Skip over navigation  Beyond Good and Evil  Friedrich Nietzsche
Overall Analysis and Themes  1 - "On the Prejudices of
Philosophers"   Nietzsche opens with the provocative question:
"Supposing truth is a woman--what then?" The dogmatism of most
philosophers, Nietzsche suggests, is a very clumsy way of trying
to win a woman's heart. At this time, no dogmatism seems wholly
satisfactory and philosophy has yet to conquer the truth.  While
dogmatism bumbles along in all seriousness, earnest of its
purpose, Nietzsche suggests that the foundations of all
dogmatism are based on childish superstitions or prejudices. He
cites as examples the "soul superstition" which remains even in
atheistic philosophy as the "subject and ego superstition" as
well as seductions of grammar, or gross generalizations based on
a narrow set of facts.  Dogmatism has been responsible for
##Plato##'s ideals of pure spirit and the Form of the Good which
Nietzsche calls "the worst, most durable, and most dangerous of
errors so far," and he al