Horizon of Error: The Function of the Sublime in Nietzsche’s Dawn

This article assesses Nietzsche’s engagement with the sublime in Dawn to shed light on an aspect thereof that has so far been overlooked: Nietzsche’s deployment of the sublime as a philosophical framework for coming to terms with epistemic limits and transcendental errors. By engaging with the sublime both descriptively and methodologically, Nietzsche promotes an awareness of cognitive limits that fosters, instead of impeding, the pursuit of knowledge and the accomplishment of philosophical endeavors. While complicating the minimal existing literature on the topic, this article highlights Nietzsche’s philosophically unique use of the sublime in navigating a characteristically post-Kantian epistemic issue (the awareness of epistemic partiality and inadequacy) and in mitigating an illusory faith in reason.