[387W-{?/49} ML: p. 430-431]
[P. 430] {FEUER} [re Ludwig Feuerbach’s book Thoughts on Death and Immortality,Wagner states that:] “The absorbing questions treated here … as if it were the first time they had ever been raised, had occupied me ever since my initial association with Lehrs in Paris, just they occupy the mind of every serious and imaginative person … . The frankness which Feuerbach finally finds the courage to adopt in the mellower parts of his book, in treating these deeply interesting questions, pleased me greatly, as much for its tragic implications as for its social radicalism. I found it elevating and consoling to be assured that the sole authentic immortality adheres only to sublime deeds and inspired works of art. (…) … Feuerbach became for me the proponent of the ruthlessly radical liberation of the individual from the bondage of conceptions associated with the belief in traditional authority, and the initiated will therefore understand why I prefaced my book The Artwork of the Future with a dedication and an introduction addressed to him. (…) [P. 431] The fact that he proclaimed what we call “spirit” to lie in our aesthetic perceptions of the tangible world, together with his verdict as to the futility of philosophy, was what afforded me such useful support in my conception of a work of art which would be all-embracing while remaining comprehensible to the simplest, purely human power of discernment, that is, of the drama made perfect at the moment of its realization of every artistic intention in ‘the art-work of the future’ … . Admittedly, after only a short time it became impossible for me to return to his works, and I recall that one of his books appearing shortly thereafter entitled On the Essence of Religionscared me off by the monotony of its title alone to such an extent that, when Herwegh opened its pages in front of me, I closed the book with a bang before his very eyes.” [387W-{?/49} ML: p. 430-431]
[388W-{1-2/49} Jesus of Nazareth: PW Vol. VIII. p. 299]
[P. 299] {FEUER} “ ‘Ye shall not swear’; in Oaths lay the binding law of a world that knew not Love as yet. Let every man be free to act at every moment according to Love and his ability: bound by an oath, I am unfree: if in its fulfilment I do good, that good is robbed of merit (as every bounden virtue) and loses the worth of conviction; but if the oath leads me to evil, then I sin against conviction.” [388W-{1-2/49} Jesus of Nazareth: PW Vol. VIII. p. 299]
[389W-{1-2/49} Jesus of Nazareth: PW Vol. VIII. p. 301]
[P. 301] {FEUER) “Every creature loves, and Love is the law of life for all creation; so if Man made a law to shackle love, to reach a goal that lies outside of human nature (-- namely, power, dominion – above all, the protection of property:), he sinned against the law of his own existence and therewith slew himself … .” [389W-{1-2/49} Jesus of Nazareth: PW Vol. VIII. p. 301]
[390W-{1-2/49} Jesus of Nazareth: PW Vol. VIII. p. 302]
[P. 302] {FEUER} The Individual’s natural rights were … extended over those close-knit to him by love: thus ripened the idea of Marriage, its sacredness, its right; and this later became embodied in
