EDITORIAL NOTE.
_______

THE Editor begs to call attention to some of the difficulties he had
to encounter in preparing this edition of the complete works of
Friedrich Nietzsche. Not being English himself, he had to rely upon
the help of collaborators, who were somewhat slow in coming forward.
They were also few in number; for, in addition to an exact knowledge
of the German language, there was also required sympathy and a certain
enthusiasm for the startling ideas of the original, as well as a
considerable feeling for poetry, and that highest form of it,
religious poetry.

Such a combination--a biblical mind, yet one open to new thoughts--was
not easily found. And yet it was necessary to find translators with
such a mind, and not be satisfied, as the French are and must be, with
a free though elegant version of Nietzsche. What is impossible and
unnecessary in French--a faithful and powerful rendering of the
psalmistic grandeur of Nietzsche --is possible and necessary in
English, which is a rougher tongue of the Teutonic stamp, and
moreover, like German, a tongue influenced and formed by an excellent
version of the Bible. The English would never be satisfied, as
Bible-ignorant France is, with a Nietzsche à l'Eau de Cologne--they
would require the natural, strong, real Teacher, and would prefer his
outspoken words to the finely-chiselled sentences of the raconteur. It
may indeed be safely predicted that once the English people have
recovered from the first shock of Nietzsche's thoughts, their biblical
training will enable them, more than any other nation, to appreciate
the deep piety underlying Nietzsche's Cause.