Editing Virtue (section)

=== Friedrich Nietzsche ===
[[Friedrich Nietzsche]]'s view of virtue is based on the idea of an order of rank among people.{{citation needed|date=January 2025}} For Nietzsche, the virtues of the strong are seen as vices by the weak and slavish, thus Nietzsche's virtue ethics is based on his distinction between [[master and slave morality|master morality and slave morality]]. Nietzsche promotes the virtues of those he calls "higher men", people like Goethe and Beethoven. The virtues he praises in them are their creative powers ("the men of great creativity, the really great men according to my understanding"<ref name=WP>{{cite book|last=Nietzsche|first=Friedrich|title=The Will to Power|orig-year=1901|year=1968|translator-first1=W.|translator-last1=Kaufmann|translator-first2=R.J.|translator-last2=Hollingdale|location=New York|publisher=Vintage}}</ref>{{rp|957}}).
According to Nietzsche these higher types are solitary, pursue a "unifying project", revere themselves and are healthy and life-affirming.<ref name="Leiter">{{cite encyclopedia |url=https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/nietzsche-moral-political/#NietPosiEthiVisi |last= Leiter |first=Brian |title=Nietzsche's Moral and Political Philosophy |encyclopedia= The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy|edition=Spring 2013 |editor-first=Edward N.|editor-last= Zalta|year= 2020 }}</ref> Because mixing with the herd makes one base, the higher type "strives instinctively for a citadel and a secrecy where he is saved from the crowd, the many, the great majority…".<ref name=BGE>{{cite book|translator-first=W.|translator-last=Kaufmann|location=New York|publisher=Vintage|year=1966|orig-year=1886|last=Nietzsche|first=Friedrich|title=Beyond Good and Evil|page=26}}</ref> The "Higher type" also "instinctively seeks heavy responsibilities"{{r|WP|page=944}} in the form of an "organizing idea" for their life, which drives them to artistic and creative work and gives them psychological health and strength.<ref name="Leiter"/> The fact that the higher types are "healthy" for Nietzsche does not refer to physical health as much as a psychological resilience and fortitude. Finally, someone of the "Higher type" affirms life because he is willing to accept the [[eternal return]] of his life and affirm this forever and unconditionally.

In the last section of ''[[Beyond Good and Evil]]'', Nietzsche outlines his thoughts on the noble virtues and places [[solitude]] as one of the highest virtues:

<blockquote>And to keep control over your four virtues: courage, insight, sympathy, solitude. Because solitude is a virtue for us, since it is a sublime inclination and impulse to cleanliness which shows that contact between people ("society") inevitably makes things unclean. Somewhere, sometime, every community makes people – "base."{{r|BGE|at=§284}}</blockquote>

Nietzsche also sees truthfulness as a virtue:

<blockquote>Genuine honesty, assuming that this is our virtue and we cannot get rid of it, we free spirits – well then, we will want to work on it with all the love and malice at our disposal and not get tired of 'perfecting' ourselves in our virtue, the only one we have left: may its glory come to rest like a gilded, blue evening glow of mockery over this aging culture and its dull and dismal seriousness!{{r|BGE|at=§227}}</blockquote>