The text presents two essays by Friedrich Nietzsche originally published as part of his Unzeitgemässe Betrachtungen. The first essay, The Use and Abuse of History, addresses the malady of the historical sense that afflicted nineteenth-century Germany. Nietzsche contends that history has become a substitute for life and action, transforming men into passive spectators and encyclopedic collectors rather than creative actors. He categorizes history into three types: monumental, antiquarian, and critical, showing how each serves life when properly balanced with the unhistorical capacity to forget, but destroys life when taken to excess.
The second essay, Schopenhauer as Educator, turns from history to the thinker who serves as a model of resistance against the stagnation of professional philosophy and the state. Nietzsche reflects on his early need for a true educator who could rescue him from the conventionality and sloth of public opinion. He explores the characteristics of genuine philosophy through the honesty, joy, and consistency of Arthur Schopenhauer, contrasting him with the academic philosophers who serve state interests and business self-interest.
Nietzsche analyzes the three major dangers that threatened Schopenhauer's life and thought: isolation, the despair of truth following Kantian critique, and the inner dualism between genius and holiness. He discusses the three modern images of man represented by Rousseau, Goethe, and Schopenhauer, arguing that Schopenhauer's man voluntarily takes on the pain of sincerity to break through the falsity of the temporal world.
The argument moves toward practical duties in education and culture. Nietzsche criticizes the university system for turning philosophy into an academic discipline of textual history and examination preparation, completely severed from the task of producing true human greatness. He maintains that the ultimate task of humanity is the production of individual great men—philosophers, artists, and saints—who serve as the redeemers of nature and provide the true measure of culture.
The volume concludes with a call for youth to free themselves from the false culture of business and state-controlled education. By cultivating the unhistorical and super-historical antidotes to history, individuals can organize the chaos within themselves, reject second-hand learning, and recover the courage to live authentically.
