Being free from anything--means only being clear or rid. "He is free from headache" is equal to "he is rid of it." "He is free from this prejudice" is equal to "he has never conceived it" or "he has got rid of it." In "less" we complete the freedom recommended by Christianity, in sinless, godless, moralityless, etc.
Freedom is the doctrine of Christianity. "Ye, dear brethren, are called to freedom."[107] "So speak and so do, as those who are to be judged by the law of freedom."[108]
Must we then, because freedom betrays itself as a Christian ideal, give it up? No, nothing is to be lost, freedom no more than the rest; but it is to become our own, and in the form of freedom it cannot.
What a difference between freedom and ownness! One can get _rid_ of a great many things, one yet does not get rid of all; one becomes free from much, not from everything. Inwardly one may be free in spite of the condition of slavery, although, too, it is again only from all sorts of things, not from everything; but from the whip, the domineering temper, etc., of the master, one does not as slave become _free_. "Freedom lives only in the realm of dreams!" Ownness, on the contrary, is my whole being and existence, it is I myself. I am free from what I am _rid_ of, owner of what I have in my _power_ or what I _control_. _My own_ I am at all times and under all circumstances, if I know how to have myself and do not throw myself away on others. To be free is something that I cannot truly _will_, because I cannot make it, cannot create it: I can only wish it and--aspire toward it, for it remains an ideal, a spook. The fetters of reality cut the sharpest welts in my flesh every moment. But _my own_ I remain. Given up as serf to a master, I think only of myself and my advantage; his blows strike me indeed, I am not _free_ from them; but I endure them only for _my benefit_, perhaps in order to deceive him and make him secure by the semblance of patience, or, again, not to draw worse upon myself by contumacy. But, as I keep my eye on myself and my selfishness, I take by the forelock the first good opportunity to trample the slaveholder into the dust. That I then become _free_ from him and his whip is only the consequence of my antecedent egoism. Here one perhaps says I was "free" even in the condition of slavery,--to wit, "intrinsically" or "inwardly." But "intrinsically free" is not "really free," and "inwardly" is not "outwardly." I was own, on the other hand, _my own_, altogether, inwardly and outwardly. Under the dominion of a cruel master my body is not "free" from torments and lashes; but it is _my_ bones that moan under the torture, _my_ fibres that quiver under the blows, and _I_ moan because _my_ body moans. That _I_ sigh and shiver proves that I have not yet lost _myself_, that I am still my own. My _leg_ is not "free" from the master's stick, but it is _my_ leg and is inseparable. Let him tear it off me and look and see if he still has my leg! He retains in his hand nothing but the--corpse of my leg, which is as little my leg as a dead dog is still a dog: a dog has a pulsating heart, a so-called dead dog has none and is therefore no longer a dog.