135

Being pitied.  To savages the idea of being pitied evokes a moral shudder: it divests one of all virtue. To offer pity is as good as to offer contempt: one does not want to see a contemptible creature suffer, there is no enjoyment in that. To see an enemy suffer, on the other hand, whom one recognises as one's equal in pride and who does not relinquish his pride under torture, and in general any creature who refuses to cry out for pity  cry out, that is, for the most shameful and profoundest humiliation  this is an enjoyment of enjoyments, and beholding it the soul of the savage is elevated to admiration: in the end he kills such a valiant creature, if he has him in his power, and thus accords this indomitable enemy his last honour: if he had wept and wailed and the expression of cold defiance had vanished from his face, if he had shown himself contemptible  well, he would have been let live, like a dog  he would no longer have excited the pride of the spectator of his suffering, and admiration would have given place to pity.

Friedrich Nietzsche - Daybreak
Book II - Aphorism # 135

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