in the community as the DELIVERER, in the herd, and
therefore in "themselves."

203. We, who hold a different belief--we, who regard the democratic
movement, not only as a degenerating form of political organization, but
as equivalent to a degenerating, a waning type of man, as involving his
mediocrising and depreciation: where have WE to fix our hopes? In
NEW PHILOSOPHERS--there is no other alternative: in minds strong and
original enough to initiate opposite estimates of value, to transvalue
and invert "eternal valuations"; in forerunners, in men of the future,
who in the present shall fix the constraints and fasten the knots which
will compel millenniums to take NEW paths. To teach man the future
of humanity as his WILL, as depending on human will, and to make
preparation for vast hazardous enterprises and collective attempts in
rearing and educating, in order thereby to put an end to the frightful
rule of folly and chance which has hitherto gone by the name of
"history" (the folly of the "greatest number" is only its last
form)--for that purpose a new type of philosopher and commander will
some time or other be needed, at the very idea of which everything that
has existed in the way of occult, terrible, and benevolent beings might
look pale and dwarfed. The image of such leaders hovers before OUR
eyes:--is it lawful for me to say it aloud, ye free spirits? The
conditions which one would partly have to create and partly utilize for
their genesis; the presumptive methods and tests by virtue of which
a soul should grow up to such an elevation and power as to feel a
CONSTRAINT to these tasks; a transvaluation of values, under the new
pressure and hammer of which a conscience should be steeled and a heart
transformed into brass, so as to bear the weight of such responsibility;
and on the other hand the necessity for such leaders, the dreadful
danger that they might be lacking, or miscarry and degenerate:--these
are OUR real anxieties and glooms, ye know it well, ye free spirits!
these are the heavy distant thoughts and storms which sweep across the
heaven of OUR life. There are few pains so grievous as to have seen,
divined, or experienced how an exceptional man has missed his way and
deteriorated; but he who has the rare eye for the universal danger
of "man" himself DETERIORATING, he who like us has recognized the
extraordinary fortuitousness which has hitherto played its game in
respect to the future of mankind--a game