The Antichrist Read Online Free Page A

he destroys it, promising to honour the past and proclaiming a future (all the while knowing that after him there will be none), promising to redeem mankind and humanity while he brings men to their deaths, as though his lying tongue does not know what acts his murderous hand is committing. Now that he has come in such a deceitful guise we have not recognized him, the Antichrist.
    But I have uncovered him. I see through him when, in the east of this failing continent he proclaims the freedom of the workers and the ennoblement of work; when in the West he promises to defend the freedom of culture and raises the false flags of humanity over the roofs of prisons; when in Central Europe (meaning between east and west) he promises a nation blessings and prosperity while laying the groundwork for the war that will destroy it; when he persuades the island race of Europe, the English, the sailors of the old continent, to maintain indifference to all that may occur on the mainland – as seafaring sailors, although sons of the mainland, can be persuaded to disregard the fate of the homes in which they were born; when he promises the sons of the European mountains, the Swiss, and the children of the coast, the Dutch, profit and fortune from the mutual destruction of others; when he pits the yellow races against the white and the blacks against both; when he offers the Italians the might of Ancient Rome and the Greeks the glory of Ancient Hellas. Yes, even when he, the Prince of Darkness, visits the Vatican and dictates concordats … I recognize him, the Antichrist.
    And although his power is far greater than mine, I fear him not – and will try to unmask him.

A FORCE HAS COME BETWEEN US AND THE GRACE OF REASON
    This has also been attempted, in order to guard against surprise; surprise is imitated, they try to anticipate it using machines. They manufacture technical surprises, so that it may seem as though there were only these and that spiritual ones were no longer possible. Surprise has been mechanized. There exists today a machinery of surprise. In the technical, there is such a tremendous potential today, that everything seems possible. All possibilities are contained in this machinery, and they need no longer become reality. And thus whatever becomes reality can never surprise – one knows that everything was already inherent in the great machines. – Max Picard,
The Human Face
    I have already said that the Antichrist did not come with pitch and sulphur as we had imagined he would arrive. His entrance was so excellently prepared that the hellish elements had long before been transformed into those that were seemingly natural, familiar and earthly. I should not be understood as agreeing with the opinion of those narrow-minded advocates of the view that industry and technical civilization are the works of hell. No! I am far removed from this viewpoint. For I believe that God himself has bestowed upon us the reason to investigate, to enquire, to uncover answers and solutions, better answers and solutions and still better answers and solutions. We were granted intelligence so that with itshelp we might relieve our hands of their heavy burden and gradually learn to hold high our heads, which were made in the image of God, so that they may project towards the heavens where, as it were, their sublime and eternal reflection is mirrored. When man was exiled from paradise and condemned to cultivate the earth in the sweat of his brow, limitlessly mild God – for He blesses even where he punishes – gave him the grace of reason to lighten his way, a memory of paradise, so to speak, a shining memory, a tiny jewel from the endless crown of divine wisdom. The good God gave man the blessing of reason to make the curse of labour milder and lighter. They are thus fools and knaves who say that inventions and discoveries are a curse, that machines are vices. But it is a vice to characterize invention, discovery, the fruits