The term "pathos of distance" appears early in Nietzsche's *Genealogy of Morals*, in response to an English explanation of the origin of morality which was grounded in utility, that is, one which is based upon the notion that what was "good" was "good for someone," and that someone must have been responsible for designating such actions as good.
For Nietzsche, this is a reactive position, an example of slave ethics, responding to a condition that precedes the judgment. Nietzsche is interested, instead, in locating the origins of "good" in something akin to the creative act; "good" is first and foremost, according to Nietzsche, an act of affirmation rather than negation. "All truly noble morality grows out of triumphant self-affirmation" (1, sec. X), he explains. Such growth establishes what Nietzsche describes as a "pathos of distance":
...the judgment good does not originate with those to whom the good has been done. Rather it was the "good" themselves, that is to say the noble, mighty, highly placed, and high-minded who decreed themselves and their actions to be good, i.e., belonging tothe highest rank, in contradistinction to all that was base, low-minded and plebeian. It was only this pathos of distance that authorized them to create values and name them--what was utility to them? (1, sec. II)
It is this "contradistinction" which provides some problems, though. It is difficult to explain why the "distance" doesn't correspond with some accuracy to the difference or negation that is the creative act within slave ethics. Because we are working, though, with a "genealogy" rather than an "ontology," the task might be somewhat easier. The task of defining what noble morality is may not be as important for us as where morality comes from. Spinoza (and any number of thinkers besides him) observes that all definition is negation, and I think Nietzsche is concerned about resisting definition in this case.
He does so by introducing the term "pathos." In *The Birth of Tragedy*, Nietzsche cites with approval the following observation from Schiller, "With me emotion is at the beginning without clear and definite ideas; those ideas do not arise until later on (v)." If we recall that the pathos of distance is the emotion, and the words themselves an appellation that we have necessarily added to it in order to define, understand, and refer to that source of noble morality, we are perhaps a little closer.
Take a look at the following passage from *The Gay Science*:
We had forgotten that some greatness, like some goodness, wants to be beheld only from a distance and by all means only from below, not from above; otherwise it makes no impression (Gay Science, I.15).
Nietzsche is speaking here of the effect that a mountain has upon the landscape which surrounds it, and how such a mountain makes the landscape "charming and significant." When we climb the mountain, though, when we seek to define/understand what we see as the source of the charm and significance, we can only be disappointed. Nietzsche describes this pathological will-to-knowledge in *The Birth of Tragedy*.
Distance, then, may indeed have a similar effect upon our understanding as the negation upon which slave ethics are founded. By linking that distance up with pathos, Nietzsche appears to be suggesting that while we (now) can only understand noble morality in terms of its opposites, there was an initial act of affirmation which established such pathos. While it is possible to understand the effect of the mountain as juxtaposed with the landscape, it is the effect of the entire scene which strikes us. It is the unity of effect that we react towards, that we try to find a source for. We react to the pathos, and then explain it.
As contemporary thinkers, under the influence of a reactive herd instinct, the pathos of distance cannot really be explained. It requires us to pierce or throw aside the Apollonian veil, past binaries, past negation, to an originary affirmation that we might only understand genealogically.
Key(less)terms in this entry, for possible links to forthcoming entries:
Nietzsche
Rhetoric
The seminar E5352: "Fred Nietzsche
and Rhetorical Theory"
Nietzsche Project at UTA
Syllabus, description of the project