By depriving a man of his wickedness—more particularly nowadays— therefore, one may unwittingly be doing violence to the greatest in him. It may be an outrage against his wholeness, just as the lopping-off of a leg would be. Fortunately, the natural so-called “wickedness” of higher men has in a certain measure been able to resist this lopping process which successive slave-moralities have practised; but signs are not wanting which show that the noblest wickedness is fast vanishing from society—the wickedness of courage and determination—and that Nietzsche had good reasons for crying: “Ah, that (man’s) baddest is so very small! Ah, that his best is so very small. What is good? To be brave is good! It is the good war which halloweth every cause!” (see also par. 5, “Higher Man”).
criticism · Notes: Part III
The noble wickedness of higher men
Ludovici argues that depriving a higher man of his so-called wickedness may do violence to the greatest in him, and that the noblest wickedness, that of courage and determination, is vanishing under slave-moralities, which is why Nietzsche cried that man's baddest is so small and that to be brave is good.
On Zarathustra
- Revaluation of values (old and new tables)What slave-morality calls wickedness may be the highest part of the higher man.
- War, the warrior and courageCourage as the noble wickedness Nietzsche wished to preserve.
- The higher menHigher men's wholeness is threatened by lopping off their evil.