[54] If this book be read in conjunction with my monograph on Nietzsche: his Life and Works (Constable), or my Who is to be Master of the World? (Foulis), there ought to be no difficulty in understanding this point.
[55] B. Bosanquet, A History of Æsthetic, p. 4.
[56] W. P., Vol. II, p. 246. See also T. I., Part 10, Aph. 19: "The 'beautiful in itself' is merely an expression, not even a concept."
[57] T. I., Part 10, Apr. 19: "In the beautiful, man posits himself as the standard of perfection; in select cases he worships himself in that standard. A species cannot possibly do otherwise than thus say yea to itself."
[58] W. P., Vol. II, p. 361: "Legislative moralities are the principal means by which one can form mankind, according to the fancy of a creative and profound will: provided, of course, that such an artistic will of the first order gets the power into its own hands, and can make its creative will prevail over long periods in the form of legislation, religions, and morals." See p. 79 in the first part of this lecture.
[59] W. P., Vol. II, p. 185.
[60] G. E., p. 107: "The essential thing 'in heaven and earth' is, apparently, that there should be long obedience in the same direction; there thereby results, and has always resulted in the long run, something which has made life worth living; for instance, virtue, art, music, dancing, reason, spirituality—anything whatever that is transfiguring, refined, foolish, or divine."
[61] T. I., Part 10, Aph. 24.
[62] T. I., Part 10, Aph. 47: "Even the beauty of a race or family, the pleasantness and kindness of their whole demeanour, is acquired by effort; like genius, it is the final result of the accumulated labour of generations. There must have been great sacrifices made to good taste; for the sake of it, much must have been done, and much refrained from —the seventeenth century in France is worthy of admiration in both ways; good taste must then have been a principle of selection, for society, place, dress, and sexual gratification, beauty must have been preferred to advantage, habit, opinion, indolence. Supreme rule:—we must not 'let ourselves go,' even when only in our own presence.—Good things are costly beyond measure, and the rule always holds, that he who possesses them is other than he who acquires them. All excellence is inheritance; what has not been inherited is imperfect, it is a beginning."
[63] W. P., Vol. II, p. 245: "'Beauty,' therefore, is, to the artist, something which is above order of rank, because in beauty contrasts are overcome, the highest sign of power thus manifesting itself in the conquest of opposites; and achieved without a feeling of tension." See also Hegel, Vorlesungen über Æsthetik, Vol. I, pp. 130, 144.