3i

Immense Wars of the Spirit

T h e decline of community life suggests that in the future, we risk

becoming secure and self-absorbed last men, devoid of thymotic
striving f o r higher goals in o u r pursuit of private comforts. But
the opposite d a n g e r exists as well, namely, that we will r e t u r n to
being first men engaged in bloody and pointless prestige battles,
only this time with m o d e r n weapons. Indeed, the two problems
are related to o n e another, f o r the absence of regular and con­
structive outlets f o r megalothymia may simply lead to its later r e ­
surgence in an e x t r e m e and pathological f o r m .
It is reasonable to w o n d e r w h e t h e r all people will believe that
the kinds o f struggles and sacrifices possible in a self-satisfied and
p r o s p e r o u s liberal democracy a r e sufficient to call forth what is
highest in man. For a r e t h e r e not reservoirs of idealism that can­
not be exhausted—indeed, that a r e not even touched—if one be­
comes a d e v e l o p e r like Donald T r u m p , o r a mountain climber like
Reinhold Meissner, o r politician like George Bush? Difficult as it
is, in many ways, to be these individuals, and f o r all the recogni­
tion they receive, their lives a r e not the most difficult, and the
causes they serve a r e not the most serious o r the most just. A n d as
long as they a r e not, the horizon o f h u m a n possibilities that they
define will not be ultimately satisfying f o r the most thymotic na­
tures.
In particular, the virtues and ambitions called forth by war are
unlikely to find expression in liberal democracies. T h e r e will be
plenty o f metaphorical w a r s — c o r p o r a t e lawyers specializing in
hostile takeovers w h o will think of themselves as sharks o r gun-

328
 Immense Wars of the Spirit 329

slingers, and bond traders w h o imagine, as in T o m Wolfe's novel

The Bonfire of the Vanities, that they a r e "masters of the universe."
(They will believe this, however, only in bull markets.) But as they
sink into the soft leather of their B M W s , they will know some-
where in the back of their minds that t h e r e have been real gun-
slingers and masters in the world, w h o would feel contempt f o r
the petty virtues required to become rich o r famous in m o d e r n
America. How long megalothymia will be satisfied with metaphor-
ical wars and symbolic victories is an open question. O n e suspects
that some people will not be satisfied until they p r o v e themselves
by that very act that constituted their humanness at the beginning
of history: they will want to risk their lives in a violent battle, and
thereby p r o v e beyond any shadow o f a doubt to themselves and to
their fellows that they a r e free. T h e y will deliberately seek dis-
comfort and sacrifice, because the pain will be the only way they
have of proving definitively that they can think well of themselves,
that they remain human beings.
Hegel—as opposed h e r e to his i n t e r p r e t e r , K o j è v e —
understood that the need to feel p r i d e in one's humanness would
not necessarily be satisfied by the "peace and prosperity" of the
1
end of history. Men would face the constant d a n g e r o f degen-
erating f r o m citizens to m e r e bourgeois, and feeling contempt f o r
themselves in the process. T h e ultimate crucible o f citizenship
therefore was and would remain the willingness to die f o r one's
country: the state would have to r e q u i r e military service and con-
tinue to fight wars.
This aspect of Hegel's thought has led to the charge that he
was a militarist. But he n e v e r glorified w a r f o r its own sake, o r saw
it as the chief end of man; w a r was i m p o r t a n t f o r its secondary
effects on character and community. Hegel believed that without
the possibility of war and the sacrifices d e m a n d e d by it, men would
grow soft and self-absorbed; society would degenerate into a mo-
rass of selfish hedonism and community would ultimately dis-
solve. Fear of man's "lord and master, Death" was a force like n o
other, capable of drawing men outside of themselves and r e m i n d -
ing them that they w e r e not isolated atoms, but members o f com-
munities built a r o u n d shared ideals. A liberal democracy that
could fight a short and decisive w a r e v e r y generation o r so to
defend its own liberty and independence would be f a r healthier
and m o r e satisfied than one that experienced nothing but contin-
uous peace.
330 THE LAST MAN

Hegel's view of w a r reflects a common experience of combat:

for while men suffer horribly and a r e seldom as frightened and
miserable, their experience if they survive has the tendency of
putting all o t h e r things in a certain perspective. W h a t is com­
monly called heroism and sacrifice in civilian life seems positively
petty, friendship and valor take on new and m o r e vivid meanings,
and their lives a r e henceforth transformed by the m e m o r y of
having participated in something much greater than themselves.
As o n e writer noted o f the end of the American Civil W a r — s u r e l y
o n e o f the bloodiest and most terrible conflicts of m o d e r n times—
"One o f Sherman's veterans, going h o m e with all the rest, found
that w h e n the armies did melt back into the heart of the people
the adjustment was a little difficult. T h e men had been every­
w h e r e and had seen everything, life's greatest experience had
ended with most o f life still to be lived, to find common purpose
2
in the quiet days o f peace would be h a r d . . . "
But supposing that the w o r l d has become "filled up," so to
speak, with liberal democracies, such that t h e r e exist no tyranny
and oppression w o r t h y o f the n a m e against which to struggle?
Experience suggests that if men cannot struggle on behalf of a
j u s t cause because that j u s t cause was victorious in an earlier gen­
eration, then they will struggle against the j u s t cause. T h e y will
struggle f o r the sake of struggle. T h e y will struggle, in other
words, out o f a certain b o r e d o m : f o r they cannot imagine living in
a w o r l d without struggle. A n d if the greater part of the world in
which they live is characterized by peaceful and prosperous liberal
democracy, then they will struggle against that peace and pros­
perity, and against democracy.
Such a psychology could be seen at w o r k behind outbreaks like
the French événements o f 1 9 6 8 . Those students who temporarily
took o v e r Paris and b r o u g h t down General de Gaulle had no
"rational" reason to rebel, f o r they w e r e for the most part pam­
p e r e d offspring o f o n e o f the freest and most prosperous societies
on earth. But it was precisely the absence of struggle and sacrifice
in their middle-class lives that led them to take to the streets and
c o n f r o n t the police. W h i l e many w e r e infatuated with unworkable
fragments o f ideas like Maoism, they had no particularly coherent
vision o f a better society. T h e substance of their protest, however,
was a matter of indifference; what they rejected was life in a
society in which ideals had somehow become impossible.
B o r e d o m with peace and prosperity has had far g r a v e r con-
 Immense Wars of the Spirit 331

sequences in the past. Take, f o r example, the First W o r l d W a r .

T h e origins of this conflict remain to this day complex, much-
studied, and controversial. Interpretations o f the causes of the
war, including G e r m a n militarism and nationalism, the progres­
sive breakdown of the European balance o f power, the increasing
rigidity of the alliance system, the incentives placed on p r e ­
emption and offense by doctrine and technology, and the stupid­
ity and recklessness of individual leaders, all contain elements of
the truth. But in addition, there was a n o t h e r intangible but crucial
factor leading to war: many European publics simply wanted w a r
because they w e r e fed u p with the dullness and lack of community
in civilian life. Most accounts of the decision making leading u p to
war concentrate on the rational strategic calculus, and fail to take
into account the e n o r m o u s p o p u l a r enthusiasm which served to
push all countries toward mobilization. Austria-Hungary's harsh
ultimatum to Serbia following the assassination of A r c h d u k e
Franz Ferdinand at Sarajevo was greeted in Berlin with frenzied
public demonstrations in support of Austria-Hungary, despite the
fact that G e r m a n y had no direct stake in the quarrel. For seven
critical days at the end of J u l y 1 9 1 4 , and the beginning of August,
there w e r e huge nationalistic demonstrations before the Foreign
Office and the Kaiser's residence; when the latter r e t u r n e d to
Berlin f r o m Potsdam on J u l y 3 1 , his motorcade was swamped by
crowds clamoring f o r war. It was in that atmosphere that critical
3
decisions leading to w a r w e r e t a k e n . T h e s e scenes w e r e repeated
that week in Paris, Petrograd, London, and Vienna. A n d much o f
the exuberance of those crowds reflected the feeling that w a r
meant national unity and citizenship at long last, an overcoming
of the divisions between capitalist and proletariat, Protestant and
Catholic, f a r m e r and w o r k e r , that characterized civil society. A s
one witness described the feeling among the crowds in Berlin,
"No one knows anybody else. But all a r e seized by one earnest
4
emotion: W a r , war, and a sense o f togetherness."
In 1 9 1 4 , Europe had experienced a h u n d r e d years of peace
since the last major, continent-wide conflict had been settled by
the Congress of Vienna. T h a t century had seen the flowering o f
m o d e r n technological civilization as Europe industrialized, bring­
ing in its train e x t r a o r d i n a r y material prosperity and the emer­
gence of a middle class society. T h e p r o - w a r demonstrations that
took place in the different capitals of Europe in A u g u s t 1 9 1 4 can
be seen in some measure as rebellions against that middle-class
332 THE LAST MAN

civilization, with its security, prosperity, and lack of challenge.

T h e growing isothymia of everyday life no longer seemed suffi­
cient. O n a mass scale, megalothymia r e a p p e a r e d : not the mega­
lothymia of individual princes, but of entire nations that sought
recognition of their w o r t h and dignity.
In G e r m a n y , above all, the w a r was seen by many as a revolt
against the materialism o f the commercial world created by France
and that archetype o f bourgeois societies, Britain. G e r m a n y of
course had many specific grievances against the existing o r d e r in
Europe, f r o m colonial and naval policy to the threat of Russian
economic expansion. But in reading G e r m a n justifications for the
war, one is struck by a consistent emphasis on the need for a kind
of objectless struggle, a struggle that would have purifying moral
effects quite independently of w h e t h e r G e r m a n y gained colonies
or won f r e e d o m of the seas. T h e comments of a young G e r m a n
law student on his way to the f r o n t in September 1 9 1 4 were typ­
ical: while denouncing w a r as "dreadful, u n w o r t h y of human be­
ings, stupid, o u t m o d e d , and in every sense destructive," he
nonetheless came to the Nietzschean conclusion that "the decisive
issue is surely always one's readiness to sacrifice and not the object
5
of sacrifice." Pflicht, o r duty, was not understood as a matter of
enlightened self-interest o r contractual obligation; it was an abso­
lute moral value that demonstrated one's inner strength and su­
periority to materialism and natural determination. It was the
beginning o f f r e e d o m and creativity.
M o d e r n thought raises no barriers to a f u t u r e nihilistic war
against liberal democracy on the part of those brought u p in its
bosom. Relativism—the doctrine that maintains that all values are
merely relative and which attacks all "privileged perspectives"—
must ultimately end u p u n d e r m i n i n g democratic and tolerant val­
ues as well. Relativism is not a weapon that can be aimed selectively
at the enemies one chooses. It fires indiscriminately, shooting out
the legs of not only the "absolutisms," dogmas, and certainties of
the W e s t e r n tradition, but that tradition's emphasis on tolerance,
diversity, and f r e e d o m o f thought as well. If nothing can be true
absolutely, if all values a r e culturally determined, then cherished
principles like h u m a n equality have to go by the wayside as well.
T h e r e is no better example of this than the thought of Ni­
etzsche himself. Nietzsche believed that man's awareness that
nothing was t r u e was both a threat and an opportunity. It was a
threat because, as noted earlier, it u n d e r m i n e d the possibility of
 Immense Wars of the Spirit 333

life "within a horizon." But it was also an opportunity, because it

permitted total h u m a n f r e e d o m f r o m p r i o r moral constraints.
The ultimate f o r m of h u m a n creativity f o r Nietzsche was not art
but the creation of what was highest, new values. His project, once
he liberated himself f r o m the shackles of earlier philosophy that
believed in the possibility of absolute truth o r right, was to "re­
value all values," beginning with those of Christianity. He delib­
erately sought to u n d e r m i n e belief in h u m a n equality, arguing
that this was simply a prejudice instilled in us by Christianity.
Nietzsche hoped that the principle of equality would give way one
day to a morality justifying the domination of the weak by the
strong, and ended u p celebrating what amounted to a doctrine of
cruelty. He hated societies that w e r e diverse and tolerant, p r e f e r ­
ring instead those that w e r e intolerant, instinctive, and without
remorse—the Indian Chandala caste that tried to breed distinct
races of men, o r the "blond beasts o f prey" which "unhesitatingly
6
lay (their) terrible claws upon a populace." Nietzsche's relation­
ship to G e r m a n fascism has been debated at great length, and
while he can be defended f r o m the n a r r o w charges of being the
forefather of National Socialism's simpleminded doctrines, the
relationship between his thought and nazism is not accidental.
J u s t as in the case of his follower, Martin Heidegger, Nietzsche's
relativism shot out all of the philosophical p r o p s holding u p West­
ern liberal democracy, and replaced it with a doctrine of strength
7
and domination. Nietzsche believed the e r a of European nihil­
ism, which he was helping to inaugurate, would lead to "immense
wars" of the spirit, objectless wars whose only p u r p o s e was to
affirm war itself.
T h e m o d e r n liberal project attempted to shift the basis of
human societies f r o m thymos to the m o r e secure g r o u n d of desire.
Liberal democracy "solved" the problem of megalothymia by con­
straining and sublimating it t h r o u g h a complex series o f institu­
tional arrangements—the principle of p o p u l a r sovereignty, the
establishment of rights, the rule of law, separation of powers, and
the like. Liberalism also made possible the m o d e r n economic
world by liberating desire f r o m all constraints on acquisitiveness,
and allying it to reason in the f o r m o f m o d e r n natural science. A
new, dynamic, and infinitely rich field of e n d e a v o r was suddenly
opened u p to man. According to the A n g l o - S a x o n theorists o f
liberalism, idle masters w e r e to be persuaded to give u p their
vainglory, and to make their h o m e in this economic w o r l d instead.