first through our written tests. In German composition, on the 'advantages and dangers of wealth' Nietzsche passed with No. 1; also in a Latin exercise de bello Punico primo; but in mathematics he failed with the lowest mark, No. 4. This upset him and in fact he who was almost the most gifted of us all was compelled to withdraw."

While the two were strolling up and down in front of the schoolhouse, Nietzsche unburdened his grief to his friend, and Deussen tried to comfort him. "What difference does it make," said he, "if you pass badly, if only you pass at all? You are and will always be more gifted than all the rest of us, and will soon outstrip even me whom you now envy. You must increase but I must decrease."

The course of events was as Deussen had predicted, for Nietzsche though not passing with as much distinction as he may have deserved nevertheless received his diploma.

When Deussen with his wife visited Nietzsche in August 1907 at Sils-Maria, Nietzsche showed him a requiem which he had composed for his own funeral, and he added: "I do not believe that I will last much longer. I have reached the age at which my father died, and I fear that I shall fall a victim to the same disease as he." Though Deussen protested vigorously against this sad prediction and tried to cheer him up, Nietzsche indeed succumbed to his sad fate within two years.

FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE FROM PHOTOGRAPH
IN THE POSSESSION OF PROFESSOR DEUSSEN.

Professor Deussen, though Nietzsche's most intimate friend, is by no means uncritical in judging his philosophy. It is true he cherishes the personal character and the ideal tendencies of his old chum, but he is not blind to his faults. Deussen says of Nietzsche: "He was never a systematic philosopher.... The great problems of epistemology, of psychology, of æsthetics and ethics are only tentatively touched upon in his writings.... There are many pearls of worth upon which he throws a brilliant side light, as it were in lightning flashes.... His overwhelming imagination is always busy. His thoughts were always presented in pleasant imagery and in language of dazzling brilliancy, but he lacked critical judgment and was not controlled by a consideration of reality. Therefore the creation of his pen was never in harmony with the actual world, and among the most valuable truths which he revealed with ingenious profundity there are bizarre and distorted notions stated as general rules although they are merely rare exceptions, as is also frequently the case in sensational novels. Thus Nietzsche produced a caricature of life which means no small danger for receptive and inexperienced minds. His readers can escape this danger only when they do what Nietzsche did not do, when they confront every thought of his step by step by the actual nature of things, and retain only what proves to be true under the touchstone of experience."

Between the negation of the will and its affirmation Nietzsche granted to Deussen while still living in Basel, that the ennoblement of the will should be man's aim. The affirmation of the will is the pagan ideal with the exception of Platonism. The negation of the will is the Christian ideal, and according to Nietzsche the ennoblement of the will is realized in his ideal of the overman. Deussen makes the comment that Nietzsche's notion of the overman is in truth the ideal of all mankind, whether this highest type of manhood be called Christ or overman; and we grant that such an ideal is traceable everywhere. It is called "Messiah" among the Jews; "hero" among the Greeks, "Christ" among the Christians, and chiün, the superior man, or to use Nietzsche's language, "the overman," among the Chinese; but the characteristics with which Nietzsche endows his overman are unfortunately mere brutal strength and an unscrupulous will to play the tyrant. Here Professor Deussen halts. It appears that he knew the peaceful character of his friend too well to take his ideal of the overman seriously.

We shall discuss Nietzsche's ideal of the overman more fully further down in a discussion of his most original thoughts, the typically Nietzschean ideas.

EXTREME NOMINALISM

According to Nietzsche, the history of philosophy from Plato to his own time is a progress of the idea that objective truth (a conception of "the true world") is not only not attainable, but does not exist at all. He expresses this idea in his Twilight of the Idols (English edition, pp. 122-123) under the caption, "How the 'True World' Finally Became a Fable," which describes the successive stages as follows:

"1. The true world attainable by the wise, the pious, and the virtuous man,—he lives in it, he embodies it.

"(Oldest form of the idea, relatively rational, simple, and convincing. Transcription of the proposition, 'I, Plato, am the truth,')

"2. The true world unattainable at present, but promised to the wise, the pious, and the virtuous man (to the sinner who repents).

"(Progress of the idea: it becomes more refined, more insidious, more incomprehensible,—it becomes feminine, it becomes Christian.)

"3. The true world unattainable, undemonstrable, and unable to be promised; but even as conceived, a comfort, an obligation, and an imperative.

"(The old sun still, but shining only through mist and scepticism; the idea becomes sublime, pale, northerly, Koenigsbergian.)

"4. The true world—unattainable? At any rate unattained. And being unattained also unknown. Consequently also neither comforting, saving nor obligatory: what obligation could anything unknown lay upon us?

"(Gray morning. First dawning of reason. Cock-crowing of Positivism.)

"5. The 'true world'—an idea neither good for anything, nor even obligatory any longer,—an idea become useless and superfluous; consequently a refuted idea; let us do away with it!

"(Full day; breakfast; return of bon sens and cheerfulness; Plato blushing for shame; infernal noise of all free intellects,)

"6. We have done away with the true world: what world is left? perhaps the seeming?... But no! in doing away with the true, we have also done away with the seeming world!

"(Noon; the moment of the shortest shadow; end of the longest error; climax of mankind; Incipit Zarathustra!)"

The reader will ask, "What next?" Probably afternoon and evening, and then night. In the night presumably "the old sun," i. e., the idea of Plato's true world, which (according to Nietzsche) grew pale in the morning, will shine again.

Nietzsche's main desire was to live the real life and make his home not in an imaginary Utopia but in this actual world of ours. He reproached the philosophers as well as the religious leaders and ethical teachers for trying to make mankind believe that the teal world is purely phenomenal, for replacing it by the world of thought which they called "the true world" or the world of truth. To Nietzsche the typical philosopher is Plato. He and all his followers are