At about the same time I realised that what my instincts most desired to attain was precisely the reverse of what Schopenhauer's instincts wanted—that is to say, a justification of life, even where it was most terrible, most equivocal, and most false: to this end, I had the formula "Dionysian" in my hand.
Schopenhauer's interpretation of the "absolute" as will was certainly a step towards that concept of the "absolute" which supposed it to be necessarily good, blessed, true, and integral, but Schopenhauer did not understand how to deify this will: he remained suspended in the moral-Christian ideal. Indeed, he was still so very much under the dominion of Christian values, that, once he could no longer regard the absolute as God, he had to conceive it as evil, foolish, utterly reprehensible. He did not realise that there is an infinite number of ways of being different, and even of being God.
1006.
Hitherto, moral values have been the highest values: does anybody doubt this? If we bring down the values from their pedestal, we thereby alter all values; the principle of their order of rank which has prevailed hitherto is thus overthrown.
1007.
Transvalue values—what does this mean? It implies that all spontaneous motives, all new, future, and stronger motives, are still extant; but that they now appear under false names and false valuations, and have not yet become conscious of themselves.
We ought to have the courage to become, conscious, and to affirm all that which has been attained—to get rid of the humdrum character of old valuations, which makes us unworthy of the best and strongest things that we have achieved.
1008.
Any doctrine would be superfluous for which everything is not already prepared in the way of accumulated forces and explosive material. A transvaluation of values can only be accomplished when there is a tension of new needs, and a new set of needy people who feel all old values as painful,—although they are not conscious of what is wrong.
1009.