[49] W. P., Vol. II, p. 252.
[50] W. P., Vol. II, p. 290. See also p. 292: "Art is more divine than truth."
[51] W. P., Vol. II, p. 133. See also Schopenhauer, Parerga und Paralipomena, Vol. II, Chap. XV, "Ueber Religion," para. 176, where this view is ably upheld.
[52] Rig-Veda, I, 23.
Now, having reached this point, and having established—First: that it is our artists who value and interpret things for us, and who put a meaning into reality which, without them, it would never possess; and, secondly: that it is their will to power that urges them thus to appropriate Nature in concepts, and their will to prevail which gives them the ardour to impose their valuation with authority upon their fellows, thus forming a people; the thought which naturally arises is this: The power that artists can exercise, and the prerogative they possess, is one which might prove exceedingly dangerous; for while it may work for good, it may also work very potently for evil. Does it matter who interprets the world? who gives a meaning to things? who adjusts and systematizes Nature? and who imposes order upon chaos?
Most certainly it matters. For a thousand meanings are possible, and men may have a thousand been aiming for years, other interpretations are still possible.
Listen to your artistic friend's description of the most trifling excursion he has made, and then set your inartistic friend to relate—say, his journey round the world. Whereupon ask yourself whether it matters who sees things and who interprets life for you. The first, even with his trifling excursion in his mind, will make you think that life is really worth living, that the world is full, of hidden treasure. The second will make you conclude that this earth is an uninteresting monster, and that boredom can be killed only by the dangers of motor racing, aerial navigation and glacier climbing.
"A thousand paths are there which never have been trodden," says Zarathustra, "a thousand salubrities and hidden islands of life. Still unexhausted and undiscovered is mankind and man's world."[53]