Mysticism and domination

Abstract

Abstract taken from Dissertation Abstracts International Vol 42 No 04 October 1981, p. 1753-A:

Schopenhauer also described this will-to-live as expressed in the sexual instinct, for the ultimate goal of the Will was not simply the maintenance of the individual, but the preservation and protection of the species in which he participated

In Gobineau's racial theory similar habits of thought existed. Man was described as an animal with an innate tendency for expansion which served the instinct for self-preservation. For Gobineau, however, the forms of the expression of this instinct were racially determined, appearing in lower (black) races as mere brigandage with only a rudimentary organization of conquered territory, and in the higher (white) Aryan races as the efficient utilization of resources for the more permanent result of establishing civilization

Neither original thinker set out their ideas as justifications for imperialism. On the contrary, in both of these deterministic systems man's activities, for one reason or another, ultimately were meaningless and futile. But, in a series of chapters, the way in which these ideas were varied, reinterpreted and refashioned, and gradually became a new philosophy of imperialism supporting the ideology created for territorial expansion, is examined by reviewing parts of the works of figures like Friedrich Nietzsche, Ernest Seilliere, Benjamin Kidd, Oswald Spengler and Houston Steward Chamberlain. There is also a chapter which examines how these philosophical themes appeared in the writings of nineteenth century imperialist writers

The final chapters are an examination of how Adolf Hitler's National Socialist ideology, seen as the culmination of both the philosophical and ideological movement of German imperialism, corresponded to and reflected the themes of the philosophy of imperialism