Beyond Good and Evil

by

Friedrich Nietzsche

The Depths Symbol Analysis

The Depths Symbol Icon

Nietzsche believes that human ideas and behavior are motivated not just by our conscious beliefs but also by inner, often unconscious psychological drives and inherited or imparted characteristics, which he illustrates by invoking the symbol of the depths. To Nietzsche, the human psyche—or indeed human nature—extends far deeper than just its conscious expression. Correspondingly, a psychological study of humankind worthy of the name is one which does not content itself with staying on the surface, but instead deliberately descends to the depths of human consciousness. Through his use of this symbol, Nietzsche ironically inverts the typical formulation of the search for truth: rather than ascending upward to a lofty ideal, the philosophers of the future must descend into the depths, look within themselves, and confront the darker side of their own nature in order to reach truth. Much of past philosophy, however, has contented itself with remaining on the surface due to its own moral prejudices. Nietzsche also frequently compares the depths of the soul to a primeval forest or wilderness, emphasizing the animality of humankind and just how much of our being is not governed by reason but by instincts and drives: by the will to power. This places Nietzsche’s philosophy sharply at odds with Enlightenment humanism, which believes that humans are rational beings, as opposed to animals which obey only their own instincts. Religion, too, is to Nietzsche an unconscious expression of drives found in the depths of a person’s own being, often driven much more by fear than by love. The ideas that Nietzsche expresses through this symbol would prove greatly influential in 20th-century philosophy and psychology, both of which took up similar theories of unconscious and subconscious motives and decision making.

The Depths Quotes in Beyond Good and Evil

The Beyond Good and Evil quotes below all refer to the symbol of The Depths. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Good and Evil Theme Icon
).
4. Epigrams and Interludes Quotes

Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And when you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.

Related Characters: Nietzsche (speaker)
Related Symbols: The Depths
Page Number: 279
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Beyond Good and Evil LitChart as a printable PDF.
Beyond Good and Evil PDF

The Depths Symbol Timeline in Beyond Good and Evil

The timeline below shows where the symbol The Depths appears in Beyond Good and Evil. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
1. On the Prejudices of Philosophers
Good and Evil Theme Icon
Knowledge, Truth, and Untruth Theme Icon
...all psychology to date, too, has been prevented from making true discoveries—from descending to the depths—by moral prejudice. He proposes instead to rethink psychology as the development of the will to... (full context)
3. What Is Religious
Knowledge, Truth, and Untruth Theme Icon
The Individual and the Crowd Theme Icon
Comparing the depths of the soul to a great, primeval forest and the philosopher to a lone hunter,... (full context)
Good and Evil Theme Icon
Knowledge, Truth, and Untruth Theme Icon
The Individual and the Crowd Theme Icon
...religious desire for purity to express a fear of the more complex truth that lies beneath. This is the source of religion’s fearfulness, as it is threatened by a deep pessimism.... (full context)
4. Epigrams and Interludes
Good and Evil Theme Icon
Knowledge, Truth, and Untruth Theme Icon
...monsters of the danger of becoming monsters themselves, warning them of the dangers of the abyss within the human soul. At the same time, he affirms the conditional nature of evil,... (full context)
7. Our Virtues
Good and Evil Theme Icon
Knowledge, Truth, and Untruth Theme Icon
The Dark Side of Modernity Theme Icon
...Nietzsche suggests that knowledge changes the spirit of the learner, the majority of which is “deep down” and unknowable. (full context)
8. Peoples and Fatherlands
The Individual and the Crowd Theme Icon
The Dark Side of Modernity Theme Icon
...be exclusively German where the others’ is European, a loss of a greater ideal and descent into “fatherlandishness.” Nietzsche then angrily criticizes the German language, which he finds tonally and rhythmically... (full context)
9. What Is Noble
Good and Evil Theme Icon
The Individual and the Crowd Theme Icon
The Dark Side of Modernity Theme Icon
...the same status. On such a wide scale, equality is a denial of life, which deep down is the will to power in all its forms. Exploitation, therefore, is a category of... (full context)
Good and Evil Theme Icon
Knowledge, Truth, and Untruth Theme Icon
The Individual and the Crowd Theme Icon
...their spirit and even their philosophy; he suggests that every book one writes conceals truer, deeper thoughts, and indeed every philosophy is a mask that hides another philosophy beneath it. To... (full context)