. We do not again deny that “faith produces salvation”: for that very reason we do deny that faith proves anything⁠—a strong faith, which produces happiness, causes suspicion of the object of that faith, it does not establish its “truth,” it does establish a certain probability of⁠— illusion . What is now the position in these cases? These solitaries and deniers of today; these fanatics in one thing, in their claim to intellectual cleanness; these hard, stern, continent, heroic spirits, who constitute the glory of our time; all these pale atheists, anti-Christians, immoralists, Nihilists; these sceptics, “ephectics,” and “hectics” of the intellect (in a certain sense they are the latter, both collectively and individually); these supreme idealists of knowledge, in whom alone nowadays the intellectual conscience dwells and is alive⁠—in point of fact they believe themselves as far away as possible from the ascetic ideal, do these “free, very free spirits”: and yet, if I may reveal what they themselves cannot see⁠—for they stand too near themselves: this ideal is simply