη the crucial test, the negative result οί the nihilistic experience, than the sentiment expressed by
Sartre ίη these words: "We are condemned to be free."13 Man takes
absolute freedom for himself, but he can only feel this freedom as a
condemnation. Metaphysical anguish is its counterpart.

38

1n the World Where God 15 Dead

Later we shall examine the specific themes of existentialism. For
now, we shall see what can be retained of Nietzsche's views, not as a
nihilist but as one who thought that he had left nihilism behind him,
and thus created the premises for a higher existence and a new state of
health.
Once the idols have fallen, good and evil have been surpassed,
along with all the surrogates of the old God, and the mist has lifted
from one's eyes, nothing is left to Nietzsche but "this world," life, the
body; he remains "faithful to the earth." Thereupon, as we know,
the theme of the superman appears. "God is dead, now we want the
superman to come."14 The superman will be the meaning of the earth,
the justification of existence. Man is "a bridge, not a goal," "a rope
stretched bttween the brute and the superman, a rope stretched above
an abyss."15 This is not the place for a deep analysis of the manifold
and divergent themes that crystallize ίη Nietzsche's work around this
central motif. The essential can be spelled out as follows.
The negative, destructive phase of Nietzsche's thought ends with
the affirmation of immanence: all transcendent values, systems of ends
and of higher truths, are interpreted as functions of life. Ιη its turn, the
essence of life-and more generally of nature-is the will to power.
The superman is also defined as a function of the will to power and
domination. One can see from this that Nietzsche's nihilism stops halfway. It sets up a new table of values, including a good and an evil.
It presents a new ideal with dogmatic affirmation, whereas ίη reality this ideal is οηlΥ one of many that could take shape ίη "life," and
which is not ίη fact justified ίη and of itself, without a particular choice
and without faith ίη it. The fact that the fixed point of reference set
up beyond nihilism lacks a true foundation so long as one insists οη
pure immanence is already apparent ίη the part of Nietzsche's thought
that deals with historical criticism and sociology. The entire world of
"higher" values is interpreted there as reflecting a "decadence." But at
the same time these values are seen as the weapons of a hidden will
to power οη the part of a certain human group, which has used them
to hamper another group whose life and ideals resemble those of the
superman. The instinct of decadence itself is then presented as a special
variety of the will to power. Now, it is obvious that ίη function of a

Active Nihilism

39

mere will to power, all distinctions vanish: there are ηο more supermen or sheep-men, neither affirmers nor negators of life. There is only
a variety of techniques, of means (far from being reducible to sheer
physical force), tending to make one human class or another prevail;
means that are indiscriminately called good ίη proportion to their success. If ίη life and the history of civilization there exist phases of rise
and decline, phases of creation and destruction and decadence, what
authorizes us to ascribe value to one rather than to the others? Why
should decadence be an evil? It is all life, and all justifiable ίη terms
of life, if this is truly taken ίη its irrational, naked reality, outside any
theology or teleology, as Nietzsche would have wished. Even "antinature" and "violence against life" enter ίηto it. Once again, all firm
ground gives way.
Nietzsche moreover wanted to restore its "innocence" to becoming by freeing it from all finality and intentionality, so as to free man
and let him walk οη his own feet-the same Nietzsche who had justly
criticized and rejected evolutionism and Darwinism because he could
see that the higher figures and types of life are only sporadic and fortuituous cases. 16 They are positions that man gains only ίη order to lose
them, and they create ηο continuity because they consist of beings who
are more than usually exposed to danger and destruction. The philosopher himself ends with a finalistic concession when, ίη order to give
meaning to present-day humanity, he proposes the hypothetical future
man ίη the guise of the superman: a goal wort~ dedicating oneself to,
and even sacrificing oneself and dying for. Mutatis mutandis, things
here are not very different from the Marxist-communist eschatology,
ίη which the mirage of a future human condition after the worldwide
revolution serves to give meaning to everything inflicted οη the man of
today ίη the areas controlled by this ideology. This is a flagrant contradiction of the demands of a life that is its own meaning. The second
point is that the pure affirmation of life does not necessarily coincide
with the will to power ίη the strict, qualitative sense, nor with the affirmation of the superman.
Thus Nietzsche's solution is only a pseudosolution. Α true nihilism
does not spare even the doctrine of the superman. What is left, if one
wants to be radical and follow a line of strict coherence, and what we

40

In the World Where God Is Dead

can accept ίη our investigations, is the idea that Nietzsche expressed
through the symbol οί the eternal return. It is the affirmation, now truly
unconditional, οί all that is and οί all that one is, οί one's own nature
and one's own situation. It is the attitude οί one whose self-affirmation
and self-identity come from the very roots οί his being; who is not scared
but exalted by the prospect that for an indefinite repetition οί identical
cosmic cycles he has been what he is, and will be again, innumerable
times. Naturally we are dealing with nothing more than a myth, which
has the simple, pragmatic value οί a test οί strength. But there is another
view that ίη fact leads beyond the world οί becoming and toward an
eternalization οί the being. Nietzsche differs little from Neoplatonism
when he says: "For everything to return is the closest approximation οί
a world οί becoming'"to a world οί being."17 And also: "Το impose the
character οί being υροη becoming is the supreme test οί power."18 At its
base, this leads to an opening beyond immanence unilaterally conceived,
and toward the feeling that "all things have been baptized ίη the font οί
eternity and beyond good and evil."19 The same thing was taught ίη the
world οί Tradition; and it is uncontestable that a confused thirst for eternity runs through Nietzsche's works, even opening to certain momentary ecstasies. One recalls Zarathustra invoking "the joy that wills the
eternity οί everything, a deep eternity"20 like the heavens above, "pure,
profound abyss οί light."21

7
"Being Oneself"

For now we must set aside such allusions to a higher dimension οί experience οί a liberated world ίη order 10 define more precisely what such a
vision οί existence offers us ίη realistic terms. It is, ίη fact, the principle
of purely being oneself. This is what remains after the elimination οί
what philosophy calls "heteronomous morality," or morality based οη
an external law or command. Nietzsche said this about it: "They call
you destroyers οί morality, but you are οηlΥ the discoverers οί yourselves";l and also: "We must liberate ourselves from morality so that
we can live morally."2 ΒΥ the latter phrase, he means living according to
one's own law, the law defined by one's own nature. (This may result ίη
the way οί the superman, but οηlΥ as a very special case.)
This is οη the same lines as the "au1onomous morality" οί Kant's
categorical imperative, but with the difference that the command is
absolutely internal, separate from any external mover, and is not based
οη a hypothetical law extracted from practical reason that is valid for
all and revealed 10 man's conscience as such, but rather οη one's own
specific being.
Nietzsche himself often presented these issues as though they were
equivalent to naturalism. One frequently finds ίη him the simplistically
physiological and materialistic interpretation οί human nature, but it
is basically inauthentic, accessory, and prompted by his well-known
polemic against "pure spirit." lη fact, Nietzsche saw deeper than that,
and did not stop at the physical being when he spoke οί the "greater
reason"3 contained ίη the body and opposed 10 the lesser reason: that
which "does not say Ι, but is Ι," and which uses the "spirit" and even
the senses as "little 100ls and 1oYs." It is a "powerfullord, an unknown
sage that is called oneself (Selbst}," "the guiding thread οί the Ι that
suggests all its ideas to it," which "looks with the eyes οί the senses and
41

42

In the World Where God Is Dead

listens with the ears οί the spirit." He is not speaking here οί the physis
but οί the "being" ίη the full ontological significance οί the word. The
term he uses, das Selbst, can also be rendered by "the Self" as opposed
to the Ι (Ich): an opposition that recalls that οί the traditional doctrines
already mentioned between the supra-individual principle οί the person
and that which they call the "physical Ι"
Once the crude physiological interpretation is cleared away, there
emerges a valid attitude for the man who must stay standing as a free
being, even ίη the epoch οί dissolution: to assume his own being into
a willing, making it his own law, a law as absolute and autonomous as
Kant's categorical imperative, but affirmed without regard for received
values, for "good" or "evil," nor for happiness, pleasure, or pain.
(Nietzsche too -regarded hedonism and eudaemonism, the abstract,
inorganic search for pleasure and happiness, as symptoms οί weakening and decadence.) The man ίη question affirms and actualizes his
own being without considering rewards or punishments, either here
or ίη an afterlife, saying: "The way does not exist: this is my will, neither good nor bad, but my OWIl."4 lη short, Nietzsche hands οη the
ancient sayings "Be yourself," "Become what you are,"5 as propositions for today, when all superstructure has fragmented. We shall see
that the existentialists take υρ a similar theme, albeit less confidently.
Stirner is, however, not to be counted among its antecedents, because
ίη his idea οί the "Unique" there is virtually ηο opening οί the deepest
dimensions οί existence. One has to go back to Μ. Guyau, who equally
posed the problem οί a line οί conduct beyond any sanction or duty; he
wrote: ''Authoritarian metaphysics and religion are leading-strings for
babies: it's time to walk by oneself. ... We should look for revelation
ίη ourselves. Christ is ηο more: each οί us must be Christ for himself,
and be joined to God as far as he will or can be, or even deny God."6 It
is as though faith still existed, but "without a heaven waiting for us or
a positive law to guide us," as a simple state. Strength and responsibility must be ηο less than they were long ago, when they were born from
religious faith and from a given point οί support, ίη a different human
type and a different climate. Nietzsche's idea is identical.
For our part, ίί this system is to be made acceptable as valid for
the problem ίη hand, every unspoken but limiting implication has to

"Being Oneself"

43

be eliminated from it, everything from which one might draw a new,
illusory support.
Post-Rousseau anarchic doctrines were already characterized by
premises οί this kind: the nihilism οί the anarchist classics had as its
counterpart the supposition οί the fundamental goodness οί human
nature. Guyau, who has just been quoted, offers another example. He
sought to found a morality "without sanctions or obligations," a "free"
morality, οη "life."7 But his notion οί life was not the naked, authentic
life free from attributes, but rather a life conceived as preventively and
arbitrarily moralized or sterilized, a life ίη which certain tendencies
are taken for granted: expansion, altruism, superabundance. Guyau
formulated a new idea οί duty: a duty that derived from power, from
the life impulse, from the sense οί one's own strength "that demands to
be exercised"g ('Ί can, therefore Ι must"). Its limitation becomes obvious when Guyau endows the expansive life impulse with an exclusively
positive, even a social character, while presenting pure self-affirmation,
expansion not toward others and for others but against them, as a selfnegation and a contradiction οί life, opposed to its natural expressive
motion οί increase and enrichment. It is enough to ask what could ever
prevent a life that wanted to "negate" or "contradict" itself from doing
so, and what would be censurable ίί it decided to take this route, to realize that Guyau has by ηο means made a tabula rasa, but has furtively
introduced restrictions that more or less return to one οί the systems οί
the old morality that he intended to supersede, b~cause he recognized
their vulnerability to nihilist criticism.
The elimination οί every presupposition also causes a crisis for
much οί the Nietzschean doctrine οί the superman, which is ηο less
unilateral because οί its frequent emphasis οη aspects οί life contrary
to those just posited by Guyau: will to power, hardness, and so οη. Ιη
all strictness, to be purely oneself and to have a fully free existence, one
should be able to accept, will, and say an absolute ''yes'' to whatever
one is-even when there is nothing ίη one's nature that approaches the
ideal οί the superman; even ίί one's own life and destiny do not present
heroism, nobility, splendor, generosity, and altruism, but decadence,
corruption, debility, and perversion. Α distant reflection οί this path
is to be found even ίη the Christian world, ίη Calvinism. It is the

44

1n the World Where God 15 Dead

doctrine of fal1en man, broken by original sin but redeemed through
"faith"; of man simultaneously justified and a sinner, ίη the face of the
Absolute. But ίη the world without God, the result of such an attitude
is to leave one to oneself ίη an extreme trial of strength and denudation of the Ι. Hence the Nietzschean claim of having "rediscovered
the way that leads to a yes and a ηο: Ι teach you to say yes to al1 that
strengthens, that gathers energy, that justifies the feeling of vigor."9
This claim is justified only when the corresponding command is transposed, internalized, and purified, detached from any specific content
and especially from any reference to a greater or lesser vitality. It is
rather a matter of either being capable or incapable of holding firm
within, ίη one's own naked absolute being, with nothing to fear and
nothing to hope fo!":"
At this level, the words about the liberation from every sin may
become valid: "There is ηο place, ηο aim, ηο sense, ίη which we can
be ίη any way unburdened of our own being"10-not ίη the physical
world, nor ίη society, nor ίη God. It is an existential mode. As for the
content of one's own law, as Ι have said, that remains and must remain
undetermined.
We can now summarize the positive gains to be made from the
systems of Nietzsche and other thinkers along the same lines as his. For
our purposes, however, we should remember that this analysis is not
being made ίη the abstract, but ίη view of what may have value, not for
everyone but for α special human type.
This requires some extra considerations, because without this
premise it is easy to see that even the solution of "being oneself" cannot
really serve as a solid foundation. We shall see ίη due course that it is
only a "first-grade solution," but before that there is a difficulty to be
dealt with.
It is clear that the rule of being oneself implies that one can speak
of a "proper nature" for everyone, whatever it may be, as something
well defined and recognizable. But this is problematic, especially at the
present time. It may have been less difficult ίη societies that did not
know individualism, ίη traditional societies organized along groups and
castes where the factors of heredity, birth, and environment favored a
high degree of internal unity and the differentiation of types, and where

"Being Oneself"

45

the natural articulations were reinforced and nurtured by customs, ethics, laws, and sometimes even by ηο less differentiated religious forms.
ΑΙΙ this has long ceased to exist for modern Western man, and has long
been "superseded" along the road οί "liberty"; thus the average modern
man is changeable, unstable, devoid οί any real form. The Pauline and
Faustian lament, "two souls, alas, live ίη my breast,"ll is already an
optimistic assumption; all toο many have to admit, like a typical character ίη Hesse, that they have a multitude οί souls! Nietzsche himself
admitted this state οί affairs when he wrote: ''One should not assume
that many men are 'persons.' There are also men composed οί several
persons, but the majority possess none at all."12 And again: "Become
yourself: an injunction addressed οηlΥ to a few, and which to an even
smaller number appears redundant."13 One can see now how problematic is the very point that has hitherto seemed fixed: fidelity to
oneself, the absolute, autonomous law based οη one's own "being,"
when it is formulated ίη general and abstract terms. Everything is
subject to debate-a situation accurately exemplified by characters ίη
Dostoyevsky, like Raskolnikov or Stavrogin. At the moment when they
are thrown back οη their own naked will, trying to prove it to themselves with an absolute action, they collapse; they collapse precisely
because they are divided beings, because they are deluded concerning their true nature and their real strength. Their freedom is turned
against them and destroys them; they fail at the very point at which
they should have reaffirmed themselves-in th~ir depths they find
nothing to sustain them and carry them forward. We recall the words
οί Stavrogin's testament: ''Ι have tested my strength everywhere, as you
advised me to do ίη order to know myself.... What Ι have never seen,
and still do not see, is what Ι should apply my strength to. ΜΥ desires
lack the energy; they cannot drive me. One can cross a river οη a log,
but not οη a splinter."14 The abyss wins out over Stavrogin, and his
failure is sealed by suicide.
The same problem evidently lurks at the center οί Nietzsche's doctrine οί the will to power. Power ίη itself is formless. It has ηο sense
without the basis οί a given "being," an internal direction, an essential
unity. When that is wanting, everything slides back ίηto chaos. ''Here
is the greatest strength, but it does not know what it is for. The means

ΦΖ

46 1n the World Where God 15 Dead

exist, but they have ηο end." We shall soon see how this situation is
aggravated when the transcendent dimension is activated ίη it.
For the moment, we note that ίη general, the phenomenon οί remorse
is closely linked to the situation οί a divided and self-contradictory
being. Remorse occurs when, despite everything, a central tendency
survives ίη the being and reawakens after actions that have violated or
denied it, arising from secondary impulses that are not strong enough
to completely supplant it. Guyau speaks ίη this sense οί a morality "that
is none other than the unity οί the being," and an immorality that, "οη
the contrary, is a splitting, an opposition οί tendencies that limit one
another." We know Nietzsche's image οί the "pale criminal," a true
mirror οί the Dostoyevskian character just mentioned, "whose action
has paralyzed his poor reason, as a chalk line paralyzes a chicken."15
We have clearly reached the point at which one must go beyond the
"neutral" posing οί the problem. Το continue our agenda, Ι will now
consider a line οί conduct during the reign οί dissolution that is not
suitable for everyone, but for a differentiated type, and especially for
the heir to the man οί the traditional world, who retains his roots ίη
that world even though he finds himself devoid οί any support for it ίη
his outer existence.

The Transcendent Dimension
"Life" and "More Than Life"
ΟηΙΥ

this kind of man can use those positiνe aspects gleaned from
the preceding analysis as his elementary basis, because when he looks
within himself, he does not find a changeable and diνided substance,
but a fundamental direction, a "dominant," eνen though shrouded or
limited by secondary impulses. What is more, the essential thing is that
such α man is characterized by an existential dimension not present in
the predominant human type of recent times-that is, the dimension
of transcendence.
The problems raised by these last considerations can be exemplified
with reference to Nietzsche himself, for the tacit assumption of many
of his attitudes is ηο different: it is the action, albeit unconscious, of the
transcendent dimension. This alone can explain the otherwise arbitrary
and contradictory quality of some of his statements; οηlΥ this point of
νiew also offers the possibility of integrating and consolidating them by
not taking the wrong path of "naturalism." Οη the one hand, Nietzsche
really felt the νocation of the particular human type just mentioned,
both ίη his destructiνe role and ίη his effort to get beyond the zero point
of νalues. Οη the other hand, rather than consciously taking υρ the
existential dimension of transcendence, he was, as it were, its νictim,
the object rather than the subject of the corresponding energy ίη action.
This giνes one a sure guide for orientation throughout Nietzsche's philosophy, for recognizing both its limitations and its high νalue for our
purposes.
Νο less eνident here is the solution giνen by turning the tragic and
absurd νision of life into its opposite. Nietzsche's solution of the problem
of the meaning of life, consisting in the affirmation that this meaning

47

48

1n the World Where God 15 Dead

does not exist outside of life, and that life in itself is meaning (from
which derive all the themes already mentioned, including the myth οί
the eternal return), is valid only on the presupposition of α being that
has transcendence as its essential component.
This is ηο place for the detailed proof οί this thesis, which would
belong ίη a special study οί Nietzsche. We have already seen with regard
to the "will to power" that it is not so much the general characteristic οί
life, but one οί its possible manifestations, one οί its many faces. Το say
that life "always surpasses itself," "wants to ascend, and to regenerate
itself by rising and surpassing itself,"l or that the life's secret is "Ι am
that which must always conquer itself"2 -all that is simply the result οί
a very unusual vocation projecting itself to the dimensions οί a worldview. It is merely the reflection οί a certain nature, and by ηο means the
general or objective character οί every existence. The foundation that
really prevails ίη existence is much closer to Schopenhauer's formulation than to this one οί Nietzsche's; that is, the will to live as eternal
and inexhaustible desire, not the will to power ίη the true sense, or the
positive, ascending drive to dominance.
It is οηlΥ, ίη fact, through the other dimension, that οί transcendence, that life presents those characteristics that Nietzsche mistakenly
generalizes and thinks he can attribute to it when he sets up his new
values. His imperfect understanding οί what was going οη inside him
explains not οηlΥ the oscillations and limitations οί his philosophy, but
also the tragic side οί his human existence. Οη the one hand, we have
the theme οί a pure, naturalistic exaltation οί life, albeit ίη forms that
betray a surrender οί being to the simple world οί instincts and passions; for the absolute affirmation οί the latter οη the part οί the will
runs the danger οί their asserting themselves through the will, making
it their servant. Οη the other hand, many and indeed prevalent are
the testimonies to a reaction to life that cannot arise out οί life itself,
but solely from a principle superior to it, as revealed ίη a characteristic
phrase: "Spirit is the life that cuts through life" (Geist ist das Leben,
das selber ins Leben schneidet}.3
ΑΙΙ the positive aspects οί the way οί the superman belong to this
second aspect: the power to make a law for oneself, the "power to
refuse and not to act, when one is pressed to affirmation by a prodi-

The Transcendent Dimension

49

gious force and an enormous tension"\ the natural and free asceticism
moved to test its own strength by gauging "the power οί a will according to the degree οί resistance, pain, and torment that it can bear ίη
order to turn them to its own advantage"S (so that from this point
οί view everything that existence offers ίη the way οί evil, pain, and
obstacles, everything that has nourished the popular forms οί savior
religions, is accepted, even desired); the principle οί not obeying the
passions, but οί holding them οη a leash ("greatness οί character does
not consist ίη not having such passions: one must have them to the
greatest degree, but held ίη check, and moreover doing this with simplicity, not feeling any particular satisfaction thereby"6); the idea that
"the superior man is distinguished from the inferior by his intrepidity,
by his defiance οί unhappiness"7 ("it is a sign οί regression when pleasure begins to be considered as the highest principle"B); the responding
with incredulity to those who point "the way to happiness" ίη order to
make man follow a certain behavior: "But what does happiness matter
to US?"9; the recognition that one οί the ways to preserve a superior
species οί man is "to claim the right to exceptional acts as attempts
at victory over oneself and as acts οί freedom . . . to assure oneself,
with a sort οί asceticism, a preponderance and a certitude οί one's
own strength οί will,"lO without refusing any privation; to affirm that
freedom whose elements include "keeping the distance which separates us, being indifferent to difficulties, hardships, privations, even
to life itself,"ll the highest type οί the free m<ιη being seen ίη "he who
always overcomes the strongest resistances ... great danger making
him a being worthy οί veneration"12; to denounce the insidious confusion between discipline and enfeeblement (the goal οί discipline can
οηlΥ be a greater strength-"he who does not dominate is weak, dissipated, inconstant") and holding that "indulgence can οηlΥ be objected
to ίη the case οί him who has ηο right to it, and when all the passions
have been discredited thanks to those who were not strong enough to
turn them to their own advantage"13; to point the way οί those who,
free from all bonds, obeying οηlΥ their own law, are unbending ίη
obedience to it and above every human weakness; all those aspects, ίη
fine, ίη which the superman is not the "blond beast οί prey"14 and the
heir to the equivocal virtus οί Renaissance despots, but is also capable

50

ln the World Where God 15 Dead

of generosity, quick to offer manly aid, of "generous virtue," magnanimity, and superiority to his own individuality15-all these are the
positive elements that the man of Tradition also makes his own, but
which are only comprehensible and attainable when "life" is "more
than life," that is, through transcendence. They are values attainable
only by those ίη whom there is something else, and something more,
than mere life.
This is ηο place to go into detail about all the finer shades of meaning ίη the mass ofNietzsche's thought concerning these main points, nor
into the confusions and deviations of which one must beware when one
passes the point at which most of Nietzsche's admirers, as well as his
detractors, have stopped. Life and transcendence are continually muddled ίη his philoso1Jhy, and of all the consequences of his anti-Christian
polemic, this confusion has been one of the worst. He characterizes
the values negated by Christian ideals-the ideals of the pariah, the
chandala-and which supposedly constitute the opposite, affirmative,
antinihilistic ideals, as follows: "dignity, distance, great responsibility,
exuberance, proud animality, the martial and victorious instincts, the
apotheosis of the passions, of revenge, cunning, anger, voluptuousness,
the spirit of adventurous knowledge"16; then he enumerates among the
positive passions "pride, happiness, health, love between the sexes, hostility and war, reverence, beautiful attitudes, good manners, strong will,
the discipline of higher intellectuality, the will to power, respect for the
earth and for life-all that is rich, which wants to give and to justify
life, eternalize it, divinize it."17 The muddle is evident; it is a confusion
of the sacred and the profane.
But there is another point, and for us it is an even more important
one. Even if one extracts from all this the effective forms of a selftranscendence, one faces an awkward situation when trying to speak of
an "ascesis as a goal ίη itself" and when the superman is presented as
the utmost limit of the human species, rather than as "more than man"
and a being of a different nature, wielder and witness of a different dignity. One danger is that all the experiences not marked by a simple adherence to the pure, irrational, and instinctive substratum of life, ίη which
the simple will to power is surpassed and the path is not that of a dominator of men and of external forces, but rather a dominator of oneself,

The Transcendent Dimension 51

remain closed οΗ ίη the field οί mere sensation. There is a significant
passage ίη Nietzsche concerning this, ίη which the "saying ηο" to all
the force surging within oneself is presented as a "Dionysism,"18 whereas
a more fitting term would perhaps be auto-sadism. Α lifelong discipline
and an asceticism pursued inexorably for better or worse, through
extreme trials, regardless οί oneself and others, may have the mere value
οί an increased and exasperated sensation οί "life," οί an ''Ι" whose
sense οί itself comes οηlΥ from this savage and embittered sensation. ΑΙΙ
too often, it is ίη such terms that Nietzsche interpreted his own experience and the way that he proclaimed. For our purposes it is all the more
important to signal this wrong turning, because, all theory aside, it is
easy to see that it lies at the basis οί many extreme experiences οη the
part οί those contemporary generations who courted disaster, as mentioned above.
As for the internal, "esoteric" interpretation οί Nietzsche's personal experience, taken as a whole beyond this pseudosolution, Ι have
already indicated that the key to it is given by a passive experience
οί transcendence and οί its activation. The cutting οί all bonds, the
intolerance οί alllimits, the pure and incoercible impulse to overcome
without any determined goal, to always move οη beyond any given
state, experience, or idea, and naturally and even more beyond any
human attachment to a given person, fearing neither contradictions
nor destructions, thus pure movement, with all that that implies οί dissolution-"advancing with a devouring fire tb.,at leaves nothing behind
itself," to use an expression from an ancient wisdom tradition, though
it applies to a very different context-these essential characteristics
that some have already recognized ίη Nietzsche can be explained precisely as so many forms ίη which the transcendent acts and manifests.
But the fact that this is not recognized and admitted as such, the fact,
therefore, that this energy remains ίη the closed circle οί immanence
and οί "life," generates a higher voltage than the circuit can sustain.
This fact, moreover, may be the true and deeper cause οί the final
collapse οί Nietzsche the man. Besides, he always had a sensation οί
living dangerously. ΒΥ 1881 he was writing to Gast: ''Ι have the feeling
οί living a life that is risky to the highest degree- Ι am one οί those
machines that might explode."19 At other times he spoke οί a "continual

52 1n the World Where God 15 Dead

proximity to danger," and it was surely from this that he drew the
generalization that "superior men find themselves ίη continual inner
and outer peril."
It is clear, even ίη this particular respect, how important Nietzsche
is as a symbolic figure for our entire investigation. His case illustrates
ίη precise terms what can, and indeed must, occur ίη a human type ίη
which transcendence has awakened, yes, but who is uncentered with
regard to it. We shall see that the essential themes of existentialism are
to be interpreted ηο differently.
This is not the way of the man we have ίη mind, who has quite
another constitution. Α clean line of division must be drawn. But first it
is useful to see what is to be expected ίη the case of those who remain
οη this side of the line, that is, ίη those who follow the way of immanence unflinchingly, without turning back, without lowering their level,
but also without the capacity to reach the turning point that alone can
make good their lack, from the very start, of the quality Ι have indicated ίη the man of Tradition, ίη the man who is constitutionally not
modern. Once they have entered οη the way of absolute affirmation,
and have mastered all those forms of "ascesis" and the activation of a
higher intensity of life that we have mentioned, their οηlΥ saving solution is ίη a conscious change of polarity; ίη the possibility that at a
given point, ίη given situations or environments, by a kind of ontological rupture of level, their life would be turned upside down, as it were,
and transformed into a different quality-the mehr leben [living more]
would give place to a mehr-als-Ieben [more than living], to use the neat
expression suggested ίη another context by Georg Simmel. 20
This is a possibility that can be entertained even ίη this present
epoch. The few who can accomplish it may achieve, even under current
conditions, a qualification analogous to what was inborn ίη the type
under consideration. Certain gropings toward openings of the kind are
not unknown today, alongside the traumatization of existence. One
typical sign, for example, is the interest ίη Zen felt by some members
of the Beat Generation. The condition for it is something like a sudden
illumination-the satori of Zen. Without it, the path of those who have
undergone experiences like Nietzsche's-and, ίη general, of those ίη
whom, for one reason or another and with or without their volition,

The Transcendent Dimension

53

transcendence has awakened ίη the human circuit as an energy ίη the
world where God is dead-is a path that leads to the abyss. It is cold
comfort ίη such cases to speak οί "the damned saints οί our time" or of
"angels with the face οί a criminal or a pervert"; that is pure, gratuitous
romanticism.
Ιη the contrary and positive case, the result might be expressed as a
transition from the plane οί "Dionysus" to that of a spiritual superiority, known ίη antiquity under the Apollonian or Olympian symbol. It
is οί capital importance to recognize that this is the only solution that
does not involve a regression, and that it is the antithesis οί any solution of the religious or devotional type. The "conversion" of certain
contemporaries who found themselves unable to sustain the tension οί
the nihilistic climate, or who faced the experiences ίη question superficially, as mere intellectuals, represent cases οί surrender that are devoid
οί any interest for us.

9
Beyond Theism
and Atheism
Following οη from this, and before taking υρ the positive part οί our
subject, Ι should return to what was said earlier when specifying what
had reached, or wa~ reaching, the point οί crisis ίη the modern world.
Ι have explained that the crisis οη the social plane concerned bourgeois society and civilization. From the spiritual point οί view, Ι spoke
οί the double aspect οί the process οί "emancipation" that has led to the
present situation: first οί its solely destructive and regressive aspect, then
οί how it faces a differentiated human type with the risky ordeal οί a complete internalliberation. Pursuing the latter aspect, Ι would make another
point, namely that one οί the causes favoring the processes οί dissolution
has been the confused sense οί a true fact: the sense that everything ίη
the recent West οί a religious nature, especially Christianity, belongs to
the "all too human" and has little to do with really transcendent values,
beside being fairly incompatible, as a general climate and an internal attitude, with the dispositions and vocations proper to a higher human type.
Ιη particular, an important factor has been the mutilated character οί Christianity when compared to the majority οί other traditional
forms; mutilated, because it does not possess an "esotericism," an inner
teaching οί a metaphysical character beyond the truths and dogmas οί
the faith offered to the common people. The extensions represented by
sporadic experiences that are simply "mystical" and little understood
cannot make υρ for this essentiallack ίη Christianity as a whole. This
is why the work οί demolition was so easy with the rise οί so-called free
thought, whereas ίη a different, complete tradition the presence οί a
body οί teachings above the simply religious level would probably have
prevented it.

54

Beyond Theism and Atheism

55

What is the God whose death has been announced? Nietzsche himself replies: 'ΌηΙΥ the god οί morality has been conquered."l He also
asks: ''Is there sense ίη conceiving οί a god beyond good and evil?"2 The
reply must be affirmative. "Let God slough οίί his moral skin, and we
shall see him reappear beyond good and evil."3 What has disappeared
is therefore not the god οί metaphysics, but the god οί theism, the personal god who is a projection οί moral and social values and a support
for human weakness. Now, the conception οί a god ίη different terms
is not οηlΥ possible but essential within all the great traditions before
and beside Christianity, and the principle οί nonduality is also evident
ίη them. These other traditions recognized as the ultimate foundation οί
the universe a principle anterior and superior to all antitheses, including those οί immanence and transcendence considered unilaterally. This
conferred οη existence-on aΙΙ οί existence, including that part οί it that
appears problematic, destructive, and "evil"-the supreme justification
that was being sought through a liberated worldview, to be affirmed
beyond the demolitions οί nihilism. Zarathustra ίη fact announces nothing new when he says: ''Everything that becomes seems to me divine
dance and divine whim, and the liberated world returns to itself"\ it
is the same idea that Hinduism casts ίη the well-known symbol οί the
dance and play οί the naked god Shiva. As another example, we might
recall the doctrine οί the transcendent identity οί samsara (the world
οί becoming) with nirvana (the unconditioned), that ultimate peak οί
esoteric wisdom. Ιη the Mediterranean regio".n, the saying οί the final
mystery initiation, "Osiris is a black god," refers to a similar level; and
one could also include the teachings οί Neoplatonism and οί a few mystics οί high stature concerning the metaphysical, impersonal, and superpersonal One, and so forth-right up to William Blake's allegory οί the
"Marriage οί Heaven and Hell" and the Goethean idea οί the God οί
the "free glance" who does not judge according to good and evil, an
idea encountered from the ancient West right up to Far Eastern Taoism.
We see one οί the most drastic proofs οί this wisdom ίη the words οί an
ascetic οη the point οί being murdered by a European soldier: "Don't
deceive me! You too are God!"
Ιη the course οί the involutional process described ίη the introduction, such horizons have gradually vanished from view. Ιη cases like

56

1n the World Where God Is Dead

Buddhism and Taoism it is very evident that they have passed from the
metaphysical plane to the religious and devotional one, ίη terms οί a
regression due to the diHusion and profanation οί the original inner
doctrine, which most people are incapable οί understanding and following. 5 Ιη the West, the conception οί the sacred and the transcendent ίη
devotional and moral terms, which ίη other systems belonged οηlΥ to the
popular or regressive forms, became predominant and all but exclusive.
We should mention, however, that even ίη the Christian world there
have been some allusions οη the margins οί ]ohannine mysticism to a
future epoch οί a higher freedom. ]oachim de Flore gave out that the
"third age," the age οί the Spirit following those οί the Father and the
Son, would be that οί freedom; and the "Brethren οί the Free Spirit,"
along similar lines, pro~laimed an "anomie," a liberty from the Law,
from good and evil, ίη terms that even Nietzsche's superman would not
have dared to profess. Echoes οί these anticipations are to be found
ίη ]acopone da Todi himself, when ίη his Hymn to Holy Poverty and
Its Threefold Heaven 6 he tells us "do not fear Hell, do not hope for
Heaven," and that one should "not rejoice ίη any good, nor mourn any
adversity"; when he refers to a "virtue that asks not why" and goes so
far as to dispense with virtue itself, possessing all things "ίη freedom
οί spirit," this being for him the inner and symbolic sense οί true "poverty."
The conclusion to be drawn from all οί this is that a group οί concepts considered ίη the Christian West as essential and indispensable for
any "true" religion-the personal god οί theism, the morallaw with the
sanctions οί heaven and hell, the limited conception οί a providential
order and a "moral and rational" finalism οί the world, faith resting οη
a largely emotional, sentimental, and subintellectual basis-all οί these
are foreign to a metaphysical vision οί existence such as is well attested
ίη the world οί Tradition. The God who has been attacked is God conceived as the center οί gravity οί all this merely religious system. But ίη
fact this may open the horizon οί a new essentiality for those who accept
as a trial οί their strength-one might even say, οί their faith ίη the
higher sense-all the dissolving processes brought about by the direction that civilization has taken ίη recent times. The "moral skin" falls οΗ
a God who has finished υρ as opium οί the people, or as the counterpart

Beyond Theism and Atheism

57

of the petty morality that the bourgeois world substitutes for the greater
morality. But the essential core, represented by metaphysical teachings
such as those just mentioned, remains inviolate for those who can perceive and live them, remains inaccessible to all those nihilistic processes,
and withstands any dissolution.
After this essential clarification and widening of perspectives, we
are now ready to gather υρ everything from the themes considered
hitherto that may have a positive value today for the human type with
whom we are concerned.
As far as worldviews are concerned, we are dealing with a conception of reality freed from the categories of good and evil, but with a metaphysical foundation, not a naturalistic or pantheistic one. Being knows
nothing of good or evil, nor do the great laws of things, nor the Absolute.
Α good or an evil exists solely ίη function of an end, and what is the standard by which to judge this end and thereby fix the ultimate legitimacy
of an action or a being? Even the theology of Providence and the efforts
of theistic theodicy to prop υρ the concept of the moral God cannot do
away with the idea of the Great Economy that includes evil, ίη which
evil is οηlΥ a particular aspect of a higher order, transcending the little
human categories of the individual and the collectivity of individuals.
The ''other world" attacked by European nihilism, presented by the
latter as sheer illusion or condemned as an evasion, is not another reality; it is another dimension of reality ίη which the real, without being
negated, acquires an absolute significance ίη the inconceivable nakedness of pure Being.
Ιη an epoch of dissolution, this is the essential basis of a vision of
life that is appropriate for the man reduced to himself, who must prove
his own strength. Its counterpart is to be central or to make oneself so,
to know or discover the supreme identity with oneself. It is to perceive
the dimension of transcendence within, and to anchor oneself ίη it,
making of it the hinge that stays immobile even when the door slams
(an image from Meister Eckhart). From this point οη, any "jnvocation"
or prayer becomes existentially impossible. The heritage of "God" that
one dared not accept is not that of the lucid madness of Kirilov; it is the
calm sense of a presence and an intangible possession, of a superiority
to life whilst ίη the very bosom of life. The deeper sense of what has

Ι

~

58

1n the World Where God 1s Dead

been said about the "new nobility" is πο different: "Divinity consists
precisely this: that the gods exist, but ηο God." We could use the
image of a ray of light proceeding with ηο need to turn back, and carrying its luminous energy and the impulse from the center from which
it originated. It is also the absolute claim to one's own position ίη terms
that exclude the theme of religious crisis, "feeling oneself abandoned by
God." Ιη such a state, that would be equivalent to a God who had abandoned himself. Similarly, ηο negation of God is possible: to negate or
doubt God would be to negate or doubt oneself. Once the idea of a personal God has disappeared, God ceases to be a "problem," an object of
"belief," or a need of the soul; the terms "believer," "atheist," or "freethinker" appear nonsensical. One has gone beyond both attitudes.
Once this Ροίηt.ίs grasped, we can indicate the terms ίη which
to deal with the existential challenge ίη relation to life's negativity,
tragedy, pain, problems, and absurdities. Seneca said that ηο spectacle is more pleasing to the gods than that of the superior man grappling with adversity. ΟηΙΥ thus can he know his own strength-and
$eneca adds that it is the men of valor who are sent to the riskiest
positions or οη difficult missions, while the spineless and feeble are
left behind. There is the well-known maxim: "That which does not
destroy us makes us stronger."7 Ιη our case, the basis for this courage
refers to the dimension of transcendence in oneself: it is attested and
confirmed ίη all situations of chaos and dissolution, thus turning them
to our own advantage. It is the antithesis of an arrogant hardening of
the physical individuality ίη all its forms, whether unilaterally Stoic
or Nietzschean. Instead, it is the conscious activation ίη oneself of the
other principle and of its strength, ίη experiences, moreover, that are
not merely undergone but also sought, as Ι shall explain later. This
must be kept firmly ίη mind.
Ιη some cases nowadays, the shock of reality and the consequent
trauma may serve not to validate and increase a strength that is already
present, but to reawaken it. These are the cases ίη which οηlΥ a thin
film separates the principle of being ίη a person from that of the merely
human individuality. Situations of depression, emptiness, or tragedy
whose negative solution is the return to religion may through a positive
reaction lead to this awakening. Even ίη some of the most advanced
ίη

Beyond Theism and Atheism

59

modern literature one finds curious testimonies of moments of liberation realized ίη the midst of disintegration. One example will suffice,
from an author already cited. Henry Miller, after all the signs of the
chaotic disintegration of a meaningless life, after stupefaction at "the
grandiose collapse of a whole world," speaks of a vision that justifies
everything as it is-"a sort of eternity ίη suspense ίη which everything
is justified, supremely justified." One looks for a miracle outside, he
says, "while a counter counts within and there is ηο hand that can
reach it or stop it." Only a sudden shock can do it. Then a new current
arises ίη the being. This makes him say: "Perhaps ίη reading this, one
has still the impression of chaos but this is written from a live center
and what is chaotic is merely peripheral, the tangential shreds, as it
were, of a world which ηο longer concerns me."8 This brings us back,
ίη a way, to the rupture of levels mentioned above, which h".s the virtue
of instilling a different quality ίη the circuit of mere "life."

,
Ι

~

10
Invulnerability
Αροllο

and Dionysus
•

Up to now we have been establishing the rule for being oneself. Now
we must bring 10 light the rule for proving oneself, then unite and
specify the two principles wlth particular reference 10 the human type
that concerns us. Just as this type is dual ίη its essential structureίη its determination as an individual, and its dimension of transcendence-being itself, and knowing itself through proving itself, present
two quite distinct degrees.
With regard 10 the first degree, we have already noted the difficulty,
especially ίη our times, that the principle of being oneself encounters ίη
the vast majority of individuals, given their lack of a basic unity or even
of one predominant and constant tendency among a multitude of others. Only ίη exceptional cases are these words of Nietzsche's valid: "One
does best never to speak of two very lofty things, measure and mean.
Α few know their powers and their signs, thanks 10 the mystery paths
of inner experiences and conversions. They venerate something divine
ίη them, and abhor speaking out loud."l But ίη an age of dissolution, it
is difficult even for one who possesses a basic internal form to know it,
and thereby to know "himself," otherwise than through an experiment.
Hence we recall the line already mentioned, 10 be unders100d now as the
search for, or the acceptance of, those situations or alternatives ίη which
the prevailing force, one's own "true nature," is compelled 10 manifest
and make itself known.
The only actions that can be valid for this purpose are those that
arise from the depths. Peripheral or emotional reactions do not qualify, for those are like reflex movements provoked by a stimulus, arising "long before the depth of one's own being has been touched or

60

Invulnerability

61

questioned,"2 as Nietzsche himself said, seeing ίη this very incapacity
for deep impressions and engagement, and ίη this skin-deep reactivity
at the mercy οΕ every sensation, a deplorable characteristic οΕ modern
man. For many people it is as though they have to relearn how to act
ίη the true sense, actively, as one might say, and also typically. Even
for the man whom we have ίη mind, taken ίη his worldly aspect, this
is an essential requirement today. We might note the corresponding
discipline that is so important ίη traditional "inner teachings": that οΕ
self-remembering or self-awareness. 3 G. Ι. Gurdjieff, who has taught
similar things ίη our time, describes the contrary state as that οΕ being
"breathed" or "sucked" into ordinary existence without any awareness οΕ the fact, without noticing the automatic or "somnambulistic"
character that this existence has from a higher point οΕ view. "Ι am
sucked ίη by my thoughts, my memories, my desires, my sensations, by
the steak Ι eat, the cigarette Ι smoke, the love Ι make, by the sunshine,
the rain, by this tree, by that passing car, by this book." Thus one is
a shadow οΕ oneself. Life ίη a state οΕ being, the "active act," "active
sensation," and so οη are unknown states. But this is not the place to
digress further about this special method οΕ realization. 4
This trial through self-knowledge under the stimulus οΕ various
experiences and various encounters with reality may be associated ίη a
certain sense with the maxim οΕ amor (ati (love οΕ fate).5 Karl ]aspers
has rightly said that this is not so much a precept οΕ passive obedience to a necessity presumed to be pred~termined and knowable, as
an injunction to face each experience and everything ίη one's existence
that is uncertain, ambiguous, and dangerous with the feeling that one
will never do anything other than follow one's own path. The essential
thing ίη this attitude is a kind οΕ transcendent confidence that gives
security and intrepidity, and it can be included among the positive elements ίη the line οΕ conduct that is gradually being delineated.
The problem οΕ being oneself has a particular and subordinate solution ίη terms οΕ a unification. Once one has discovered through experiment which οΕ one's manifold tendencies is the central one, one sets about
identifying it with one's will, stabilizing it, and organizing all one's secondary or divergent tendencies around it. This is what it means to give
oneself a law, one's own law. As we have seen, the incapacity to do this,

62

1n the World Where God 15 Dead

"the many discordant souls enclosed ίη my own breast," and the refusal
to obey even before one is capable οί commanding oneself are causes
οί the disaster that may well end the path οί a being driven toward the
boundary situation ίη the world without God. There is a relevant saying:
''He who cannot command himself must obey. And more than one can
command himself, but is still far from being able to obey himself."6
There is an example from the world οί Tradition that may be οί
interest here. lη Islam, long before nihilism, the initiatic Order οί the
Ismaelis used the very phrase "Nothing exists, everything is permitted."7 But it applied ίη this order exclusively to the upper grades οί the
hierarchy. Before attaining these grades and having the right to adopt
this truth for oneself, one had to pass four preliminary grades that
involved, among otherthings, a rule οί unconditional, blind obedience,
taken to limits that are almost inconceivable for the Western mentality.
For example, at a word from the Grand Master one had to be prepared
to throw one's life away without any reason or purpose.
This brings us to the consideration οί the second degree οί the trial
through self-knowledge, which belongs to the transcendent dimension and which conditions the final solution οί the existential problem. With the first degree, ίη fact, with the recognition οί "one's own
nature" and the making οί one's own law, this problem is οηlΥ resolved
partially, οη the formal plane. That is the plane οί determination, or, ίί
one prefers, individuation, which furnishes one with an adequate base
for controlling one's conduct ίη any circumstances. But this plane has
ηο transparency for one who wants to get to the bottom οί things;
absolute meaning is not yet to be found therein. When the situation
remains at this stage, one is active ίη wanting to be oneself, but not
with regard to the fact οί being thus and not otherwise. Το a certain
type, this can seem like something so irrational and obscure as to set ίη
motion a crisis that endangers everything he has gained hitherto along
the lines indicated. It is then that he must undergo the second degree οί
self-proving, which is like an experimental proof οί the presence within
him, ίη greater or lesser measure, οί the higher dimension οί transcendence. This is the unconditioned nucleus that ίη life does not belong to
life's sphere, but to that οί Being.
It depends οη this last trial to resolve, or not to resolve, the problem

Invulnerability 63
οί the

ultimate meaning οί existence ίη an ambience lacking any support
or "sign." After the whole superstructure has been rejected or destroyed,
and having for one's sole support one's own being, the ultimate meaning
οί existing and living can spring only from α direct and absolute relationship between that being (between what one is ίη a limiting sense)
and transcendence (transcendence ίη itself). This meaning is not given
by anything extrinsic or external, anything added to the being when the
latter turns to some other principle. That might have occurred ίη a different world, a traditionally ordered world. But ίη the existential realm
under consideration, such a meaning can οηlΥ be given by the transcendent dimension directly perceived by man as the root οί his being and
οί his ''own nature." Moreover, it carries an absolute justification, an
indelible and irrevocable consecration, which completely destroys the
state οί negativity and the existential problem. Οη this basis alone does
"being what one is" cease to constitute a limitation. Otherwise every
path will be limited, including that οί "supermen" and any other kind
οί being that serves with its outward traits to deflect the problem οί ultimate meaning, thereby hiding its own essential vulnerability.
This unity with the transcendent is also the condition for preventing the process οί self-unification from taking a regressive path. There
is ίη fact a possibility οί a pathological unification οί the being from
below, as ίη the case οί an elementary passion that takes over the whole
person, organizing all his faculties to its own ends. Cases οί fanaticism
and possession are ηο different ίη kind. 0pe must consider this possible reduction to absurdity οί "being oneself" and οί the unity οί the
self. This is a further reason to require our particular type οί man to
undergo the trial οί self-knowledge at the second degree, which concerns, as we have said, the presence οί the unconditioned and the supraindividual as his true center.
It is easy to see how this requires one to surpass and prove oneself,
beyond one's own nature and one's own law. The autonomy οί him
who makes his own will coincide with his own being is not enough.
Moreover, it requires a rupture οί levels that can sometimes have the
character οί violence done to oneself, and one has to be sure to remain
οη one's feet even ίη the void and the formless. This is positive anomie,
beyond autonomy. Ιη less qualified types, ίη those ίη which the original

64

1n the World Where God 15 Dead

inheritance, as Ι called it, is not sufficiently alive existentially, this trial
almost always requires a certain "sacrificial" disposition: such a man
has to feel ready to be destroyed, ίί need be, without being hurt thereby.
The result οί trials or experiences οί this kind remains undetermined,
and has always been so, even when the ultimate consecration οί inner
sovereignty was sought within the institutional frameworks provided
by Tradition. It is all the more so ίη today's social climate, ίη circumstances where it is almost impossible to create a magical circle οί protection ίη this confrontation with transcendence, with that which is ίη
fact not human.
But we repeat: Ιη a meaningless world, the absolute sense οί being
depends almost exclusively οη this experience. If it has a positive outcome, the last limit fallS""away; transcendence and existence, freedom
and necessity, possibility and reality coincide. Α centrality and invulnerability are realized without restriction ίη any situation, be it dark or
light, detached or apparently open to every impulse or passion οί life.
Above all, the essential conditions are thereby created for adapting,
without losing oneself, to a world that has become free but left to its
own devices, seized by irrationality and meaninglessness. And this is
exactly the problem with which we began.
Having established this basic point regarding the ultimate clarification οί oneself, Ι turn now to some special aspects οί the integrated
rnan's orientation within current experience.
If we follow the method used up to now and take some οί Nietzsche's
categories as our provisional reference point, we might immediately
relate this to "Dionysism." But ίη fact, the philosopher οί the superman
has given this term differing and contradictory meanings. One οί the
signs οί his incomprehension οί ancient traditions is his interpretation οί
the symbols οί Dionysus and ΑροlΙο οη the basis οί a modern philosophy like Schopenhauer's. As Ι have already pointed out, he uses the term
"Dionysus" for a sort οί divinized immanence, an intoxicated and frenetic affirmation οί life ίη its most irrational and tragic aspects. Οη the
other hand, Nietzsche makes Apollo into the symbol οί a contemplation
οί the world οί pure forms, as though taking flight to free oneself from
the sensations and tensions οί this irrational and dramatic substratum οί
existence. ΑΙΙ οί this is without foundation.

Invulnerability

65

Without entering into the special field οί the history οί religions and
ancient civilization, Ι will limit myself to recalling that the Dionysian
way was a way οί the Mysteries, apart from a few decayed and spurious popular forms. Just like other Mysteries that correspond to it ίη
other cultural areas, it can be defined ίη the terms already used: an
experience οί life raised to a particular intensity that emerges, overturns, and frees itself ίη something more than life, thanks to an ontological rupture οί levels. But this conclusion, which is equivalent to the
realization, revival, or reawakening οί transcendence ίη oneself, can
equally well be referred to the true content οί the symbol οί Apollo;
hence the absurdity οί Nietzsche's antithesis between "Apollo" and
"Dionysus."
This serves as a preliminary to our real intention, which can only
concern a "Dionysism" that is integrated, as one might say, with
Apollonism. Here one possesses the stability that is the result οί the
Dionysian experience not as a goal before oneself, but ίη a certain sense
behind oneself. Or else we can speak οί a "Dionysian Apollonism," and
define ίη these terms one οί the most important ingredients οί the attitude οί the modern human type ίη his encounter with existence, beyond
the special domain οί his trials.
Naturally, we are not dealing here with normal existence, but with
those possible forms οί it that are already differentiated, that have a
certain intensity, while still being defined ίη a chaotic ambience, ίη the
domain οί pure contingency. They are not inf~quent today, and ίη the
times to come they will surely proliferate. The state ίη question is that
οί the man who is self-confident through having as the essential center of his personality not life, but Being. He can encounter everything,
abandon himself to everything, and open himself to everything without
losing himself. He accepts every experience, ηο longer ίη order to prove
and know himself, but to unfold all his possibilities ίη view οί the transformations that they can work ίη him, and οί the new contents that
offer and reveal themselves οη this path.
Nietzsche often spoke ίη similar terms οί the "Dionysian soul,"
albeit with his usual dangerous confusions. It was for him "the soul
that, having being, plunges into becoming"8; that which can run
beyond itself, almost fleeing from itself, and find itself ίη a vaster

66

1n the World Where God 15 Dead

sphere; the soul that feels the need and joy of adventuring ίη the world
of chance or even the irrational. Ιη the process, "by transfiguring itself,
it transfigures existence"9: existence here to be taken ίη all its aspects,
just as it iS, "without withdrawal, exception, or choice."10 The domain
of the senses is not excluded, but included. The Dionysian state "is the
state ίη which the spirit rediscovers itself right down to the senses, while
the senses rediscover themselves ίη the spirit."l1 This concerns superior
types ίη which even experiences largely tied to the senses "end by turning into the image and inebriation of the highest spirituality."12
One could show many correspondences between the latter point
and the doctrines, paths, and very elaborate practices of the world of
Tradition. 13 One of the aspects of Dionysism ίη the broad sense can
ίη fact be seen ίη its capa~ty to overcome the antithesis of spirit and
senses, an antithesis typical of the previous Western religious morality
that is now ίη crisis. That which enables this antithesis to be overcome
is the other quality, introduced into the sense domain to transform its
motive force as it were catalytically.
Moreover, the capacity to open oneself without losing oneself takes
οη a special importance ίη an epoch of dissolution. It is the way to
master every transformation that may occur, even the most perilous
ones. Α passage ίη the Upanishads marks its extreme limit, speaking
of him against whom death is powerless, because it has become part of
his being. 14 Ιη this state, outside events that might affect or upset his
being can become the stimulus that activates an ever greater freedom
and potential. The transcendent dimension, which holds firm through
all turns of the tide, all ups and downs, will also play the part here of
a transformer. It prevents any intoxicated self-identification with the
life force, not to mention what might be induced by a thirst for life,
or by the disorderly impulse to seek ίη mere sensation a surrogate for
the meaning of existence, and to lose oneself ίη actions and "achievements." Detachment coexists with a fully lived experience; a calm
"being" is constantly wedded to the substance of life. The consequence
of this υηίοη, existentially speaking, is a most particular kind of lucid
inebriation, one might almost say intellectualized and magnetic, which
is the absolute opposite of what comes from the ecstatic opening to the
world of elementary forces, instinct, and "nature." In this very special

--Γ,------------------------------------------~

Invulnerability 67
inebriation, subtilized and clari(ied, is to be seen the vital element necessary (or an existence in the (ree state, in α chaotic world abandoned
to itself.
Later οη, Ι may have occasion to enter into more detail about this
inebriation. The important point here is to grasp the essential opposition
between this state and attitudes that have taken shape ίη the modern
world alongside the rebellion against rationalism or puritanism. It often
calls itself a new "paganism" and follows a path like that οί Nietzsche's
worst "Dionysism" ("exuberance, innocence, plenitude, the joy οί life,"
the agape, ecstasy, eros, cruelty, intoxication, springtime,15 "a whole
scale οί lights and colors going from semidivine forms, ίη a sort οί
divinification οί the body, to those οί a healthy semi-animality and
the simple pleasures οί uncorrupted natures"16-as he wrote with particular reference to the ancient world). We have noticed a similar spirit
pervading much οί the modern cult οί action, despite the mechanical
and abstract traits often present ίη it. But the perspective that interests
us here is one οί clarity and presence οί mind ίη every encounter and
evocation, and a calm that coexists with movement and transformations. It imparts stability to every step οί the way, and a continuity that
is also that οί invulnerability and an invisible sovereignty.
This also demands a kind οί freedom from the past and the future,
the intrepidity οί a soul free from the bonds οί the lesser Ι, the "being"
that manifests itself ίη the form οί "being ίη action." The naturalness
required by this mode οί being prevents ~s from using the term "heroism" to describe some οί its incidental features, for there is nothing ίη
it οί the pathos, romanticism, individualism, rhetoric, and even exhibitionism that nearly always accompany the current idea οί heroism.
And we hardly need underline the difference between this use οί the
word "act" and a certain empty academic philosophy, an outmoded
neo-Hegelianism that took the concept as its center. 17

..

11
Acting without Desire

The Causal Law
•
Ι

now address a particular aspect of the attitude ίη question, applicable
to a wider and less exclusive field: that of life seen as the field of works,
activities, and achievements..in which the individual deliberately takes
the initiative. We are not dealing now with simple, lived experiences,
but with procedures aimed at a goal. The character of the human type Ι
have been describing must result ίη a certain orientation whose essence
was defined ίη the traditional world by two basic maxims.
The first of these is to act without regard to the fruits, without being
affected by the chances of success or failure, victory or defeat, winning
or losing, any more than by pleasure or pain, or by the approval or
disapproval of others. This form of action has also been cal1ed "action
without desire." The higher dimension, which is presumed to be present
ίη oneself, manifests through the capacity to act not with less, but with
more application than a normal type of man could bring to the ordinary forms of conditioned action. One can also speak here of "doing
what needs to be done," impersonal1y.
The necessary coexistence of the two principles is even more distinct ίη the second traditional maxim, which is that of "action without
acting." It is a paradoxical, Far Eastern way of describing a form of
action that does not involve or stir the higher principle of "being" ίη
itself. Yet the latter remains the true subject of the action, giving it its
primary motive force and sustaining and guiding it from beginning to
end. 1
Such a line of conduct obviously refers to the domain ίη which one's
own nature is al10wed to function, and to that which derives from the
particular situation that one has actively assumed as an individual. This

68

Acting without Desire

69

is the very context ίη which the maxims οί "acting without regard to
the fruits" and οί "doing what needs to be done" apply. The content οί
such action is not what is given by initiatives that arise from the void οί
pure freedom; it is what is defined by one's own natural inner law.
Whereas the Dionysian attitude mainly concerns the receptive side
οί the testing and confirmation οί oneself while ίη the midst οί becoming, and perhaps when facing the unexpected, the irrational, and the
problematic, the orientation οί which Ι have been speaking concerns
the active side, ίη the specific and, ίη a way, external sense οί personal
behavior and expression. Another saying from the world οί Tradition
may apply here: "Be whole ίη the broken, straight ίη the bent."2 Ι have
already alluded to it when evoking a whole category οί actions that are
really peripheral and "passive," which do not engage the essence but
are automatic reflexes, unreflecting reactions οί the sensibility. Even
the supposed plenitude οί pure "living," which is largely biologically
conditioned, does not belong to a much higher plane. Very different
is the action that arises from the deep and ίη a way supra-individual
core οί being, ίη the form οί "being inasmuch as one acts." Whatever
their object, one is involved ίη these actions. Their quality never varies,
divides, οτ multiplies: they are a pure expression οί the self, whether
ίη the humblest work οί an artisan οτ ίη precise mechanical work, ίη
action taken ίη situations οί danger, οί command, οτ οί controlling
powerful material οτ social forces. Charles Peguy was οηlΥ stating a
principle οί broad application ίη the wοι;.ld οί Tradition when he said
that a work well done is a reward ίη itself, and that the true artisan puts
the same care into a work to be seen, and into one that remains unseen.
Ι will return to this theme ίη a later chapter.
Α particular point that deserves to be highlighted concerns the real
significance οί the idea that neither pleasure ηοτ pain should enter as
motives when one must do what must be done. It might easily make
one think along the lines οί a "moral stoicism," with all the aridity
and soullessness inherent ίη that concept. Ιη fact, it will be difficult ίοτ
someone who is acting from a basis ίη "life" and not from "being" to
imagine the possibility οί this kind οί orientation, ίη which one obeys
ηο abstract rule, ηο "duty" superimposed οη the natural impulse οί
the individual, because his impulse would instead be to seek pleasure

-

70

In the World Where God Is Dead

and aνoid pain. This, howeνer, is a commonp1ace deriνed from the
fa1se genera1ization of what οη1Υ app1ies to certain situations, where
p1easure and pain are right1y νiewed as detached ideas, which a pre1iminary rationa1 consideration transforms into goa1s and motiνes of
action. Situations of this kind are rarer than one might think ίη any
"sane" nature (and the expression right1y app1ies here); there are many
cases ίη which the starting point is not a reflection, but a νita1 motion
that resonates as p1easure or pain as it deνe1ops. One can ίη fact speak
of a νita1 "decadence" when νa1ues of hedonism and comfort take first
p1ace ίη one's conduct of 1ife. It imp1ies a sp1itting and a 10ss of sou1
that are ana1ogous to the form sexua1 p1easure takes for depraνed and
νicious types. Ιη them, what otherwise arises naturally from the motion
of eros and conC1udes with the possession and embrace of the woman
becomes a separate end, to which the rest serνes as a means.
Ιη any case, the important thing is to make the distinction, well
known to traditiona1 teachings, between the happiness or p1easure that
is ardent, and that which is heroic-using the 1atter term with due reserνation. The distinction corresponds to that between two opposite
attitudes and two opposite human types. The first type of happiness
or p1easure be10ngs to the natura1istic p1ane and is marked by passiν­
ity toward the wor1d of impu1ses, instincts, passions, and inc1inations.
Tradition defines the basis of natura1istic existence as desire and thirst,
and ardent p1easure is that which is tied to the satisfaction of desire ίη
terms of a momentary dampening of the fire that driνes 1ife onward.
Heroic p1easure, οη the other hand, is that which accompanies a decisiνe action that comes from "being," from the p1ane superior to that of
1ife, and ίη a way it b1ends with the specia1 inebriation that was mentioned ear1ier.
The p1easure and pain that are not to be taken account of, according to the ru1es of pure action, are those of the first type, the natura1istic. Pure action inνo1νes the other kind of p1easure or happiness,
which it wou1d be wrong to imagine as inhabiting an arid, abstracted,
and soulless c1imate. There, too, there can be fire and νigor, but of
a νery specia1 kind, with the constant presence and transparency of
the higher, ca1m, and detached princip1e-which, as Ι haνe said, is the
true acting princip1e here. It is a1so important ίη this context not to

Acting without Desire

71

confuse the form of action (that is, its inner significance, the mode of
its validity for the Ι) with its content. There is ηο object of ardent or
passive pleasure that cannot ίη principle be also the object of heroic or
positive pleasure, and vice versa. It is a matter of a different dimension,
which includes everything but which also includes possibilities that fall
outside the realm of natural, conditioned existence. Ιη practice, there
are many cases ίη which this is true and possible οη the sole condition
of this qualitative change, this transmutation of the sensible into the
hypersensible, ίη which we have just seen one of the principal aspects of
the orientation of an integrated and rectified Dionysism.
Finally there is an analogy between positive or heroic pleasure and
that which, even οη the empirical plane, accompanies any action ίη
its perfection, when its style shows a greater or lesser degree of diligence and integrity. Everyone has experienced the particular pleasure
obtained from the exercise of an acquired skill, when after the necessary efforts to develop it (without being driven by the idea of "ardent
pleasure") it becomes an ability, a spontaneity of a higher order, a mastery, a sort of game. Thus all the elements considered ίη this paragraph
complement each other.
There are some further observations to be made ίη a more external
field: that of the interactions to which the individual is exposed, even
if he is integrated ίη our sense, by virtue of being placed ίη a specific
society, a civilization, and a cosmic environment.
Pure action does not mean blind action,:. The rule is to care nothing
for the consequences to the shifting, individualistic feelings, but not ίη
ignorance of the objective conditions that action must take into account
ίη order to be as perfect as possible, and so as not to be doomed to failure from the start. One may not succeed: that is secondary, but it should
not be owing to defective knowledge οΕ everything concerning the coη­
ditions of efficacy, which generally comprise causality, the relations of
cause to effect, and the law of concordant actions and reactions.
One can extend these ideas to help define the attitude that the integrated man should adopt οη every plane, once he has done away with
the current notions of good and evil. He sets himself above the moral
plane not with pathos and polemics but with objectivity, hence through
knowledge-the knowledge of causes and effects-and through conduct

72

1n the World Where God Is Dead

that has this knowledge as its οηlΥ basis. Thus for the moral concept
of "sin" he substitutes the objective one of "fault," or more precisely
"error."3 For him who has centered himself ίη transcendence, the idea
of "sin" has ηο more sense than the current and vacillating notions of
g·ood and evil, licit and illicit. ΑΙΙ these notions are burnt out of him
and cannot spiritually germinate again. One might say that they have
been divested of their absolute value, and are tested objectively οη the
basis of the consequences that ίη fact follow from an action inwardly
free from them.
There is an exact correspondence with traditional teachings here,
just as there was ίη the other behavioral elements suggested for an epoch
of dissolution. Το name a well-known formula that is nearly always misunderstood, thanks to overblown moralizing, there is the so-called law
of karma. 4 It concerns the effects that happen οη all planes as the result
of given actions, because these actions already contain their causes ίη
potentiality: effects that are natural and neutral, devoid of moral sanction either positive or negative. It is an extension of the laws that are
nowadays considered appropriate for physical phenomena, laws that
contain ηο innate obligation concerning the conduct that should follow once one knows about them. As far as "evil" is concerned, there is
an old Spanish proverb that expresses this idea: "God said: take what
you want and pay the price"; also the Koranic saying: ''He who does
evil, does it οηlΥ to himself." It is a matter of keeping ίη mind the possibility of certain objective reactions, and so long as one accepts them
even when they are negative, one's action remains free. The determinism of what the traditional world called "fate," and made the basis
of various forms of divination and oracles, was conceived ίη the same
way: it was a matter of certain objective directions of events, which
one might or might not take into account ίη view of the advantage or
risk inherent ίη choosing a certain course. ΒΥ analogy, if someone is
intending to make a risky alpine climb or a flight, once he has heard
a forecast of bad weather he may either abandon or pursue it. Ιη the
latter case, he accepts the risk from the start. But the freedom remains;
ηο "moral" factor comes into play. Ιη some cases the "natural sanction," the karma, can be partially neutralized. Again by analogy: one
may know ίη advance that a certain conduct of life will probably cause

Acting without Desire

73

harm to the organism. But one may give it ηο thought and eventually
resort to medicine to neutralize its effects. Then everything is reduced
to an interplay οί various reactions, and the ultimate effect will depend
οη the strongest one. The same perspective and behavior are also valid
οη the nonmaterial plane.
If we assume that the being has reached a high grade οί unification,
everything resembling an "jnner sanction" can be interpreted ίη the
same terms-positive feelings will arise ίη the case οί one line οί action,
negative ίη the case οί an opposite line, thus conforming to "good"
or "evil" according to their meanings ίη a certain society, a certain
social stratum, a certain civilization, and a certain epoch. Apart from
purely external and social reactions, a man may suffer, feel remorse,
guilt, or shame when he acts contrary to the tendency that still prevails
ίη his depths (for the ordinary man, nearly always through hereditary
and social conditioning active ίη his subconscious), and which has only
apparently been silenced by other tendencies and by the dictate οί the
"physical 1." Οη the other hand, he feels a sense οί satisfaction and
comfort when he obeys that tendency. Ιη the end, the negative "jnner
sanction" may intervene to cause a breakdown ίη the case mentioned,
where he starts from what he knows to be his deepest and most authentic vocation and chooses a given ideal and line οί conduct, but then
gives way to other pressures and passively recognizes his own weakness
and failure, suffering the internal dissociation due to the uncoordinated
plurality οί tendencies.
These emotional reactions are purely psychological ίη character and
origin. They may be indifferent to the intrinsic quality οί the actions,
and they have ηο transcendent significance, ηο character οί "moral
sanctions." They are facts that are "natural" ίη their own way, οη which
one should not superimpose a mythology οί moral interpretations ίί
one has arrived at true inner freedom. These are the objective terms
ίη which Guyau, Nietzsche, and others have treated ίη realistic terms
such phenomena οί the "moral conscience," οη which various authors
have tried to build a kind οί experimental basis-moving illegitimately
from the plane οί psychological facts to that οί pure values-for an
ethics that is not overtly founded οη religious commandments. This
aspect disappears automatically when the being has become one and

74

In the World Where God Is Dead

his actions spring from that υηίΙΥ. Ιη order to eliminate anything implying limitation or support Ι would rephrase that: when the being has
become one through willing it, having chosen υηίΙΥ; because a choice
is implied even here, whose direction is ηο! obligatory. One might even
accept and will ηοηυηίΙΥ, and ίη the same class οί superior types that
we are concerned with here, there may be those who permit themselves
to do so. Ιη such a case their basal υηίΙΥ does ηο! cease Ιο exist, but
rather dematerializes and remains invisibly οη a deeper plane.
Incidentally, ίη the same tradition ιο which the doctrine οί karma
belongs there is the possibility ηο! οηlΥ οί eliminating the emotive
reactions mentioned above (through "impeccability," inner neutrality
toward good and evil), but also οί the "magical" neutralization οί karmic reactions ίη 1he case οί a being who has real1y burnt out his naturalistic part, and thereby become actively de-individualized.
This partial digression may serve to clarify how the "moral"
plane can be eliminated impersonally, without any pathos, through
considering the law οί cause and effect ίη its ful1est extension. Earlier
οη, Ι examined the field οί external actions ίη which this law must
be taken into account. Ιη the inner realm it is a question οί knowing
what "blows to one's own self" may result from certain behaviors,
and οί acting accordingly, with the same objectivity. The "sin" complex is a pathological formation born under the sign οί the personal
God, the "God οί morality." The more metaphysical traditions, οη the
other hand, are characterized by consciousness οί an error committed,
rather than by the sense οί sin; and this is a theme that the superior
man οί our own time should make his own, beyond the dissolution οί
religious residues, by following the course Ι have described. Αη additional clarification comes from these observations οί Frithjof Schuon:
"The Hindus and Far Easterners do ηοι have the ηοιίοη οί 'sin' ίη the
Semitic sense; they distinguish actions ηο! according to their intrinsic value but according Ιο their opportuneness ίη view οί cosmic or
spiritual reactions, and also οί social υιίΙίΙΥ; they do ηοι distinguish
between 'moral' and 'immoral,' but between advantageous and harmful, pleasant and unpleasant, normal and abnormal, Ιο the ροίηι of
sacrificing the former-but apart from any ethical classification-to
spiritual interests. They may push renunciation, abnegation, and mor-

Acting without Desire 75

tification to the limits of what is humanly possible, but without being
'moralists' for all that."s
With that we can conclude the principal part of our investigation.
Το sum up, the man for whom the new freedom does not spell ruin,
whether because, given his special structure, he already has a firm base
ίη himself, or because he is ίη the process of conquering it through an
existential rupture of levels that reestablishes contact with the higher
dimension of "being" -this man will possess a vision of reality stripped
of the human and moral element, free from the projections of subjectivity and from conceptual, finalistic, and theistic superstructures. This
reduction to pure reality of the general view of the world and of existence will be described ίη what follows. Its counterpart is the return of
the person himself to pure being: the freedom of pure existence ίη the
outside world is confirmed ίη the naked assumption of his own nature,
from which he draws his own rule. This rule is a law to him to the
degree that he does not start from a state of unity, and to the degree
that secondary, divergent tendencies coexist and external factors try to
influence him.
Ιη the practical field of action, we have considered a regime of
experiments with two degrees and two ends. First there is the proving
knowledge of himself as a determined being, then of himself as a being
ίη whom the transcendent dimension is positively present. The latter is
the ultimate basis of his own law, and its s~preme justification. After
everything has collapsed and ίη a climate of dissolution, there is only
one solution to the problem of an unconditioned and intangible meaning to life: the direct assumption of one's own naked being as a function
of transcendence.
As for the modes of behavior toward the world, once a clarification and confirmation of oneself has been achieved as described, the
general formula is indicated by an intrepid openness, devoid of ties but
united ίη detachment, ίη the face of any possible experience. Where
this involves a high intensity of life and a regime of achievement that
enliven and nourish the calm principle of transcendence within, the
orientation has some features ίη common with Nietzsche's "Dionysian
state"; but the way ίη which this state should be integrated suggests that

76

1n the World Where God Is Dead

a better term would be "Dionysian Apol1onism." When one's relations
with the world are not those οί lived experience ίη general, but οί the
manifestation οί oneself through works and active initiatives, the style
suggested is that οί involvement ίη every act, οί pure and impersonal
action, "without desire," without attachment.
Attention was also drawn to a special state οί lucid inebriation that
is connected with this entire orientation and is absolutely essential for
the type οί man under consideration, because it takes the place οί that
animation that, given a different world, he would receive from an environment formed by Tradition, thus fil1ed with meaning; or else from the
subintellectual adhesion to emotion and impulses at the vital base οί
existence, ίη pure bios. Finally, Ι devoted some attention to the reality
οί actions and the regime οί knowledge that should take the place οί the
mythology οί inner moral sanctions and οί "sin."
Those who know my other works wil1 be aware οί the correspondence between these views and certain instructions οί schools and
movements ίη the world οί Tradition, which almost always concerned
only the esoteric doctrine. Ι repeat here what Ι have said already: that
it is only for incidental and opportune reasons that Ι have taken into
consideration themes from modern thinkers, especial1y Nietzsche. They
serve to create a link with the problems that preoccupy Europeans who
have already witnessed the arrival οί nihilism and οί the world without
God, and have sought to go beyond these ίη a positive way. It must
be emphasized that such references could have been dispensed with
altogether. With the intention οί creating a similar link to what some
contemporary thinkers have presented ίη a more or less muddled way,
it seems useful to treat briefly that contemporary current known as
existentialism, before proceeding to some particular sectors οί today's
culture and lifestyles, and to the proper attitude to take toward them.

--PART

3

The Dead End of
Existentialism

12
Being and
Inauthentic Existence
It is well known that there are two different types σί existentialism.
The first belongs to a group σί philosophers by trade, whose ideas
until recently were unk.Q,.own outside their narrow intellectual circles.
Second, there is a practical existentialism that came into νogue after
World War 11 with groups that borrowed a few themes from the philosophical existentialists. They adapted them ίστ literary purposes στ
as grounds ίστ anticonformist, pseudo-anarchist, στ rebellious behaν­
ίστ, as ίη the well-known case σί yesterday's existentialists σί SaintGermain-des-Pres and other Parisian locales, inspired aboνe all by
Jean-Paul Sartre.
Both types σί existentialism haνe νalue essentially as signs σί the
times. The second type, ίστ all its forced and snobbish nature, still has
this νalue ησ less than the "serious," philosophical existentialism. Ιη
fact, the practical existentialists are presented, στ present themselνes,
as a νariety σί that "generation at risk," νictims σί the final crisis σί the
modern world. Thus they may actually find themselνes at an adνantage
oνer the philosophical existentialists, who are mostly professors, and
whose academic table talk certainly reflects some motifs σί the crisis σί
contemporary man, but whose lifestyle has remained petit bourgeois,
far from the practical, personal, anticonformist conduct that the second
existentialist current displays.
Neνertheless, it is the philosophical existentialism that concerns us
here. Let it be understood that Ι certainly do not intend to discuss its
positions "philosophically," to see ίί they are speculatiνely "true" στ
"false." Apart from the fact that this would require a much longer treatment than Ι can giνe it here, it would be σί ησ interest ίστ συτ purposes.

78

Being and Inauthentic Existence
Ι

79

will examine instead a few of the more typical motiνes of existentialism ίη terms of their symbolic and, indeed, "existential" significance,
that is, as indirect testimonies οη the abstract and discursiνe leνel of the
sensation of existence belonging to a certain human type of our time.
Moreoνer, this examination is necessary for drawing the line between
the positions defined so far and the existentialists' ideas, which is all the
more important since my usage of a certain terminology could giνe rise
to the mistaken idea of nonexistent affinities.
Apart from their systematizing and their more elaborate philosophical apparatus, the philosophical existentialists' situation is analogous
to Nietzsche's: they too are modern men, that is, men seνered from
the world of Tradition and deνoid of any knowledge or comprehension
of that world. They work with the categories of "Western thought,"
which is as much as to say profane, abstract, and rootless. Noteworthy
is the case of Karl ]aspers, perhaps the οηlΥ one among the existentialists to make a few superficial references to "metaphysics,"l confused
by him with mysticism; at the same time he exalts "rational illumination," "the liberty and independence of the philosophical," and is
intolerant of any form of spiritual and secular authority, and of any
claim to obedience for men "belieνed to be God's microphones"-as
if nothing else were imaginable. 2 These are the typical horizons of the
intellectual of liberal-bourgeois origin. Ι, οη the contrary, eνen though Ι
haνe considered and will be considering modern problems, will not use
modern categories to clarify or dismiss them. Moreoνer, eνen when the
existentialists partially follow the right p;th, it happens as if by chance,
not based οη sound principles but with ineνitable waνerings, omissions,
and confusions, and aboνe all ίη a state of internal surrender. Worse
yet, philosophical existentialists use an arbitrary terminology that they
haνe specially inνented, and which, especially ίη Heidegger, is of an
inconceiνable abstruseness, both superfluous and intolerable.
The first point to be emphasized ίη existentialism is the affirmation
of the ''ontic-ontological'' primacy of that concrete and irreplicable being
that we always are. This is also expressed by saying that "existence precedes essence." The "essence" here is equiνalent to eνerything that can
be judgment, νalue, and name. As for existence, it is immediately related
to the "situation" ίη which eνery indiνiduallocates himself concretely ίη

80

The Dead End of Existentialism

space, time, and history. The expression used by Heidegger for this elementary reality is "being-there" or "being-here" (Da-sein).3 He connects
it closely to "being-in-the-world," to the extent of seeing it as an essential
constituent element of the human being. Το recognize the conditionality
imposed by the "situation" ίη the treatment of every problem and the
vision of the world is necessary, he says, ίη order not to fall into mystification and self-deception.
Whatever value they may have, the consequences of this first basic
existentialist motif add little to what we have already established
regarding the affirmation of one's own nature and one's own law, and
regarding the rejection of all doctrines and norms that claim universal,
abstract, and normative validity. Obviously it confirms the direction ίη
which to seek the only-support ίη a climate of dissolution. ]aspers, especially, brings to light the fact that every 'Όbjectίνe" consideration, when
detached from the context of the problems and visions of the world,
leads inevitably to relativism, skepticism, and ultimately to nihilism.
The οηlΥ viable path is that of an "elucidation" (Erhellung) of the ideas
and principles οη the basis of their existential foundation, or of the truth
of the "being" that each one is. It is like enclosing oneself ίη a circle.
Heidegger, however, says of this, and not unjustly, that the important
thing is not to leave the circle, but to remain there ίη the right way.
The relation between this orientation and an environment by
now devoid of meaning is given by the existential opposition between
authenticity and inauthenticity. Heidegger speaks of the state of inauthenticity, of swooning, of "covering" oneself or fleeing from oneself to
find oneself, of "being flung"4 into the anodyne existence of everyday
life with its platitudes, chattering, lies, entanglements, expedients, its
forms of "tranquilization" and "dejection," and its escapist diversions. 5
Authentic existence is seen and sought when one senses the emptiness
underlying that existence and is recalled to the problem of one's own
deepest being, beyond the social Ι and its categories. Here we have a
recapitulation of all the critiques that conclude by showing the absurdity and insignificance of modern life.
The affinity of these ideas with the positions already defined here
is, however, relative, because existentialism is characterized by an unacceptable overvaluation of "situationality." "Dasein" for Heidegger is

Being and Inauthentic Existence

81

always "being-in-the-world."6 The destiny of the "boundary situation"7
is, for ]aspers as well as for Marcel, a liminal fact, a given ίη the face
of which thinking halts and crashes. Heidegger repeats that the characteristic of "being-in-the-world" is not accidental for the Self: it is not as
though the latter could exist without it, it is not that man firstly is, and
then has a relation with the world-a causal, occasional, and arbitrary
relationship with that which is. ΑΙΙ this might well be the case, but
only for a human type different from that which concerns us. As we
know, ίη this human type an inner detachment, albeit coupled with an
absolute assumption of his determined nature, limits any "situational"
conditions and, from a superior point of view, minimizes and relegates
to contingency any "being-in-the-world."
There is an evident incongruence ίη the existentialists, since at the
same time they generally consider a rupture of that "enclosure" of the
individual, and an overcoming of that simple immanence, which, as we
have seen, gravely prejudice the positions of Nietzsche. Already ίη S0ren
Kierkegaard, considered as the spiritual father of the existentialists,
"existence" is presented as a problem; with a special use of the German
term Existenz, different from current usage, he defines Existenz as a
paradoxical point ίη which the finite and the infinite, the temporal and
the eternal, are copresent, meeting but mutually excluding each other.
So it would seem to be a matter of recognizing the presence ίη man of
the transcendent dimension. (Following the abstract habit of philosophy, the existentialists toο speak of man ίη gt;peral, whereas one should
always refer to one or another human type.) Still, we can accept the
conception of Existenz as the physical presence of the Ι ίη the world,
ίη a determined, concrete, and unrepeatable form and situation (cf. the
theory of one's own nature and law ίη chapter 7) and, simultaneously, as
a metaphysical presence of Being (of transcendence) ίη the Ι
Along these lines, a certain type of existentialism could also lead to
another point already established here: that of a positive antitheism, an
existential overcoming of the God-figure, the object of faith or doubt.
Since the center of the Ι is also mysteriously the center of Being, "God"
(transcendence) is a certainty, not as a subject of faith or dogma, but
as presence ίη existence and freedom. The saying of ]aspers: "God is a
certainty for me inasmuch as Ι exist authentically,"8 relates ίη a certain

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Deαd

End of Existentiαlism

way to the state already indicated, ίη which calling Being into question
would amount to calling oneself into question.
From this first dissection οί existentialist ideas we can reckon οη
the positiνe side its highlighting οί the dual structure οί a giνen human
type (not οί man ίη general) and the piercing οί the plane οί "life" to
admit a higher type οί presence. But we shall see the problem that all
this entails, and that existentialism does not resolνe.

13
Sartre:
Prisoner without Walls

Of all the existentialists, Sartre is perhaps the one who has most emphasized "existential freedom." His theory essentially reflects the movement
toward detachment that has led to the nihilistic world. Sartre speaks of
the nihilating (neantisant) act of the human being, which expresses his
freedom and constitutes the essence and the ultimate meaning of every
motion directed at a goal, and, ίη the final instance, of his whole existence ίη time. The speculative "justification" of such an idea is that "ίη
order to act it is necessary to abandon the plane of being and resolutely
attack that of nonbeing," because every goal corresponds to a situation not yet ίη existence, hence to a nothingness, to the empty space of
that which is mere possibility. Freedom ίη action introduces, then, the
"nothingness" into the world: "the human being first rests ίη the bosom
of being, then detaches himself from it with a'nihilating recoil" (recul
neantisant). This occurs not only when freedom calls being into question by doubting, interrogating, seeking out, and destroying it, but also
ίη any desire, emotion, or passion, without any exception. Freedom is
then presented to us as "a nihilating rupture with the world and with
oneself," as pure negation of the given: not being that which is, but being
that which is not. 1 Through repetition, this process of rupture and transcendence that leaves nothing behind itself and goes forward toward
nothing, gives rise to the development of existence ίη time (to "temporalization.") Sartre says precisely: "Freedom, choice, nihilation, and
temporalization are one and the same thing."2
This view is shared by other existentialists, especially by Heidegger,

83

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The Dead End of Existentialism

when he locates ίη "transcendence" the essence, the fundamental structure of the subject, the self, the ipseity, or whatever else one wants to call
"the entity that we always are." But it is Sartre who is responsible for
relating such views to their "existential" underpinning, made from the
specific experience of the last man who, having burned every support or
bond, finds himself consigned to himself.
Sartre employs every subtle argument to demonstrate 'ΌbjectίveΙΥ"
that the final ground of any human action is absolute freedom, that
there is ηο situation ίη which man is not compelled to choose, having ηο
other basis ίη his choice outside of himself. Thus Sartre points out that
even not choosing is a choice, so that basically the act of volition entails
ηο more freedom than the impassioned act, than surrendering oneself,
obeying, or giving way t~ instinct. Referring to "nature," "physiology,"
"history," and so on, is not a valid excuse, because according to the
given terms one's own fundamental freedom and one's own responsibility still subsist. Thus what ίη Nietzsche was an imperative-that the
superior man should know nothing to which to consign his responsibility and sensation of living-is here posited as a given fact proven by
philosophical analysis. But Sartre's state of mind is very different. For
him, man is like someone ίη a prison without walls; he cannot find,
either ίη himself or outside himself, any refuge from his freedom; he is
destined, is sentenced to be free. He is not free to accept or refuse his
freedom; he cannot escape it. Ι have already mentioned this state of the
mind as the most characteristic evidence of the specific, negative sense
that freedom has assumed ίη a certain human type ίη the epoch of
nihilism. Freedom that cannot cease to be such, that cannot choose to
be or not to be freedom, is for Sartre a limitation, a primordial, insuperable, and distressing "given."
Ιη his philosophy, everything else, including the outside world, the
totality of limitations belonging to men, things, or events, is supposedly never a real constriction; every impotence, every tragedy, even
death itself, can be assumed, ίη principle, within freedom. Ιη most
cases, everything will be reduced to factors that one must still take into
account, but that are not internally binding (as if following the objective
line of conduct considered below ίη chapter 16). Here Sartre has taken
from Heidegger the concept of "instrumentality" (Zuhandenheit), of

Sartre: Prisoner without Walls

85

the character οί "mere usable means" that everything that comes to us
from the outside, from people and things, may present to us: it always
presupposes not οηlΥ my particular structure or formation, but also any
attitude, goal, or direction selected or accepted by me alone, to which
the external factors cease to have a neutral character and make themselves known as favorable (usable) or adverse. ΑηΥ οί these characters
may be inverted to the point at which they change my position, the
order οί my goals and tendencies. Once again, there is ηο exit from the
enclosed circle οί one's own basic freedom. "[Man] has οηlΥ done what
he willed; he has οηlΥ willed what he has done."
Ι will not digress here over the details οί Sartre's often paradoxical arguments οη this subject. It is more interesting to realize that all
these describe the specific image οί the free, "nihilating" man, alone
with himself. Sartre writes: "We do not have behind or before us the
luminous realm οί values, justifications, or causes." Ι am abandoned to
my freedom and responsibility, without refuge ίη or outside οί me, and
without excuse.
As for the emotional tone, it amounts to feeling absolute freedom not as a victory, but as a burden. Heidegger even uses the term
"weight" (Last) to characterize the sensation that one feels, once finding oneself "hurled" into the world: one is very alive to the sense οί
"being-here" but ίη the dark as to "whence" and "whither." Moreover,
the introduction οί the concept οί responsibility already reveals one οί
the principal flaws οί all existentialis!p: to whom is one responsible?
Α radical "nihilation," when interpreted with regard to our special
human type as an active manifestation οί the dimension οί transcendence, should not tolerate anything that could give the word "responsibility" such a sense: naturally, we mean a "moral" sense, aside from
the consequences, external repercussions, either physical or social,
that can be expected for a given act, internally free. One finds oneself
already faced with the well-known situation οί a freedom that is suffered, rather than claimed: modern man is not free, but finds himself
free ίη the world where God is dead. ''He is delivered υρ to his freedom." It is from this that his deep suffering comes. When he is fully
aware οί this, anguish seizes him and the otherwise absurd sensation
οί a responsibility reappears.

14
Existence, "Α Project Flung
into the World"

We now consider another characteristic and symptomatic theme of
existentialism: that of the problematical nature of "Dasein."l For
Heidegger, the basis of pasein is nothingness; one is only flung into
the world as a mere possibility of being. Ιη existence, for the entity
that Ι am, the metaphysical question concerns my own being: Ι may
either attain it, or fail to do so. Heidegger's odd definition of what the
indiνidual represents is "an existent potentiality of being," and also "a
project flung into the world" (and a mere project is not necessarily realized). Sartre: "The Ι which Ι am depends, ίη itself, οη the Ι that Ι haνe
not yet become, precisely as the Ι that Ι haνe not yet become depends οη
the Ι that Ι am."2 Here we meet the existential angst, which Heidegger
rightly distinguishes from fear. Fear arises ίη the face of the world, due
to external, physical situations or perils; it would not exist if angst did
not exist, caused by the feeling of the generally problematic nature of
one's own being, and by the feeling that one not yet is; that one might
be, but also might not be. This theory is another witness to the climate
of modern existence and to a basic traumatization of being. It goes
without saying that it would be absolutely incomprehensible ίη an integrated human type, who is ignorant of angst, hence also of fear.
Ιη the existentialism that knows ηο openings οη a religious basis,
a graνe but logical consequence of the conception of the Self as a mere
uncertain possibility of being is the temporality or historicity of existence. If Ι am nothing, if Ι lack a preexistent metaphysical basis, if Ι only
am if that mere project of myself becomes realized, eνidently Ι exist only
ίη time, wherein that actuation of my project of being wil1 unfold-or
not, as the case may be. Thus the eνentual process of "transcendence"

86

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'Ά

Project Flung into the World"

87

envisaged by this type of existentialism is purely horizontal, not vertical
ίη character. As we shall see, Heidegger speaks of a "horizontal ecstasy
ίη the temporal,"3 meaning that the entity of each of us is not temporal because it happens to find itself within history, but because it is so
ίη its own basic nature: it is able to be solely within time. Given this
anguished resort to becoming for the source of one's being, and also
given the recognition of the insignificance of "inauthentic" existence
ίη a life that is socialized, superficial, and anodyne, we have evidently
reached the extreme limit of a true "philosophy of crisis," which we
could have included among the varieties of modern nihilism.
Quite obviously, we cannot harvest anything worthwhile from
these existential themes to bear οη the problems and orientation of the
man who concerns us. Just as we have excluded the intrinsic and fundamental value of "being-in-the-world," we must also exclude, for the
integrated man, temporality ίη the limiting sense used up to now. The
idea of the simple possibility of being, of my being ontologically my
own project, realizable or otherwise, is οηlΥ acceptable to us within
precise limits. What is ίη question is not "being," but one of its determined modalities: recognized, willed, and assumed. Since being ίη the
transcendent dimension is not at stake, the sense of one's own problematic nature is relativized and defused, and one does away with the metaphysical angst that the existentialists' man, having a different internal
constitution, feels, and indeed is bound to feel.
Turning to another point, existentiali~m, by introducing the concept of a "project," finds that it has to admit a nondeducible act that
took place before individual existence ίη the world: a mysterious decision that has determined the scheme of this existence. Yes, it is οηlΥ a
possibility of existence, but it is always determined and incontrovertible
ίη the case when it is realized. We can see here how a motif belonging
to traditional metaphysics, ίη both East and West (for the latter, see
Plotinus) has fallen onto most unsuitable soil. Traditional doctrines
accepted a predetermination that is ίη a way timeless, precosmic, and
prenatal, and connected with it the concept of one's "own nature" (the
Hindu svadharma, the ''original face" of Far Eastern philosophy). They
thereby justified within certain limits the precepts of fidelity to oneself,
self-election, and responsibility. But οη these grounds one can ηο longer

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The Dead End of Existentialism

hold to the existentialist principle: "existence precedes essence." Essence
should rightly refer to the preformation that contains potentially that
which is to be realized ίη human existence ίί one follows a path οί
"authenticity," that is, οί profound unity with oneself.
Even Sartre, for all his emphasis οη the "nihilating" freedom οί the
Ι, arrives at this order οί ideas without ever suspecting that they belong
to a millenary wisdom. He speaks οί a "fundamental project,"4 due to
an original freedom, which is the basis οί all the particular plans, goals,
and passional or voluntary motions that may take form ίη my "situation." Even for him there is a pretemporal, timeless choice, "a unitary
synthesis οί all my present possibilities," which remain ίη the latent
state ίη my being until "particular circumstances bring them to light,
without thereby suppressing tlreir membership ίη a whole." We might
think οί an analogy οί such ideas with what was said about the testing
self-knowledge, the amor fati, and even the Dionysian state, but always
as limited to that part οί my being that is tied to form. There is, however, an essential difference ίη the fact that for existentialist consciousness the way leading "back" is blocked: it strikes against something
that seems impenetrable, unjustifiable, indeed fatal to it. Sartre even
says drastically that any particular use οί that inescapable freedom,
whether ίη voluntary or passionate, rational or irrational decisions,
occurs "when the bets are already laid." Thus he compares the original
choice to the act οί throwing the ball οηto the roulette wheel, an act
with which everything is already potentially decided.
We therefore face a curious contrast between two distinct themes:
that οί formless freedom having nothingness as its basis, and that οί
a species οί destiny, a primal determination that basical1y annuls the
former or renders it as illusory as ever. This mirrors an inner sensation
typical οί a period οί dissolution.
Against this background, two motifs οί Heidegger's seem fairly
insignificant, which might otherwise correspond to the elements already
mentioned for the attitude οί the integrated man. One is his concept οί
decision (Entschlossenheit), which corresponds to acts that are true to
one's own Self and awaken one from the state οί anodyne and semiconscious living among others. The other is the concept οί the instant as an
active and continuous opening ίη time to circumstances as they present

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'Ά

Project Flung into the World"

89

themselves, as chances for realizing one's own possibilities. The correspondence is only an outward one. Ιη fact, the existentialist perspectives do not seem much different from those of theistic theology when
it talks about the "freedom of the creature," meaning the freewill that
God has given to man while leaving him the sole alternatives of either
renouncing it, or else being banished and damned if he makes real use
of it by deciding and acting ίη any way but to accept and follow the
divine will and law.
This religious framework is obviously lacking when existentialism
reflects the climate of the world without God, but the same situation
exists ίη covert form, with the same emotional complexes. It is directly
admitted ίη the existentialism that has deviated ίη the religious direction (Jaspers, Marcel, Wust, not to mention the Italian epigones of this
trend). ]aspers, for example, ends by limiting existential freedom to that
which enables the project presented as a given possibility to be actuated
or not actuated, but not changed. He draws from this a moral imperative ίη these terms: "This is how you must be, if you are faithful to
yourself."5 ΕνίΙ, the non-value, is referred instead to the will that denies
itself because it contradicts itself, because it does not choose that which
it has already chosen to be. This may again appear to be partly the path
that we have traced, until we reach the moment of divergence, which is
]aspers's passivity ίη the face of a "boundary situation" whose opaqueness causes him to swerve and abdicate. He even cites the Christian
saying: "Thy will be done," and adds: "Ι feel ~ith certainty that ίη my
freedom Ι am not free by virtue of myself, but that Ι am therein given
to myself; Ι can even fail ίη myself and not attain my freedom."6 For
him, the supreme freedom is to be "aware of oneself as freedom from
the world and as supreme dependence οη the transcendent," and he also
mentions the "hidden and ever uncertain demand that comes from the
divinity."7
Heidegger also speaks of having oneself before one as "an inexorable enigma,"8 of the possible being (of the Ι) delivered or entrusted
to itself, involved ίη a given possibility about which freewίll can ηο
longer be indifferent. γet this author denies that there is any entity from
which to derive "Dasein," that is, my concrete and determined being
ίη the world and ίη time. Worse yet, Heidegger can find nothing better

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The Dead End of Existentialism

than to revive the concept οί the "voice οί conscience,"9 interpreted as
"a call that comes from myself, and yet from above me,"10 when Ι am
deafened by the din οί inauthentic, anodyne, exterior life, and have ηο
heart for the choice already made. The fact that Heidegger sees ίη the
voice οί conscience an objective, constitutional phenomenon οί Dasein
and abstains, following his phenomenological method, from interpreting it ίη a religious or moral sense, does not ίη the least affect the passivity οί the experience and the relative transcendence ("above me") οί this
voice. Thus he treats as nonexistent the critical effort οί the nihilistic
period, which showed how indeterminate and relative this "voice" is,
lacking any normative, objective, or unequivocal value.
When Sartre treats the ''original project" and says ''Ι choose the
whole οί myself ίη the-whole οί the world,"ll he admits the possibility οί
a change affecting the original choice, but ίη terms οί a breakdown, an
abyssal menace that 100ms over the individual from birth till death. We,
οη the other hand, have seen that it is only through such awakenings
that the norm οί absolutely being oneself can receive its confirmation
and its supreme legitimization as freedom, unconditionality, and transcendence. It is the second degree οί the testing knowledge οί oneself
that was considered earlier. How distant it is frOln the existentialists'
horizons will become clear from once more addressing ]aspers.
]aspers speaks οί the "unconditioned demand" through which is
manifested "the Being, the eternal, or whatever one likes to call the
other dimension οί being." It is a command to act ίη a way that has ηο
motive or justification ίη objective, rational, or natιιralistic terms. One
might almost think that it was the detached, "pure action" that Ι have
described.
The framework, ίη itself, is acceptable: "The 10ss οί positions falsely
believed to be safe opens υρ a possibility οί wavering that reveals not an
abyss but a realm οί freedom; that which appeared to be nothingness
manifests as the place from which the most authentic being speaks."
But when we try to see what ]aspers means by "the hidden unconditioned, which only ίη extreme sitιιations governs the course οί life
with tacit decision," we find the categories οί "good" and "evil" reappearing, at three levels. At the first level, what appears as "evil" is
the existence οί the man who remains ίη the conditioned state where

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'Ά

Project Flung into the World"

91

animal life unfolds, ruly or unruly, mutable, and void οί decision. Up
to this point Ι might agree, ίί ]aspers did not add that such an existence
must be subject to "moral values" (where do these come from? what
justifies them?), and ίί he would make it clear that this is not a matter οί
the particular contents οί action, but οί the various forms ίη which any
action whatever, without restrictions or exclusions, can be lived. Thus
it would not necessarily exclude those actions that ίη a different human
type would belong to "naturalistic" or conditioned life.
At ]aspers' second level, "evil" is human weakness ίη the face οί
what ought to done; it is the self-deception and impurity οί motives
with which we justify certain actions and behaviors ίη our own eyes.
Here too Ι find nothing to object to. But at the third level, "evil" is
the "will to evil,"12 defined as "the nihilistic will to destruction for its
own sake," the impulse to cruelty, "the nihilistic will to destroy all that
is and has value." Οη the other hand, "good" is love, which carries
one toward being and creates a relationship with transcendence that
ίη the opposite case would be dissolved ίη the egotistic affirmation οί
the Ι. Νο comment is needed to indicate how little unconditioned is the
"unconditioned demand" οί which ]aspers speaks. One does not have
to go as far as Nietzsche ίη exalting the opposite kind οί behavior, such
as lawlessness, cruelty, and "superhuman" hardness, ίη order to realize that ]aspers has fallen headfirst into the orbit οί religious or social
moralizing, and that the case οί a deconditioning rupture that Ι have
described, which incurs the extreme test ΟΙ one's own ontological status
and the verification οί one's sovereignty, has ηο place ίη his system.
Το conclude this part οί my analysis, it can be said that existentialism leaves the fundamental problem unresolved: that οί a specific, positive, and central relationship with the transcendent dimension. For it is
οηlΥ the place of trαnscendence within us that can decide οη the value
and ultimate sense οί the existential tasks relating to the absolute mastery οί Dasein, that is, what Ι am or can be ίη a determinate way. That
we have to call a draw ίη this regard is evident from the way the existentialists conceive οί the pretemporal act (ίί they do conceive οί it, and not
simply leave it to the oblivion οί absurdity), which they have rightly
posited as the origin οί individuation, real or possible as the case may
be. We see motifs here that seem to replicate those οί Orphic or

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The Dead End of Existentialism

Schopenhauerian pessimism: existence, Dasein, is felt not only as expulsion and as "being flung" (Geworfenheit) irrationally into the world,
but also as a "fall" (Heidegger's Ab-fallen, Verfallen) and even as a debt
or a fault (which is the double meaning οί the German word Schuld).
Existential angst, then, is caused by the act or choice with which one
obscurely willed to be what one now is, or what one ought to be (ίί one
can); it is caused by the use made οί a freedom that is ίη a way transcendent, for which there is ηο meaning or explanation but for which one
remains responsible.
None οί the philosophical eHorts οί the existentialists, especially
Heidegger and Sartre, have managed to give meaning to such notions,
which really derive from a covert, tenacious residue οί an extroverted
religious attitude, spe~ifically from the oHshoot οί the idea οί original
sin as given ίη Spinoza's axiom: Omnis determinatio est negatio (every
determination is a negation). This comes down to saying that Dasein
is blameworthy "just by the simple fact οί existing"; existence, both
ίη fact and as a simple project, is ίη every case determined and finite,
hence it necessarily excludes all the infinite possibilities οί pure being,
which might equally well have been the object οί the original choice.
That is why it is "guilty." ]aspers ίη particular underlines this point: ΜΥ
guilt lies ίη the destiny οί having chosen (and οί not having been able
not to choose) only the one direction that corresponds to my real or
possible being, and negating all the others. This is also the source οί my
responsibility and "debt" toward the infinite and the eternal.
Such an order οί ideas could obviously only appeal to a human
type who was so οΗ center with regard to transcendence as to feel that
it was external to himself. This makes him incapable οί identification
with the principle οί his own choice and his own freedom before time;
and hence, as counterpart, the Sartrean sensation οί freedom as something alien to which one is condemned. Α further and more particular
implication appears ίη a rigid, false, substance-bound concept οί transcendence-of the Absolute, Being, the Infinite, or whatever one prefers
to call the principle ίη which occurred the original individualizing and
finalizing act that is presented as a fall. The absurdity οί this view can
be illustrated by a parallel from everyday life. It is as though Ι had been
left entirely to myself ίη deciding how to pass the evening-going to a

Existence,

'Ά

Project F/ung into the World"

93

concert, staying at home to read, going out to dance or drink, and so
on-and then made to feel guilty and indebted simply because Ι had
decided for one οί these possibilities and excluded the others. Someone
who is really free, when he does what he wants, has ηο "complexes"
or soul-searching οί this kind, nor does he feel "finalized" and fallen
because he thereby excludes other possibilities. He knows that he could
have done otherwise, but οηlΥ a hysteric or neurotic would be driven by
such a thought ίηto "existential anguish." Admittedly, the transparency
ίη oneself οί one's own original basis, the Grund, may be οί very different degrees, but it is the orientation that counts here. Measured by this
touchstone, existentialism condemns itself.
Making a short digression to the abstract, metaphysical plane, Ι
find false and constricting the conception οί an absolute and an ίηίί­
nite that are condemned to indetermination and to fluctuation ίη the
merely possible. Rather, the truly infinite is free power: the power οί a
self-determination that is not at all its own negation, but its own affirmation. It is not the fall from a sort οί substantialized "totality," but
the simple use οί the possible. Arising from this idea, one can see the
absurdity οί speaking οί existence as a fault or sin, merely by virtue οί
being a determined existence. Nothing prevents us from adopting the
contrary point οί view, for example, that οί classical Greece, which sees
ίη limit and form the manifestation οί a perfection, a completion, and
a kind οί reflection οί the Absolute.
The human type to whom all these ~xistentialist ideas appeal is
characterized by a (ractured will and remains so; the will (and the freedom) οί the "before" to which the mystery οί Dasein refers, and the
will (and the freedom) οί this same Dasein ίη the world and ίη the
"situation," are not rejoined (rejoining the two parts οί a broken sword
was an esoteric theme used ίη the symbolism οί medieval chivalric literature).13 When ]aspers asserts that knowing my own origin as an existence determined by a choice does not "possibilize" me, that is, does
not release the obscure bonds and the irrationality that this represents
and thereby give me freedom (or the presentiment οί freedom), this evidently derives from the fact οί feeling separated from that origin, cut οΗ
from the transcendent dimension, sundered from the original being. For
the same reason, Kierkegaard conceived the coexistence οί the temporal

94

The Dead End of Existentialism

and the eternal, of the transcendent and the unrepeatable indiνidua­
tion ίη existence, as a paradoxical "dialectic" situation, anguishing and
tragic, to be accepted as it is rather than oνercome by posing the second
term ίη function of the first, so as to restore to unity that which ίη man
"js fragment and mystery and terrible chance."
When ]aspers himself says that without the presence of transcendence, freedom would be purely arbitrary without any sense of blame,
he confirms ίη the clearest way possible how existence senses transcendence-namely, as a species of paralyzing and anguishing "stone
guest." ΒΥ projecting it outside oneself, one's relationship to transcendence is οΗ center, exterior, and dependent. This is so much like the
relationship ίη religious consciousness that one might well accuse this
philosophy of maΚing a 10t of fuss about nothing, and of being just a
prolongation of the religious world ίη crisis, not a space that can open
itself aHirmatiνely beyond that world. Transcendence, like freedom,
ought to furnish existence with a foundation of calm and incomparable security, with a purity, a wholeness, and an absolute decisiνeness
ίη action. Instead, it feeds all the emotional complexes of the man ίη
crisis: angst, nausea, disquiet, finding his own being problematical, the
feeling of an obscure guilt or fall, deracination, a feeling of the absurd
and the irrational, an unadmitted solitude (though some, like Marcel,
fully admit it), an inνocation of the "jncarnate spirit," the weight of an
incomprehensible responsibility-incomprehensible, because he cannot resort to oνertly religious (and hence coherent) positions like those
of Kierkegaard or Barth, where angst refers to the sentiment of the soul
that is alone, fallen, and abandoned to itself ίη the presence of God. Ιη
all of this, feelings appear like those that Nietzsche warned about ίη
the case of a man who has made himself free without haνing the necessary stature: feelings that kill and shatter a man-modern man-if he
is incapable of killing them.

15
Heidegger:
"Retreating Forwards"
and "Being-for-Death"
Collapse οί Existentialism
Το

complete this "existential" analysis οί the basis οί existentialism,
it will be useful to return to Heidegger, who, like Sartre, excludes the
"vertical opening" οί religion and claims to be "phenomenologically"
agnostic.
We have seen that the obscurity already inherent ίη existentialism is
exacerbated ίη Heidegger by his view οί man as an entity that does not
include being within itself (or behind it, as its root), but rather before
it, as ίί being were something to be pursued and captured. Being is
conceived here as the totality οί possibilities, with regard to which one
is to blame, or, taking the other meaning οί Schuld, ίη debt. The existentialists never explain why this is the case, or why one shoula feel
this destiny οί seizing a pandemic totality at all costs. We can explain it
with reference to what Ι have already said: that it is all symptomatic οί
someone who suffers the unfolding or activity οί the transcendent as a
coercive force, with ηο feeling οί freedom. It is as though the possibilities necessarily excluded from a finite being (finitude being negation,
as explained ίη chapter 14) were projected onto goals and situations
deployed ίη time; as though man had being before him, running ahead
οί him (the term used is actually Sich-vorweg-sein) ίη a process that can
never lead to a real possession, ίη a "horizontally ecstatic"l succession
(ecstasy here ίη the literal meaning οί exit from a stasis) that constitutes "authentic temporality." This is how Heidegger presents things;
95

96
ηο

The Dead End of Existentialism

other meaning is permitted for man's being, as long as he is alive,
because he always suffers from nontotality.
The prospects could not be darker. Dasein, the Ι, which is nothing ίη itself, pursues being that is outside and before it, and thus runs
through time, ίη the same dependent relationship as the thirsty man
seeking water-with the difference that it is inconceivable that he will
ever reach Being, when he does not already possess it (as the Eleatic
philosophers said, ηο violence can make that to be which is not). The
view of life ίη Heideggerian existentialism could well be characterized
by Bernanos's expression: a retreat forward (une fuite en avant). It also
underlines the absurdity of speaking of a "decision" (Entschlossenheit),
ίη a really affirmative sense, for any action or moment ίη which the
"horizontal ecstasy" is developing, whereas that is exactly what applies
to the human type who interests us: becoming and existing ίη time are
substantially transformed ίη their structure and significance. The dark
downward pull, the neediness, compulsion, and unquiet tension are
destroyed, and existence takes οη a character of acting and living decisively, arising from an existing principle that is detached and free with
regard to itself and its determined action. This happens naturally when
the accent falls away from the Ι, or is transferred to the transcendent
dimension-to Being.
Someone has spoken of a "frenetic desire to live, to live at any
price, which is not the result of the rhythm of life within us, but of
the rhythm of death." This is one of the principal traits of our time.
One would not be rash ίη saying that this is the ultimate meaning of
Heidegger's existentialism, when thought through to its foundations,
that is, of existentialism that admits ηο religious opening. This is its
effective "existential" content, however it may seem to the philosopher
himself.
This significance seems to be confirmed by the ideas one meets
with ίη Heidegger concerning death, which are otherwise fairly
strange. Basically, it is οηlΥ ίη death that he sees, and problematically
confines, the possibility of capturing this that is always escaping and
fleeing before us ίη time. Therefore Heidegger speaks of existence ίη
general as a "Being-towards-death," as a "Being-for-the-end."2 Death
overcomes being because it halts its constant, irremediable privation

Heidegger: "Retreating forwards" and "Being-for-Death"

97

and non-totality, and offers it "its very own possibility, unconditioned
and insuperable." And the individual's anguish ίη the face of death,
which deals the deathblow to Dasein, is the anguish ίη the face of this
possibility. This emotional coloring is again typical and significant,
showing how the condition of passivity persists even here, ίη the face
of that "end" that represents the "accomplishment," as ίη the dual
sense of the Greek word telos, ίη the context of the traditional doctrine
of mors triumphalis (triumphal death). Heidegger proceeds with an
accusation of a form of "inauthenticity" and diversionary tranquilization aimed not οηlΥ at the stupid indifference to death but also at
the attitude that judges the preoccupation with death, and anguish ίη
the face of it, as effeminate and cowardly, preferring to face it with
impassibility. He speaks of the "courage to have anguish ίη the face of
death,"3 which is absolutely inconceivable, not to say ridiculous, for an
integrated human type.
The negative character of the whole existential process, which
includes death and gravitates around it, is once again confirmed by
Heidegger's talk of "dying as being flung into one's very own possibility οί being, unconditioned and insuperable."4 It sounds like a destiny
of the most somber kind. And just as what lies before Dasein, the prior
state οί what we are, falls outside the zone illuminated by Heideggerian
(and non-Heideggerian) existential awareness, so everything "after
death" is left ίη obscurity, including the problems of survival and posthumous states, of a higher or lower existence after this mortal one.
Even less attention is given to that "typology of death" that ha~ had
such an important part ίη traditional doctrines: they have seen ίη the
various ways of approaching death a most important factor regarding
what death itself might represent, and, moreover, what may occur postmortem ίη each case.
The few positive motifs casually touched οη by Heidegger are thus
neutralized by an essentiallimitation. Remarks such as that freedom "is
the foundation" (that is, the basis of "that being which is our truth")
"and as such is also the bottomless abyss of Dasein," turn out to
lack any real significance, ηο more than the need to "free oneself
from Egoity [Ichheit, the quality of being an Ι] to conquer oneself
ίη an authentic selfhood" (which would return to that abyssal free-

98

The Dead End of Existentialism

dom}. Replying to the accusation of affirming an "anthropocentric"
freedom, Heidegger hastens to recall that for him the essence of Dasein
is "ecstatic, hence eccentric" (sic!), and that thus the feared freedom is
an error; so that after all there remains the simple alternative of inauthentic existence, which is fleeing from oneself and dissolving ίη the
irrelevant and anodyne life of everyday society, or else the obedience
to the demand of being that translates into accepting one's "Beingtowards-death," after spending one's life ίη the vain pursuit of that
fata morgana, the totality of being; that is, after having experienced
transcendence solely as that which unfolds and urges from within the
individual and his becoming, acting almost as a vis a tergo (force from
behind).
A~ a last point, Ι would mention the final collapse of existentialism as seen ίη ]aspers's views οη foundering, defeat, and failure (das
Scheitern). One must first accept two fairly incompatible conditions.
One concerns that free realization of the being that we are not, but are
able to be-and strictly speaking, we could stop here and resolve the
existential problem ίη these terms, which is the elementary or partial
solution that Ι have repeatedly considered. At the same time, ]aspers,
like Heidegger, speaks of man's impulse to embrace being, not as this
or that particular being, but as pure and total being. This impulse is
destined to fail ίη all its positive forms. Pure being may present itself
outside us through a "ciphered language," by means of symbols, but
ίη its essence it is "transcendent" ίη the negative sense, thus i m p o s - t
sible to be attained ίη any way. This character of the object of our
deepest metaphysical impulse manifests itself ίη the "boundary situations" against which we are powerless. For ]aspers, examples of these
are guilt, chance, death, the ambiguity of the world, and being taken by
surprise. Ιη the face of all these situations that "transcend" us, one can
supposedly react either inauthentically with self-mystifications, deceptions, and attempted evasions, or else authentically, facing υρ to reality
with desperation and anguish.
It is hardly necessary here to point out the absolute falsity of these
alternatives, because there are other reactions possible, such as those Ι
have defined for the integrated man-not to mention everything Sartre
has discovered about the fundamental freedom and intangibility of the

Heidegger: "Retreating forwards" and "Being-for-Death"
Ι.

99

But it is interesting to see what solution appears to ]aspers as the
"authentic" reaction. This solution consists of recognizing one's own
defeat, one's own checkmate or foundering, even ίη the effort of gaining
or somehow attaining being: οηlΥ at that point, as the negative somersaults into the positive, does one enter the presence of being, and
existence opens itself to being. "It is decisive how man lives defeat (or
failure or foundering-Scheitern): whether it remains hidden ίn order
to crush him ίη the end, or whether it appears unveiled, placing itself
ίη front of the inescapable limits of his own Dasein; either he seeks
solutions and palliatives that are inconsistent and fantastic, or else he
frankly keeps silence οη account of the presence of the inexplicable."
At that point, nothing is left but faith. For ]aspers, the way consists
precisely ίη desiring one's own defeat, one's foundering, more or less
like the Gospel principle of losing one's life ίη order to find it. Let go,
quit the game: "the will to eternity, far from refusing failure, recognizes
there its own goa1." The tragic collapse of the self is identified with the
epiphany or opening to transcendence. At the very moment when Ι, as
myself, see Being escaping me, it reveals itself to me, and thereupon Ι
attain the supreme enlightenment of the existential duplicity ίη itselfthe point of departure for all existentialism since Kierkegaard-which
is supposed to clarify the relationship between my finite existence and
transcendence. It is a sort of ecstatic and believing opening, ίη defeat.
This is the price of superseding the anguish and disquiet of living, seeking, and striving, with a state of peace, of which one can hardly miss
its basis ίη Christianity, and specifically ίη the dialectical theo1ogy of
Protestantism.
]aspers's only attempt to go beyond this truly creaturely level concerns the concept of the "All-encompassing" (das Umgreifende). This
is a far echo of ideas that also belong to traditional teaching. The problem is posed by that dual consciousness that is always led to objectivize, to juxtapose an object to the Ι as subject, and can therefore never
grasp the ultimate root of being, the reality ίη which we are contained,
which is anterior and superior to this duality. ]aspers seems to allow the
possibility of overcoming the subject-object division and experiencing
unity, the "All-encompassing." It is necessary for every object (anything
juxtaposed to myself as Ι) to disappear, and for the Ι to dissolve. But

Ι

•

100

The Dead End of Existentialism

given the sentiment of oneself that, as we have seen exhaustively, is the
οηlΥ one known to the human type considered by this philosopher, it is
natural that everything would be reduced to another sort of foundering,
to the simple mystical experience of "diving into the All-encompasslng"
(these are ]aspers's words). It is the equivalent of Heidegger's confused,
passive, and ecstatic bursting into Being through death, after "living
for death." It is just as antithetical to any positive, clear, and sovereign
realization or opening to the transcendent as the true ground of being
and of Dasein, ίη an effective and creative conquest of the dual state.
With this, we can conclude our analysis of existentialism. Το summarize it, existentialism takes over some of the Nietzschean demands, but
... cannot go beyond them except as concerns the point highlighted ίη the
preceding examination: by including transcendence as a constitutive
element. ΟηΙΥ here can existentialism relate to the human type who
concerns us; and the logical consequence should have been the break
with all naturalism and with every immanent religion of life. Including
this dimension ίη existentialism, however, causes it to fall right into criSi8, and none of the solutions offered οη the grounds of emotional and
subintellectual complexes-anguish, guilt, destiny, extraneity, solitude,
disquiet, nausea, the problem of Dasein, and so on-go beyond the
point one could have reached by developing and rectifying the postnihilist positions of Nietzsche, or even go as far as that.
As we have seen, ίη Kierkegaard, ]aspers, and Marcel, not to mention other exponents of a "Catholic existentlalism" that passes for
"positive existentialism," the transcendent ίη question ends υρ as the
object of faith and devotion. It makes little difference that they use a
novel, abstract, and abstruse terminology instead of the more honest
one of orthodox theistic theology. The "free" man again looks backward to the abandoned earth, and with an "lnvocatlon" (the actual
term used by Marcel) tries to reestablish a tranquilIzing contact with
the dead God.
Taken as a whole, the existential balance adds υρ to a negative. It
acknowledges the structural duality of existence and transcendence,
but the center of gravity of the Ι does not fall οη the transcendent,
but οη the existent side. Transcendence is basically conceived as the

Heidegger: "Retreating forwards" and "Being-for-Death"

101

"other," whereas one ought rather to conceive it the other way around,
with one's own determined, "situationa1" being, one's Dasein, as
''other'' to the true Self that one is. The former represents a simp1e
manifestation ίη the human state, and is subject to the corresponding conditions, which are re1ative because they often act ίη various
ways according to the attitudes one assumes. (As Ι have said, this is
the positive contribution οί Sartre's ana1ysis.) Even though the re1ation
between the terms may often seem obscure and prob1ematic-and that
is the οη1Υ rea1 prob1em οί the inner 1ife-it does not destroy the fee1ing
that the integrated man has οί centra1ity, ca1m, sovereignty, superiority
over himself, and "transcendent confidence."
This confirms the fundamenta1 difference between the human type
who finds his reflection ίη existentia1 phi1osophy, and the one who
still preserves, as an inde1ib1e character, the substance οί the man οί
Tradition. Existentia1ism is a projection οί modern man ίη crisis, rather
than οί modern man beyond crisis. Anyone who a1ready possesses that
inner dignity described above, as natura1 as it is detached, or who "has
10ng wandered ίη a strange 1and, 10st among things and contingencies,"
finds this phi1osophy abso1ute1y a1ien to him. Through crises, tests,
errors, destructions, and successes he has rediscovered the Self, and he
is reestab1ished ίη the Self, ίη Being, ίη a ca1m and unshakab1e mode.
Equally distant is the man who has 1earned to give a 1aw to himself
from the heights οί a superior freedom, so that he can wa1k οη that rope
stretched over an abyss, οί which it is said: "It is peri10us to cross from
one side to the other, peri10us to find oneself ίη the midd1e, peri1ou~ to
tremb1e or to stop."
It is perhaps not so unkind to think that 1itt1e e1se was to be expected
from the specu1ations οί men who, 1ike a1most all the "serious" existentia1ists (as distinct from those οί the new "generation at risk"), are
professors, mere armchair intellectua1s whose 1ifesty1e, aside from their
so-called prob1ems and positions, has a1ways been οί the petit bourgeois
type. They are far from being "burned out" or beyond good and evi1 ίη
their actua1 existence, which is conformist except ίη the few cases that
flaunt a po1itica1 p1umage, sometimes 1ibera1, sometimes communist.
Men ίη revo1t within the chaotic 1ife οί the great cities, or men who
have passed through the storms οί stee1 and fire and the destructions οί

102

The Dead End of Existentialism

the last total wars, or have grown υρ ίη the bombed-out zones, are the
ones who possess ίη greater measure the premises for the reconquest οί
a higher sense οί life and for an existential overcoming, ηοτ theoretical
but genuine, οί all the problems οί man ίη crisis; and these are also the
points οί departure for any corresponding speculative expressions.
Ιη conclusion, ίτ may be interesting to give an example οί the value
that some themes touched οη ίη existentialism may have, when assimilated το a different human type and integrated into traditional teaching.
The example is offered by the idea οί that sort οί transcendent decision
or choice that, as we have seen, many existentialists place at the ίουη­
dation οί every individual's Dasein ίη the world. Ιτ underlies his having
a certain range οί possibilities and types οί experience, and ηοτ others,
"and his awareness οί having come from far away; thus ίτ also supplies
him at least with a line οί less resistance, and maybe even with the basis
for authentic existence and fidelity το himself.
Ι have already mentioned the presence οί a similar teaching ίη the
traditional world. Ι would add that ίτ is ηοτ οηlΥ part οί the esoteric
doctrine οί that world, but often οί the general, exoteric view οί life,
where ίτ takes the form οί the doctrine οί preexistence (ηοτ to be confused with that οί reincarnation, which is οηlΥ a popular symbolic formulation, and absurd ίί taken literally). The rejection οί the doctrine οί
preexistence must be counted among the limitations οί the theistic and
creationist theology that has come το predominate ίη the West. Οη the
one hand, this has mirrored, and οη the other, ίτ has furthered a suppression or silence about the prehuman and nonhuman dimension οί
the person, οί Dasein.
Now, we have seen that existentialism often exhibits a presentiment οί this ancient truth, giving rise either Το the anguishing sensaτίοη οί an insuperable limitation that is obscure ίί ηοτ absurd, or else
to the abdication and retreat into a creatural attitude ίη a more or less
religious sense. Ιη the differentiated type who interests us, οη the contrary, the same presentiment can οηlΥ act as ίτ has always acted ίη the
upper strata οί the traditional world, being a most essential part οί the
attitude required for staying οη one's feet and "riding the tiger." As
an opening to the doctrine οί preexistence, ίτ generates an unequalled
force. Ιτ reawakens the consciousness οί one's origins and οί a higher

Heidegger: "Retreating forwards" and "Being-for-Death"

103

freedom ίη the heart of the world, the awareness of having come from
far away, thus also that of a distance. The natural effects will be along
the lines indicated: the relativization of everything that seems so important and decisive ίη human existence as such, but ίη terms absolutely
opposed to indifference, sloth, and alienation. It is οηlΥ οη the basis of
this sensation that the dimension of Being can open υρ more and more,
beyond the physical Ι, thereby strengthening the capacity for involving
and giving one's whole self, not for the sake of exaltation, ecstasies,
or a merely vital task, but according to the duality already mentioned
when speaking of pure action. Ιη fact, the ultimate criterion of being
able to be destroyed, even, without thereby being wounded-which can
easily present itself ίη an epoch such as we live ίη, and such as will
very likely continue-is closely related to the lived experience of preexistence, which indicates the direction ίη which the "two parts of the
sword" may be reunited.

--PART4

Dissolution of
the Individual

16
The Dual Aspect
of Anonymity
Turning to a more concrete realm than that οί the last chapter, Ι shall
now examine the problem οί the personality and the individual ίη the
cQ.ntemporary world. There are many today who deplore the "crisis οί
the personality," and while they still pose as defenders οί Western civilization, they often appeal to the "values οί the personality," holding
them to be a most essential part οί the European tradition.
Thus a problem presents itself, one that cannot simply be solved by
the facile polemic against the collectivism, mechanization, standardization, and soullessness οί modern existence. Moreover, we must make
it very clear: What exactly is to be saved? Today's intellectuals who
have at heart the "defense οί the personality" give ηο satisfactory reply,
because they hold οη to what Ι have called the regime οί residual forms
(see chapter 1), and, almost without exception, they think and evaluate
ίη terms οί liberalism, naturallaw, or humanism.
The true point οί departure should instead be the distinction
between person and individual. Strictly speaking, the concept οί the
individual is that οί an abstract, formless, numerical unity. As such,
the individual has ηο quality οί its own, hence nothing that really distinguishes it. Considered simply as individuals, one can assume that
all men and women are equal, so that we can ascribe equal rights and
responsibilities to them and presumably equal "dignity" as "human
beings" (the concept οί "human being" is οηlΥ a dignified version οί
that οί the individual). Ιη social terms, this defines the existentiallevel
proper to "natural rights," liberalism, individualism, and absolute
democracy. One οί the principal and most apparent aspects οί modern
decadence refers, ίη fact, to the advent οί individualism as a conse-

106

The

Duαl

Aspect of Anonymity

107

quence of the collapse and destruction of the former organic and traditionally hierarchical structures, which have been replaced primarily by
the atomic multiplicity of individuals ίη the world of quantity, that is to
say the masses.
The "defense of the personality" appears insignificant and absurd
when measured οη any individual basis. It makes ηο sense to position
oneself against the world of the masses and of quantity without realizing that it is individualism itself that has led to it, ίη the course of one
of those processes of "liberation" that historically have ended by taking
the opposite direction. lη our epoch this process has already had irreversible consequences.
When we turn from the social to the cultural arena, things οηlΥ seem
to present themselves ίη a different way. The cultural field has remained
somewhat isolated, detached from the larger forces ίη motion today, and
that is the οηlΥ reason the misunderstanding exists. Although atomized
individualism is not ίη question here, the idea of the personality is still
bound to a subjectivism based οη the individual, ίη which the poverty,
or even the nonexistence of a spiritual basis is concealed by literary and
artistic talent, by an intellectualism and rootless originality, and by a
creativity devoid of any profoundsignificance.
Ιη fact, ίη the West there has been a collusion between individualism, subjectivism, and "personality" that goes back to the Renaissance
period and which developed ίη the light of that "discovery of man"
exalted by antitraditional historiography. Historians have care(ully
ignored, or considered as positive, the counterpart, that is, the more
or less conscious and complete separation from transcendence. ΑΙΙ the
splendor and power of "creativity" of that period should not blind us
to this basic tendency. Schuon has clarified the true state of affairs
regarding the artistic realm as follows: "Speaking ίη human terms, certain Renaissance artists are without a doubt great, but their grandeur
becomes insignificant when faced with the grandeur of the sacred. lη
the sacred, it is as if the genius is concealed; what predominates is an
impersonal, vast, mysterious intelligence. The sacred work of art has a
perfume of infinitude, the imprint of the absolute. The individual talent
is there disciplined; it mingles with the creative function of the entire
tradition, which cannot be substituted, much less surpassed by the mere

108

Dissolution of the Individual

resources οί man."l One can say the same regarding self-affirmation οη
other levels οί the "personality" ίη that epoch: from the Machiavellian
Prince type, with its more or less perfect historical incarnations, to the
condottieri and demagogues and, ίη general, all those who received
Nietzsche's approbation for their prodigious yet unformed accumulation οί power.
Later, the emphasis οη the human and individual Ι, the basis οί
humanism, would survive οηlΥ ίη the by-products οί the nineteenthcentury bourgeois cult οί the Ι, associated with a certain aesthetic cult
οί heroes, geniuses, and "nobility οί spirit." But to meet many οί the
current defenders οί "personality" one must descend yet another degree,
to where all the vanity οί the Ι predominates: its exhibitionism, worship
'Όί one's own "interiority," the craze οί originality, the boastfulness οί
brilliant literati and ambitious belletrists. Even with regard to art alone,
this "personalism" almost always appears joined to an inner impoverishment. Luk

---

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