To this modern world, with its belief in Happiness, Nietzsche was bound to appear unreasonable, for he brought with him not only a tragic conception of Life, but a tragic philosophy. A tragic philosophy—the marriage of Knowledge and Tragedy: nothing could have seemed more irrational to modern Europe than that!
192
Tragedy and Arguments
Those who desire to restore a tragic conception of Life should not use these arguments: that Happiness is a condition which, if it were possible of realization, would become intolerable, producing its opposite, unhappiness; or that only when the individual renounces Happiness does Happiness become his. These are the statements of a Hedonism once removed. The argument for the tragic view should be founded on considerations altogether irrelevant to Happiness. It should not care enough about Happiness even to disdain it.
193
Morality and Happiness
Philosophers have from the beginning acknowledged that Happiness is not won by seeking for it, but by striving for other things. This, however, has not prevented them from proclaiming Happiness as the goal of Man and as the deliberate object of ethics. Contradiction upon contradiction! If the individual cannot by taking thought capture Happiness, is it conceivable that a community can, or the human race, in toto? To throw a net round this mirage compounded of desire and fancy—surely Reason was itself the most unreasonable thing to attempt that. And, after all, does Man desire Happiness? Tragedy denies it.
194
End or Effect
One may possess all the virtues save Love, and remain unhappy. Love, however, brings Happiness with it as the sun brings light. Is Happiness, then, the end of morality? Or an effect of Love?