Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal

Volume 15, Number 2,1991

On Nietzsche's "We Good,

Beautiful, Happy Ones!''^

Michel Henry

When he writes "we the noble, we the good, the beautiful, the happy,"
Nietzsche has two things i n mind: explicitly, the condition of the strong,
implicitly, yet fundamentally, the essence of life.
The condition of the strong is only known by opposition to that of the
weak. T h i s opposition between the weak and the strong permeates
Nietzsche's work, to the astonishment and perhaps the embarrassment
of the c o m m e n t a t o r ; w i t h the a i m of e l u c i d a t i n g t h i s o p p o s i t i o n
between the strong and the weak, I shall pose four questions:
1. Who are the strong, i n what does their strength consist?
2. Who are the weak, what is the nature of weakness?
But, since Nietzsche states that the weak inevitably prevail against
the strong, and that the strong must be protected f r o m the weak, one
must also understand:
3. W h a t i t is that allows the weak to subjugate the strong, i n what
does their strength consists and by extension,
4. H o w do the strong come to be defeated by the weak, what is the
nature of their weakness?
The first question—in what does the strength of the strong consist—
seems easy to answer: the strong are strong insofar as they are, i f the
essence of being is strength, what Nietzsche calls w i l l to power. So it
becomes necessary to say something about the w i l l to power which is
o n l y i n t e l l i g i b l e by w a y of a k n o w l e d g e of S c h o p e n h a u e r ' s W i l l .
Schopenhauer's w i l l is a "starved reality," an unquenchable thirst, a
desire that is unsatisfied and unsatisfiable because it is the desire for a
reality t h a t does not exist, because there is no r e a l i t y beyond this
object-less desire. Hence the indefinite reiteration of this v a i n desire.

Translated by Madeleine Dobie.

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B y contrast, (as has rightly been said), Nietzsche's w i l l to power is

not a desire, it is not the aspiration to a reality w h i c h it can never pos-
sess; i n other words, this is not a case of a w i l l to a power w h i c h i t does
not yet possess and w h i c h it is struggling to attain. The w i l l to power is
already power. A s a force, i t consists entirely i n power and strength.
The " w i l l " w h i c h is attached to this power is actually n o t h i n g more
t h a n a movement w i t h i n it, its f u l f i l l m e n t of its own essence, and is
dependant on it.
However, already for Schopenhauer, the w i l l is not a desire i n the
sense of a vague impulse severed f r o m reality. It is itself the originary
body, not the body as it is represented, but the body w h i c h one is, the
body of real movements, real corporeal activity, and the fact that this
activity recommences indefinitely rather t h a n leading to any veritable
satisfaction, does not detract f r o m its reality. The Schopenhauerian w i l l
is thus never really cut off f r o m power, i t is power, the only real power
i n the world and what is more, the entire power of this power w h i c h is
concentrated i n every point of its action—^whence the vertiginous char-
acter of the Schopenhauerian universe.
So what is the significance of Nietzsche's annexation of power to this
w i l l w h i c h is itself already power through and through, and all-power-
f u l power at that? It is that whatever the degree of this power, what-
ever the intensity of its strength, power and strength must first be—
a n d this being consists i n a prerequisite a n d presupposed power by
virtue of w h i c h power and strength have already grasped their very
essence—by virtue of w h i c h they are. I n Nietzsche's perspective, w i l l to
power signifies the power of the w i l l , i n other words, it is not just that
it is power, that it is the body, but more fundamentally, that a l l power,
all strength and the body itself only exist because of the work of a more
original power w h i c h throws them into themselves and forces t h e m to
be. A n d it is only i n this 'hyper-power' of the origin that power and
force can act.
N o w although there are degrees of power and quanta of force, the
prerequisite power by which they exist and i n w h i c h they inhere knows
neither degree nor quantification, neither growth nor d i m i n u t i o n , nei-
ther modification nor alteration, it is the omni-present and omnipotent
hyper-power w i t h i n a l l power—power w h i c h it gives to itself so that it
can be what it is and do what it does. Present i n a l l power: i n the weak-
est as i n the strongest. Thus we already understand that there is no
force, however insignificant or derisory, that does not contain a n ele-
ment of the i n c o m m e n s u r a b i l i t y of this hyper-power—which cannot
itself be measured by any other force, just as it does not itself measure
any force, for it is present i n a l l force before it is deployed, before it
sizes itself up and shows what it is capable of ^—it exists w i t h i n every

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force as the incoercible and unconditioned tie i n w h i c h it first takes

hold of itself and feels itself.
Here one must consider the decisive though unnoticed event of mod-
e m philosophy: the fact that w i t h Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, B e i n g
receives for the first time, the meaning of being life. The interpretation
of B e i n g as life does not i m p l y any forgetting of being itself—far f r o m
reducing being to a mere mode of the being of a particular being—the
l i v i n g being—the determination of the force as l i v i n g represents a
return to the original work of the being, to the original self-embrace of
that w h i c h takes hold of itself, grows f r o m itself and w h i c h , i n the
intoxication of this experience of itself, of this growth, growth which
knows neither beginning nor end, is life, or, i n Nietzsche's mythological
idiom: Dionysus. The w i l l to power is the self-accretion present i n the
original self-embrace, it is the richest part of the self, the need of the
self (BGE, § 295). This self-accretion as coming into selfliood, as experi-
ence of the self, as being in-itself, is what I call immanence.
Nietzsche's t h i n k i n g of immanence takes many forms, most notably
he says that life is forgetting. Forgetting is not thinking-of. We oppose
forgetting to remembering w h i c h by contrast consists i n t h i n k i n g of
that w h i c h one was not t h i n k i n g of previously. Forgetting and remem-
bering are thus two modes of the thought, the one positive, the other
negative. W h e n Nietzsche says that life is forgetting, he intends some-
thing very different. L i f e is forgetting not because it is not t h i n k i n g of
this or of that, because of some temporary distraction, but because it
does not contain i n itself the essence of thought—the very possibility of
t h i n k i n g of something, for example—of remembering it. L i f e is forgetful
by nature because it is immanence which expels f r o m itself a l l ek-stasis
and by consequence, a l l possible forms of thought. Nietzsche represents
this originary structure of being as immanence to itself and as life i n
the figure of the animal, a figure which, for good reason, permeates his
work since what is i n question is the absence of thought: the capacity
which traditionally defines the humanity of m a n and characterizes h i m
as rational animal. It is thus i n virtue of an essential necessity that the
being of the a n i m a l , w h i c h figures the essence of life, w h i c h i n t u r n
excludes thought, is defined by forgetfulness: M a n "this a n i m a l w h i c h
needs to be forgetful" (GM, 11.2).
H o w can that w h i c h is i n essence forgetful come to remember? This
is the paradox w h i c h Nietzsche is forced to confront and which begins
the second essay of On the Genealogy of Morals: "To breed an a n i m a l
w i t h the right to make promises," i.e., to remember, while the essence
of life excludes thought. Remarkably, Nietzsche settles this problem by
completely displacing the issue of memory and, rather than portraying
it as it is traditionally portrayed—as a faculty of thought, a representa-

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tive faculty, he immediately subjugates it to the w i l l to power, i.e. to

life—and moreover, to that w h i c h is most essential i n life, that w h i c h is
shown to us here for the first time: to affectivity. "Tf something is to
stay i n the memory it must be burned i n : only that w h i c h never ceases
to hurt stays i n the memory'" {GM, 11.3). A s always w h e n he discovers
the grounds of life, the affects, s u f f e r i n g , Nietzsche's text becomes
inflamed, elevated by a great blast of air, the images crackle, the great
fires of history are conjured up, each proof is a n inferno, a monstrous
torture we are invited to enjoy. T h i s is what m a n needed to create a
memory for himself: "...torture and sacrifices...the most dreadful sacri-
fices and pledges...the most repulsive mutilations...the cruelest rites...."
A n d this is what Germans needed "...fearful means...stoning, breaking
on the wheel...piercing w i t h stakes, t e a r i n g apart or t r a m p l i n g by
horses, boiling of the c r i m i n a l i n oil...flaying alive, cutting flesh f r o m
the chest..." {GM, II, 3). P a i n is everywhere "the most powerful a i d to
mnemonics," suffering takes the place of thought and finally grounds it.
The immanence of life, its unconditional internal coherence, is the
condition of its activity, the condition of the central phenomenon of
action—as is shown i n the fable of the birds of prey who swoop down on
the lambs to devour them (GM, 1.13). This difficult but essential analysis
takes the f o r m of a critique of morality. The point is to refute the argu-
ment by w h i c h the lambs t r y to save their lives by condemning the
action of the birds of prey—they need only share this condemnation
w i t h the birds of prey to save their lives. N o w the lambs' argument
depends on the presupposition of the doubling of force, of its separation
f r o m itself, i n short, on the negation of its radical immanence. The dou-
b l i n g of force consists i n a dissociation introduced into every action
between a subject capable of deciding to perform or not perform the
action, and the action itself understood as the result of a subject's free
w i l l . T h e d o u b l i n g of the action i s , (to give a n example a n d u s i n g
Nietzsche's image), what the populus projects into the pause between
t h u n d e r a n d l i g h t n i n g . T h i s comes d o w n to t a k i n g the same phe-
nomenon twice, first as the cause and then as its effect, "scientists do
no b e t t e r , " says N i e t z s c h e , " w h e n t h e y say 'force m o v e s ' , 'force
causes'..." (GM, 1.13).
Let us return to the lambs: they must thus consider the birds of prey
as subjects free to exercise their strength or not to, free to be or not to
be birds of prey. The salvation of the lambs hangs on this freedom to be
or not to be b i r d s of p r e y , i n t h i s f r e e d o m of s t r e n g t h to not be
strength—not to devour them. The only problem is that i n general, nei-
ther strength nor life has this freedom. Non-freedom, the impossibility
of not being itself, is the essence ordering the relation of life to itself. It
is the relation constitutive of life—^its experience of itself i n the uncon-

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ditionality of the tie which binds it to itself so that it can be what it

must always be, its eternity, what Nietzsche calls "the eternal return of
the same."
This non-freedom—the incoercibility of the tie w h i c h gives life to
itself, is the hyper-power i n which being collects itself and takes hold of
itself i n the experiencing of itself which is its life. Because this hyper-
power of being is non-freedom it is also powerlessness, life's ultimate
inability to renounce itself. It is this ultimate impotence which is exam-
ined i n section 13 of the first essay. This text is not really about lambs
a n d birds of prey, and the c l a i m i t makes is not that either group
couldn't act differently, but the more fundamental claim that neither
can be other t h a n it is. However, they are such only by virtue of the
ground of being which they contain w i t h i n themselves and to the extent
that the structure of being is non-freedom, insurmountable passivity i n
regard to itself, the powerlessness to r i d itself of that which coheres i n
itself as life.
T h i s is the essence of s t r e n g t h w h i c h is able to give of itself:
"Everything it knows as part of itself it honors.... In the foreground
there is the feeling of fullness, of power that seeks to overflow, the hap-
piness of h i g h tension, the consciousness of wealth that would give and
bestow" {BGE, § 260), so that everything it does, for example, t a k i n g
care of the unfortunate is prompted more "by a n urge begotten by
excess of power" {Ibid.). B u t i f the essence of aristocracy is that of life,
then we have learned what the strength of the strong consists i n : not i n
any given force be it more or less great, nor i n a fate reserved for some
power or other, but i n the hyper-power which, by throwing every force,
every power into itself, enables them to grow f r o m themselves and to
overabound.
In what does the weakness of the weak consist? It is this question
w h i c h is problematic, for i f w i l l to power is the essence of being, i f
everything that is, is by virtue of this power which overflows itself, then
it is no longer easy to grasp how something like weakness i n general
can r e m a i n possible. A n external explanation is that e v e r y t h i n g is
indeed strength, but that there are quanta of force, and when one of
t h e m f i n d s i t s e l f m a t c h e d against another, greater q u a n t u m , i t is
weaker, and the quantitative difference between the forces comes to
express their qualitative difference as weakness and strength—^which
now only qualifies the strongest. This qualitative difference finds fur-
ther expression i n the claim that the weaker force—which suffers the
action of the stronger—^becomes "reactive," since its action is now deter-
mined by this stronger action w h i c h it continues to suffer while the
greater force alone remains really, totally and t r u l y "active."

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The problem here is that this extrinsic characterization of the inner

nature of forces is the very opposite of what Nietzsche means by w i l l to
power. The latter describes the inner nature of force as a force w h i c h
overabounds itself and thus never ceases to be what i t is. The fact that
there is an essence of force which cannot, at any rate, become something
else, even its opposite, that masters don't suddenly t u r n into slaves
when they encounter someone stronger than themselves, and that mas-
tery and servitude are thus not successive or fragile determinations, is
what Nietzsche postulates when he calls aristocracy a race, or i n other
words, an essence. The plebe is likewise a race: weakness, too, should
be understood, not on the basis of an extrinsic determination, but i n
regard to its internal possibility. N o w this possibilty is exactly the same
as that of strength—^there is nothing else—it is the essence of life, i n
other words, immanence. Strength—and we are now no longer consid-
ering it naively i n its facticity—^is the strength of immanence, i t is the
unquantifiable, incoercible and unsurpassable strength of the tie w h i c h
binds life to itself. Nietzsche does not understand weakness as a lesser
force, but as the negation of its own essence, and since this essence is
immanence, as a disruption i n immanence.
This is the meaning of nihilism, of the 'no' said to life: it is not the
external negation of its factitious existence, but the destruction of its
internal essence. B u t this inner destruction as self-destruction is life (we
shall see why below) saying no to life; this self-negation confronts what
is in essence, an impossibility: the essence of life, like the tie which binds
it to itself, is unbreakable and can never be broken. The impossible self-
destruction of the inner essence of life, self-destruction which, as such,
continues indefinitely, is what Nietzsche calls the sickness of life, it is
what makes man—to the extent that immanence is a n i m a l i t y and is
here i n the balance—a "sick a n i m a l , " "the most chronically and pro-
foundly sick of a l l sick animals" (GM, III.14). Nietzsche's whole project
was to open his eyes to the bottomless mystery of this sickness of life, its
w i l l to attack its o w n essence a n d t h u s to self-destruct. N i e t z s c h e
describes the many forms taken by this process of rupture: self-doubt,
loss of faith, skepticism, objectivism, scientism, self-criticism i n a l l its
forms—one is tempted to say "analysis"—all the doctrines of bad faith,
bad conscience, self-examination, interpretation, suspicion, everj^hing
that locates the t r u t h about life outside life itself, m a k i n g of our times a
"decaying present," which emits, as Ossip Mandelstam h a d himself to
admit, a smell of rotten fish. It is a l l these partisans of the break w i t h
the self, "the sick are man's greatest danger.... Those who are failures
f r o m the start, downtrodden, crushed—^it is they, the weakest, who must
undermine life among men, who call into question and poison most dan-
gerously our trust i n life, i n man, and i n ourselves" (GM, 111.14).

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We shall see more clearly that this break w i t h the immanence of life
constitutes the essence of weakness i f we now examine the struggle of
the weak against the strong, and i n particular, the way i n which the
former set about overthrowing the latter. This destruction of strength
depends on t h i s v e r y same break w i t h i m m a n e n c e to the self a n d
occurs wherever the weak succeed i n insinuating their own weakness
into the souls of the strong, "undoubtedly i f they succeeded i n poisoning
the consciences of the fortunate w i t h their own misery, w i t h a l l misery,
so that one day the fortunate began to be ashamed of their good fortune^
and perhaps said to one another: 'it is discraceful to be fortunate, there
is too much misery^'' {GM, 111.14) Strength and weakness thus clearly
assume the characteristics of happiness and shame, of the immanence
of life and its disruption.
B u t it is the impossibility of this disruption that finally leads us to
the very foundations of weakness and to its true essence. F o r the weak-
ness of the weak is ultimately determined not just by that which lurks
i n the m u d of shame and self-loathing: "It is on such soil, on swampy
ground, that every weed, every poisonous plant grows..." {Ibid.)—i.e.,
the monstrous project of self-destruction: it is the failure of this project
which ultimately constitutes the essence of weakness. Life's w i l l not to be
itself, the self s w i l l to renounce the self, is weakness itself because this
w i l l necessarily collides w i t h a force greater than itself, w i t h the great-
est of forces, the force of life. This radical text tells us how i n the inner
relation of life to itself, the weakness of the w i l l not to be oneself con-
fronts the strength of this self and thus constitutes the essence of weak-
ness, the essence of the "unfortunate" and the "ill-constituted": "Where
does one not encounter that veiled glance w h i c h burdens one w i t h a
profound sadness, that inward-turned glance of the born failure which
betrays how such a man speaks to himself—that glance which is a sigh!
Tf only I were someone else,' sighs this glance: 'but there is no hope of
that. / am who I am."^ H o w could I ever get free of myself? A n d yet—I
am sick of myself {GM, 111.14). Such is the essence of weakness.
T h i r d question: how are the weak able to defeat the strong? This
question seems to lead to an insurmountable aporia i f it means under-
standing how the weakness of life's project of self-renunciation could
ever defeat the unsurpassable strength of its cohesion to itself i n i m m a -
nence. In fact, i f weakness seems to and does t r i u m p h over the greatest
strength it is because it bears it w i t h i n itself—because it is, and, like
even the most i n s i g n i f i c a n t weakness, i t coheres w i t h i t s e l f i n the
hyper-power of life: life's desire to renounce itself never ceases for a
moment to belong to life, nor to bear its essence w i t h i n itself.
T h i s is w h a t Nietzsche says i n his extraordinary analysis of the
ascetic priest. Here, for the first time, casting a retroactive light on the

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whole work, weakness and strength no longer appear as two separate

entities in two different individuals: the ascetic priest contains both,
and he can therefore reveal the nature of their internal connection. The
ascetic priest is weak because he is the man of bad conscience, that is,
of life turned against itself. He differs from others who are sick in that
he nurses them, but he must therefore still belong amongst them since,
in order to avoid the contagion of this terrible sickness of life, all those
who are in contact with the sick, and notably those who attend them,
must themselves be sick. But the ascetic priest is strong, stronger per-
haps than the very strongest: "...but he must also be strong, master of
himself even more than of others, with his will to power intact" (GM, III.
15). For his task is gruelling: he must defend his flock both against the
strong and against itself. Against the strong, by the genial invention of
the ascetic ideal which legitimizes ressentiment by the inversion of val-
ues and which, by presenting the different forms of weakness as good
and the different forms of strength as evil, ensures, by means of this
inversion of values, the ascendancy and dominion of the weak over the
strong. Against the flock itself: having defended the weak against the
strong, he must in turn prevent any explosion which would break up
the flock and, in order to do this, he must channel their ressentiment,
guiding and appeasing it; the skill of this great magician is to poison
the wound and calm it at the same time (Ibid.).
It is at this point that he reveals in himself the mysterious imbrica-
tion of weakness and strength and shows how he converts the former
into the latter. In himself, by himself—an exhausted, a desperate life
endeavors to survive, to save itself. But what is it in extreme weakness
which provides it with the extraordinary strength to want to go on liv-
ing, to resist succumbing to the strong and, furthermore, to subjugate
them—what instinct for life remains intact? This is what Nietzsche's
extreme lucidity discovers at the bottom of the ascetic ideal: ''The
ascetic ideal springs from the protective instinct of a degenerating life
which tries by all means to sustain itself and to fight for its existence; it
indicates a partial physiological obstruction and exhaustion against
which the deepest instincts of life, which have remained intact, continu-
ally struggle with new expedients and devices" (GM, III.13; my italics).
The ascetic ideal thus shows itself to be the reverse of what it initially
appeared to be: not life turned against life, against itself, but the
pathetic bid for survival of this same waning life: "this ascetic priest,
this apparent enemy of life...precisely he is among the greatest conserv-
ing and yes-creating forces of life" (Ibid.). And again: "...life wrestles in
it and through it (the ascetic ideal), with death and against death..."
(Ibid.). We also learn the nature of this death against which life so pas-
sionately struggles: it is not exactly death, but a mortal sickness, the

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m e t a p h y s i c a l a i l m e n t of life: "...the physiological struggle of m a n

against death (more precisely: against disgust w i t h life, against exhaus-
tion, against the desire for the "end") {Ibid.). We have thus come to
understand how the greatest strength can appear i n the very heart of a
degenerating life which it comes to save: this life comes into its own i n
the hyper-power of its immanence.
A doubt remains: do the preceding analyses fully accoimt for the possi-
bility of weakness, for its origin? W h y does life t u r n against itself, why
does i t devise the aberrant project of self-renunciation? N i e t z s c h e
responds: because of suffering "...the whole herd of the ill-constituted, dis-
gruntled, underprivileged, unfortunate, and a l l who suffer of themselves"
{Ibid.). We return to the second essential determination of life: affectivity.
Suffering, sometimes denigrated by Nietzsche, is at other times the
object of an unconditional apology. If one looks closely at the texts, one
sees that it is not suffering itself which is condemned, but rather the
hatred or the vengefulness it is capable of generating, and more specifi-
cally, the very particular k i n d of w i l l it engenders when, becoming intol-
erable, i.e. when it can no longer bear itself, suffering undertakes to
destroy itself In other words, it is life's will to no longer be what it is, and
this is the essential project of weakness. Everywhere else, where no
nihilism is engendered, suffering is celebrated: "The discipline of suffer-
ing, of great suffering—do you not know that only this discipline has cre-
ated a l l enhancements of m a n so far?" {BGE, § 225) This is why Oedipus,
for example, is he who "through his tremendous suffering, spreads a
magical power of blessing" {BT, § 9). B y contrast and almost paradoxi-
cally, Christianity and its descendant, the "democratic movement," are
condemned on account of their "almost feminine inaptitude for suffering"
{BGE, § 202).
The good, the strong, the masters are the happy. So what does this cele-
bration of suffering mean? We are lead to Nietzsche's abyssal intuition that
far from being opposed, suffering and joy are one and the same and further-
more, that together they constitute the ground of things. The essence of life,
their unity is what Nietzsche calls the originary One. From The Birth of
Tragedy on, we are confronted with this identity of suffering and joy i n the
guise of the magical transformation of the former into the latter. In tragedy,
we witness the trials and tribulations of a hero who, be he Tristan or
Oedipus, is essentially the Schopenhauerian hero, moved by desire and fight-
ing against the course of a world destined to turn against him and destroy
him. But at the same time as we anxiously witness the trials and ultimately,
the death of the hero, we find ourselves invaded by an incomprehensible,
infinitely higher pleasure. For the destruction of the hero, his goals and his
desires, is that of the phenomenal world i n its entirety and this destruction of
the world unveils the ground of all things, its secret essence, the will to

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power. It is this unveiling of the will to power which constitutes the infinite
pleasure to be derived from tragedy. To be more precise, this unveiling is, at
the same time, suffering and joy. The spectacle of the hero's suffering gives
us occasion to remember and to relive i n ourselves the infinite suffering of
life which is also its happiness, the pleasure of existence.
H o w can this be? L i f e is that w h i c h experiences itself, or more pre-
cisely, the fact that it experiences itself, without distance; i t is i m m e d i -
ate suffering, the suffering of self in-itself w h i c h is the possibility of a l l
suffering. B u t to suffer oneself for the sake of life is also to come into
oneself, to grow f r o m oneself, to take pleasure i n oneself. S u f f e r i n g and
joy are thus not two different, separate, opposed modalities, each suffic-
ing to itself and able to exist independently of the other. O n the con-
trary, each constitutes the substance of the other, and this creates this
"surprising mixture of affects" which reveals "the duplicity of Dionysian
madmen," i.e. of those who are identified w i t h the god, w i t h the unique
essence of things. T h i s surprising m i x t u r e of the affects is "the phe-
nomenon by w h i c h p a i n begets joy" (BT, § 2). The ''phenomenon'' by
which pain begets joy is the originary essence of phenomenality, the
originary coming into itself of being i n the f o r m of suffering of self, i n
self-accretion and self-enjoyment. B e i n g is not, it is a coming, the eter-
nal coming into itself of life. Such a coming is neither i n the future nor
relegated to the past. It is the coming of joy f r o m suffering such that
the latter, the phenomenological movement of the suffering-itself of life,
is identical w i t h its self-enjoyment. Moreover, life tests itself by intensi-
f y i n g its suffering and i n the final paroxysm of its suffering, the more
powerfully and profoundly it takes hold of itself, the more intense its
pleasure.
T h i s i n t e r n a l connection between suffering and joy appears as a n
unnoticed support throughout Nietzsche's work. L e t us consider, for
example, the genealogy of morals. It ostensibly develops f r o m a n i n i t i a l
social relationship posited between debtor and creditor, a relationship
w h i c h results f r o m men's exchange of the goods they produce. T h i s first
relationship generates debt, the feeling of personal obligation, the need
to remember and thus the need to raise a n a n i m a l capable of m a k i n g
promises, the existence of h a r m and of punishment as a means of com-
pensating this h a r m . T h i s network of relationships is so dense that it
explains i n t u r n the relation of the i n d i v i d u a l to society, to his ances-
tors and ultimately, to God.
B u t the essential sequence i n the genealogy of morals occurs w h e n
the debtor fails to reimburse the creditor, who then claims the right to
a strange f o r m of compensation, consisting not i n money or i n nature,
but i n the right to make the debtor suffer, to strike h i m , to mistreat
him, to insult, even to violate h i m . Hence the abyssal question posed by

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the genealogy: "...to what extent can suffering balance debts or guilt?"
A n d the no less abyssal answer: "To the extent that to make suffer was
i n the highest degree pleasurable, to the extent that the injured party
exchanged for the loss he h a d sustained, i n c l u d i n g the displeasure
caused by the loss, an extraordinary counterbalancing pleasure: that of
making suffer—a genuine festival {GM, IIL6).
One might say that it is merely a question of revenge. B u t revenge
just leads us back to the same problem: "How can m a k i n g suffer consti-
tute a compensation?" {Ibid.) One might say that it is just a question of
cruelty. B u t is not cruelty itself a pleasure derived f r o m suffering?
In cruelty and i n revenge, suffering and joy seem to be external to
each other, l i n k e d to two different i n d i v i d u a l s : the s u f f e r i n g of the
debtor and the pleasure of the creditor (who takes pleasure i n causing
the suffering of the person who has injured h i m and thus i n avenging
himself on him). B u t this is just how things appear. F o r one must still
explain how, i n the creditor, the suffering f r o m the i n j u r y that has been
done to h i m can transform itself into the joy of causing suffering. In the
same way we must account for the transformation of suffering into joy
i n the theater spectator—and ultimately, i n Dionysus himself—in the
very essence of life. L i k e the strong, like the weak, revenge and cruelty
are merely the figures of life, they divide the components w i t h i n the
One so that they may be exposed to view. A m o n g the horrors of ancient
Greece which most fascinated Nietzsche was the sacrifice of a young
m a n whose lacerated and bloody limbs were dispersed and then strewn
a l l about so that his blood might fertilize the earth and give it life.
Nietzsche's philosophy is this r i t u a l murder, it is the dis-junction and
the pro-jection, magnified against the backdrop of the sky of myth, of
the structure of absolute subjectivity.

NOTES

1. GM, 1.10. Tr: This essay, unpublished in French, is a condensed version of

chapters 7 and 8 of Michel Henry's book Genealogie de la psychanalyse
(Paris: P U F , 1985).
2. Tr: "Avant qu'elle prenne et donne sa mesure" (i.e., the force measures
itself, sizes itself up, then gives its measure, shows what it is made of).
3. My italics.
4. Both my italics.

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