1
Wilamowitz (Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Möllendorff) published a "rejoinder" (Er-
widrung) to Nietzsche's The Birth of Tragedy, entitled Zukunftsphilologiel, "phil-
ology of the future" (Berlin, 1872). Wilamowitz's judgement, though damaging
to Nietzsche's reputation among classicists, was not universally assented to; it
incited a reply of its own from Nietzsche's friend and fellow-classicist Erwin
Rohde — which in turn incited a second Zukunftsphilologie pamphlet from Wila-
mowitz, directed against what he called Rohde's "rescue attempts" (Rettungsver-
suche) (Berlin, 1873).
2
For example, a recent book by Victor Tejera entitled Nietzsche and Greek
Thought (Dordrecht, 1987) has no mention of Greek skepticism.
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64 Richard Bett
5
Alexander Nehamas, Nietzsche: Life as Literature (Cambridge, Mass., 1985), es-
pecially chapter 6.
6
In fact it is not quite true that, at the time of composing Ecce Homo (October
1888), he had not even handled a book for half a year. In June of that year he
was reading Stendhal's Rome, Naples and Florence and also Ludwig Nohl's Leben
Wagners', in May he was reading a French translation of Manu's book of laws,
and also browsed in Löscher's bookstore in Turin. See letters to Heinrich Köse-
litz (Peter Gast) of June 20, May 31 and May 17 1888, in Nietzsche Briefwechsel:
Kritische Gesamtausgabe, edd. Giorgio Colli and Mazzino Montinari (Berlin/
New York, 1975-1984) III.5, pp. 337-339, 324-326 and 315-317 respectively.
After that, however, he does not appear to mention any reading in his letters
until November (Strindberg; see letters to Köselitz, November 18 (op. cit.,
pp. 477-479) and to Georg Brandes, November 20 (pp. 482 f.)).
7
At the time of composition of Ecce Homo, he was actually feeling much better
than usual; but his health had been very bad for much of the previous summer.
See letter to Köselitz, October 30, and to Malwida von Meysenbug, end of July,
pp. 460-463 and 377-379 respectively in Nietzsche Briefwechsel III.5.
8
"Three-quarters blind" was his own description in a letter to Georg Brandes of
December 2, 1887 (p. 207 in Nietzsche Briefwechsel III.5). But as early as 1873
his bad eyesight had led him to dictate a letter rather than write it himself (letter
to Erwin Rohde, October 18, 1873, pp. 166-169 in Nietzsche Briefwechsel II.3).
9
V. 13, p. 579 in Friedrich Nietzsche, Sämtliche Werke: Kritische Studienausgabe
in 15 Bänden, edd. Giorgio Colli and Mazzino Montinari (Berlin/New York,
1980) - hereafter cited as KSA.
10
KSA v. 13, pp. 579, 580 ("keine Bücher kaufen!", "keine Bücher lesen!").
11
Given that he was reading other books in May and June (see above, n. 6), and
that he claims that this was the last book he had read, one might suppose that
"half a year" is an exaggeration. However, the sudden spate of references, to
ancient skeptics in his unpublished writings of the first few months of 1888 (see
below) suggest that this dating is accurate.
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Nietzsche on the Skeptics and Nietzsche as Skeptic 65
12
See KSA v. 13, pp. 264f., 276-278, 293, 311 f., 324, 332, 347, 378, 403, 446.
13
See sections 428, 434, 437, 442, 455 in the edition of Walter Kaufmann,
translated by Walter Kaufmann and R. J. Hollingdale (New York, 1968); The
Will to Power will be cited hereafter as WP, with citations by section number,
and quotations from it will follow the Kaufmann/Hollingdale translation. Un-
surprisingly, one fragment that does not appear in WP (KSA v. 13, p. 347) has
to do with the story (from Diogenes Laertius, 9.66) that Pyrrho was disturbed
from his usual equanimity - the one time this happened, according to Nietzsche,
though the text does not in fact specify this - by an incident involving his sister;
Nietzsche jokingly traces to this incident an alleged fear of sisters on the part of
philosophers in general.
u
15
KSA v. 13, p. 293 = WP 428.
DL 3.26, Brochard p. 82 (in the 1923 edition). For the other ancient sources, see
M. Di Marco, Timone di Fliunte: Silli (Rome, 1989), p. 79.
16
See especially KSA v. 13, pp. 285 f. = WP 458, in which the ancient skeptics are
specifically mentioned; also v, 13, p. 422 «= WP 414, which seems to be a model
for the section of The Antichrist cited below.
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66 Richard Bett
pens, the evidence is not so much in Nietzsche's three published works on Diogenes.17
Here I have found only three places where he discusses specific points concerning the
life of Pyrrho, the main source on skepticism in Diogenes;18 and in one of these places,
he commits what would now be generally regarded as a fairly basic error.19 However,
if one looks behind the published works to the notes that preceded them, a rather dif-
ferent picture emerges. Already in December 1866 he refers, in a letter to his teacher
Ritschl, to a work on Timon by the classicist Kurt Wachsmuth.20 And in his notes from
the late 1860s there are plentiful references to Pyrrhonian skepticism in general, and to
Pyrrho, Timon, Aenesidemus, Sextus Empiricus and other Pyrrhonians in particular;
the references are sometimes strictly philological in nature, and at other times bear
more broadly upon the history of philosophy.21 Under the latter heading, Nietzsche
shows a particular interest in the philosophical links between Pyrrho and Democritus;
Pyrrho is said at one point to have followed Democritus5 epistemological ideas22 (an
entirely respectable view, though arguably a mistaken one),23 and at other points to
have followed his ethical outlook24 (which seems to be in a broad sense correct).25
17
De Laertii Diogenis fontibus, Analecta Laertiana and Beitr ge zur Quellenkunde
und Kritik des Laertius Diogenes, in Kritische Gesamtausgabe: Werke, II. l (edd.
Fritz Bonmann & Mario Carpitella — general series editors Giorgio Colli and
Mazzino Montinari — Berlin/New York, 1982). The material in this volume does
not appear in KSA.
18
See pp. 178 f., 206 f., 222 f. in the edition cited in the previous note. Besides these,
there are occasional other mentions of the life of Pyrrho, but only as part of
more general arguments referring to numerous other lives as well.
19
On pp. 206 f. he is discussing DL 9.70, where a certain Theodosius is said to
have denied, for various reasons, that skepticism should be called Pyrrhonism.
Nietzsche infers that Theodosius was a skeptic, but not a Pyrrhonian skeptic.
But it seems clear that the point is, rather, that those thinkers usually called
Pyrrhonians, among whom Theodosius will have numbered himself, should not
employ or accept this label — not that Theodosius identified himself with a dif-
ferent skeptical tradition. For the details, see Jonathan Barnes, "Diogenes Laer-
tius IX 61 — 116: The Philosophy of Pyrrhonism", Aufstieg und Niedergang der
R mischen Welt II.36.6, pp. 4241-4301, at pp. 4284-4286.
20
Nietzsche Briefwechsel 1.2, pp. 188 f.
21
See, e.g., v. 3, pp. 269, 332, v. 4, pp. 36, 38, 42, 47, 49, 63, 68, 78, 86, 90, 388,
v. 5, pp. 41, 43, 131, 152—161, 260 in Friedrich Nietzsche, Fr he Schriften, edd.
Hans Joachim Mette and Karl Schlechta (Munich, 1994) — hereafter cited as
FS.
22
FS v. 3, p. 332.
23
Arguably mistaken because many scholars (though not by any means all) now
hold that Pyrrho's central philosophical attitudes were much more of a meta-
physical than an epistemological character. For discussion of the issue, and an
argument for the metaphysical interpretation, see Richard Bett, "Aristocles on
Timon on Pyrrho: The Text, its Logic and its Credibility", Oxford Studies in
Ancient Philosophy 12 (1994), pp. 137-181.
24
FS v. 4, pp. 63, 90.
25
Democritus promoted an ideal of ευθυμία ('good spirits') which, to judge from
its description in the fragments and other ancient sources, appears closely related
to the αταραξία ('freedom from worry') strived for by Pyrrho and other Pyrrhon-
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Nietzsche on the Skeptics and Nietzsche as Skeptic 67
There are also remarks on the philosophical common ground between Pyrrho or the
Pyrrhonians and other schools, such as the Stoics.26 In any case, the general impression
to be derived from this material is of a scholar who knows the history of Greek skepti-
cism very well, and who considers it an important episode in the wider history of Greek
philosophy. As I said, Diogenes' treatment of skepticism is almost entirely confined to
a single section of his work, the life of Pyrrho; Nietzsche seems to have involved himself
with skepticism to a greater degree than he would have had to do purely in his role as
a scholar of Diogenes Laertius.
Between the very early and the very late phases of Nietzsche's career,
evidence of an interest in ancient skepticism is much scarcer. Outside
these periods, Pyrrho is mentioned only once; he appears in The Wan-
derer and his Shadow, in a peculiar little dialogue with an unnamed old
man,27 and the connections between the ideas Tyrrho' expresses in this
dialogue and the ideas Pyrrho or other ancient skeptics really ex-
pressed, while not non-existent, are certainly pretty loose.28 And be-
sides Pyrrho, no ancient skeptic is ever cited by name (again, outside
the very early and the very late writings). The terms 'skeptic' and 'skep-
ticism' do of course occasionally appear in Nietzsche's works.29 But it
is often clear that no specifically philosophical skepticism is meant; and
even when the context is philosophical, it is not always clear whether
Nietzsche has in mind those ancient philosophers who were actually
called skeptics, or some more generally skeptical species of thought
which might be encountered in any period in the history of philosophy,
ancient or modern. (The same might be said, incidentally, of some ref-
erences to skepticism even in the late writings of 1888, the period in
ian skeptics. See fragments 68B3 and 68B191 in H. Diels, rev. W. Kranz, Die
Fragmente der Vorsokratiker (Berlin, 6th edition 1951 - many subsequent re-
printings); Cicero, De Finibus 5.23, 87; Diogenes Laertius 9.45; Stobaeus 11.52,
15-19. The last of these texts even says that Democritus named his ideal αταρ-
αξία, in addition to several other names; this may well be anachronistic, but it
does not seriously misrepresent the view in question.
26
E.g., FS v. 4, p. 42 (Stoics), v. 4, p. 36 (Epicureans).
27
28
Section 213.
It is claimed in a footnote in R. J. Hollingdale's translation (of Human, All-Too-
Human in its final expanded version, including Mixed Opinions and Maxims and
The Wanderer and his Shadow (Cambridge, 1986)) that this dialogue is modeled
after Timon's dialogue Pytho* I see no reason to believe this; among other things,
Pytho has not survived and we know virtually nothing about it.
29
See, e.g., (by section numbers) Human, All-too-Human 21, 631, Daybreak 120,
155, 477, The Gay Science 64, 110 f., 122, 265, Beyond Good and Evil 54, 208-
211 On the Genealogy of Morals IIL24. From the Nachlass, see also, e,g M KSA
v. 11, p. 605 (June-July 1885); v. 12, pp. 143 f. - WP 410 (Fall 1885-Fall 1886);
p. 340 « WP 101 and p. 428 = WP 380 (Fall 1887).
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68 Richard Bett
II
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Nietzsche on the Skeptics and Nietzsche as Skeptic 69
34
On developments in Nietzsche's views on truth, see Maudemarie Clark, Nietzsche
on Truth and Philosophy (Cambridge, 1990). Clark does not actually address the
question whether, or in what sense, Nietzsche was a skeptic; indeed, the word
'skepticism' does not even appear in the index, and hardly at all in the entire
book (the only occurrence I have found is on p. 45, in a context having to do
with Putnam and Colin McGinn, not Nietzsche). Nevertheless, Clark's discussion
is certainly relevant to my current concerns, and her understanding of Nietzsche's
mature conception of truth seems to be broadly compatible with the conclusions
35
for which I argue in this section; see below, n. 44.
KSA v. 1, pp. 875-890, translated by Daniel Breazeale in Truth and Philosophy:
Selections from Nietzsche's Notebooks of the 1870s (Atlantic Highlands, NJ,
1979).
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70 Richard Bett
36
See, e.g., Leslie Paul Thiele, "Out from the Shadows of God: Nietzschean
Scepticism and Political Practice", International Studies in Philosophy 27 (1995),
pp. 55—72; Robert Hull, "Skepticism, enigma and integrity: Horizons of affirma-
tion in Nietzsche's philosophy", Man and World 23 (1990), pp. 375-391; Glen
T. Martin, "A Critique of Nietzsche's Metaphysical Scepticism", International
Studies in Philosophy 19 (1987), pp. 51-59; Philip J. Kain, "Nietzsche, Skepti-
cism, and Eternal Recurrence", Canadian Journal of Philosophy 13 (1983),
pp. 365-387; Bernd Magnus, "Nietzsche's Mitigated Skepticism", Nietzsche Stu-
dien 9 (1980), pp. 260-267; Adi Parush, "Nietzsche on the Skeptic's Life", Re-
view of Metaphysics 29 (1975-1976), pp. 523-542.
37
See Wolfgang Fuchs, "Post-Modernism is not a Scepticism", in Scepticism: Inter-
disciplinary Approaches, Proceedings of the Second International Symposium of
Philosophy and Interdisciplinary Research (Athens, 1990), pp. 207—217; Alexan-
der Nehamas, Nietzsche: Life as Literature, pp. 83 f.
38
It does not follow that a skeptic can have no legitimate concern with relativity
— as is suggested, for example, by Julia Annas and Jonathan Barnes, The Modes
of Scepticism (Cambridge, 1985); on this, see Richard Bett, "Sextus' Against the
Ethicists: Scepticism, Relativism or Both?", Apeiron 27 (1994), pp. 123-161, esp.
section IV.
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Nietzsche on the Skeptics and Nietzsche as Skeptic 71
39
40
See, e.g., The Gay Science section 354, WP 481.
I follow Breazeale's translation (see above, n. 35), p. 86; the original is at KSA
41
v.l, p. 884.
Gay Science, section 54; Beyond Good and Evil, section 16; Genealogy of Morals,
III. 12. For both Beyond Good and Evil and On the Genealogy of Morals, I follow
Walter Kaufmann's translations in Basic Writings of Nietzsche.
42
43
E.g., 481,556, 567f.
Section 9.1 follow the translation of Marion Faber with Stephen Lehmann (Lin-
coln, Nebraska, 1984).
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72 Richard Bett
both the ancient and the modern periods, of our being cut off from the
true nature of things - for the very idea of 'the true nature of things'
is simply nonsensical in his eyes.
So the answer to the question 'Is Nietzsche a skeptic?' is 'yes and
no'; both those who claim that he is a skeptic, and those who claim that
he is not, say something important and correct.44 Given the elasticity of
the term 'skepticism', in philosophical as well as in ordinary language,
it would be pointless to insist that only the narrower usage (according
to which Nietzsche does not qualify as a skeptic) is appropriate. But
far more important, in any case, than that terminological issue is the
connection between the two main points I have emphasized in this sec-
tion and Nietzsche's expressed attitudes towards the ancient skeptics
and towards skeptical modes of thought in general. For it turns out
that Nietzsche is notably ambivalent towards skepticism; and the dual
response at which we have arrived on the question of Nietzsche's own
skeptical credentials is, I think, a large part of the explanation for this
ambivalence. He makes common cause with the skeptics in their oppo-
sition to the traditional pretensions of philosophy; but since he rejects,
much of the time, the traditional conception of objective truth — which
the skeptics accept — he is also importantly at odds with them. His
ambivalence is a little more complicated than this, but this is at any
rate central to the story. The next section takes up these matters in
greater detail.
Ill
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Nietzsche on the Skeptics and Nietzsche as Skeptic 73
45
I follow the translation in The Portable Nietzsche, edited and translated by Wal-
46
ter Kaufmann (New York, 1954).
KSA v. 12, p. 428 = WP 380; v. 13, pp. 22 f. (virtually but not quite the same as
WP 963, and also clearly a prototype of Antichrist 54).
4
? KSA v. 13, pp. 311 f. = WP 434.
4
« KSA v. 13, p. 278 = WP 437.
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74 Richard Bett
All this seems to add up to a very positive vote for the skeptics during the last
year or so of Nietzsche's working life. But this is not the whole story. Even in the
passage where Pyrrho is named as the only original philosopher after Socrates, he
is also referred to as a "nihilist", always a term with pejorative connotations in
Nietzsche. And in numerous other notes from the same period, Nietzsche describes
either Pyrrho or the skeptics in general as "decadent"49, one of his favorite terms of
abuse. In one passage Pyrrho is even described as the "high point" (Höhepunkt) in
the decadence of Greek philosophy — a trend that is supposed to have started with
Socrates.50 Pyrrho's decadence is here also connected with his "Buddhist" tenden-
cies, and this connection is explored in more detail in another passage, which specifi-
cally alludes to Diogenes' story of Pyrrho's having consorted with the Naked Wise
Men in India;51 the grounds for this view of Pyrrho seem to be both his ethical ideal
of untroubledness and his withdrawal from all scientific ambitions or pretensions -
that is, his refusal to commit himself to any determinate account of how things are.
In keeping with Nietzsche's discussion of Buddhism in several sections of The Anti-
christ — where besides being called nihilistic and decadent, it is said to be a religion
of exhausted, enervated spirits or cultures52 — there is also a note in the Nachlass
claiming that Pyrrho's skepticism was inspired by "a need for rest, a weariness"53.
In several other notes, the decadence inherent to skepticism is said to be connected
with the fact that skepticism (like most other philosophies, in fact) has a moral origin
or aim.54 It is not immediately clear what this means. One passage reads: "One
must act; consequently rules of conduct are needed' — said even the skeptics of
antiquity. The urgent need for a decision as an argument for considering something
truer'55 But the notion that values, or for that matter any other views about the
world, have their origin in practical or other psychological needs is commonplace in
Nietzsche's works, and would hardly serve to distinguish decadents from other peo-
ple. A deeper claim is suggested by another passage,56 which opens as follows: "Mo-
rality as the supreme value, in all phases of philosophy (even among the skeptics).
Result: this world is good for nothing, there must be a 'real world'. What really
determines the supreme value here? What is morality really? The instinct of deca-
dence; it is the exhausted and disinherited who in this way take their revenge and
play the master." Here it is clear that 'morality' does not refer to just any system of
values, but specifically to life-denying or world-denying values - the ones that
Nietzsche elsewhere associates especially with the ascetic ideal and with Christianity.
And the point is that the positing of a 'real world', whose true nature is entirely
independent of our experiencing things in any particular way, must be the result of
an urge to deny or devalue the world as ordinarily experienced - precisely the same
49
E. g., KSA v. 13, p. 264 = WP 43; p. 403.
50
KSA v. 13, p. 265.
51
KSA v. 13, pp. 276 f. = WP 437. On Pyrrho as Buddhist, see also pp. 264, 378.
52
Sections 20-23.
53
KSA v. 13, p. 446 = WP 455.
54
KSA v. 13, p. 321 = WP 401; p. 324 = WP 442.
55
KSA v. 13, pp. 285 f. = WP 458.
56
KSA v. 13, p. 321 = WP
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Nietzsche on the Skeptics and Nietzsche as Skeptic 75
57 Section 110.
58
III.9.
59 IH.24.
60
Section 54.
61
62
KSA v. 12, pp. 143 f. = WP 410.
"Maxims and Arrows", 26.1 follow Walter Kaufmann's translation, in The Port-
able Nietzsche.
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76 Richard Bett
63
PH 1.31 -179.
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Nietzsche on the Skeptics and Nietzsche as Skeptic 77
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78 Richard Bett
in fact are; the terms on which these pronouncements were to be assessed would
be quite different from what they in fact are; and our own deliberations about
whether or not to accept these pronouncements would need to take a quite dif-
ferent form from that which they should in fact assume. Since, according to
Nietzsche, philosophy has standardly assumed that the concept of absolute truth
is coherent, and that such truth is in principle attainable, it would be very natural
for him to regard the admission by his new philosophers that they are not offer-
ing their conclusions as absolute truth as a revolutionary, and salutary, move.
From the fact that a certain concept is incoherent, it does not follow that no
work is done by emphasizing one's rejection of that concept; the important ques-
tion is what role acceptance of that concept has played in the previous history
of thought. And Nietzsche clearly thinks that belief in the concept of absolute
truth has played an immense- role in the history of philosophy prior to himself.
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Nietzsche on the Skeptics and Nietzsche as Skeptic 79
settled how things are in themselves - that is, virtually any previous philosophy;
but this does not lead for the 'stronger skeptic', as it does for the standard skeptic,
to the cultivating of intellectual detachment as an end in itself. In section 210
Nietzsche says that this skepticism constitutes only one feature of the new philo-
sopher and not the whole. And in the next section he suggests that perhaps the
genuine philosopher - a character closely related to, if not identical with, the philo-
sopher of the future - must have been a skeptic at some time, but that this and many
other roles (including that of dogmatist) "are merely preconditions of his task", that
task being to "create values". In creating values, one must doubtless be aware that
that is what one is doing, rather than limning some absolute reality. But the task of
creating values requires a psychological attitude that is anything but suspensive. It
requires a kind of imposing of oneself on the world; as Nietzsche says of these value-
creating philosophers, "Their 'knowing' [note again the quotation marks] is creating,
their creating is a legislation, their will to truth is - mil to power9'.
IV
66
The only possible exception is in Twilight of the Idols, "How the True World'
Finally Became a Fable", 3, where Kant's version of the idea of a 'True World"
is said to be the same as the Christian version except that it is "seen through mist
and skepticism". But it is not clear that any particular verdict, for or against, is
here being offered on skepticism itself. It is true that elsewhere skepticism's reli-
ance on the concept of a 'true world' is taken as grounds for criticism; but that
theme is not placed on display here.
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80 Richard Bett
67
See especially section 188.
68
See especially sections 21 Of., discussed above for their remarks on skepticism.
Here there is a firm division between genuine philosophers and what Nietzsche
calls "philosophical laborers", among whom Kant and Hegel are numbered; yet
philosophical laborers are said to be an essential precondition for the emergence
of genuine philosophers — in fact, it may be that genuine philosophers them-
selves must previously have been philosophical laborers.
69
In Twilight of the Idols, see especially " 'Reason' in Philosophy" (in section 2 of
which Heraclitus is labeled an exception) and "The Four Great Errors"; in The
Antichrist, again see especially section 12.
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Nietzsche on the Skeptics and Nietzsche as Skeptic 81
There is another reason why the criticism of skepticism as decadent does not
appear in these works. We have seen that one basis for this criticism is Nietzsche's
view that suspension of judgement is itself a symptom of an unhealthy desire not
to engage with the world, and that he instead recommends the imposing of new
interpretations upon things - without, however, losing one's awareness that they
are interpretations. But this recommendation, prominent in Beyond Good and Evil
and also present in On the Genealogy of Morals70, is not to be found in the published
works of 1888. Here, on the contrary, the interpretation of things seems itself to
come in for criticism, as tantamount to their distortion. As I mentioned earlier, in
The Antichrist (section 52) Nietzsche speaks approvingly of philology as involving
"ephexis [restraint] in interpretation"; in the same passage he characterizes it as "the
art of reading well — of reading facts without falsifying them by interpretation" (my
emphasis). Christianity, in his view, engages in precisely that kind of falsification;
earlier he alleges that "In Christianity neither morality nor religion has even a single
point of contact with reality"71. Similarly in Twilight of the Idols we are told that
"Moral judgements agree with religious ones in believing in realities which are no
realities. Morality is merely an interpretation of certain phenomena — more pre-
cisely, a misinterpretation"72. These books seem, then, to offer a very different out-
look from Beyond Good and Evil and related works. There is no suggestion that our
views of the world are never other than interpretation, or that the cultivating of
dynamic new interpretations is what philosophers should be about; rather, inter-
pretations are to be eschewed, because they get in the way of reality. In these works,
therefore, there is no room for criticism of the skeptics on the grounds that they
suspend judgement rather than throwing themselves into the task of interpretation;
for here Nietzsche expresses a suspicion of interpretations just as strong as that of
the skeptics themselves.
But this leads to a peculiar consequence. At the same time as
Nietzsche distances himself from a set of ideas that elsewhere serve as
a criticism of skepticism, he also becomes more distant from skepticism
itself. For in saying that Christianity has no contact with reality, and
that morality is a misinterpretation, he at least gives the impression
that he himself is in possession of the objective truth; there are various
misguided views of reality, and then there is reality as it actually is, and
Nietzsche seems to present himself as showing us the latter. But if so,
of course, Nietzsche comes across as anything but a skeptic in these
works — in either the strict or the loose senses distinguished earlier; he
seems to accept the concept of objective truth - which skeptics in the
strict sense also accept - but he also seems to speak as if he knows
what the objective truth is, which no skeptic would ever do. It may be
70
Again, I am thinking particularly of the discussion of perspective in 111.12.
71
72
Section 15.
"The Improvers of Mankind", section 1.
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82 Richard Bett
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Nietzsche on the Skeptics and Nietzsche as Skeptic 83
so, there is an important sense in which these works are more anti-
skeptical than those from earlier periods, even at the same time as they
are more consistently and vocally approving of skepticism.
This point also has a counterpart at the level of method and style - a topic about
which I have said very little, but which is clearly of prime importance in considering
Nietzsche. Methodologically, much of Nietzsche's published work before 1888 has
significant points of kinship with ancient skepticism; this is perhaps particularly true
of The Gay Science and Beyond Good and Evil, but by no means only those. It is
characteristic of his method of writing in small, disjointed sections - his 'aphoristic'
style, as it is often called - that his books are hard, if not impossible, to read as
adding up to a single, consistent point of view. Instead, he throws out a wide variety
of ideas on some subject, often from apparently very differing perspectives; and it
is frequently very hard to tell whether, or how far, he seriously means what he is
saying. As he himself suggests in the final section of Beyond Good and Evil, he does
not want his books to be seen as consisting of a body of truths; his relation to their
contents is much more elusive and evasive than that. Bernard Williams recently
expressed it well: "With Nietzsche [...]", writes Williams, "the resistance to the con-
tinuation of philosophy by ordinary means is built into the text, which is booby-
trapped not only against recovering theory from it, but, in many cases, against any
systematic exegesis that assimilates it to theory"77. Nowadays this kind of distancing
strategy, this rejection of straightforward assertoric modes of utterance, is familiar
in many intellectual circles; but if one were to search for a parallel case from before
Nietzsche's time, one of the most obvious would be the writings of Sextus. (Another,
incidentally, would be Montaigne; but then, Montaigne's links with ancient Pyrrhon-
ism are clear and undisputed.)78
indeed the case) Nietzsche now treats the two as even more closely connected
than he had done before. Finally, many may be inclined to interpret this phenom-
enon as wholly or partly the product of a stylistic decision. See, for example,
Tracy Strong's introduction to the new Hackett translation (by Richard Polt) of
Twilight of the Idols (Indianapolis, 1997); Strong agrees (p. xx) that "The book
is [...] full of conclusions", and that "The experience of Twilight is an experience
[...] of definiteness, of assertiveness", but accounts for this in terms of stylistic
choices rather than any doctrinal shift, tentative or otherwise. (If this is correct,
incidentally, it does not pose any difficulty for the picture I am proposing. What-
ever Nietzsche's motivations, stylistic or otherwise, this is in fact the attitude
projected by this book and by others of the same period, and it is on these terms
77
that they demand to be considered.)
In "Nietzsche's Minimalist Moral Psychology", European Journal of Philosophy
1 (1993), pp. 4-14 (the quoted sentences are on the first page); reprinted in
Bernard Williams, Making Sense of Humanity (Cambridge, 1995).
78
On the links between Nietzsche and Montaigne, see David Molner, "The Influ-
ence of Montaigne on Nietzsche: A Raison d'Etre in the Sun", Nietzsche Studien
22 (1993), pp* 80-93. For a treatment of Montaigne linking him both to the
ancient Pyrrhonists and to postmodern trends, see David R. Hiley, "The Politics
of Skepticism: A Reading of Montaigne", History of Philosophy Quarterly 9
(1992), pp. 379-399.
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84 Richard Bett
Like Nietzsche, Sextus aims to avoid being pinned down to a single definite view,
and favors the contemplation of a multiplicity of perspectives; Sextus also employs
a variety of literary devices to make clear that his own writing is not to be taken as
philosophical writing of any usual sort. The most obvious of these devices is perhaps
the use of the various stock skeptical 'expressions' such as 'no more' and Ί determine
nothing'. 79 One notable feature of these phrases is their self-applicability, or as Sex-
tus himself puts it, their 'self-canceling' (συμπεριγράφειν);80 and even aside from his
use of such phrases, Sextus sometimes shows himself willing to accept that his argu-
ments are in certain ways self-refuting — for example, at the end of his discussion
of proof.81 It has recently been persuasively argued (in the only article I have ever
seen which is wholly devoted to a comparison between Nietzsche and Sextus)82 that
in this respect, also, the two of them share common ground; Nietzsche, too, fre-
quently lays himself open to charges of self-refutation — as part of a deliberate
strategy, according to the interpretation of this article — and occasionally makes
explicit that he is happy about this state of affairs. (See, in particular, the often
quoted remark from Beyond Good and Evil: "Supposing that this also is only inter-
pretation — and you will be eager enough to make this objection? — well, so much
the better."83) The same may be true on a much broader scale if Bernd Magnus is
right about the 'self-consuming' character of several of Nietzsche's key concepts.84
In any case, there is clearly a good deal of similarity in the self-presentations of
Nietzsche and of Sextus. Of course, their aims are by no means the same. But they
are at one in their sophisticated development of a certain type of voice — a voice
which is in a sense philosophical, but which is radically distinct from the voice of
traditional philosophizing.
But all this, I am saying, is characteristic of Nietzsche's works — or
many of them, at least — before 1888. In the published works of 1888,
the multiplicity of perspectives, the stylistic distancing and the other
features I just mentioned are much less obvious, if they are present at
all. Instead, in The Antichrist we are treated to a single point of view,
argued for in a relentless high pitch. In Twilight of the Idols, too, it
79
See especially PH 1.187-208.
80
PH 1.14, 15,206.
81
M8.480f.
82
Daniel W. Con way and Julie K. Ward, "Physicians of the Soul: Περιτροπή in
Sextus Empiricus and Nietzsche", in Daniel W. Conway and Rudolf Rehn, edd.,
Nietzsche und die antike Philosophie (Trier, 1992), pp. 193-223. Despite the pat-
ronizing comments of L. Deitz in a generally condescending review of the whole
collection (Classical Review N.S. 44 (1994), p. 220), this article contains much
thought-provoking material.
83
Section 22.
84
See Bernd Magnus, "Nietzsche and Postmodern Criticism", Nietzsche Studien 18
(1989), pp. 301-316; Bernd Magnus, Stanley Stewart and Jean-Pierre Mileur,
Nietzsche's Case: Philosophy andlas Literature (New York/London, 1993), esp.
ch. 1.
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Nietzsche on the Skeptics and Nietzsche as Skeptic 85
85
Again, this is not to deny that stylistic experimentation of some kind is an impor-
tant feature of the book; my point is just that Nietzsche dispenses with, or at
any rate greatly plays down, those traits of style that are friendly to a perspecti-
vist approach. (Here I would emphasize especially the disjointedness of adjacent
sections dealing with recognizably related material. There seems to be much less
of this in Twilight of the Idols than in, say, Beyond Good and Evil; in most chap-
ters, on the contrary, there is a strong impression of continuous, cumulative
argument.) Once more, the salutary remarks of Tracy Strong (see above, n. 76)
on the 'musical' and other stylistic qualities of the book seem to me quite com-
86
patible with the view I have been developing.
Section 477. I follow the translation of R. J. Hollingdale (Cambridge, 1982).
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86 Richard Bett
87
An earlier version of this paper was presented at a conference entitled "Le defi
sceptique. Variantes antiques, modernes et postmodernes" — Paris, June 1996.1
thank the participants for their comments; and I especially thank the conference
organizer, Giulia Sissa, for inviting me to take part in this event. I also thank
Susan Hahn for helpful written reactions to the earlier version; and the two
anonymous referees for the Archiv, whose comments prompted a number of final
improvements. , ^ · ;; ;
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