en perverted by his
interpreters there is no doubt. They have taken this eagle who gazed
unblinded at the sun and exhibited him to the young people in all sorts
of philosophic roles for the benefit of the industrial and military
coalition. Nietzsche depicted in lines of fire the resurrection of
heroism, his vision of the superman was that of an ardent soul, steeled
by sufferings, meditating a tragic conception of life with serenity,
and in his solitary individualism surmounting the infirmity of man and
his own by the insistent will to eternal ascension.

He was made the apostle of brute force, a sort of Messiah of the
"struggle for life." Moreover, he was soon put one side and Gobineau was
revived. He also, who if he did not have genius had wit, would have been
surprised and hardly flattered perhaps by the role which they made him
play. The dolichocephalic (long-skulled) blonde whom he celebrated was
not exactly the one whom we are now judging by his works, but at least
he proclaimed the superiority of the German race.

His doctrine was the centre around which were gathered a complete
ensemble of dogmas and of very diverse theories, whose connected thread
it is not easy to discover when it is searched for logically, but
appears quite distinctly when not reason, but reasons, are demanded. The
reasons are found in the need of justifying in theory the economic and
military imperialism, born as we have seen from conditions of fact and
from very practical motives.

I do not pretend that it was calculated, nor that the optimates made
express requisition of the naturalists, economists, and historians and
sociologists and moralists to provide an imperialistic philosophy for
the use of adult and normal dolichocephalous blondes. But there
certainly was a coincidence. It may have been due to the influence of
what is called a _milieu ambiant_, that of the commercial and military
party. The authors of the doctrine lived in a special atmosphere. Their
intellect was there formed--or deformed--their work consisted in
gathering facts, inventing reasonings, elaborating formulas, so as to
subject natural science, history and morality to the service of that
keen will for hegemony which was in Germany the common characteristic
and was the connecting link between the ancient and the new directing
class.

To convince one that this is so, it is enough to arrange the works of
the pan-Germanists in a series passing from the simplest to the m