are the source of all rights (Nietzsche remarks that up to the time of his writing—1877 apparently—there had been no war or compacts, hence there were no rights or "ought" in the matter].[1] The movement is, of course, a movement of those interested, but Nietzsche recognizes that it may also be espoused by persons from other classes animated simply by sentiments of justice and ready to practise it at their own cost—high-minded (if not just very discerning) representatives of the ruling class might act in this way.[2]
For his own part he admits the socialist contention that the present distribution of property is the consequence of numberless injustices and violences; he simply adds that this is only one instance, the old culture in general being built on a basis of force, slavery, deception, and error. He thinks that the unjust disposition lurks everywhere, in the propertyless as well as propertied, and that the needful thing is not violences, but the gradual alteration of men's minds, justice becoming greater and violent instincts weaker on all sides.[3] He considers the remedies of an equal division of property and common ownership, and finds them both impracticable. Instead he urges that avenues to small ownership should be kept wide open, and that the acquisition of wealth suddenly and without effort should be prevented. In particular should all branches of transportation and trade which are favorable to the amassing of great wealth—he instances especially banking (Geldhandel)—be taken out of private hands:[4] it comes pretty near to practical socialism. g He even meets by an illuminating explanation an objection often made to socialism, namely, that it overlooks the matter-of-fact inequalities between men. It does so, he says, much as Christianity overlooks differences in human sinfulness—they are too slight to be taken into account: in the total reckoning all are sinful and need salvation. So socialism regards the common nature and powers and needs of men as so much more important than the respects in which they differ, that it deliberately puts the latter to one side—and in the resolve to ignore differences lies an inspiring force.[5]
And yet on the whole Nietzsche is hostile to socialism. The
