64.
The second appearance of Buddhism.—Its precursory signs: the increase of pity. Spiritual exhaustion. The reduction of all problems to the question of pleasure and pain. The glory of war which calls forth a counter-stroke. Just as the sharp demarcation of nations generates a counter-movement in the form of the most hearty "Fraternity." The fact that it is impossible for religion to carry on its work any longer with dogma and fables.
The catastrophe of Nihilism will put an end to all this Buddhistic culture.
65.
That which is most sorely afflicted to-day is the instinct and will of tradition: all institutions which owe their origin to this instinct, are opposed to the tastes of the age.... At bottom, nothing is thought or done which is not calculated to tear up this spirit of tradition by the roots. Tradition is looked upon as a fatality; it is studied and acknowledged (in the form of "heredity"), but people will not have anything to do with it. The extension of one will over long periods of time, the selection of conditions and valuations which make it possible to dispose of centuries in advance—this, precisely, is what is most utterly anti-modern. From which it follows, that disorganising principles give our age its specific character.
66.
"Be simple"—a demand which, when made to us complicated and incomprehensible triers of the heart and reins, is a simple absurdity.... Be natural: but even if we are unnatural—what then?
67.
The means employed in former times in order to arrive at similarly constituted and lasting types, throughout long generations: entailed property and the respect of parents (the origin of the faith in gods and heroes as ancestors).
Now, the subdivision of property belongs to the opposite tendency. The centralisation of an enormous number of, different interests in one soul: which, to that end, must be very strong and mutable.