In detail, the following must be distinguished:
1. the dominating passion, which even brings with it the supremest form of health; here the co-ordination of the inner systems and their operation in the service of one end is best achieved-but this is almost the definition of health!
2. the antagonism of the passions; two, three, a multiplicity of “souls in one breast”: very unhealthy, inner ruin, disintegration, betraying and increasing and inner conflict and anarchism -unless one passion at last becomes master. Return to health-
3. juxtaposition without antagonism or collaboration: often periodic, and then, as soon as an order has been established, also healthy. The most interesting men, the chameleons, belong here; they are not in contradiction with themselves, they are happy and secure, but they do not develop—their differing states lie juxtaposed, even if they are separated sevenfold. They change, they do not become.
Will To Power 778
#1 is Nietzsche’s old saw about how to be maximally awesome, and so not terribly interesting. #2 is a variation on his critique of modern mentality, phrased especially well (with a Goethe quote). But #3 is something I haven’t seen elsewhere, sort of a mercurial Rameau’s Nephew type without the psychology or self-awareness. They aren’t really chameleons though, are they? Just naturally prodigal or adaptable? (It depends on when and where the states show themselves.)
31 October 2010 at 00:56
In one of the books that I have recently been reading about authoritarian countries — I think it was Daniel Kalder’s “Strange Telescopes,” but it might have been Nien Cheng’s “Life and Death in Shanghai” — there was a reference to this adaptable and self-preserving type of man, who shifts his views to accommodate the prevailing winds without being aware that he is doing it, and without worrying about any contradictions: The present is all. There is change in these people but, as Nietzsche indicates, there is no process of becoming. In Flaubert’s famous formulation, “To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost,” I think what he means by “stupid” is “lacking in self-awareness” (compare a line of dialogue from Ron Shelton’s film “Bull Durham” — “The world is made for people who aren’t cursed with self-awareness”). Such men and women are always useful to those in power, and they are more likely to be survivors than many of us.