The Antichrist

In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point. What is good? All that heightens the feeling of power in man, the will to power, power itself. What is bad? All that is born of weakness. What is happiness? The feeling that power is growing, that resistance is overcome. The very word "Christianity" is a misunderstanding - in truth, there was only one Christian, and he died on the cross. As an artistic triumph in psychological corruption... the Gospels, in fact, stand alone... Here we are among Jews: this is the first thing to be borne in mind if we are not to lose the thread of the matter. This positive genius for conjuring up a delusion of personal "holiness" unmatched anywhere else, either in books or by men; this elevation of fraud in word and attitude to the level of an art - all this is not an accident due to the chance talents of an individual, or to any violation of nature. The thing responsible is race. That faith makes blessed under certain circumstances, that blessedness does not make of a fixed idea a true idea, that faith moves no mountains but puts mountains where there are none; a quick walk through a madhouse enlightens one sufficiently about this. I call Christianity the one great curse, the one great intrinsic depravity, the one great instinct for revenge for which no expedient is sufficiently poisonous, secret, subterranean, petty - I call it the one immortal blemish of mankind.