t
we find Christian ethics "deeper" than Socrates! Plato was easier to
compete with! We are at the present time, so to speak, merely chewing
the cud of the very battle which was fought in the first centuries of
the Christian era--with the exception of the fact that now, instead of
the clearly perceptible antiquity which then existed, we have merely its
pale ghost; and, indeed, even Christianity itself has become rather
ghostlike. It is a battle fought _after_ the decisive battle, a
post-vibration. In the end, all the forces of which antiquity consisted
have reappeared in Christianity in the crudest possible form: it is
nothing new, only quantitatively extraordinary.

160

What severs us for ever from the culture of antiquity is the fact that
its foundations have become too shaky for us. A criticism of the Greeks
is at the same time a criticism of Christianity; for the bases of the
spirit of belief, the religious cult, and witchcraft, are the same in
both--There are many rudimentary stages still remaining, but they are by
this time almost ready to collapse.

This would be a task . to characterise Greek antiquity as irretrievably
lost, and with it Christianity also and the foundations upon which, up
to the present time, our society and politics have been based.

161

Christianity has conquered antiquity--yes; that is easily said. In the
first place, it is itself a piece of antiquity, in the second place, it
has preserved antiquity, in the third place, it has never been in combat
with the pure ages of antiquity. Or rather: in order that Christianity
itself might remain, it had to let itself be overcome by the spirit of
antiquity--for example, the idea of empire, the community, and so forth.
We are suffering from the uncommon want of clearness and uncleanliness
of human things; from the ingenious mendacity which Christianity has
brought among men.

162

It is almost laughable to see how nearly all the sciences and arts of
modern times grow from the scattered seeds which have been wafted
towards us from antiquity, and how Christianity seems to us here to be
merely the evil chill of a long night, a night during which one is
almost inclined to believe that all is over with reason and honesty
among men. The battle waged against the natural man has given rise to
the unnatural man.

163

With the dissolution of Christianity a great part of antiquity has
become incomprehensible to us, for instance, the entire