Note 372 — Chapter V

Dr. Hugo Kaatz, Die Weltanschauung Friedrich Nietzsche: Erster Theil, ‘Cultur und Moral’; Zweiter Theil, ‘Kunst und Leben.’ Dresden und Leipzig, 1892, 1 Th., p. vi.: ‘We are accustomed, especially in matters concerning the deepest problems of thought, to a finished, systematic exposition.... There is none of all this in Nietzsche. No single work of his forms a finished whole, or is wholly intelligible without the others. Each book, moreover, is totally wanting in organic structure. Nietzsche writes almost exclusively in aphorisms, which, filling sometimes two lines, sometimes several pages, are complete in themselves, and seldom manifest any direct connection with each other.... With proud indifference to the reader, the author has avoided cutting even one gap in the hedge with which he has closely surrounded his intellectual creations. Access to him must be gained by fighting,’ etc. In spite of its seeming obscurity, Nietzsche has himself given such pointed information concerning his method of work as amounts to an avowal. ‘All writing makes me angry or ashamed; for me, writing is a necessity.’ ‘But why, then, do you write?’ ‘Yes, my dear friend, let me say it in confidence: I have hitherto found no other means of ridding myself of my thoughts.’ (The italics are Nietzsche’s.) ‘And why do you wish to rid yourself of them?’ ‘Why I wish? Do I so wish? I must.’ Die fröhliche Wissenschaft. Neue Ausgabe, p. 114.