133

Before we present the further consequences of this condition, we want to avow that man has arrived at this condition not through his "guilt" and "sin," but rather through a series of errors of reason, that if his nature seemed dark and hateful to him to that degree, it was the fault of the mirror, and that that mirror was his creation, the very imperfect creation of human imagination and powers of judgment. First, any being who would be capable of purely selfless actions only is more fabulous than the phoenix. It cannot even be imagined clearly because from the start the whole concept of "selfless action," if carefully examined, evaporates into the air. Never has a man done anything that was only for others; and without any personal motivation. Indeed, how could he do anything that had no reference to himself, that is, with no inner compulsion (which would have to be based on a personal need)? How could the ego act without ego?
A God who conversely is all love, as is occasionally assumed, would not be capable of one single selfless action, which should remind us of a thought of Lichtenberg's, taken, to be sure, from a more common sphere: "It is impossible for us to feel for others, as the saying goes. We feel only for ourselves. The principle sounds harsh, but it is not, if it is only understood correctly. We love neither father nor mother nor wife nor child, but rather the agreeable feelings that they give us."¹⁹ Or, as La Rochefoucauld says, "Si on croit aimer sa maîtresse pour l'amour d'elle, on est bien trompé."²⁰ For the explanation of why actions of love are esteemed higher than others, namely because of their usefulness rather than their essence, see the above-mentioned investigations On the Origin of Moral Feelings.²¹ But if a man should want to embody Love, quite like that God, to do everything for others, nothing for himself, it is already impossible from the start, because he has to do a great deal for himself in order to be able to do anything at all for the sake of others. Next, it assumes the other person is egoist enough to accept those sacrifices, that life for his sake, over and over again: so men of love and self-sacrifice have an interest in the continued existence of loveless egoists incapable of self-sacrifice, and the highest morality, in order to endure, would have virtually to exact the existence of immorality (by which, to be sure, it would cancel itself out).
Furthermore, the idea of a God disturbs and humiliates as long as it is believed, but given the present state of comparative ethnology, its origin can no longer be in doubt; and with insight into that origin, the belief disappears. The Christian who compares his nature to God is like Don Quixote, who underestimates his own bravery because he is preoccupied with the miraculous deeds of heroes out of chivalric novels; in both cases, the standard of measure being used belongs to the realm of fable. But if the idea of God disappears, so too does the feeling of "sin" as a transgression against divine precepts, as a stain on a creature consecrated to God. Then what probably remains is that discontent which is very intimately bound up with and related to the fear of punishment by a secular justice, or the fear of men's disrespect; but discontent from the pangs of conscience, the sharpest sting in the feeling of guilt, has been stopped short when one perceives that through one's actions one may have transgressed against human tradition, human statutes and regulations, but that one has not yet jeopardized the "eternal salvation of the soul" and its relation to the divinity. If in the end man succeeds in convincing himself philosophically that all actions are unconditionally necessary and completely irresponsible, and if he takes this conviction into his flesh and blood, those vestiges of the pangs of conscience disappear, too.