Note 407 — Chapter V

‘With what magic she lays hold of me! What? Has all the world’s repose embarked here?’ ‘What use has the inspired one for wine? What? Give the mole wings and proud imaginings?’ ‘In so far as he says Yes to this other world, what? must he not then say No to its counterpart, this world?’ ‘Round about God all becomes—what? perhaps world?’ ‘A pessimist ... who says Yes to morality ... to læde-neminem-morality; what? is that really—a pessimist?’ ‘Fear and pity: with these feelings has man hitherto stood in the presence of woman. What? Is there now to be an end of this?’ I will content myself with these examples, but let it be remarked once for all, that all the specimens I adduce here for the purpose of examining Nietzsche’s mental state could easily be multiplied a hundredfold, as the characteristic peculiarities recur in him hundreds of times. On one occasion he plainly becomes conscious of this living note of interrogation, always present in his mind as an obsession. In Also sprach Zarathustra, pt. iii., p. 55, he calls the passion for rule, ‘the flashing note of interrogation by the side of premature answers.’ In this connection, this expression has absolutely no sense; but it at once becomes intelligible when it is remembered that the insane are in the habit of suddenly giving utterance to the ideas springing up in their consciousness. Nietzsche plainly saw in his mind ‘the flashing note of interrogation,’ and suddenly, and without transition, spoke of it.