nietzsche's napoleon - paul f. glenn

Nietzsche's Napoleon: The Higher Man as Political ActorAuthor(s): Paul F. GlennSource: The Review of Politics, Vol. 63, No. 1 (Winter, 2001), pp. 129-158Published by: Cambridge University Press for the University of Notre Dame du lac on behalfof Review of PoliticsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1408381Accessed: 27/10/2009 16:56

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Nietzsche's Napoleon: The Higher Man as Political Actor

Paul F. Glenn

Nietzsche's concept of the higher man is often seen as vague. The article adds concreteness to the concept by studying an example of a higher man, Napoleon. Napoleon embodied power and spiritual health, and was therefore an admirable person. By looking at Nietzsche's description of Napoleon as an artist, we also gain insight into the higher man as a political actor: he uses the public arena as the medium on which he practices his art. In doing so, he presents himself as a exemplar of humanity, inspiring others to seek their own path to excellence. By studying this, we gain important insight into Nietzsche's political teaching. But Nietzsche's account of Napoleon is not one-sided: he also describes Napoleon's corruption. The fall of a higher man is both a warning of the dangers of the political realm, and a reminder that sickness and health are closely connected. Even the mightiest individual is fragile.

Who is Nietzsche's higher man? What sort of being is he?1 The higher man is a central concept in Nietzsche's thought, and although much has been written on the subject, most scholarly accounts of the overman remain abstract. The higher man in the literature is faceless, a being who is supposed to stand out from the herd but ironically lacks any individual identity.2 At most he is portrayed as an artist or a warrior or a free spirit-but these are roles and activities, not identities. The higher man rarely comes across as a flesh-and-blood human being.

1. Throughout this article, I refer to the higher individual as a male. This is because of Nietzsche's repeated references to the higher individual in this way: even though the German term Ubermensch is not gender specific (Mensch means "human being," not "male"), Nietzsche repeatedly uses the pronoun "he" to describe the Ubermensch. And all of the examples he uses are male. It is not entirely clear that Nietzsche simply rejected the idea that women could be higher individuals, but given his repeated statements that women were weaker and less capable of intelligence, it seems likely.

2. Many scholars argue that the overman is by necessity a vague concept: because Nietzsche cannot prescribe a single moral code for all, or hold up one ideal of excellence, a concrete description of such a being is impossible. See, e.g., Arthur Danto's Nietzsche as Philosopher (New York: Columbia University Press, 1965), p. 199, and Alexander Nehamas, Nietzsche: Life as Literature (New York: Columbia University Press, 1965), pp. 221-23. Others argue that the overman is a being of the future, beyond humanity, and therefore cannot be adequately described by mere humans. See, e.g., Daniel Conway, Nietzsche and the Political (New York:

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Nietzsche himself, however, was more concrete in his depic- tion of the higher man. For him such beings were not merely a hypothetical possibility, or beings which will emerge in the future. They had existed in the past and their character is known to us. While not to be imitated in slavish fashion, such people exem- plified in unique ways the aristocratic values Nietzsche advocated. One of Nietzsche's frequently cited examples of an actually exist- ing higher man was Napoleon Bonaparte. The French emperor is often included in the lists Nietzsche compiled of admirable figures. Despite this, no detailed account of Nietzsche's understanding of Napoleon-and what the emperor means more broadly for Nietzsche's political teaching-exists.3

Examining a concrete example from Nietzsche's writings does more than tell us about his interpretation of that one figure- Napoleon stands for something greater. Nietzsche did not write about individuals simply because they interested him; he selected the objects of his writing with care. As he noted in Ecce Homo, "I never attack persons; I merely avail myself of the person as a strong magnifying glass that allows one to make visible a general but creeping and elusive calamity" (EH, "Wise," 7).4 Just as his critiques of individuals point toward larger issues, so his praise also indicates a general point. Napoleon embodies many of the qualities Nietzsche admired, but more important he was a political leader in an egalitarian era dominated by a populist ethos.

Routledge, 1997), p. 14; Gilles Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, trans. Hugh Tomlinson (London: Athlone Press, 1983), p. 163 and pp. 169-71; and Tracy Strong, Friedrich Nietzsche and the Politics of Transfiguration (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975), p. 54. Others who argue that the concept is intelligible and knowable often present little more than abstract descriptions. Walter Kaufmann, for example, separates the overman from any Darwinian interpretation (Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist, 4th ed. [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1974], pp. 311-13), and describes the overman as "the one who has transfigured his physis and acquired self-mastery" (p. 312), but distances the concept from concrete individuals from history (pp. 313-16)

3. In this article, I address myself to the growing English-language literature on Nietzsche.

4. References to Nietzsche's writings are cited parenthetically in the text. Each citation consists of an abbreviation of the title followed by the section number (not the page number). For works without sequentially numbered sections, the name of the chapter or section is given. Roman numerals are used to differentiate parts of the book. A "P" indicates Nietzsche's preface. The abbreviations are: BGE=Beyond Good and Evil, trans. Walter Kaufmann (New York: Vintage Books, 1989); CW=The

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Napoleon therefore exemplifies how greatness is possible in a time of spiritual weakness and widespread cultural decay. By studying Nietzsche's description of Bonaparte, we can learn something about the higher man as a political actor: How can his political activity promote healthy and strong values? What are the dangers of political engagement? A concrete example can make the theory of the overman clearer and less abstract.5

In this article, I reconstruct Nietzsche's interpretation of Na- poleon. I begin by explaining why Nietzsche admired him. Then I analyze his interpretation of Napoleon as an artist and what this can teach us about Nietzsche's view of the relationship between spiritual elevation and politics. Finally, I examine Nietzsche's account of Napoleon's failings in order to highlight the multifaceted character of the higher man.

The account offered here is necessarily a reconstruction. Un- like his portraits of Jesus or Wagner, Nietzsche did not write an extended description of Bonaparte. His discussions of the emperor tend to be fragmentary: he usually refers to Napoleon in the course of a discussion of another issue. But there is a consis- tency to Nietzsche's view. The scattered passages echo similar sentiments and do suggest a coherent portrait. Other clues can be found by analyzing Nietzsche's more lengthy discussion of other figures to whom he links the French emperor, notably Goethe. By piecing this material together, a coherent and revealing account of Nietzsche's Napoleon emerges.

Case of Wagner, trans. Walter Kaufmann (New York: Vintage Books, 1967); EH= Ecce Homo, transl. Walter Kaufmann (New York: Vintage Books, 1989); GS=The Gay Science, trans. Walter Kaufmann (New York: Vintage Books, 1974); HH=Human, All-Too-Human, trans. R.J. Hollingdale (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1986); GM=On the Genealogy of Morals, trans. Walter Kaufmann and R.J. Hollingdale (New York: Vintage Books, 1989); Z=Thus Spoke Zarathustra; trans. Walter Kaufmann (New York: Penguin Books, 1966); TI=Twilight of the Idols and The Antichrist, trans. R.J. Hollingdale (New York: Penguin Books, 1990);A=The Antichrist; UM=Untimely Meditations, transl. R.J. Hollingdale (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996); WP=The Will to Power, trans. Walter Kaufmann and R.J. Hollingdale and ed. Walter Kaufmann (New York: Vintage Books, 1968).

5. Nietzsche may be influenced here by one of his intellectual heroes, Ralph Waldo Emerson. Emerson's Representative Men: Seven Lectures analyzes a number of individuals as standing for something greater than themselves. On Nietzsche and Emerson, see Stanley Cavell, "Aversive Thinking: Emersonian Representations in Heidegger and Nietzsche," in Conditions Handsome and Unhandsome: The Constitution of Emersonian Perfectionism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990).

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Power, Totality, and Elevation in Napoleon

Napoleon cast a long shadow over nineteenth century Eu- rope. Long after the din of the battlefield had quieted and many of his political accomplishments had faded, the sheer stature of Napoleon's character left an indelible mark on the minds of many. Bonaparte was greatly admired by artists, writers, musicians, poli- ticians, soldiers, and many others for a number of different reasons. Some focused on his prowess as a general. Napoleon was one of the great commanders in history; his tactics and strategies are still taught in military schools. The French admired (and still admire, in some cases) him as a symbol of national greatness: Napoleon showed the world what France could do. Still others point to his political reforms and innovations. Despite the great bloodshed he caused, many felt that Napoleon advanced humanity and helped establish the foundation for European politics for the next century6

Nietzsche grew up in a region filled with Napoleonic events and memories. Saxony was the site of many battles during the invasions of Germany. Because of the frequent presence of Napo- leon and his troops, supporters and opponents of Bonaparte were commonplace in the region. Through the influence of his grand- mother, who witnessed many of the key events, Nietzsche learned to admire the emperor.7 But though he admired Napoleon, he did not do so for typical reasons. In his descriptions of the French emperor, Nietzsche never mentions Bonaparte's great victories at

6. There is a tradition of nineteenth-century history (particularly, but not exclusively, French) which consistently elevates Napoleon above humanity and attributes great deeds to him. Even those critical of his deeds often attributed nearly superhuman qualities to him. For a good summary of such historiography, see chapter 14 of G.P. Gooch, History and Historians in the Nineteenth Century, 3d ed. (New York: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1920). Historians were not the only ones to focus on the emperor. Hegel's account of Napoleon as a tool of the "cunning of reason" fits here-despite his own intentions, Napoleon furthered the cause of freedom in the world. Similarly, Raskolnikov in Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment sees Napoleon as a person unafraid to commit crimes in order to move humankind forward. Nietzsche was certainly not alone in holding Bonaparte up as an exemplar, but his reasons for doing so are quite different.

7. Peter Bergmann, Nietzsche: "The Last Antipolitical German" (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987), p. 16. Given this, it is probable that Napoleon influenced Nietzsche's vision of human excellence.

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Austerlitz and Jena. Nor does he care about the glorification of France-in his later works, Nietzsche repeatedly denounced all forms of nationalism.8 And unlike Hegel he did not care about any contribution Napoleon may have made to the common good of humanity. As he frequently notes, the value of great men does not come from any promotion of human well-being: "one misunderstands great human beings if one views them from the paltry perspective of public utility" (TI, "Expeditions," 50). Instead, Nietzsche characterizes Napoleon as a higher man for who he was, not what he did. The extraordinary character of the man, and not his accomplishments, marks him as elevated.9 Napoleon was a being of great power and thus stands as a symbol of what the highest exemplars of humanity can become. For this reason, Nietzsche includes him in a list of "the more profound and comprehensive men of this century" (BGE, 256) and frequently praises him.

To understand more deeply why Nietzsche admired Bonaparte, we must first briefly touch on Nietzsche's value standard, power. He describes that standard as follows: "What is good?-All that heightens the feeling of power, the will to power, power itself in man. What is bad?-All that proceeds from weakness" (A, 2). The reason for the standard is that, according to Nietzsche, the will to power is the fundamental driving force of all life. Individuals and epochs which embody power are to be admired as the highest, while those which are rooted in weakness are to be vilified. The core of Nietzsche's scathing attack on modernity is its weakness. Modernity represents the triumph of values like equality, humanism, peace, and the freedom of the will, which are slavish values: their origin lies in weakness, not strength.10 The French Revolution and the subsequent spread of democratic values in its wake represent a new high point for the

8. As will be discussed later, Nietzsche regarded Napoleon's nationalism as a sign of weakness and decay.

9. In this, Nietzsche closely follows romantic attitudes toward Bonaparte. Nancy Rosenblum notes that "His [Napoleon's] achievements as a strategist and his imperial ambitions are ignored; romantics draw their inspiration instead from Napoleon as an exemplary personality" (Another Liberalism [Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987], p. 20).

10. The core of Nietzsche's analysis of slave morality, and its origins in weakness, can be found in On the Genealogy of Morals, particularly the first essay.

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hegemony of slave values. Nearly everyone now accepts these values as truth.

In the midst of the spread of such values, however, atavistic individuals have appeared, harkening back to an aristocratic past. Instead of striving for equality and humanism, they sought distance and struggle to attain nobility of soul. The two most prominent atavistic figures whom Nietzsche cites are Goethe and Napoleon. It is widely noted that Nietzsche idolized Goethe, greatly praising him, but it is rarely noted that he links the two figures together. In two passages in The Will to Power (notes 104 and 1017), Nietzsche connects the two as overcoming the eighteenth century. And both did so within the crucible of the Revolution and its aftermath. Amidst an explosion of values of weakness, Napoleon and Goethe embodied the qualities of an older, nobler time. For this reason, Nietzsche describes Napoleon as "the ideal of antiquity incarnate" and "the noble ideal as such made flesh" (GM, I. 16). Because of their opposition to modernity, Napoleon and Goethe sought to destroy the preeminence of egalitarianism and other modern beliefs. Napoleon, for example, "considered modern ideas and civilization itself almost as a personal enemy" (GS, 362). Goethe and Napoleon stood as giants amidst the human soul of the modern era, dwarfed and stunted by the dissemination of slave values.n In the following para- graphs, I will draw on the connection between the two in order to further explicate Nietzsche's view of Napoleon.

What Napoleon and Goethe shared was power and strength. They were among the rare few whose souls contain great vitality, and this marked them as noble. But what does it mean to say that they were powerful? Power is a characteristic of the soul. Nietzsche rejects traditional monistic views of the soul, instead arguing that it should be understood as a "subjective multiplicity" or "social structure of the drives and affects" (BGE, 12). The core of the soul is its constituent complex of drives and affects. In a strong individual, these drives are formidable-they are not easily sated or resisted, but fervently push the individual toward their objects. At times the drives are so strong that they push the

11. It is interesting to note that Emerson viewed Napoleon in an almost opposite fashion: he termed Bonaparte the representative of the middle classes and a democratic figure. See Emerson, "Napoleon, or the Man of the World," in Representative Men: Seven Lectures.

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person toward self-destruction: often, our drives seek a goal which will destroy us (Z, "On Self-Overcoming"). Nietzsche therefore argues that self-preservation represents a degeneration of the instincts (BGE, 13). At the core of a powerful soul, then, are severe, overflowing drives and affects.

A consequence of the multiplicity of drives within our souls is that frequently the affects conflict. Each drive seeks to master the others: "The will to overcome an affect is ultimately only the will of another, or of several other, affects" (BGE, 117). The conflict is particularly intense in the strong individual because of the energy behind the drives, but this does not incapacitate him. Nor does he rely on destroying some drives (what Nietzsche criticizes as "castration" [TI, "Morality asAnti-Nature"]). Instead, he shapes and molds his internal chaos into a coherent whole. Some affects are ranked above others, some are sublimated in different directions, and others are harnessed together. In doing so, the individual creates himself: out of the turmoil and strife of the soul, a unified (if not monistic) persona emerges. Both Napoleon and Goethe did this, marking them as superior humans. In his paean to Goethe, Nietzsche notes that the poet "aspired to totality; he strove against the separation of reason, sensuality, feeling, will...he disciplined himself to a whole, he created himself" (TI, "Expeditions," 49). Similarly, Nietzsche lists among Napoleon's accomplishments "'Totality' as health and highest activity" (WP, 1017).

Several consequences flow from the ability of Napoleon and Goethe to shape their internal affects into a whole. The first is that the two lived by instinct, not by slow and careful calculation. Living by instinct for Nietzsche is not living according to some primal urge; it is rather the result of a unified soul. When the internal world has been formed into a coherent whole, all the drives function together in a smooth way. In this situation, one acts quickly and with confidence because all the affects have been harnessed in the same direction; one's will is singular. Thus, Nietzsche writes that "Everything good is instinct-and conse- quently easy, necessary, free" (TI, "Errors," 2). One possessing great instinct appears to act impetuously and takes great risks because of his innate self-confidence. Weakness, on the other hand, leads to a slow and deliberate pace because one's instincts constantly pull in different directions; one does not wish to tempt fate by taking chances and acting abruptly. Napoleon's instincts guided

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him through many successful military campaigns, and his confidence was unshakeable-both signs of a coherent and powerful soul. Because of their living according to instinct (as he defines it), Nietzsche states that both Napoleon and Goethe were natural men: they lived according to nature, not as a regression to ani- malism, but by going "up into a high, free, even frightful nature and naturalness" (TI, "Expeditions," 48).12

A related characteristic of Napoleon's well-ordered soul was his egoism, his profound belief that he ranked far above the aver- age person.13 Because his unified soul allowed certainty of action, Bonaparte felt a great deal of self-assurance and regarded those without such internal order as beneath him. He did not seek honor (and in fact despised it), presumably because honor bestowed by inferiors meant nothing to him (WP, 751).14 Unlike many of the militant romantics whom he inspired, Bonaparte had no use for glory and accolades because he scorned those who bestowed such honors. And Bonaparte felt no need to obey the moral dictates of those he saw as inferior. For example, when Napoleon was con- fronted by his wife with charges of infidelity, Nietzsche claims that he responded "I have the right to answer all accusations against me with an eternal 'That's me.' I am apart from all the world and accept conditions from nobody. I demand subjection even to my fancies, and people should find it quite natural when I yield to this or that distraction" (GS, 23).

Napoleon and Goethe also embodied Nietzsche's conception of freedom. Nietzsche does not view freedom as traditional liber- als do, as freedom from restraint and limitation, but instead sees it as the outcome of internal struggle. The warring affects threaten to destroy the coherent whole the higher person has fashioned of

12. On this point,Adrian Del Caro writes that "Nature is not moral, but terrible; and Napoleon stands as the greatest example of a man who succeeded in returning to nature" (Nietzsche Contra Nietzsche [Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1989], p. 113).

13. Nietzsche repeatedly claims that egoism is part and parcel of the character of the noble individual-such people seek to create distance between themselves and the masses. Therefore Nietzsche writes that "egoism belongs to the nature of the noble soul" (BGE, 265).

14. The description is also similar to Aristotle's account of the magnanimous person who does not wish to be praised by those inferior to him. The similarity fits with the point made by both Kaufmann and Hollingdale that Nietzsche's Ubermensch is very similar to Aristotle's magnanimous man.

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himself. The successful struggle to resist this entropic tendency marks freedom as an agonistic determination, an ongoing struggle and display of strength:

Freedom means that the manly instincts that delight in war and victory have gained mastery over the other instincts. ...The free man is a warrior. How is freedom measured in individuals as in nations? By the resistance which has to be overcome, by the effort it costs to stay aloft. One would have to seek the highest type of free man where the greatest resistance is constantly being overcome (TI, "Expeditions," 38).

Goethe's great power and self-creation allowed this; Nietzsche describes him as "emancipated" (TI, "Expeditions," 49). Napoleon was also free. His self-imposed discipline and severity were reflected outward in his actions. In numerous passages, Nietzsche notes that one of Napoleon's greatest contributions to Europe was the restoration of the manly instincts of the warrior associated above with freedom: "He [Napoleon] should receive credit some day for the fact that in Europe the man has again become master over the businessman and the philistine" (GS, 362). And these "instincts of the warrior" arose in the emperor because of his own interior severity. Bonaparte's strength allowed him to overcome the ever-threatening dissolution of his soul, and this marked him as free.15

The end result of the powerful soul is the creation of a beautiful character. Unifying conflicting drives results in the creation of oneself as a shining example of humanity: "One thing is needful.- To 'give style' to one's character-a great and rare art! It is practiced by those who survey all the strengths and weaknesses of their nature and then fit them into an artistic plan until every one of them appears as art and reason and even weaknesses delight the eye" (GS, 290).16 The outward manifestation of a great soul is a

15. This is a significant contrast to a number of strands of romanticism. Nancy Rosenblum has pointed out that romantics take certain liberal ideas to an extreme, and one of these prominent values is freedom: romantics reject all law and predictability as limitations and favor the anarchic and unpredictable "law of the heart" (see Rosenblum's Another Liberalism, chap. 2).

16. This account of what makes for great character fits with several other of Nietzsche's writings. For example, in On the Advantage and Disadvantage of History for Life, he describes creativity of the Greeks in similar language: "The Greeks gradually learned to organize the chaos" (UM, II. 10). And in Beyond Good and Evil section 200 he notes that the warring drives that result from ethnic mixing can be mastered by noble ones (such as Alcibiades and Caesar).


vibrant and charismatic personality, something both Goethe and Napoleon clearly possessed. Although others cannot directly perceive the soul of a strong individual, they can sense the power at work in structuring that soul.17 Nietzsche here fits his own description: he admired the two because of their luminous souls. Thus, the beauty and incandescence of Napoleon's soul, not his achievements in politics and warfare, made him a higher individual.

Napoleon and Goethe were able to overcome the mediocrity and pettiness of the eighteenth century because of their magnificent souls. Both resisted the narrow-minded bigotry of nationalism and instead aspired to create a pan-European culture and political arena (WP, 104). Like Nietzsche they rejected petty national boundaries and sought to be good Europeans. Both rejected the egalitarianism prevalent at the time and sought to invoke the pathos of distance characteristic of the noble soul. And both were firmly grounded in reality, overcoming the flight into imagina- tion of romanticism.18 The strength of soul of the two men ranks them among the highest of the modern era and marked them as radiant exemplars of humanity.

Contrary to what I have argued, some scholars claim that Nietzsche did not hold Bonaparte in high esteem. It is true that in a passage from the Genealogy (GM, I. 16) Nietzsche refers to Na- poleon as a "problem" and calls him as a "synthesis of the inhuman [Unmensch] and superhuman [Ubermensch]." This prompts Walter Kaufmann to argue that "in the end, however, Nietzsche did not consider Napoleon an Ubermensch" because Nietzsche was "evi- dently not charmed by Napoleon's inhuman qualities."19 Drawing on the same passage, Alan White makes a similar claim: "I em- phasize, because the point is easily missed, that Nietzsche explicitly identifies Napoleon as incarnating the problem of the noble ideal, not its solution."20 For both authors, Napoleon does not rank high in Nietzsche's pantheon. He is flawed by his inhumanity.

17. For this reason Nietzsche notes that even strong people respected the saint because "they sensed the superior force that sought to test itself in such a conquest, the strength of will in which they recognized and honored their own strength" (BGE, 51).

18. Nietzsche describes Goethe as "in an epoch disposed to the unreal, a convinced realist" (TI, "Expeditions," 49). And he characterizes Napoleon as one of "the greatest of factual men" (EH, "Clever," 3).

19. Kaufmann, Nietzsche, p. 315. 20.Alan White, Within Nietzsche's Labyrinth (New York: Routledge, 1990), p. 55.

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These interpretations are problematic. First, they downplay numerous passages where Nietzsche lavishes great praise on Napoleon. Given the frequency of such comments, downplaying them seems suspect. Second, they ignore the connection between Goethe (whom Nietzsche clearly idolized) and Napoleon. As discussed above, the two are linked in several passages, and the language used to describe them is often similar. Third and most important, they assume that "inhuman" is a pejorative term for Nietzsche. Given his frequent praise of hardness and cruelty, and his attempt to subvert the "humanitarian" ethics of Christianity, it stands to reason that "inhuman" could be worn as a badge of honor by Nietzsche, as he wore the term "immoralist" with pride. As Zarathustra points out, greatness and inhumanity are coeval: "it is with man as it is with the tree. The more he aspires to height and light, the more strongly do his roots strive earthward, down- ward, into the dark, the deep-evil" (Z, "On the Tree on the Mountainside"). And Nietzsche explicitly makes this point about Napoleon: "Napoleon: insight that the higher and the terrible man necessarily belong together" (WP, 1017). Napoleon may still be a problem, but not in the way Kaufmann and White describe. Some possibilities include: How could a being such as Napoleon emerge in the midst of the seemingly overwhelming triumph of egalitarianism? What does the emergence of Napoleon mean for European development? What are the costs to others of a figure like Napo- leon? The term "problem" does not necessarily imply Nietzsche's disapproval of Bonaparte.21

Napoleon as Artist

We have seen that Nietzsche held Napoleon in high repute, but we have not yet discovered how Nietzsche's account of Napoleon can help us understand the relationship between the

21. It is a bit surprising that Kaufmann overlooks the way in which Nietzsche uses the term "problem." Nietzsche also labeled Socrates as a problem (a chapter in Twilight of the Idols is called "The Problem of Socrates"), yet this did not stop Kaufmann from arguing that Nietzsche actually held Socrates in high esteem (see Kaufmann, Nietzsche, chap. 13). Kaufmann's interpretation of Nietzsche's Napoleon seems to reflect Kaufmann's desire to rehabilitate Nietzsche and make him "safe."

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higher individual and the political actor. I think an answer to this question can be offered by examining a somewhat curious component of Nietzsche's descriptions of Bonaparte: his characterization of Napoleon as an artist in a number of passages. He is listed (along with Confucius, the Roman Empire, and the worldly popes of the Renaissance) as a "great artist of government" (WP, 129). Nietzsche also favorably quotes Taine's declaration that Napoleon is the "posthumous brother of Dante and Michelangelo" (WP, 1018).22 And Napoleon is not the only political actor so described-Nietzsche similarly depicts Caesar.23 This connection suggests that the political actor can be just as significant as the artist because the higher man as political actor is an artist. Politics, then, is not a lesser pursuit than art.24 It is another possible realm of creativity.25

22. It is worth noting that Taine did not particularly admire Bonaparte. His point about Napoleon as related to the artists is that the emperor was more akin to amoral Italians of the Renaissance than good upstanding Frenchmen. Nietzsche, however, makes the equation between the emperor and the artists for different reasons.

23. RuthAbbey and FrederickAppel, in their valuable article "Nietzsche and the Will to Politics," Review of Politics 60 (1998): 92-94, also note the connection Nietzsche draws between art and politics. In general, I agree with their view on the issue.

24. This point is not widely held. Two prominent examples show this. Bruce Detwiler argues that political leaders are important in Nietzsche's project, but the philosopher ranks above the leader; the leader, in effect, is a tool of the philosopher: "[Nietzsche] advocates a kind of politics...that is wholly subordinate to what is conducive to or expressive of the highest levels of cultural attainment" (Nietzsche and the Politics of Aristocratic Radicalism [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990), p. 66). This view is also held by Straussian interpreters of Nietzsche, such as Lawrence Lampert, Stanley Rosen, and Peter Berkowitz, who argue that Nietzsche (like Plato before him) valorized philosophy as the highest human undertaking. Daniel Conway, on the other hand, sees the philosopher as beneath the great political actor-the philosopher has the same aspirations as the legislator but lacks the

strength to act: "Nietzsche proposes the emergence of philosophers as an unmistakable symptom of the inevitable decay of a people or age" (Nietzsche's Dangerous Game: Philosophy in the Twilight of the Idols [New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997], p. 104). As will become more clear as the argument develops, I disagree with both views-I think that art, politics, and philosophy are all possible avenues for greatness. None is necessarily privileged above the others.

25. Nietzsche is of course not alone among nineteenth-century intellectuals in linking art and politics. Linda Nochlin, in her essay "The Invention of the Avant- Garde," in The Politics of Vision: Essays on Nineteenth Century Art and Society (New York: Harper and Row Publishers, 1989), shows that politics and art were inseparable for French avant-garde artists of the nineteenth century: the point of art was to challenge the ideas of the present day.

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Napoleon is as much an artist-and thus as highly valorized- as sculptors, musicians, painters, and writers.26 Nietzsche's description of him as "artist of government" is not isolated. In another passage, Nietzsche uses an explicitly artistic metaphor when he claims that Bonaparte "brought back again a whole slab of antiquity, perhaps even the decisive piece, the piece of granite" (GS, 362). What do such passages indicate? Within the public arena, Napoleon acted as an artist-he worked his creation on the transient but formidable medium of government. On this point, I partially agree with Alexander Nehamas who claims that Nietzsche only valued Napoleon because of his "literary dimen- sion."27 But it is very significant that Napoleon is an artist who is a political actor. Napoleon is not an artist who also happens to be a leader; his art is his political action, a point Nehamas seems to overlook.28 Napoleon is an artist of government because he worked on the state as a painter works on canvas-the medium for his creativity was the state.

To understand what Napoleon can teach us about Nietzsche's view of the elevated person as political actor, we must first understand Nietzsche's view of the artist and aesthetics. Perhaps most important, Nietzsche views art from the point of view of the artist, not the spectator. He writes that all art "belongs either to monological art or to art before witnesses" (GS, 367). The essential feature of monological art is that the artist "has forgotten the world" and thus creates solely for himself. Other artists, on the other hand, create with the audience in mind-they seek to gratify the spectators. In the extreme case, the artist panders to the audience in order to gain approval.29 Monological artists are superior because their art is more pure; it is not contaminated by the audience. The creations of monological art are solely a reflection of the talent (or lack thereof) of the creator.

26. Nietzsche's description of Napoleon as an artist reinforces the link between Napoleon and Goethe.

27. Nehamas, Nietzsche: Life as Literature, p. 227. 28. It is not too surprising that Nehamas interprets Nietzsche's Napoleon in

this way. The main thrust of Nehamas's interpretation is decidedly antipolitical, and it would undercut his own argument to claim that the higher man can be valuable as a political actor.

29. Nietzsche accuses Richard Wagner of doing just this: he charges him with "demolatry" (worship of and groveling before the demos) (CW, Preface).

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A second key point about Nietzsche's aesthetics is that artistic creation is connected to power. He writes that intoxication is the "physiological precondition" for art. And intoxication is defined as "the feeling of plenitude and increased energy" (TI, "Expedi- tions," 8). What does the artist do when creating? He creates a transfigured vision of the world based on his own power: "In this condition one enriches out of one's abundance: what one sees, what one desires, one sees swollen, pressing, strong, overladen with energy. The man in this condition transforms things until they mirror his power-until they are reflections of his perfection. This com- pulsion to transform into the perfect is-art" (TI, "Expeditions," 9). The artist creates a representation of his own power in his work: the creation is an outgrowth of his soul's vitality.

Art as a representation of the artist's soul explains the third key point of Nietzsche's aesthetics: art serves as an incentive to life. When viewing art (or reading literature or philosophy), we are tempted to strive for our own creation and greatness by the brilliant image of the artwork. But what draws us upward is not simply the painting itself-it is the image of the artist lurking within the painting. In a famous passage, Nietzsche writes that a philosophy is "the personal confession of its author and a kind of involuntary and unconscious memoir" (BGE, 6). It makes sense to think that the same is true of art. A piece of artwork is a reflection of the artist's soul (although the artist and the artwork are separate). Thus it makes sense that Nietzsche refers repeatedly to artists, not their creations; the value of art is the forceful character of the artist, so what really matters is that character.30 Art serves as a stimulus to life-both for the artist himself and for the spectator-because it lures us upward to higher pursuits. We see an image of human greatness and are

30. Thus E. E. Sleinis writes that Nietzsche's "great and unwavering admiration for Goethe is not just admiration for the totality of his works, it is an admiration for the man.... The works are a sign of the greatness of the man, they do not exhaust it" (Nietzsche's Revaluation of Values [Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1994], p. 132). Chapter five of Sleinis's book is a useful discussion of Nietzsche's aesthetics. A somewhat contrary position is taken by Ruth Abbey and Frederick Appel, who argue that "many passages suggest that an individual's worth depends upon the quality of their life's work and that their identity derives partly from their deeds" ("Nietzsche and the Will to Politics," p. 95). I think that the fact that Nietzsche dwells on artists as individuals, and barely mentions their writings or other creations, suggests that it is not the deeds, but the stature of the soul, that determines one's worth.

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inspired to emulate or surpass it. Art is transfiguring because it offers an image of human greatness.31

These three features of Nietzsche's aesthetics can help us understand his view of Napoleon as an artist of government. First, Napoleon was (at least initially) a monological artist-he engaged in politics for his own purposes, not to promote the agenda of any group or the glory of the French nation. Like the monological artist, Napoleon was indifferent to the public. Instead, he approached the state and the people as if they were marble to be sculpted. He did not serve a particular constituency-even that of other higher individuals-but focused solely on the act of creation; he forgot the world, to use Nietzsche's phrase. This fits with Nietzsche's repeated statements that one misunderstands the great person if one judges him from the viewpoint of public utility: the monological artist does not care about the audience, and thus does not work for the general welfare.

It is for this reason that Nietzsche writes in places that rule by the higher individuals can be extremely dangerous to the general populace. The ruler is only concerned with his own growth and elevation and may end up harming people through his artistic politics. Thus, Nietzsche describes the higher man as "prodigal" and "dangerous" (TI, "Expeditions," 44) and notes that Napoleon, like all great political artists, acted "whatever the cost in men" (WP, 975). Indeed, he claims that a key part of the nature of the noble soul is the willingness to accept the sacrifice of others as part of one's project of cultivation and growth (BGE, 265). Napoleon certainly shared this self-assurance.

The harm Napoleon caused is thus not an objection to his stature. Napoleon was not cruel or sadistic; such conditions reflect weakness, not strength. But because of his indifference to the audience, Napoleon unintentionally harmed many people. It is not too surprising that Nietzsche discusses the emperor in the section titled "The Criminal and what is related

31. Murray Edelman's comment about art more generally, that it "can transfigure experience and conception, calling attention to aspects and meanings previously slighted or overlooked" (From Art to Politics [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995], p. 55), fits in well with my analysis of Nietzsche's aesthetics. Art of its nature then plays a political and moral role because it presents viewers with an image of new values as embodied in an excellent human being.

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to him" (TI, "Expeditions," 45). Unlike the common criminal, Napoleon was strong enough to overcome society-he did not let compassion or mercy interfere with his stepping over the morals of the herd. He felt himself above common herd values. While he did not consciously set out to hurt people, the nature of his political action all but guaranteed such an outcome. Nietzsche is not a humanist, and his appraisal of Napoleon fits his self-professed immoralism.

Napoleon is a great figure because of the power and vitality of his soul, not because of anything he accomplished.32 In his praise of the French emperor, Nietzsche never mentions the Code Napo- leon, the bureaucratic reforms he enacted, or his military conquests. Instead, he focuses on who Napoleon was-his forceful character. Just as Nietzsche lauds Goethe for his personality and power, not for his specific writings, he esteems Bonaparte not for his conquests but for his character. The measure of an artist is his power, and artists of government are no different. The French emperor acted on the government as a piece of marble, and the resulting creation, if fleeting, reflected his power and elevation.

Politics, then, should be viewed aesthetically. As noted before, a piece of art is inferior to the artist because it is the brilliance of the creator that shines through and that lures others to greatness. Similarly, what is important is not the outcome of political action but the act itself.33 The value of Napoleon's political deeds

32. For this reason, I disagree withAbbey andAppel's contention that Nietzsche's political task was "the emergence of a good society," and the higher individual has a certain responsibility to the human race as a whole ("Nietzsche and the Will to Politics," pp. 99-100). If Nietzsche is indifferent to the harm that a ruler such as Napoleon caused, and does not pay much attention to the details of how his regime was structured, then it seems unlikely that he cared about creating a good society. Rather, his politics seem much more individualistic: political action can be used as a tool of self-creation by the higher man, as art and other pursuits can. The higher man as political actor seems to have no obligation to help, or even care about, others.

33. This is not to say that outcomes are simply unimportant: after all, it would be impossible to know the greatness of a person without any artifacts. But Nietzsche is clear that outcomes are secondary, mere symptoms of who the person is (what Daniel R. Ahern, Nietzsche as Cultural Physician [University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania University Press, 1995], refers to as Nietzsche's symptomatic approach). Thus, Nietzsche writes that "every great philosophy so far" has been "the personal confession of its author and a kind of involuntary and unconscious memoir" (BGE, 6), and also argues against the idea that our deeds differ from our characters (GM, I. 13).

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to life was inherent in the act itself, regardless of the result. His deeds exhibited his power and character, just as a painting or poem exhibits the strength of the artist. This means that Napoleon did not act simply to bring about a particular objective. While an aesthetic view of politics like this does not rule out efforts to promote specific goals, such goals are ultimately of secondary importance. Nietzschean politics is expressivist, not outcome-oriented. But politics does not become aimless. James Knauer has argued con- vincingly that Hannah Arendt's aesthetic view of politics does not preclude motives and objectives. While political action is not primarily about achieving a particular objective, it is not completely devoid of goals. An actor can set out to achieve something specific as long as the objective is not the defining feature of the deed.34 This can shed light on Nietzsche's evaluation of Napo- leon. The meaning and justification of his political action are found in the deed itself. Goals and outcomes may be present, but are of secondary importance. Napoleon may have benefitted the French nation or certain parts of it, but such benefits are accidental, not essential, to the act.

An analogy which can shed light on the aesthetic view of politics is play. Nietzsche repeatedly invokes the image of a child playing as the highest state of spiritual development. In Zarathustra he explicitly writes that the innocent child, creating without any reference to or acknowledgment of an audience, is the highest form of elevation.35 A child engages in play not to achieve a particular aim, but for the sheer joy of the act itself. Goals and ends can exist within the context of the game, but the child does not enter the game solely to gain something.36 Nietzsche connects

34. James Knauer, "Motive and Goal in HannahArendt's Concept of Political Action," American Political Science Review 74 (1980): 721-33.

35. Although the section in which this point is made-"On the Three Metamorphoses"-is a very early one, the imagery recurs throughout Zarathustra. At the end of Part II, when Zarathustra is about to embark on his most difficult task (culminating in the embrace of the eternal recurrence at the end of Part III), the voice in his dream tells him "You must yet become as a child and without shame" ("The Stillest Hour").

36. The image of the child at play also sheds light on the harm a political actor can cause. It is a cliche, but nonetheless frequently accurate, that children are often very cruel because they do not know any better. A child at play is often so wrapped up in his activity that he does not think about consequences or outcomes and thus can damage things and other people unwittingly.

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Napoleon to just this sentiment. When describing his version of the "return to nature"-of which he gives Bonaparte as an example-he writes that at the peak of the return to nature one "plays with great tasks, is permitted to play with them" (TI, "Expeditions," 48).37 The value of political action, just as with art, is rooted in the act itself, not any consequences that stem from it. Napoleon sought to use the public arena as a testing ground for himself, as the medium through which to express and challenge his vitality. He did not enter politics in order to promote a specific agenda.

This argument suggests that Nietzsche offers a political teaching decidedly different from the Western tradition of political philosophy. Since Plato, political philosophy has sought to use the public realm for instrumental reasons. While thinkers may have disagreed over what ends should be sought-from Plato's promotion of virtue to Machiavelli's insistence on stability and endurance-all thinkers accepted the instrumental view. Nietzsche's philosophy suggests a very different understanding of politics. Political action is valuable for the deed itself, not for any consequences that flow from it. The higher individual, Nietzsche argues, should not make the decision to enter the public realm based on what can be achieved, but on whether the action itself can serve one's soul.38 Nietzsche's political teaching is far enough afield from traditional views that it might not be accurate to term it "political." But this is Nietzsche's point: to rethink our categories and ideas, and recast them in dramatically different ways.

Viewing Napoleon in this manner seems to raise a problem. If Napoleon acted only to further his own goals and did not seek to promote the good of humankind, then why does Nietzsche attribute such tremendous influence to him? An elevated figure who cares nothing about benefitting any constituency would not be serving other higher people either; it is not just the masses who

37. Nietzsche uses the same terms in the passages being considered. In "On the Three Metamorphoses" he describes the child as "ein Spiel," a game. And section 48 of "Expeditions of an Untimely Man," Nietzsche uses the word "spielen," to play

38. My argument is thus distinct from many aristocratic interpretations of Nietzsche's politics. Such scholars argue that Nietzsche's political goal is the creation of a regime that will help breed the philosophers of the future. See, e.g., Bruce Detwiler's Nietzsche and the Politics of Aristocratic Radicalism, and Keith Ansell- Pearson's An Introduction to Nietzsche as Political Thinker (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994).

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are ignored. Napoleon did not much care for promoting greatness in others. His government ministers, for example, were frequently chosen because of loyalty, not talent. He exiled and demoted those he felt were becoming too popular. And he rou- tinely elevated members of his family to rulership over conquered territories, despite a notorious record of incompetence. Yet Nietzsche claims that Napoleon did promote elevation in others: "One should recall what one owes to Napoleon: almost all of the higher hopes of this century" (WP, 27). How can one who consciously serves only his own soul promote greatness in others?

Direct action is problematic as a means to promoting greatness. In a number of passages, Nietzsche suggests that such action is likely to be counterproductive and might be impossible. First, it reeks of "pity for the higher man" (Zarathustra's last sin) in that it lessens the challenge to would-be higher men. Given the value Nietzsche places on struggle in self-overcoming, lessening the burden would mean lessening the height reached. Thus, a "welfare system" for higher people would result in mediocrity, not greatness. Second, given Nietzsche's critique of altruism, it seems unlikely that figures like Napoleon would wish to help others. Finally, Nietzsche suggests that great men in effect represent a climax, a conclusion: "The danger which lies in great human beings and great epochs is extraordinary; sterility, exhaustion of every kind follow in their footsteps. The great human being is a terminus" (TI, "Expeditions," 44). This suggests that Napoleon trying to help others could be pointless- he had used all the reserves of energy himself and left nothing behind for others.

This does not mean that Napoleon could not promote greatness in others, but it would have to be achieved by indirect means. By embodying the values of a nobler time, Napoleon left an indelible impression of what humanity can become at its peak. In his deeds and actions, Napoleon cast forth a resplendent image of himself as an exemplar of the possibilities for the soul. In doing so-even if he did it unintentionally-he enticed and incited others to strike their own path to spiritual elevation.39 The dazzling

39. Daniel Conway has also argued that exemplification of values is unintended (Nietzsche and the Political, p. 10). But Conway sees a certain calculation in the lack of intention-he argues that Nietzsche, for example, consciously turned towards

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image of the man himself lured others upward. Nietzsche is clear that intentions do not matter on this issue: "Who is most influen- tial.-When a human being resists his whole age and stops it at the gate to demand an accounting, this must have an influence. Whether that is what he desires is immaterial; that he can do it is what matters" (GS, 156). Thus, Nietzsche summarizes Napoleon's greatness as exhibiting "the passion of new possibilities of the soul, an expansion of the soul" (WP, 829). Napoleon's influence came from the luminous image of his soul, not his specific accomplishments as an emperor or general. The accomplishments are merely symptoms of his nobility.

Nietzsche gives us a concrete example of Napoleon's indirect impact-Goethe himself was inspired by the French emperor. Nietzsche writes of Goethe that "he had no greater experience than that ens realissimum called Napoleon" (TI, "Expeditions," 49) and that "the event on whose account he rethought his Faust, indeed the whole problem of man, was the appearance of Napoleon" (BGE, 244). He also writes that "Goethe's heart opened at the phe- nomenon Napoleon" (TI, "Germans," 4). The emperor's glowing soul inspired Goethe to reach new heights of creative genius. And Goethe may have had a similar impact on Napoleon. Nietzsche remarks that Napoleon expressed great surprise when he met Goethe: "'Voila un homme!'-that meant: 'But this is a man! And I had merely expected a German"' (BGE, 209).40 Napoleon was impressed by Goethe's soul, not by his writings.

Indeed, one could push this reasoning and find a more col- lective value in Napoleon. Nietzsche frequently comments that suffering is endemic to human existence, but this is not an objection to life. What is intolerable is not suffering, but meaningless suffering (GM, III. 28). While great individuals can create their own meaning, the majority of human beings are not capable of doing this. They must get meaning and direction elsewhere. Such meaning usually comes from a figure like the ascetic priest, but it

unintentional action because he recognized the limits of his own capacities to affect change (see pp. 44-48). It seems to me that this does not fit with Nietzsche's description of the monological artist-it seems unlikely that they could choose to forget the audience in such a calculated manner.

40. It is worth noting the parallel between Napoleon's comment and the title of Nietzsche's autobiography, Ecce Homo ("behold the man"). Both point to the vibrant character of the person, not to any work or doctrine they created.

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is possible to receive it from another, immanent source-from the exploits and character of a higher man. In the long run, this is the only enduring solution to meaninglessness. The ascetic ideal must eventually self-destruct, but the force of a figure like Napoleon can fill the void: "a single individual can under certain circumstances justify the existence of whole millennia-that is, a full, rich, great, whole human being in relation to countless incom- plete fragmentary men" (WP, 997; cf. WP, 27). In a backhanded sort of way, then, figures like Napoleon do serve humanity as a whole, if unintentionally.41 Whether the pain they cause is out- weighed by the meaning they provide is unclear.

Napoleon provided meaning and direction to many Euro- peans. Nietzsche remarks that, despite the egalitarian and democratic rhetoric of modernity, the majority of people still re- joice and obey when an exceptional individual like Napoleon appears: "the appearance of one who commands uncondition- ally strikes these herd-animal Europeans as an immense comfort and salvation from a gradually intolerable pressure, as was last attested in a major way by the effect of Napoleon's appearance" (BGE, 199). The emperor offered meaning because of his spiritual height-later in the passage just quoted, he notes that "the history of Napoleon's reception is almost the history of the higher happiness attained by this whole century in its most valuable human beings." It is here that we see Nietzsche's loftiest tribute to Napoleon-the emperor appears as something of a miracle, a man comparable to the greatest men of ancient times amidst the disease of modernity. Nietzsche goes so far as to suggest that Napoleon's appearance may lead to the self-overcoming of decadence in Europe: "The cure [for decadence]: e.g., militarism, beginning with Napoleon who considered civilization his natural enemy" (WP, 41). Nietzsche's greatest concern with the West is its nihilism, its loss of meaning and value. Napoleon and oth-

41. In a sense, then, Nietzsche is not simply an anti-humanist as Nick Land contends. "Aborting the Human Race," in The Fate of the New Nietzsche, ed. Keith Ansell-Pearson and Howard Caygill (Brookfield, VT: Ashgate Publishing Company, 1993), pp. 303-315. It is not too surprising that Nietzsche's humanism is complex- a repeated claim of Nietzsche's is that we tend to simplify reality by bifurcating things into two categories (e.g., good vs. evil), but this misses the nuances and subtle shadings of reality. Nietzsche is neither simply a humanist or an anti- humanist; he is something of both.

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ers like him offer a way out of nihilism: they fill the void with the grandeur of their souls and offer an immanent meaning to the world.

This is high praise given the extent of the West's illness. Nietzsche's descriptions seem to indicate that Napoleon is the equal of the most eminent figures. In the midst of the infirmity of the modern age, Napoleon resurrected the vitality and virility of an older time, a truly impressive feat. If the crisis of the West stems from the nihilism resulting from the false metaphysics of Christian values, then Napoleon was an earth-shaking figure: he offered a way out of our illness, a way of overcoming Christianity. This suggests that the higher man can achieve eminence in the political realm as well as other spheres. While Nietzsche sometimes valorizes art and other more directly cultural activities above political action, his description of Napoleon suggests more latitude for the public arena as an appropriate venue for self-overcoming and achievement by the higher individual.42 Political action is a legitimate realm for the efforts of the higher man.

42. This point marks a sharp disagreement with a very prominent strand of Nietzsche scholarship which simply rejects political action as a possibility for the higher person. Kaufmann, for example, claims that "the leitmotif of Nietzsche's life and thought" is "the theme of the antipolitical individual who seeks self-perfection far from the modem world" (Nietzsche, p. 418). Similarly, Leslie Paul Thiele writes that "occupied with ordering his own soul, the philosopher has little time for insti- tuting social order, even if it might prove useful for his comfort or security" (Friedrich Nietzsche and the Politics of the Soul [Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990], p. 223). Both of these authors argue that Nietzsche isolates himself, staying as far from the public arena as possible, and encourages other higher individuals to do the same. Although I agree with Thiele's view that the primary goal of the philosopher is ordering his own soul, I argue that this can be done through political action, something Thiele rejects. While both interpretations are admirable, I think, for focusing on the spiritual elements of Nietzsche's thought, they overlook the public realm as a legitimate venue for artistic creation and self-overcoming.

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Napoleon's Demise

Nietzsche is sometimes accused of hero worship when it comes to individuals like Napoleon.43 It seems that the German philosopher is simply enthralled with the French emperor, overwhelmed by the latter's success. Daniel Conway, for example, remarks that Nietzsche had a "childlike fascination with the heroic exploits of world-historical figures" such as Napoleon,44 and Adrian Del Caro describes Napoleon as "Nietzsche's favorite hero."45 Yet Nietzsche does not wholly affirm Napoleon. While it is clear that he regards the emperor as a higher man who contributed greatly to the health of Europe, he also acknowledges that in the end Napoleon failed. Nietzsche's account of Napoleon is not one-dimensional. He did not use only the lens of antiquarian history to view the French emperor-he also made use of critical history.46

There are two key passages in which Nietzsche discusses Napoleon's demise. The first is at the end of Will to Power, note 1026. He writes that Bonaparte "was corrupted by the means he had to employ and lost noblesse of character." Kaufmann takes this passage as evidence that Nietzsche did not hold Napoleon up as an ideal-he claims that "the means he had to employ" were cruelty and tyranny. Napoleon was thus corrupted by his own

43. Not all interpreters, of course, make this accusation. As noted above, Kaufmann and White see Nietzsche's attitude toward the emperor as skeptical. Others recognize that Napoleon was an admirable figure who fell prey to corruption. Thiele, for example, writes that "Napoleon, whose character Nietzsche celebrated, was held to have been thoroughly corrupted by power" (Nietzsche and the Politics of the Soul, p. 19). And Henry Staten notes that "even Napoleon was corrupted" (Nietzsche's Voice [Ithaca, NY: Corell University Press, 1990], p. 145). But neither of these authors examines what Napoleon's corruption means to Nietzsche-what does the failing of such a dynamic exemplar indicate about the higher man? In this section, I attempt to delve into that question.

44. Conway, Nietzsche and the Political, p. 9. 45. Del Caro, Nietzsche Contra Nietzsche, p. 40. 46. The terms come from Nietzsche's On the Advantage and Disadvantage of

Historyfor Life (the second of the Untimely Meditations). Tracy Strong argues that "to some degree Nietzsche's portraits of Greek antiquity or Napoleon are cases in point" of his use of antiquarian history (Nietzsche and the Politics of Transfiguration, p. 32). I think this statement is true as far as it goes, but Strong does not mention Nietzsche's negative discussions of Bonaparte.

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inhumanity and should not be viewed as an exemplar.47 Yet it seems unlikely that the means of which Nietzsche speaks are cruelty and the like. It is true that Napoleon was at times cruel, even if he did not set out to hurt others. But cruelty is not an objection for Nietzsche. A few lines later he equates Caesar with Napoleon, and the Roman general (who was not corrupted) was hardly less cruel than the French emperor. The key sentence to interpreting the passage comes immediately after the one cited above: "If he had had to prevail among a different kind of man he could have employed other means." It seems clear that the means of which Nietzsche speaks are the methods and practices of democracy. A recurring theme in Nietzsche's discussion of Napoleon is that he rose to power during a great revolt against aristocracy and privilege. The general trajectory of European culture was toward democratic values. And Napoleon encouraged the spread of democracy. He fostered the equality of all under one ruler and promoted democratic values in order to make the population pliable (WP, 129).48 If he had lived in a different time- when belief in popular sovereignty was not endemic-then he could have ignored such techniques. But in the midst of the French Revolution such a step was impossible. It seems likely that Napoleon was corrupted by democracy.

It also makes sense to dispute Kaufmann's claim that Napo- leon was corrupted by cruelty because Nietzsche did not reject cruelty. Unlike Christian morality, Nietzsche argued that cruelty was often a necessary part of life, and therefore was not to be condemned. His frequent claims that the higher man must be hard fit here. It seems likely, therefore, that Nietzsche would think Napoleon was corrupted by something he opposed (democracy) rather than something he did not (cruelty).

Napoleon was corrupted because he stopped believing in his special privilege to use politics for his own project of self-overcoming, regardless of the common good. As he grew older, he lost what Nietzsche considered the good conscience he possessed

47. Kaufmann, Nietzsche, pp. 315-16. 48. Alexis de Tocqueville's comment that tyranny is a possible result of the

trend towards equality fits here: all people are equal under the tyrant, even if they are all equally subservient. This is a marked change from aristocracy. See Democracy in America, 2. 2. 4; 2. 4. 6.

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earlier which allowed him to disdain the needs and desires of the people in his political action. He succumbed to his own myth, coming to believe that he was the great servant of the French nation. By changing in this way, Napoleon ceased to be an artist of government. Instead, he became merely another political actor, albeit an exceptionally talented one.

Nietzsche makes this point in the other relevant passage. In Beyond Good and Evil, section 256, he remarks that great men of his time succumbed to nationalism in moments of weakness: "only in their foregrounds or in weaker hours, say in old age, did they belong to the 'fatherlandish'-they were merely taking a rest from themselves when they became 'patriots."' Napoleon fell prey to the ideal of service to the nation-a form of nationalism, and connected to populism-when he declined. This meshes with my interpretation of the passage from the Will to Power: because Na- poleon was forced to make use of populist and nationalist rhetoric, he eventually came to believe in those values. To paraphrase Umberto Eco, the habit of pretending to believe evolved into the habit of believing.49

We should not be surprised that this happens. Nietzsche writes that it is common for the higher person to misunderstand himself and submit to base values: "The man who can command rarely appears; he misinterprets himself. One positively wants to repu- diate one's own authority and assign it to circumstances" (WP, 422). When describing European rulers (including some exceptional people), he says that many (if not all) of them possess the "moral hypocrisy of those commanding": "They know no other way to protect themselves against their bad conscience than to pose as the executors of more ancient or higher commands.... Or they even borrow herd maxims from the herd's way of thinking, such as 'first servant of the people' or 'instruments of the common weal"' (BGE, 199). And Nietzsche describes the great self-doubt on the part of great figures of the nineteenth century (including Napoleon). They were intrepid explorers and artists, but they doubted their right to be exceptional, with the result that

49. Casaubon, the narrator of Eco'sFoucault's Pendulum, states at one point, "I believe that you can reach the point where there is no longer any difference between developing the habit of pretending to believe and developing the habit of believing" (trans. William Weaver [New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1989], p. 467).

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"all of them broke and collapsed in the end before the Christian cross" (BGE, 256), a set of values as base as democracy.

What does Napoleon's ultimate failure tell us about Nietzsche's view of the higher man? It offers a warning and a reminder. First, it is a strong warning of the dangers of the political realm. While it is true that the higher man can use politics just as an artist uses paint and canvas, there are dangers inherent to the political realm which can undermine the actor's nobility of soul. The political realm is crowded, unlike the artist's studio. One must constantly deal with others in public. The close prox- imity to others (who are presumably ill with the values of weakness) can infect the higher person; he can succumb to the illness of others. This is particularly true in democratic ages when the values of populism dominate the public realm, but it is also a danger in other times because even most leaders in an aristocracy are beneath the higher person in matters of the spirit. The public realm offers great opportunities for creativity and self-overcoming but it is also very risky. Occupying the public realm opens one to myriad influences of debility.

Second, Nietzsche's account of Napoleon offers a sharp reminder of the interconnectedness of illness and health in even the highest people. As powerfully recounted in On the Geneal- ogy of Morals, Nietzsche argues that at the core of Western civilization is the spiritual disease of the bad conscience. It has infected even the most powerful. This cataclysmic change in humanity did not spell the end of great individuals. Instead, it opened up new possibilities for spiritual development: "The bad conscience is an illness, there is no doubt about that, but an illness as pregnancy is an illness" (GM, II. 19). All people were affected by this shift, but the mightiest can use their illness as a springboard for new achievements. The bad conscience, for example, opened an entirely new arena for creation-the soul. Those who were strong were able to turn their disease into a new enticement to life, a new realm to be conquered. But the illness is always there; it cannot be excised completely. There- fore, there is a fine line between greatness and failure. The bad conscience makes all higher men fragile. Dissolution should be expected: "For the corruption, the ruination of the higher men, of the souls of a stranger type, is the rule; it is terrible to have such a rule always before one's eyes" (BGE, 269).

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For this reason, Nietzsche frequently notes that different facets of strength and weakness intermingle within the same soul (e.g., BGE, 260). And he describes himself in this manner: "I have a subtler sense of smell for the signs of ascent and decay than any other human being before me; I am the teacher par excellence for this-I know both, I am both" (EH, "Wise," 1). This does not mean that higher people are really not that elevated because their souls contain facets of mediocrity. Rather, it is a sign of their greatness that they can overcome that mediocrity, even if only for a short period of time. To live beyond good and evil is an immense feat and should be admired. Napoleon's failure is a reminder that greatness is an exceedingly fragile thing.50 Even in the highest of people, decadence is just a short step away.51

Conclusion

Nietzsche's description of Napoleon can shed light on the relationship between the higher individual and political action. While some scholars are quick to dismiss any such relationship, arguing that the noble spirit is of necessity apolitical (or even antipolitical), the example of Napoleon suggests a different view. Napoleon is clearly an admirable and higher figure in Nietzsche's

50. In two passages, Nietzsche explicitly links Napoleon with the mob, showing the emperor's soul to be infected with the values of weakness. In Beyond Good and Evil section 256, he describes figures like Napoleon as "successful plebeians who knew themselves to be incapable, both in their lives and work, of a noble tempo." And in The Gay Science section 282, he recounts Napoleon's inability to walk like a prince because he had come from "the mob or semi-mob."

51. It is worth noting that Nietzsche attributes similar failings to figures whom scholars universally agree that he admires. In Beyond Good and Evil section 256, where Nietzsche describes Napoleon's patriotism as a sign of weakness, he also faults Heinrich Heine and Stendahl-both of whom he respected-for the same thing. And, continuing the parallel sketched earlier, he also lists Goethe. If, as R. J. Hollingdale notes, "the description of Goethe in 'Expeditions of an Untimely Man' 49 defines the Ubermensch more succinctly than any other single passage in Nietzsche's works" (Glossary appended to Hollingdale's translation of Twilight of the Idols and The Antichrist, p. 204), then it seems that even the mightiest can fall. Based on this, one cannot argue that Napoleon succumbed to nationalism because he was weaker than Goethe. Instead, they both succumbed because of the inherent fragility of spiritual elevation.


sight, and he was a political actor. Nietzsche's account of Bonaparte, as reconstructed in this article, indicates that the higher person can use the state as the medium for his self-overcoming and spiritual growth. As the sculptor uses marble and other stone, the politician uses government as a medium of expression. The result is the same-the product of the creation reflects their vibrant and powerful character and thus offers an image of a glowing paragon of humanity. This image then entices others to strike their own paths of greatness, fostering further human elevation. Unlike the otherworldly meaning and value provided by Christianity and similar moral codes, the greatness of people like Napoleon is immanent and not subject to the self-destructive flaws of Christian morality. Human greatness offers a way out of what Nietzsche refers to as "whole millennia of labyrinth" (A, 1); Napoleon, no less than Goethe, can contribute to this goal.

By studying the case of Napoleon we also see the higher man more generally in a different light. Descriptions of the higher man can be quite vague, to the extent that some present the higher man as an unattainable ideal type meant to lure us upward. Such views render the concept almost empty-it is such an abstract idea that it seems to offer no guidance or purpose. And other interpretations of Nietzsche's idols suggest nearly solipsistic artists far removed from everyday life, thus creating the same problem.52 A concrete example such as Napoleon adds blood to the bones of the concept. The higher man becomes a living, breathing person, not an abstract idea. Nietzsche's conception of the higher man gains vibrancy and vitality when examined in specific incarnations.

The case of Napoleon also shows the complexity of such a being. The higher man is not simply an artist, or a philosopher, or a tyrant; he is something of all three, and more besides. We should not be surprised about this. After all, Nietzsche's accounts of other individuals (such as Socrates and Richard Wager) are subtle and nuanced.53 The pathos of distance within

52.An example of this view is Nancy Love's Marx, Nietzsche, and Modernity (New York: Columbia University Press, 1986). She argues that for Nietzsche, solipsism is necessary: "Only the speechless, solipsistic individual can be free" (p. 140).

53. For Nietzsche's view of Socrates, see the chapter "The Problem of Socrates" in Twilight of the Idols. Two excellent analyses of Nietzsche's interpretation of Socrates are WemerJ. Dannhauser, Nietzsche's View of Socrates (Ithaca, NY: Comell University Press, 1974), and Ahem, Nietzsche as Cultural Physician.

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the soul of such an individual results in a vast and diverse internal realm, composed of many warring elements. Thus, the higher man is not cruel or merciful, haughty or modest; he exhibits, at different times, all of these qualities. Short and simplistic accounts cannot capture the richness of the higher man. The coexistence of sickness and health within the higher man's soul is the best example of this. Bonaparte succeeded and failed, was both healthy and sick. Nietzsche repeatedly rejected binary modes of thought (see, e.g., HH, 1 and BGE, 2), and his presentation of the French emperor fits with this- Napoleon is both admirable and contemptible, magnificent and pathetic. The higher man is not simply powerful and successful, always victorious. His soul incorporates decay as well as health. The failure of the higher man is thus tragic because it deprives us of something magnificent, but it is also almost expected. The labyrinthine character of the higher man's soul is fraught with danger, and failure is always but a small step away.

We also see the danger of the higher man in a different light based on Nietzsche's account of Napoleon. The higher man is a frightening figure-it is not surprising that Nietzsche calls him explosive and prodigal because he frequently brings pain to others. This is not because he sets out to promote a brutal agenda or wishes to be a tyrant. Napoleon was terrible because he was wholly absorbed in his own project of self- overcoming, nearly oblivious to how he might affect others. But again, the picture is not one-sided. Although he is frightening and brings suffering in his wake, the higher man also brings with him the loftiest hopes of humanity. Napoleon wreaked havoc but also opened new possibilities, demonstrating a way out of the traps of Christianity. Suffering and hope go hand in hand in the wake of the higher man.

Finally, the figure of Napoleon shows the stark contrast between Nietzsche and traditional political philosophy. Nearly all political thought is goal-oriented-it seeks to use politics in order to achieve some end considered worthwhile. The ends pursued change from thinker to thinker, but the general model of how they think about politics holds. As part of his rejection of traditional modes of thought, Nietzsche explodes this idea. The value of political action is not

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determined by the outcome, but by the deed itself.54 If we accept Nietzsche's political teaching, we must be willing to accept a radical reorientation of our outlook on politics. Nietzsche is a significant political thinker not because he contests our core political values-other thinkers do that as well-but because he challenges the way in which we think about politics.55 Even if we disagree with him, the power of his thought is such that we must confront it.

54. This view might seem similar to romantic notions of political action, but as noted several times throughout the article, Nietzsche is not just another romantic. He clearly shares certain ideas with romantics-e.g., expressive individualism- but also differs in significant ways-e.g., the rejection of anarchic freedom and the pursuit of military glory. For an account of Nietzsche's complex relationship to romanticism, seeAdrian Del Caro's Nietzsche Contra Nietzsche. For a good discussion of different strands of romantic political views, and their relationship to liberal politics, see Rosenblum's Another Liberalism.

55. On this point, I disagree with Abbey and Appel, who argue that "the real value of Nietzsche's writings lies in their radical challenge to liberal and democratic commitments" ("Nietzsche and the Will to Politics," p. 114), that is, to our core political beliefs.

nietzsche's napoleon - paul f. glenn

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